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Natural Awakenings Northwest Florida

Living Lighter

Sep 30, 2021 05:23PM ● By Scott Chase

We hope you were able to make our fifth annual Emerald Coast Holistic Health Expo, which showcased dozens of Northwest Florida’s finest natural-health practitioners and products. If not, no worries. You can find all the exhibitors—from functional medicine and holistic health practitioners to providers of stem cell therapy and EMF protection—in our Holistic Health Expo Directory on the event website, ecchExpo.com. If you did attend, we hope you had a fabulous time, learned something new, and connected with these great providers. Thank you for coming!


We would also like to thank the exhibitors who made the expo possible. More than 950 visitors registered for the two-day event, coming from as far away as Biloxi, Atlanta and Fort Lauderdale. All the comments we heard from visitors were positive and enthusiastic about what they’d discovered at the expo, and several people asked if we could bring it to their town. We’re considering hosting one in Pensacola. From there, who knows? 


So we’re looking ahead but also trying to enjoy every bit of the present. (Considering how quickly September came and went, we’ll be wishing everyone Merry Christmas and Happy New Year soon.) There’s lots happening now in Northwest Florida as we approach the perfect temperatures of fall. On October 10, for example, there’s the Viva Ciclovia Street Fiesta, a family-friendly outdoor block party celebrating National Hispanic Heritage Month. It will take place from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. in downtown Fort Walton Beach, on Ferry Road and First Street. (For details, see page ??.) Then there’s the Pirates of the High Seas Fest, in Panama City Beach (October 4-10); the Baytowne Wharf Beer Fest, in SanDestin (October 8-9); and The Great Gulfcoast Arts Festival (November 5-7) and the Yoga VegFest (November 12-14), both in Pensacola. We encourage you to take advantage of every opportunity to safely gather as friends and neighbors. If there’s anything we’ve all learned over the past 18 months, it’s that community is critical to our emotional health.


We’ve also learned the value of simplicity in an unpredictable world. So this issue of Natural Awakenings focuses on ways to simplify life, with the goal of promoting tranquility in our homes and hearts and making Earth a better place for everyone. Our feature article, “Less Stuff, More Joy” (page 26), shares stories of people who made the choice to lose many of their possessions and, in so doing, found their happier, more authentic selves. (We’ve all got plenty of stuff to lose. Did you know the average American household contains 300,000 items?) And don’t miss the “Living Lighter Checklist” at the end of the article. Nothing like a good checklist for a simple sense of accomplishment. 


Our other favorite articles about simple living: the new Buy Nothing trend, page 18; pro tips for walking (a can’t-lose exercise), page 20; ancient wisdom for raising happy, healthy kids, page 32; and cultivating our natural intuition (trust your gut!), page 39.


Wishing you an October full of simple pleasures, 

Scott and Daralyn


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