1. Active Slogan Full Length Leggings @ Miss Guided €22.40

2. Evie Do It Sports Vest @ Boohoo £8

3. Nike Leg-A-See Windblur Leggings @ JD Sports €25

4. Adidas Tech Fit Bra @ Littlewoods Ireland €19.50

5. Cadence Run Jacket @ Sweaty Betty €165

1. Ballet Barre – Platinum Pilates

This is definitely one of the hardest classes you’ll take! It’s a blend between ballet, pilates and cardio to make you tone and sweat. You don’t have to have mastered the plié before to take this class so you can leave the tutu at home and bring your determination instead. For a great all over body work out that will engage muscles you didn’t know you had, check it out.

2. Body Toning – Yoga Dublin

If you want to tone your body whilst having fun then this class with instructor Claudia is for you. Her fast paced regime will get your sweat on but with her fun flair and great work-out tunes you won’t notice the hour go by!

3. Bikini Bootcamp @ The Gym Howth

This is a mix between TRX, kettle bells and body weight exercises. It’ll get your heart rate up but work your all over body muscles at the same time.

4. Pump & Sculpt – Flye Fit

With a mix of bodyweight, bar bells and dumbbells this class will work every muscle. Classes go from 30-50 minutes depending on how much you’re able for!

1. 10 minute walk

Getting out and away from the situation that’s stressing you is important. Walking helps release endorphins which are anti-stressors, and also allows for reflection and time to clear your mind. Walking in a park or green area is meant to help with inducing a state of meditation also.

2. A little sugar rush

No sadly this doesn’t give you an excuse to devour a whole tub of Ben & Jerrys, but eating or drinking something sweet has been proven to reduce stress triggers in the brain. So have yourself one square of chocolate and take a deep breath.

3. Time to visualise

Bring your mind back to a calm state by visualising a happy place. Step away from the stressful situation and go to a quiet room and picture yourself in a happy moment you’ve had, or could have, like on the beach sipping a cocktail, or with Tom Hardy on a date.

4. Give us a kiss

Kissing is another endorphin-releasing activity, so next time you’re feeling a little wound up, grab your partner and plant one on them. This may or may not be possible if you’re at work right now. Ahem.

5. Take a deep breath

Why do you think yoga instructors always seem so stress-free? Because they are constantly practicing the art of breathing. Giving yourself an extra boost of oxygen will reduce tension in your body. You’re basically cheating your body in thinking that you’re relaxed already and thus is turn, your body starts to relax itself.

Meditation

Numerous corporate figures are emerging as regular meditators: Twitter founder Evan Williams and Linked in CEO Jeff Weiner are both meditation devotees.

The Huffington post’s Arianna Huffington, founder and author of ‘Thrive’, dedicates the first half hour of everyday to meditation and has installed meditation spaces in her offices around the globe.

Google also has its own in house meditation programme. KPMG, Goldman Sachs, Unilever, and even Bank of England have all started using meditation seminars.

Meditation is about letting go, dropping firmly held judgments, fixed believes, habitual repetitive mind patterns and reactive defensive behaviours. It allows us to slow down and even stop escaping the activity of the mind and reaching a state of thoughtlessness awareness; a profound deep peace.

The mind is calm but a feeling of aliveness is there in this state of clarity we align with our true purpose. Creativity can flow in allowing us to create a more fulfilled reality. It makes sense really, as this state is a stress free zone, stress being at epidemic proportions in modern day life and the source of most unhappiness and illness. If we can give more time to de-stressing we can bring more ease into our lives and the lives of those around us.

Yoga

Recent studies show that over 20 million Americans are practicing yoga. 4 in 10 of those polled have been practicing a year or less, which underlines its fast growing popularity. Yoga meaning ‘union in Sanskrit’ (ancient Indian language); a synergy of body and mind.

Physically, yoga creates strength, flexibility, balance, and releases tension in the body. Mentally the focus on the breath forces one into the present moment, zoning in your awareness to the inner body. The job, family, worries, fears and one million things to do just dissolve. For an entire 75 minutes you escape the mental chaos and you are present. Class by class you begin to retain some mental space, gradually the chaos subsides and there is more space (for the good stuff to come in!)

The list of celebrity yogi’s is extensive: Jennifer Aniston, Gisele Bundchen, Kate Hudson, Miranda Kerr, Madonna, Lady Gaga,  George Clooney, Mathew Mc Conaughey, Adam Lavin, Russell Brand, Robert Downey junior. I could literally go on and on. I now refuse to believe that lotions potions or injections are the secret to celebrity radiance, I’m convinced its the wonder of yoga at hand.

Yoga teachers are they most enlightened creatures I have ever encountered. They seem to emanate a beauty from the inside out and can slip you into a state of surrender with a soft spoken word. Yoga is for everybody, every age, every walk of life, each class begins with a welcome and ends in gratitude to each other for the shared experience. This week I attended a Yin Yoga class (a type of yoga that focuses on self healing and inner power). It was so lovely that when I left I felt emotional, and I’m not usually the emotional type!

The Hole In Everyone

Scientist Sperry Andrews and his team, discovered irrefutable evidence that the hole of humanity is linked psychologically and physiologically by our innate capacity for being collective-consious. Andrews joined forces with some of the worlds greatest advocates on the issue of spirituality like Deepak Chopra MD (internal medicine and endocrinology), author of 22 New York Times best sellers; Echart Tolle (spiritual teacher, psychologist), and the Dali Lama. The purpose was to bring the message to the masses.

“Humanity will find peace when we realise there is only one of us”, Nobel Prize winner Freeman Dyson.

Headspace

A meditation app that is bringing mindfulness to the masses, what began as a simpe concept to help people cope better with the strains of life, is now a global phenomenon worth about £25 million and has an army of celebrity followers. “Neither I nor rich (Richard Pierson) intended to become millionaires. For us it was a social mission to help create a healthier, happier world “, Andy Puddicombe, co founder.

I can recognise that sorrow often dwells in the past, past that doesn’t exist anymore but is kept in the present by thought. I can except that fear dwells in the future; the anticipation of what might happen, but hasn’t happened yet, brings anxiety into our now. If we only ever truly have the present moment, then we are capable of being the witness to such thinking, and there by bringing more quality and joy into our lives, relationships, actions and thoughts. To dis-identify with our conditioned minds may be the next stage in evolution, to witness the being, the intelligence, divinity (it makes no difference what we label it), it could be a vehicle that could get us out of the catastrophic pain existing globally and personally.

I have read Echart Tolle’s books ‘The Power of Now’ and ‘A New Earth’, the depth of which I cant even attempt to describe. But I would seriously encourage anyone who can acknowledge the points in this article to read them.

I regularly meditate and have been using the online 21day (free) meditation by Deepak Chopra and Oprah Winfrey. You just have to register and they do a new course roughly every three months and are totally enlightening so please look into it further.

I can only speak of my own experience, but since my discovery of accessing inner peace, I feel free of judgment, free of resistance. I feel my creativity is boundless, I feel surrounded by love and opportunity. I feel calm and collected, no drama, no struggle, so you can see why I highly recommend it.

Namaste!

Nadine

Nadine is our resident Fashion, Beauty & Lifestyle contributor on MintMag.ie. Currently Senior Educator at the Peter Mark hair group, she was recruited by the company in December 2012 due to a reputation of excellence and has an abundance of awards under her belt. She also has her finger firmly on the pulse of all thing fashion – her creative nature and eye for quality and detail has ensured her an impenetrable reputation amongst the cream of Irish beauty, photography, fashion and media experts. If you would like to contribute to MintMag.ie just email louise@mintmag.ie!

Our busy lives mean that it’s important to feel fit, well and full of energy. Of course the first step is making sure that you and your family lead a healthy lifestyle, with plenty of exercise and a varied balanced diet. But sometimes we need a bit of extra support, and the team at Boots can help combat what life throws you with advice and consultation with trained healthcare advisors to ensure you are choosing the right vitamin to help you feel your very best!

According to Susan O’Dwyer, Pharmacist, Boots Ireland, “We all need a little help sometimes whether it’s an energy boost or support to help keep our hearts healthy. Boots Ireland is proud to showcase a range of award winning vitamins, as voted by members of the Irish public. The awards received a phenomenal response with over 2000 votes cast, resulting in the top 15 most loved supplements being chosen from a total of 87 products. Why not pop into your local Boots pharmacy and speak to a member of our pharmacy team who can recommend the vitamin product that’s best for your needs.”

The full list of winners is as follows;

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World’s No 1. Multivitamin

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Helps maintain healthy skin, hair and nails

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Contains a natural source of Omega 3