Many practitioners of holistic health are fond of saying health is more than the absence of disease. Their goal is to achieve an optimal state of well-being, rather than an adequate state of non-illness. Holistic medicine considers every aspect of a persons life; it is only when each of these is in balance that optimum health is achieved.

Holistic theory holds that health is the responsibility of each individual, rather than that of your doctor. In other words, the choices that we alone make about how to live our lives will significantly affect our overall well-being. Participating in our own lives, setting goals and monitoring our own health are all essential tasks.

The Four Components of Holistic Health
Holistic health practitioners believe that our wholeness is comprised of four unique aspects, our physical, emotional, mental and spiritual selves. Our physical self includes our tangible body and our five senses. Our emotional self is comprised of our entire range of feelings, our mental self consists of our beliefs, thoughts, and knowledge, and our spiritual self is concerned with our purpose, creativity, and our relationship with a higher power.

When one or more of these aspects is out of balance, we are not achieving optimum health. If we are out of balance for a long enough period of time, illness and disease can result. Factors like nutrition, exercise, love, community, positive self-image, values and vocation must all be considered and integrated within our lives in order to balance ourselves and achieve holistic health.

The main function of our immune system is to defend us against the millions of viruses, bacteria and other pathogens to which we are constantly exposed. Without our immune systems we would become ill in minutes; our immunity is an important key to our health and well-being. For this reason, it is a good idea to support it whenever you can by living a healthy lifestyle and supplying the body with immune boosting supplements.

Our bodies have two types of immunity, innate and adaptive. Innate immunity is with us when we are born. Adaptive immunity occurs when we are exposed to a virus or bacteria that gets through our defenses; our immune system must fight off this pathogen and in so doing adapts to that particular microbe. A good example of adaptive immunity is the bodys reaction to chicken pox. Once a child has had the disease, his or her body is capable of fighting it off upon re-exposure.

Supporting Your Immune System
Our immune systems consist of bone marrow, thymus, spleen and lymph nodes. These different components all produce immune cells, the soldiers that fight the pathogens that enter our bodies. We can support our immune system and its production of these cells by living a healthy lifestyle; adequate rest, nutritious diet, and regular exercise are all good ways to boost your immune system. When any of these things is lacking, our immune system begins to function inefficiently and eventually to break down, paving the way for ill-health and disease.

There are also supplements available that can help boost the immune system. It is important to remember that taking supplements is not a substitute for a healthy lifestyle, they are merely a helping hand. While many emphasize known immune boosters like Vitamin C, there is evidence that it is more important to get an adequate supply of the complex nutrients found in fruits and vegetables all the time, not just a shot of C when we are feeling under the weather. Whole foods vitamins are derived directly from raw foods, preserving all of the nutritional components of the foods themselves.

The purpose of our immune system is to defend our bodies against microbes, toxins, and other pathogens that can make us ill. Many people dont realize that many of these pathogens are present in our bodies all the time. An unhealthy lifestyle can create changes in our body, making it a more hospitable environment for these pathogens as well as suppressing our immunity, thereby making it all too easy for them to multiply and make us sick.

Stress and the Immune System
Unfortunately, in todays busy world, it is all to easy to slip into a lifestyle that does not support our immune system. Poor diet, lack of exercise and stress are some of todays most common lifestyle problems, and all of them contribute to depressed immunity. When our bodies are stressed, they release a substance called cortisol which suppresses our immune system. Poor diet and lack of exercise make our bodies more hospitable environments to pathogens; a combination of all these factors will often result in illness.

No amount of supplements made to boost the immune system will help if you are living a consistently stressful and unhealthy lifestyle. However, they can be helpful as an added support during busy, stressful times, during flu season, or whenever your body needs a little extra help. Depending on your individual needs and physiology, some immune system boosters will work better for you than others. Do a little research to help you determine what is best for you.

Supplements containing anti-oxidants are important immune system boosters. Whole foods supplements containing vitamins C and E as well as zinc have shown to be particularly helpful. Many experts also recommend green foods supplements, which contain a high concentration of anti-oxidants, as well as detoxifying agents that can help the body cleanse itself of disease causing poisons and pathogens.

Many health-conscious individuals take multivitamin supplements for a number of reasons. Studies have shown that vitamins can boost our immune systems, encourage healthy weight loss, and even help prevent disease. Vitamins are organic substances that our bodies need in order to remain healthy; they are essential parts of the many chemical processes that make up our metabolism, the normal functioning of our body.

Most vitamins we can get from the foods we eat (with the exception of vitamins D and K, which are produced by the body), however, many people take vitamin supplements to ensure that they are receiving their fully daily amount of vitamins every day. Unfortunately, todays busy lifestyle makes it difficult for many people to prepare and eat the recommended three to five servings of green vegetables and low-sugar fresh fruits a day. Because these foods are our primary source of vitamins and minerals, a supplement can help ensure your body has what it needs, no matter what.

Multivitamin Supplements Can Help Ensure Our Well-Being
When we have a deficiency of certain vitamins, our bodies cannot function properly. Any vitamin deficiency can lead to disease or irreparable damage to the body. A chronic lack of Vitamin C leads to scurvy, a disease characterized by bleeding gums, loose teeth, poor healing ability and inflamed joints. Vitamin B12 is essential for nerve health; a B12 deficiency can lead to permanent nerve damage, called neuropathy. Because vitamins are so important to our bodies, taking vitamin supplements every day is a good way to help ensure your health and well-being.

When you are choosing your multivitamin supplements, it is important to remember that they are not all created equal. Only vitamin supplements made from whole foods, i.e. unprocessed vegetables, fruits, and green foods, supply our bodies with all of the nutritional complexes found in the raw foods themselves. These complexes cannot be recreated in the lab, and it is a proven fact that the single, lab created nutrients found in most multivitamins are not as effective as naturally occurring complexes.

Many people have begun using natural health supplements as a way to ensure that their bodies get what they need all the time, even during busy or stressful times. These supplements can give our bodies the nutrients they need, even when we dont have time to eat right or exercise like we should. These health supplements are often the key to maintaining ones health during stressful periods.

Natural Health Supplements: A Helping Hand for Your Body
Many natural health supplements support the body by supplying it with the tools it needs–nutrients, enzymes, and anti-oxidants–to perform its processes smoothly. When the body is lacking in any of these essentials, processes become inefficient and may eventually fail completely. The result is ill health, lethargy, listlessness, and even disease.

Usually, the body receives these important nutrients from fresh, healthy foods like fruits, vegetables, nuts and legumes. Unhealthy, processed foods have little or no nutritional value, providing only empty calories and increasing feelings of fatigue and ill-health. Unfortunately in our culture, these unhealthy foods are the quickest, easiest things to get our hands on, and they often find their way into our diet when we are busy.

Natural health supplements, while never a substitute for a healthy lifestyle, can help to fill in the gaps when life is extra busy or stressful. When choosing the best natural health supplements for you, it is important to remember that they are not all created equal. It is important to get supplements made from whole foods, as these will contain the richest and most easily absorbable nutrients for your body.