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Massages are often sold as a purely indulgent treat that you get when you visit a spa or go on vacation, but there’s so much more to massage than just a feel good treat. Did you know that the symptoms of many health problems can be reduced and even eliminated with regular massage?

Here are a few conditions that massage can work really well on; a few you probably know and some that may surprise you!

Stress
It’s no surprise that a regular dose of massage therapy is good for your stress levels, it works by helping to lower your blood pressure, improve your quality of sleep, and by reducing your stress levels, it’s also thought to help reduce the risk of heart disease. In 2008 the journal Psycho-oncology published a study which came to the conclusion, “A significant reduction in cortisol (the main stress hormone) could be safely achieved through massage, with associated improvement in psychological well-being.”

Lower Back Pain
This is such a common problem, often caused by bad posture at work, so no wonder many employers are drafting in massage therapists to help. Poor posture and sitting for too long can cause a lot of lower back problems, as can simply getting older. Get your massage therapist on the case and you can hopefully wave goodbye to a sore back.

Sports Injuries
Fitness and sport are great for your health but they can sometimes lead to injuries and overworked muscles. A regular massage can help to heal any wear and tear on your muscles and tendons, and can also help you manage the pain from a chronic or acute sports injury. Having well looked-after muscles may also help prevent future injuries – one more reason to book those regular sessions.

Joint Stiffness
Massage can be a blessed relief for people dealing with the pain and stiffness associated with arthritis and other joint problems. Research published in 2013 in the Complimentary Therapy in Clinical Practice journal said that people with rheumatoid arthritis reported some relief from pain and stiffness after four once-a-week moderate-pressure massages, topped up with self-massage at home in between treatments. Massage can also help with your range of motion and flexibility, which can relieve pain in your shoulders, knees, and hips.

Circulation
There are a whole range of health problems that can be caused by bad circulation, so it figures that boosting your circulation will be a bonus for your whole body. Regular massage helps to get the blood moving, getting essential nutrients to where they are needed in your tissues and vital organs much faster. The squeezing and pulling actions involved in a good massage also help to flush lactic acid out of your muscles and improve the circulation of lymph - the fluid that carries metabolic waste away from your muscles and internal organs.

Migraine symptoms
Nobody really knows what causes migraines, and there isn’t a cure, but if you’re a migraine sufferer you’ll be pleased to hear that studies have shown that massage can help reduce the frequency of attacks, and lessen the severity of the symptoms. Some migraines, especially those triggered by stress, are especially receptive to massage treatment.

Skin Cancer
Of course, we wouldn’t tell you that massage cures cancer; it can’t. But in some cases your massage therapist can notice abnormalities in your skin that you can’t see or just haven’t picked up on, and alert you to them. Regular massage can also be good for your skin as it gets the circulation going and the nourishing oils used in a treatment help to keep skin feeling soft.

Allergies
A massage helps to stimulate lymph flow around your body, which boosts your immune system and can help to reduce the severity of allergic reactions. Sometimes a therapist might be able to tell just from your lymph nodes if you are an allergy sufferer as they can feel tender or swollen.

Did any of those surprise you? Of course, you don’t need to make an excuse for wanting a massage, but if you are dealing with any of these health issues, it’s good to know that your regular massage habit is helping.

She has shown you some amazing things in your time. Mothering Sunday is coming up soon - it's Sunday 11 March. If your mum is still around, make a fuss of her!

If things go as nature intends, you will outlive her and then you will look back and wonder if you ever did enough to show her your gratitude and appreciation for everything she's done for you and your family.

I thought that the tradition of Mothering Sunday started in England when girls who worked away from home would get time off to go home to visit their mothers, and usually took a bunch of flowers. I looked online for further history and found this.. 

'Mother’s Day is a day to celebrate mothers and all mother figures such as grandmothers, stepmothers and mothers-in-law and everything that they do. A special effort is made on this day when children or daughters and sons-in-law buy cards, flowers or gifts for their mothers.

The origins of Mother’s Day date back to the ancient Greek times, but the way in which we celebrate it today began in America in 1908. The ancient Greeks dedicated an annual spring festival to maternal goddesses, and ancient Romans also celebrated a spring festival called Hilaria which was for a mother goddess called Cybele.

More recent origins of Mothering Sunday date back to the 1600s in England when it was held on the fourth Sunday of Lent. Some stories say that people would return to their mother church, the church that they were baptized in or attended services in when they were children. and this would bring together communities who hadn’t seen each other for a while. Other stories say that this date was to honour mothers. A prayer service was also held in church for the Virgin Mary and children would bring gifts and flowers to pay tribute to their mothers.

This day had almost died out completely by the 19th century.

After this, in America the idea of an official celebration for all mothers came in 1872 from Julia Ward Howe, an activist, writer and poet. She suggested that June 2 should be annually celebrated as Mother’s Day and should be a day dedicated to peace. Julia also delivered a passionate appeal to women in 1870 in Boston and urged them to rise against war, and she initiated a Mothers’ Peace Day service on the second Sunday in June and annually held the meeting for a couple of years. The writer worked hard to have Mother’s Day declared as an official holiday, but it was later replaced by the holiday now celebrated in May in America. 

Anna Jarvis is recognised as the woman who invented Mother’s Day in America after she held a memorial for her mother in West Virginia in 1908. Her mother had previously expressed how much she wanted to have a mother’s day and Anna wanted to fulfil this for her. Anna held the ceremony for her mother and sent carnations to the church service for this as they were her mother’s favourite flower. After this, she and her supporters sent letters to those high up in positions of power and asked for an official holiday to honour mothers. 

Eventually in 1911, Mother’s Day was celebrated in almost every state and on 8 May 1914, President Woodrow Wilson signed a joint resolution document that confirmed every second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day. Today in the UK, Mothering Sunday and Mother’s Day have merged and it is celebrated on the second Sunday of Lent which usually falls in either March or early April.'

So there you go. That's everything I know about Mothering Sunday. Do you call it Mothering Sunday or Mother's Day - and if you call it Mother's Day where do you think the apostrophe should go - is it for mothers in general, or one mother's day?! I think it would be Mothers' Day. 

Sali sent these QUICK FIRE QUESTIONS to Neil at Neil Gayler & Co - here they are complete with Neil's answers!

1. Where do you come from and how long have you lived in Cheltenham?
I was born in Hillingdon in Middlesex and moved to Cheltenham when I was 4.

2. You help people plan for the future - how?
By talking to them at length about the dreams and aspirations they have for themselves and their family, appraising their current financial position and then producing a bespoke Financial Plan that maps out how they are going to get from where they are to where they want to be.

3. I hear you are also spiritual. Can you tell us briefly about that journey?
This started about four years ago when I enrolled on a course at The Isbourne College called ‘An introduction to Holistic Living.’ I am now a Reiki Master, Massage Therapist and Crystal Healer and am knowledgeable and experienced in a number of other healing modalities.

4. Favourite restaurant in Cheltenham?
 There are so many. Koj Cheltenham​, KIBOUsushi​, Purslane Restaurant​, The Clarence Social​, Monty's Bar and Brasserie​, The Mayflower​, India Lounge​, The Daffodil​.......

5. What would you like to be doing in 5 years' time?
Doing exactly what I want to - and only that - so a mixture of Financial Planning, Holistic Healing, mindful walking and travelling.

This mini blog was written in sunny Devon, where my 3 school friends and I took some of our kids (the nicest ones) for the half term break. We were lucky enough to borrow a beautiful cottage big enough for all of us to stay in, right on the beach.

Whatsapp Revived Our Relationship

The 4 of us met on the first day of sixth form at Pate's Grammar School in 1986. We clicked immediately and became inseparable. During lessons we constantly wrote notes to each other and when the odd wiley teacher would intercept and read them, we devised a way of getting round this by passing around an innocent school exercise book we called The Blue Book, shortened to just 'Bloob'. We also had a whole code, so that if anything very private did fall into the wrong hands, they wouldn't be able to work out what it said. Over the 2 years of sixth form we got through a few Bloobs, and they contained every detail of our lives, woes and loves and lots of silly stuff, sometimes even actual food such as a splodge of brie (pretty oily and smelly!) or a slice of satsuma.

Anyway over the years, time and distance came between us. We went off to various places and had seperate lives. Karen moved to Hong Kong. Gaby relocated to Devon, Libbi to London and then Surrey, and me to London and then back to Cheltenham. We never lost touch, but speaking, meeting and writing to each became pretty irregular.

People often point out the negatives of social media and technology and yes there are many, however Whatsapp truly revived our relationship with our online 'Bloob'. There is not a day that goes by that the four of us don't write messages to each other. We are all parents with responsibilities, but having the ability to share problems and emotions but mostly just nonsense and hilarity, we are able to experience the fun we had when we were 17 and 18 all over again.

After being seperated from Karen for twenty years we are again reunited and quality time together is back on! Thirty year old relationships are pretty wonderful!

I hope we can take a photo like this every few years now.

Spoilt Generation

As the parent of a soon to be teenager, I'm reading a few books to help be better equipped to cope! I've read 'Get Out of My Life, But First Take Me and Alex Into Town', which has been quite reassuring to know that some behaviour is not unusual. Now I have moved onto 'The Spoilt Generation' and hope that too helps me deal with some challenges. The battle of wills is in full flow.

We are are part of a 'blended' family and working through the extra teething problems that brings. My partner prefers less internet for kids and more activity, and he's totally right, but I'm too soft on my son so it leads to a lot of 'good cop, bad cop' scenarios which are not fair on anyone concerned.

We are all committed to make more effort, to learn to compromise where necessary. It's time for me to absorb lots of well-researched advice from expert authors (as well as my Bloobs!) and put it into practise. If you have views on this subject and would like to discuss online, you're welcome to join my Facebook group ' iwork4u lifestyle & wellbeing group ' and have your say.

www.saligreen.co.uk

99% of the 5.5 million businesses in the UK economy are made up of small-medium businesses (less than 250 employees), but this doesn’t make you exempt from the GDPR. In fact, smaller businesses are typically even less prepared. You will still need to take appropriate measures to comply with the GDPR, though of course this won’t be as large a task as for bigger organisations processing large amounts of data or are not involved in high risk processing . For some, it’s the fear of the unknown, for others, it’s a case of ignorance is bliss (“GDPR won’t affect me anyway”). For me? The more info I can get my mitts on to further understand the legalities, the better. Not least because I’ve got a duty to ensure my clients are compliant as employers!

So, my overview below comes with an appropriate caveat that a) it’s more focused on GDPR for employers and b) be warned that of course it’s not a substitute for seeking specialist legal advice.

Right; let’s start at the beginning. GDPR stands for the General Data Protection Regulation. If you’ve not yet heard of it then you have either been going about your day with your head in the sand, or somewhere else… anyway, long story short is that it replaces the current Data Protection Act (DPA) and it’s a BIG deal. It’s EU law that will come into force automatically on 25 May 2018 and when we leave the EU, it will be incorporated into UK law, supplemented by the Data Protection Bill which will be published by the Government. It applies to all personal data, so if any data identifies a living person, that data will be governed by the GDPR. This could be someone’s name or email address, their bank details or their medical records.

When can you process personal data?

Having an employee’s consent is unlikely to be an adequate legal basis for processing their data. One of the reasons employers can use is for the ‘proper performance of a contract’. For example, processing personal data is often essential for an employment contract, (to pay their salary). In most cases, this will be sufficient. Other reasons are:

• To comply with a legal obligation (e.g. data about an individual’s sickness records)
• The pursuit of a legitimate interest (e.g. for a disciplinary investigation). Be wary of this one, as you must identify what those interests are and ensure that your actions are necessary and are not overridden by the employee’s rights.

As an employer, you will need to consider what information you collect for employees, job applicants (successful and unsuccessful) and contractors (if applicable). How you collect it, where’s it kept, how long you retain it for – and then how you delete this data after the retention period.

Therefore, one of the first things you’ll need to do is conduct a HR personal data audit, determining the legal grounds for processing each category of employee personal data. If you process special categories of personal data or criminal records data, then you’ll need to do the same exercise for this data.

Then review your privacy notice and update in line with the GDPR:

• Company name and contact details
• Your lawful basis for processing as well as the purposes of the processing
• Details of any recipients of the data
• The right to withdraw consent (when the legal basis for processing is consent
• The source of the data (if not directly from the employee)
• How long the data will be held for
• If the data will be transferred to other countries
• Information on the right to make a subject access request: 

- Subject access requests must be responded to within one month of receipt, at the latest, and free of charge – with some exceptions.

• Information on the right to have personal data erased. The right to erasure/ the right to be forgotten applies in certain instances including: 
  

- Where there was a breach of the GDPR in unlawful processing, or where there is no longer a clear business need to keep personal data (for instance in recruitment).
- This is a change from the DPA and you need to be familiar with the other reasons for the right to erasure and restrictions on processing personal data. There are also some circumstances where you can refuse the right to erasure.
- Remember to delete any backups!

• Information on the right to have personal data rectified in certain instances
  

Here's an example of a privacy notice – what do you think of it? What about the boxes at the bottom, would they comply with GDPR? The answer is NO, they wouldn’t! They’re opt out, and remember that under the GDPR you can only use opt-in.

always be open to lightbulb moments!

My tips are relatively simple one but if you add them to your daily routine you will notice a difference in the way how your body feels. 

FEEL & MOVE BETTER:

• Drink more - WATER 💦 
• Stretch regularly - add few stretches to your morning routine. 
• Exercise - why not do few squads each time to go to the bathroom? 

IF YOU SUFFER WITH ANXIETY:

• If you suffer with anxiety you may find that things like meditation, mindfulness, visualisation work for you. 
• Movement is importnant but you need to make sure that you do it in the way your body and mind are happy - try candlelit yoga or small exercise groups. 
• And finally - make sure that you educate yourself. The monster that we know is less scary than the one that we do not know!

WATCH THE VIDEO HERE.

A nut roast is of course the default for a vegan or vegetarian Christmas dinner. Does it really have to be that somewhat dried up slab of something like softened chip board? No, of course it doesn’t. This set of Christmas dinner suggestions are bursting with colour, vibrancy, protein and nutritional punch. At the same time, you will not be asking for seconds, I guarantee it. Neither will you be reaching for the mince pies by the time the Queen has said her Christmas day piece. You will be, to be frank, stuffed!

So, there’s a few ingredients in here you probably won’t have in stock everyday, but hey it’s Christmas right?

To serve 4-6 people

For the nut loaf:

• 200g red lentils
• 1 red onion finely chopped
• 50g sun-dried tomatoes in olive oil, drained and chopped (hang on to the oil!)
• 2 large cloves of crushed garlic
• 50g dried cranberries
• 100g chopped mixed nuts
• 100g of chopped chestnuts
• 50g of mixed seeds (sunflower, pumpkin, linseed, flaxseed etc.)
• 1.5 tsp of dried herb de Provençe
• 1sp maple syrup
• 1 medium carrot finely grated
• 1 tsp turmeric
• 1 tsp sweet, smoked paprika
• Sea salt and cracked black pepper to taste.

Method

1. Cook the red lentils in plenty of boiling water for 15 minutes until soft, drain with a mesh sieve.

2. Heat the reserved oil from the sun-dried tomatoes in a sauté pan and cook the onions for 5 minutes until they just brown. Add all the other ingredients except the dried herbs and spices and stir well to combine. Add the dried herbs, spices and salt and pepper.

3. Line a large loaf tin (approximately20cm x 10cm) with baking paper. Spoon the mixture into the tin and spread evenly with the back of a fork. Bake in the oven at 180 degrees, gas mark 4 for around 55 minutes. Test by inserting sharp knife or skewer, which should come out clean when the loaf is cooked. Allow to rest for 5 minutes before turning the loaf out and slicing.

Loaf topping:

This can be prepared in advance, reheated and added to the top of the loaf after baking.

• 250g of chestnut mushrooms
• 250g of baby leaf spinach
• 1 sweet potato, baked and mashed
• A good squeeze of lemon juice
• A pinch of nutmeg
• A few good twists of freshly ground black pepper
• A few dried cranberries, soaked in boiling water for 5 minutes to soften
• A few whole walnuts
• A handful of pomegranate seeds
• A handful of fresh parsley roughly chopped

 Method

1. Pop the sweet potato in the oven with the nut roast and bake for 30-35 minutes in its skin until soft.

2. Sauté the mushrooms in a cooking oil of your choice for around 5 minutes until they brown, turn of the heat and toss in the spinach until it wilts staring together with the mushrooms at the same time. Scape the cooked potato into the pan, mashing with the spatula as you go. Add the lemon juice, black pepper and nutmeg and stir to combine. Spread the mixture in a thick layer onto the nut loaf and decorate with the cranberries, walnuts pomegranate and half the roughly chopped parsley.

3. Arrange the topped nut loaf on a warmed serving platter and surround with roasted vegetables (carrots, parsnips, squashes, potatoes, celeriac, swede even a few cherry tomatoes etc.) and your winter greens – broccoli, purple sprout tops, sprouts, black kale (cavalo nero), fine green beans etc. and serve with a jug of rich onion and red wine gravy. Toss the remains parsley over the vegetables.

Bon appetit!

It had been 25 years since I was last Tamil Nadu, South East India, as a fresh faced, green behind the ears 22 year old yogini completing my diploma in yoga therapy. My days back then were spent on an ashram so I actually saw very little of this once powerful Dravidian nation and since then Tamil Nadu has become more and more accessible with some wonderful properties opening and the infrastructure of this fascinating state improving beyond measure.

A direct flight to Chennai (Madras) is a joy though the 3 am arrival & 2 hours standing at immigration – an unfortunate coincidence that I arrived at the e-visa desks at the same time as a group of 40 Japanese tourists – is less so. After a quick rest and wash at the Taj Fisherman’s Cove about an hour south from the city it was off to Pondicherry on the South East coast for a couple of days.

Pondicherry has a fascinating French history from colonialism to the “soldars” ((dalits – the untouchable caste) who left Pondicherry to settle in France after partition, the majority joining the French Foreign Legion), temples, catholic churches with bling beyond anything Latin America has to offer, the Sri Auribindo Ashram and Auroville. I spent my time with the wonderful Bishuwajit Banik (Bishu) – a knowledgeable, interesting, quirky and, above all, funny guide who took me around on the back of his Royal Enfield motorbike.

While Pondicherry was first settled in 1674 by the French East India Company it was regularly annexed by both the Dutch and the British but was returned to France in 1814. When the British gained control of the whole of India in the late 1850s they allowed the French to retain their settlements in the country and even after partition in 1947 the French remained in power in Pondicherry until 1954 and full ratification didn’t happen until 1962.

There is a very obvious European touch to the city’s architecture with some beautiful and elegant examples of Franco-Tamil buildings in the French Quarter but in the Northern Tamil part of town the usual hubbub of stalls, workshops and markets still reigns. Sadly many of the old buildings are in a shocking state of disrepair but still retain much beauty.

The Catholic influence is strong throughout the town and the fabulous Basilica of the Sacred Heart (which was built for low caste Christian worshippers as caste apartheid even in churches existed) is decorated with some wonderfully gaudy murals and icons and even has its own Our Lady of Lourdes miracle corner outside complete with plastic goats and flashing lights. Utterly fantastic.

Not to be outdone on the technicolour interiors the Arulmigu Manakula Vinayagar Devasthanam Temple, dedicated to Ganesh, is a riot of colours and deities and also has Lakshmi – the blessing elephant. I’m always very dubious about animals being used like this but Lakshmi has been at the Temple for 18 years since she was 3 and seemed quite calm and at ease despite the enormous crowds wanting to give her money and guavas in return for a blessing (Laksmi is the goddess of wealth so I need say no more).