Monthly Archives: October 2014

7 Easy Ways to Drink More Water

Amidst the hustle and bustle of daily life, it’s easy to forget about staying hydrated. After all, drinking water isn’t exactly the most fun thing to do. Research suggests that the easiest way to learn new habits is by incorporating them into your existing routines. This is what we’ve done with these 7 easy ways to make sure you’re staying hydrated!

1. If you eat, drink

An easy way to start drinking water more often is to have a glass before every meal. It’s a simple transition, because most likely you drink something while you’re eating. Drinking water also helps you eat less, so your waistline will thank you. This trick applies to drinking as well – try having a glass of water for every cocktail or beer you order. It’ll help with your hangovers!

2. Take it with you

You can’t drink water if you don’t have access. Carrying your own water bottle is a great way to avoid costly, wasteful bottled water. It’s also important to avoid plastic, which can leach harmful BPAs. Our Evolution Healthworks Glass DrinkSafes are perfect on-the-go bottles because they have a neoprene sleeve with handles.

3. Eat your veggies!

You don’t always have to drink in order to stay hydrated. Many vegetables and fruits are packed with water, so you can stay hydrated without chugging all day!

4. Set an alarm

If you’re anything like us, you and your smartphone are inseparable. Let’s face it: phones are becoming our appendages, so we might as well use them to our benefit. It’s simple – go to your Calendar app and set alerts for several times tomorrow (i.e. 9am, 12pm, 3pm, 6pm, 9pm) with any label – maybe a Wave emoji? Then, click on the Repeat option and set it to Every Day. Now, as you’re Buzzfeeding your day away, you’ll be reminded to stay hydrated!

5. Make a game out of it

Like playing games? Of course you do. Like competition? Of course you do. Studies have shown that adding a social or competitive aspect to your goals leads to much higher levels of achievement. Think Weight Watchers meetings. Or people posting their workout numbers on social media every day. Adding this layer of social pressure leads to much better results.

Now you don’t have to throw it in everyone’s faces, but you can start a mini-competition between yourself and a few friends. Just set some stakes (first round of drinks?) and keep track. Whoever hits 8 glasses a day for the longest wins!

6. Get your money’s worth

Here at Evolution Healthworks, we’ve had numerous customers tell us that they started drinking much more water after they purchased one of our home water filtration systems. We all like to get our money’s worth. If you buy a gym membership, you’re going to use it. The same goes for drinking water systems – the only difference is its much easier to drink more water than it is to go to the gym. Even better, you’ll see results much faster.

7. Reward yourself

At the end of the day, it’s important to remember that we’re all humans. The reason you’re dehydrated in the first place is because life is hectic and it’s easy to forget to drink water. So when you succeed, make sure to reward yourself. We’ll let you decide how to do this, but whatever it is – make it worth your while to stay hydrated!

4 Great Alkaline Water and Essential Oil Recipes

Last week, we took a look at 5 Essential Oils To Improve Your Memory and Focus from our friend and holistic expert Sheree Trask.

If you read that post, you know how beneficial essential oils can be to our bodies and mind.

However, did you know that when you combine essential oils and alkaline water there is an increased benefit? Your getting all the benefits of essential oils, and multiplying them with the BENEFITS OF ALKALINE WATER!

Check out these 4 ways to combine essential oils and alkaline water:

1. All-Natural Shampoo

The FDA has NOT evaluated 90% of the beauty products on the market today. These products are packed with petrochemicals, synthetic fragrances and chemical preservatives.

Ingredients

2 tablespoons all-natural liquid soap
1 cup acidic Evolution Water
1⁄4 cup fresh herbs of choice
1 teaspoon apricot kernel oil
2 drops essential oil

Directions

Pour acidic water over herbs and let steep in a glass jar overnight. Strain liquid from the herbs. Add soap and apricot oil, mix thoroughly. Add essential oil and mix again. Pour out of recycled shampoo bottle

2. All-Natural Flea & Tick Treatment

The EPA’s research on pesticide products for flea and tick control found chemicals in the medications producing side effects such as skin irritation, skin burns, seizures and even 1600 deaths in the past five years.

Ingredients

2 teaspoons rose, geranium or palmarosa
essential oils
2 cups acidic Evolution Water

Directions

Combine ingredients in spray bottle and shake to blend. Spray pet and area where he or she sleeps.

3. Fabric Refresher

Most refresher sprays contain synthetic fragrances that can cause symptoms from headaches to more serious illness when inhaled.

Directions

Fill a spray bottle with alkaline Evolution Water and 3-5 drops of your favorite scented essential oil. Use to freshen laundry, drapes and fabric furniture.

4. Simple, Green Laundry Detergent

Traditional detergent contains a variety of toxic chemicals including chlorine bleach, phenols and ammonia. These get absorbed by your clothes and also drain into lakes, rivers and oceans.

Ingredients

1 cup soap nuts (find on Amazon or at a health
store)
4 cups Alkaline Evolution Water
2-5 drops of your favorite essential oil

Directions

Crush soap nuts and soak them in Evolution Water overnight. Blend mixture and let sit a few hours, stirring occasionally. Strain the liquid and add essential oil.

Shampoo, Narcotics and Birth Control: Things You Didn’t Know You Were Drinking

When was the last time you drank shampoo? How about painkillers or birth control? Statistically, you consumed all of the above recently, whether you wanted to or not.

Researchers have found antiseptics, pharmaceuticals, detergents and a number of other products everywhere they’ve looked for them in our water supplies.

According to a study published by the EPA, the nation’s water sources tested positive for dangerous pharmaceuticals such as oxycodone, high-blood pressure medications and antidepressants.

Water treatment plants are not required to test for or monitor levels of these so-called “emerging contaminants” in our drinking water. Some of the products – such as shampoo and dish detergent – have been in our water supplies for decades, but skyrocketing rates of prescription drug use and abuse in the U.S. are leading to other contaminants that didn’t used to pollute our water.

In fact, a recent Mayo Clinic study determined that nearly 70% of Americans take prescription drugs. Many people flush their old and unused pharmaceuticals. The only proper way to dispose of old prescription or over-the-counter meds is to take them to a pharmacist. This doesn’t prevent all pharmaceuticals from getting into our water, though. We also urinate and otherwise excrete trace amounts of drugs and antibiotics into drains and toilets.

While emerging contaminants are not currently regulated, but this does not mean they don’t pose a risk. It’s unclear how emerging contaminants in drinking water affect our health, but it’s an area of growing concern among health officials.

One medication of which we know some effects is birth control. This is because hormones work at very low concentrations in the human body, suggesting that birth control can affect our bodies even though it shows up in low concentrations in our water. This possibility was highlighted recently when fish in the Potomac River were found to have both male and female sex glands after exposure to estrogen.

Humans have been lucky to not experience such extreme consequences, but the fact that fish are absorbing pharmaceuticals from human wastewater and suffering mutations suggests problems down the line. It may also come full circle, as we are likely to consume the same contaminants with our seafood.

While healthy adults have sophisticated detoxification processes that may protect them from emerging contaminants for the time being, pregnant women and children are much more susceptible.

Home drinking water filters are a good way to cut down the amount of emerging contaminants in your tap water, according to Timothy Bartrand, PhD, a postdoctoral fellow at Drexel University, Philadelphia, who worked with the National Science Foundation (NSF) on drinking water research.

We encourage you to ask your water authority what it is doing to keep you safe from emerging contaminants. The number for the San Diego County Water Authority is (858) 522-6600.

Also, consider using an Evolution Drinking Water System in your home to not only cut down on emerging contaminants, but also add vital trace minerals to your family’s drinking, cooking and coffee/tea brewing water.

The Next Water Revolution

Drinking water has evolved in three major shifts – or revolutions – over the past 2,000 years. Each of these revolutions either made water vastly more available or potable for a large number of people.

In his book, Water 4.0: The Past, Present, and Future of the World’s Most Vital Resource, David Sedlak discusses the three water revolutions of the past 2,000 years as well as the next one – Water 4.0 – that needs to happen for the sake of societal health and safety.

The author explains that today, “continued population growth and climate change stretch the ability of urban water systems to meet our needs.” The process of devising and financing a solution will be anything but east, but Sedlak is confident there is a way.

In today’s post, we’ll discuss Sedlak’s 3 water revolutions as well as the one we need to start planning for today.

Water 1.0

The Romans are known for a number of astonishing accomplishments, but one we don’t often hear about (maybe because it’s not sexy enough for a Hollywood blockbuster) is how the behemoth ancient civilization managed to provide anywhere from 500,000 to 1 million people with drinking water.

Ingenious Roman engineers devised a system of gravity-harnessing aqueducts to bring water into the city from surrounding rural areas. Not only did they build this solution to solve the issue of water shortage, but the Romans also built a sophisticated sewer system to handle runoff. This revolution paved the way for the expansion of civilization over the next 1,900 years.

Water 2.0

The boom of the Industrial Revolution at the end of the 19th century saw the emergence of water wheels and steam engines. This led to toilets and the vast amount of waste created as a result. Rather than disposing of waste in the fields, urban toilets sent human waste down the sewers, from where it entered bodies of water and traveled downstream to some less fortunate communities.

The corresponding rise in typhoid fever and cholera necessitated the need for another water revolution. This time, the engineers behind water’s advancement were from MIT. They formulated a system of filtering with sand, which surprisingly eliminated most disease from drinking water. Similar improvements used chlorine to further disinfect the water. Water 2.0 was born, effectively increasing the average American lifespan by 15 years.

Water 3.0

While the second water revolution allowed for drinking water to be treated, there still was not a widely available technology for treating wastewater. Thus, industrial centers and large municipalities simply disposed of sewage in rivers and lakes. Waterfront cities such as New York, Cleveland and Chicago reeked and fish died at an alarming rate.

In an ultimately successful effort to curb the expansion of water pollution across the country, the federal government passed the Clean Water Act in 1972. This landmark legislation allocated federal funds toward the construction of sewage treatment plants. Water 3.0 saved the health of The Great Lakes and numerous other bodies of water across the country.

Water 4.0?

Sedlak explains that we are now in need of a 4th water revolution, one that is likely going to be more complicated – and more expensive – than its precedents.

Many of the water utilities constructed 40-50 years ago are aged significantly. As with many societal problems, the roadblock in front of water reconstruction is cost. The growth of population has led to a consequential strain on water systems built for far fewer people.

In the Northeast, many cities have experienced raw sewage overflows when snow or rain fills treatment plants to their limits. The Southwest is experiencing a problem on the other side of the spectrum; areas such as Arizona and California are suffering from drought and water shortages.

The problem for both regions is that climate change models suggest that the areas experiencing overflow will only get wetter and the drought-stricken regions will only get drier.

Three areas in which Water 4.0 has already begun to take form are desalination, water recycling and decentralization.

Desalination – the process of treating seawater to make it potable – will be a significant, but not nearly a majority of San Diego’s water (7%) starting next year. Water recycling, in which wastewater is either treated to drinking water standards or at least to a level that it can be used for watering crops, is also popular in Southern California. Decentralization likely will be a prevalent technology across the country, especially given the amount of Americans living in suburbs. This practice would involve the construction of smaller water treatment facilities outside of the large ones in city centers.

Sedlak says that Water 4.0 will happen one way or another, the only question is whether we will be proactive in preparing our water systems. The sad truth is that more often, civilizations wait for catastrophe to allocate the necessary funds for water system improvements.

5 Essential Oils To Improve Your Memory and Focus

Our good friend, and holistic health coach Sheree Trask from Lemons & Laughter took an in depth look at essential oils and why they are beneficial for our health. Enjoy!

By now, you’ve probably heard a thing or two about essential oils. First used by the Egyptians and Babylonians, today essential oils can be found in everything from lotion to hand soap to shampoo. So what is it about these potent potions that has made them a holistic staple for thousands of years?

Well, essential oils have some incredible medicinal properties when inhaled or applied topically to the skin—typically the wrists, palms, or scalp.

Though this alternative medicine practice might seem like a practice for the crystal-wearing crowd, aromatherapy actually began in Europe and has been embraced by Western medicine. Aromatherapy is used cure a variety of maladies while boosting other bodily processes. In particular, essential oils can profoundly improve memory, helping to boost both your focus and your recall time.

Here are some of the most effective memory-enhancing aromatherapy scents:

1. Rosemary:

This sharp and camphorous scent has been shown to enhance proscriptive memory, which is the ability to remember things happening in the future. If you’ve been having trouble recalling your schedule—when to pick up the mail, when to schedule your next chiropractor appointment—then this is the ideal essential oil for you. Try rubbing it on your palms in the morning as you review your schedule or add a few drops to a relaxing bath at night while you rejuvenate for the next day.

2. Basil:

The sweet and refreshing scent of basil can help ameliorate both poor memory and fatigue-induced distraction. Before heading into a late night study session or prepping for tomorrow’s big presentation, inhale basil essential oil deeply. Place a reed diffuser containing 20-25 drops of basil essential oil near your study space for increased effectiveness.

3. Cyprus:

If you’re looking for a subtler fragrance, try cyprus essential oil. This evergreen scent can help to increase concentration without suffusing your entire house with the scent of licorice, à la basil essential oil and some of the other more pungent oils.

4. Peppermint:

In need of a natural morning pick-me-up that doesn’t involve caffeine or a rooster? Try peppermint essential oil. This spicy and fragrant scent helps to wake up the mind, focus your senses, and improve your memory. Plus, it’s a natural cure for headaches. If you’re working to wean yourself off of the morning caffeine routine, this is the essential oil for you.

5. Sage:

This natural essential oil acts as a stimulant to boost your senses in the morning, without any of the crash you experience with caffeine or sugar. Pair with lemon oil or black pepper oil for complementary scents that will enhance your memory and kick-start your morning routine.

Source: Lemons & Laughter

San Diego’s Water Treatment Process

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We have spent plenty of time outlining why San Diego’s Tap Water Is So Bad, but what is the process that the city uses to attempt to clean it?

Overall, the city does the best it can to disinfect the water we import from the Colorado River and Northern California, but it doesn’t remove everything harmful; San Diego has a relatively high total dissolved solids (TDS) count in its water.

Water treatment isn’t all about removing substances though – the city also adds chlorine, ammonia, sodium hydroxide and fluoride before sending it to your home.

The Disinfection Process

#1. Primary Disinfection with Ozone or Chlorine Dioxide to inactivate viruses, bacteria and other pathogenic organisms. While this process is pretty effective in killing off nasty stuff, there are still chlorine-resistant parasites such as cryptosporidium and giardia in our water.

#2. A chemical mixture is added to remove dissolved solids.

#3. Chlorine is added again for further disinfection.

#4. Water is filtered over a coal and sand composite to remove small particles.

#5. Ammonia is added (creating dangerous chloramines) to prevent microbial growth, and sodium hydroxide is added to correct the pH of the water.

#6. As mandated by California state law, Fluoride is added to the water to ‘promote strong teeth’. And as we outlined, HERE, this is an issue.

Next, the water is sent to your tap.

The California Department of Public Health (CDPH) has a list of some contaminants it requires the City of San Diego to monitor. There are still hundreds of thousands of harmful contaminants that do not require monitoring.

The 2013 Annual Drinking Water Quality Report states that during 2013, contaminants requiring monitoring were detected at or above Detection Limits for Purposes of Reporting. They issued this warning:

“Some people may be more vulnerable to contaminants in drinking water than the general population. Immuno-compromised persons such as persons with cancer undergoing chemotherapy, persons who have undergone organ transplants, people with HIV/AIDS or other immune system disorders, some elderly, and infants can be particularly at risk from infections. These people should seek advice about drinking water from their health care providers.”

Want to ensure you have the cleanest, safest water in your home? Check out our water filter products HERE.

Why is San Diego’s Tap Water So Bad?

If you didn’t already know (and if you live here, you know) San Diego has some very subpar tap water. In fact, it has some of the worst tap water in the country, according to a study by the Environmental Working Group (EWG). It’s a shame that such a beautiful city nestled up to a pristine blue ocean has tainted drinking water.

It’s easy to complain about the water here, but it’s also important to understand why the water quality is so poor and the effects it can have on our health and well-being.

This information is pertinent for many people outside of San Diego, too. There have been a number of incidents in the past year compromising drinking water supplies across the country.

Why San Diego?

With the ocean down the street, it’s easy to forget that San Diego is actually in a desert. If you know one thing about deserts, it’s that there is very little water. We’re still some time away from desalination plants (like the one in construction in Carlsbad) being a significant source of drinking water. Thus, we get our water from thousands of miles away.

Our two main sources are the Colorado River and the California State Water Project in Northern California. There are a number of issues with each of these sources.

The Colorado River provides the majority (60%) of San Diego’s water. It runs through canyons and rocks which deposit volatile organic chemicals.

20% of San Diego’s water comes from the California Water Project in Northern California, the hotbed of agriculture for the whole country. The problem with this is the vast amount of fertilizers used on these farms. Fertilizers contain nitrates and nitrites, which make their way into the water table and into our tap water.

These problems aren’t unique to San Diego, though. A five-year study by the EPA found more than 300 contaminants in tap water across California. And worse, California water authorities were cited for 5,514 federal and state violations over that five-year period.

What are the effects of contaminated tap water?

Everything. Pollutants in your tap water are just as bad as they sound.

Below are some of the worst offenders present in San Diego’s water along with their health effects.

Arsenic – Skin damage, circulatory problems, increased risk of cancer
Asbestos (from the cement in water mains) – Increased risk of cancer and intestinal polyps
Lead – Impaired mental and physical development in children, attention and learning deficits, high blood pressure
Nitrates/Nitrites – Oxygen distribution problems, Blue Baby Syndrome

What can we do?

It’s easy to be alarmed at the quality of our tap water, but it’s important to take steps toward making it safer. The government is too strapped for cash and too slow-moving to take the initiative, so it’s up to us to manage our own water.

1. Contact your county health department for a report on your local water quality and to learn about any recent violations.

2. Read our guide to Comparing Water Filters to understand the different options you have for getting clean, healthy water in your home.

3. Call 619-356-3766 to speak with a water expert about how you can get the Certified Healthiest Water in your home today.