How do habits begin? For many of us, it’s way back in childhood. For some of us, it’s as simple as being taught to finish everything on the plate or have some cookies and milk and you’ll feel better. For a lot of people, it’s a way of self-soothing and comforting when we’ve had trauma that we don’t know how to process and we can’t talk about and we don’t have anyone to tell. It’s the whole shame and guilt and everything that goes with it. All of a sudden, food becomes our best friend. It’s something that we can go to the cookie cabinet at night and the cookies are there for us.
Weight loss hypnotherapist Rena Greenberg says we’re already hypnotized by the food industry, the media, and the advertising. We’ve already been conditioned to do the behaviors that we don’t even want to do and they often lead to undesirable outcomes. Rena talks about hypnotherapy as a way to take back your power and do what you consciously want to do to get the results that you want in your life.
Listen to the podcast here:
Expanding Awareness Through Hypnotherapy with Rena Greenberg
Our guest is Rena Greenberg, a dear, longtime friend who I’ve had the honor and pleasure to work with on a number of different projects. We’ve done various interviews and things together. Someone I deeply admire and respect. Welcome, Rena.
Thank you, Debra. It’s great to be here.
Rena Greenberg’s success with weight loss hypnosis has been featured in 150 plus news stories including USA Today, Woman’s World magazine, The Doctor’s Show, CNN, FOX TV, Good Morning America and ABC TV Nightline. She also had her own show on PBS. Rena’s wellness program has been reviewed and sponsored in 75 hospitals and 100 plus major corporations, including Disney and AT&T. Rena is a Hay House author. She works with people all over the world in private hypnotherapy and coaching sessions on Skype and face-to-face in Florida to help people get healthy and improve their lives.
Rena launched Rena’s Organic, a new line of medical grade CBD products of the highest quality. Rena holds a degree in bio-psychology from the City University of New York and a Master’s degree from the University Of Spiritual Healing and Sufism. She is also a hypnosis and NLP trainer and is board certified in biofeedback therapy. You bring such a wealth of information. Can you give us a little bit of background about your story? Touch on your story so people know how you got to be doing where you are or what you’re doing.
It’s amazing how the path towards finding our gifts and being able to share those often comes through adversity in our lives. That was certainly the case for me. I was living in New York in my twenties. Working in the fields of fashion and entertainment and having a lot of fun. All of the sudden it was like the rug being pulled out. I lost all my energy, completely wiped out. I had to stop everything. I spent a year not knowing what was going on. At the end of the year I thought, “I probably have to muster up the energy to get on with my life.”
Within a month or so after that, I ended up in the emergency room. It turns out my heart rate was beating at only 30 beats per minute. I was on death’s door at the time. They whisked me past the ER, admitted me right away. I ended up in cardiac care for three weeks. While I was in cardiac care, I had a heart attack in the hospital. At that point I was 26 years old. They determined that I needed a pacemaker in my heart. Western medicine had saved my life.
To this day, I still have that pacemaker in my heart. I realized, “I had been given a second chance to live.” I was this close to death. That reframed things for me. It awakened something in me to realize, “I can’t go back to the life I have been living.” There was nothing wrong with that life. It was a great life. Once your awareness expands, you open and you get a taste of something else, I knew that I had to do more.
I went to studying everything I could about health. I began studying about nutrition. I studied about herbs. I went back to college and enrolled in a study there. I came upon the whole field of the power of the mind, biofeedback and hypnosis. I knew nothing about them. Immediately as soon as I started, not so much learning in my head, but experiencing. I went to one of the top biofeedback therapists at the time in New York City.
I happened to find this person, Dr. Lester Fehmi and his partner Susan Shor. What they did, they never called it hypnosis. It was biofeedback. What they did was they hooked me up to biofeedback instruments that measured heart rate, blood pressure, EKG, your brain waves, skin temperature, sweating response, muscle tension, all those different aspects of the physiology. As you would practice this technique, which I’m calling self-hypnosis, they did not.
Through this technique of expanding awareness, it wasn’t even visualization or imagery. It was working with space. Instead of seeing the object in front of you, you become more aware of the space between you and the objects. Instead of being in the thoughts in your head, you imagine that your thoughts are surrounded by a field of space, where you would feel the space. There is an infinite space that surrounds us that were all resting in. Like the ocean is holding the fish.
Once I had a tangible feeling. It opened up my world. I knew that even if this knowledge and information wasn’t the source of why I got sick. It was the key to wholeness, wellness, and complete healing. I walked through that doorway and within a year my health was perfect. I started doing hypnosis seminars. It’s a natural progression through the people I met and the doors that opened. I was starting to work with hospitals in New York City and then all around New York.
In 1990, I came to Florida and started my own wellness hypnosis seminar business. The hospitals were wide open and they were receptive. I ended up one after the other, 75 hospitals started approving and offering my program. Every night I was going to a different hospital to offer. It’s a two-hour motivational seminar to help people stop smoking, lose weight. It was full of information, but very experiential guiding them through a hypnotic experience. People’s lives changed.
Once your awareness expands, you open and you get a taste of something else. Share on XYou had tremendous success. I know a number of your stories have been featured on news programs. You have a ton of information, videos and testimonials on your site. You’ve focused mostly on the weight loss and somewhat on smoking.
I started with smoking cessation and then it grew into weight loss. It’s exciting to see people when they shift their consciousness, their beliefs and their behaviors. They’re able to stop smoking completely, lose that extra 10 pounds, 80 pounds. Whatever it is, it doesn’t belong there. Those are my focuses. Through the back door they get help with their relationships, marriage, career, everything because all areas of our life are connected. Sometimes we don’t realize that at first. You think, “All I care about is I have to lose these five pounds,” and then you start to see, “It’s much more than that. These five pounds are a doorway.”
They’re a surface. There’s this whole well underneath it. I told you a little bit about this project that I’ve been doing called While We Were Silent. That’s dealing with trauma. A lot people come to you with food addiction and weight problems. Do you find that a lot of them have a background trauma? That they’ve experienced trauma and that’s a part of what’s keeping them locked in their behavior patterns that they’re wanting to release?
I like to get away from the whole terminology good, bad, but harmful, self-sabotaging behaviors. Behaviors that are undesirable because they lead us in the opposite direction of where we want to go. Nobody wants to wake up even ten pounds overweight, let alone 30, 80 pounds. Oftentimes, it’s not until people release the weight that they say, “I didn’t know I could feel this good.” People come, they don’t even realize how bad they feel because you get used to not being able to walk, taking ten minutes to get off the couch. People learn to live that way.
How did these habits begin? It’s way back in childhood. For some of us it’s as simple as being taught to finish everything on the plate or have some cookies and milk, you’ll feel better. For a lot of people, it’s a way of self-soothing, comforting. We’ve had trauma. Something has happened that we don’t know how to process and especially when you’re young. We can’t talk about it. We don’t have anyone to tell. People don’t even believe us when we try to talk to people. It’s the whole shame, guilt and everything that goes with it. If we’re talking about food but it could be any addiction, alcohol, cigarettes. Food becomes our best friend. It’s something that we can go to the cookie cabinet at night and the cookies are there for us. We feel that’s a safe place. If we dig, look and realize that all we’re looking for is that safety, that love.
It’s a matter of waking up and realizing, “It’s not in that box of cookies.” Now you go off the guilt about it. Having some self-compassion and realizing, “I’m not wrong. I’m not bad. I was misguided. I didn’t know.” It becomes a habit. What I love about the hypnotherapy. There are many misconceptions about it and erroneous thinking. It’s a way to take back your power and do what you consciously want to do to get the results that you want in your life. We’re already hypnotized by the food industry, the media, advertising. We’re already being conditioned to do the behaviors that we don’t even want to do. They lead to an undesirable outcome.
We’re programmed. That’s part of this life as we come in here and we get programmed on how we’re going to think, how we’re going to believe. What we believe is going to be helpful for us, whether it is or not. We develop belief patterns. Would you say that you’re deprogramming some of the beliefs and reprogramming more supportive and healthy beliefs?
100%, yes, just hitting that restart button. Back then we had a rationale. Mom and dad aren’t here. I feel alone. I’m going to sit here with this bowl of ice cream. What happens is, it becomes a habitual pattern. A lot of times we’re not even aware of it. Many people come to me and they’re not even aware of what they’re eating, what they’re doing and all those little self-sabotaging behaviors. The gift is after going through the hypnosis, all of a sudden they realized, “It’s 3:00. I can pass that vending machine at work. I don’t have to stop.” It becomes a choice. That is empowering. Trauma is the ultimate disempowerment. It’s helping people to gain their power back. Even as adults, sometimes we are disempowered in marriages and relationships. Without being overly aggressive, we can simply take our power back and design our own lives.
What is one key, if you could give us a key to taking that power back? If we feel that there’s a way in our life, a behavior that has got more control over us that we have over it that we wanted to start.
The first key is always awareness. That is important. It might sound cliché sometimes. No matter how far along you are on the path, when you start to go through your day, it almost seems in any given moment you can stop. Even something as simple as taking a deep breath, and with awareness noticing, “Here we are and that oxygen. That life force energy,” in yoga they call the prana. It feels good, but then we can ask ourselves in a nonjudgmental way, no criticism, “How much oxygen was I taking in a moment ago? Was I even aware of my breath a moment ago?” and the answer is no.
Even at that much time could have elapsed, but we didn’t have that awareness a moment ago. It’s constantly remembering to come back to the present moment. Often, not just with our shallow breathing, although the shallow breathing is an indicator. When we stop and look at the thoughts, especially in this little space between the ears. Not the wise mind. Not the expansive mind, but that little small mind. Most of those thoughts are repetitive and many of them are negative in one way or another. Even negative towards ourselves, to others or to another group. Realizing that that is disempowering, that sometimes we feel the power might be in our anger or self-righteousness, but really, it weakens us.
That connection of, “What are these thoughts and then the moment, dropping into the heart, taking a breath and I like to use the power of imagery. It could be as simple as looking out your window. Wherever you live, if you look out your window, maybe you have to stretch a little bit but you’re going to see a tree somewhere. I breathe in that energy of the tree. That stable, solid tree. To think the tree is not worried about its survival. It’s not fretting about anything. It’s not comparing itself to the tree next to it. It’s not too tall, it’s not too short. It just is. We can draw that in.
What would you say is the most common thing that people struggle with? I ask this to open that awareness. Like you said, a lot of times we’re struggling with something in our lives. We don’t even recognize life gives us messages. Flashing neon signs are saying, “Things aren’t going right for you here in your life.” The universe maybe wants to have something better for you. What would you say is the most common thing that people can look to? Open their eyes to that will bring them in awareness that, “There is more here for you.” Universe is flashing neon signs for you that maybe it is time to stop. Broaden your awareness. Settle in. Take that breath. Make that connection. What would you say is the most unconscious thing that people can wake up to?
There are a lot of directions we could go with that. One thing that’s key is a question we can ask our self is, what’s driving me? What’s driving me in this moment? Sometimes we’re attached to the outside. Our behaviors, becoming aware of them and modifying them are important. I like the question what’s driving me because so much of the outcomes in our lives is going to depend on what is our intentions. We can do the same action. Think about even a generous act.
Let’s say you are going to give something to somebody. Is what’s driving you fear? Some fear that, “If I don’t do this, people aren’t going to like me.” If you have strong, religious beliefs that gives you a lot of fear. That’s a different feeling than, “I have so much. I’m so blessed. I want to be used by the divine here. I’m going to give. I want to be an angel on Earth. I’m going to pay for the guy behind me in the toll.” There’s such a feeling of expansiveness and joy when you give in this way. Sometimes you don’t even need to tell anybody.
That’s an ultimate good feeling. Most religions will say that that’s the best way to give anyway is not to tell anybody. Not have ego attachment. When something else is driving us, often it is an ego attachment like, “I need people to see how great I am.” Why is that? Is there’s some shame there? Maybe there’s some feeling of not good enough. Why do you need to prove yourself? You don’t feel you’re loved? You’re abandoned and rejected. This self-inquiry takes much courage, but the outcome is wonderful.
All of a sudden you’re able to, with that awareness like, “What’s my intention? What’s my motivation? Why do I need whatever it is?” When your intention comes from wanting to express your higher light in the world and give in every way that you can. You’re going to start to receive so much back. Giving and receiving are connected. When it’s coming from a place of fear, it’s like, “I gave this. Why didn’t I get something back?” or, “This isn’t working,” and so it perpetuates that very feeling that we had when we started, which is not good enough. It mirrors back to us.
Rather than being a natural, free flow of expansion and contraction, which the giving and receiving can be. Same as the breath, the heartbeat and the movement and even our spiritual movement is that natural expansion or natural cycle of expansion and contraction. When you’re giving in that free flow state and receiving also in that free flow state, you have that natural expansion and contraction. When you give from that fear-based place, there is a giving through a constriction rather than an opening expansion. It doesn’t allow for that free flow of that cycle. That’s the visual that I’m getting as you’re explaining that. It stops the flow rather than opening a flow that can perpetuate around the world.
The best way to give any way is not to tell anybody. Share on XAnother mistake sometimes we make is that we are comparing ourselves to others. The orchid doesn’t compare itself to a rose. Some of our greatest pain and suffering comes from always comparing. I see that a lot, even when people come to me for weight loss. People are eating to keep up with their husband. I can’t eat like my husband does. I want to get to the point where that’s fine.
We all have many gifts and many blessings. It’s interesting when we compare ourselves to others, we often don’t say, “Compare ourselves to people who have less than,” we’re always looking at that person who has more and ourselves coming out short. Sometimes when things aren’t flowing our way, I find it useful to step back and noticing like, “Am I pushing?” or is it a time like the winter. Is it the winter of my life? A time to sow seeds, relax, let things percolate. You think about the seasons, it’s not always growth. Sometimes things are beneath the surface.
There’s a lot of beauty in what you’ve shared there. You were talking about the things that keep us looping in the conscious is the busyness of our lives that keep us from being out. Enjoying nature and stopping to smell the roses, the orchids and the trees all equally. We’re staying busy with the kids, with work, with the family, the chores and keeping up with all of that. It can keep us stuck in our patterning that we forget that we have choice.
What would you say is a number one tip for once you’ve developed the awareness for breaking free of the pattern? I’m aware that I’ve been in this pattern. I’m aware that I’ve got the warm cookies in the cookie jar waiting for me at night before everybody goes to bed. That I can go and have my quiet time with my cookies and enjoy it. I’d love to take off this extra ten pounds. Now I’m aware of this. I’m aware of what these cookies give me and I’m grateful for that. I can’t wait for the nighttime. What would you say then is the next step for helping to shift out of that habit?
The way the subconscious mind works is we’re always moving towards pleasure, we’re always moving away from pain. We can’t change that. It’s just the way the brain’s wired. When we’re anticipating the way you described, and it’s a perfect scenario. You’re imagining those cookies and you’re thinking, “The house will be quiet. Everyone’s going to go to bed. I’m going to sit with my bowl, it’s going to be my me time. I’m going to give that to myself. I’m going to be happy.” What we do is when we’re thinking like that, we end the movie there. It would be no different than thinking, “I’m going to go to whatever, Macy’s, Dillard’s. I’m going to try out all the scarves. I’m going to look beautiful. I’m going to have them all and I’m going to walk out the store,” and not thinking what will happen next.
That’s a scenario where you’re associating pleasure with the cookies, with the scarves. With the scarves, you would never do that, because you would always know what’s coming next. That’s not going to work out because you can’t take those and not have a consequence. When we do the cookie scenario, in our mind it’s almost like we forget that there’s a consequence. We’re not at all keyed into it. In that image of pleasure, we’re going to sit down, eat the cookies and then we end the movie. That’s not where the movie ends because the movie continues until the next morning when we wake up. “I feel disgusting. I feel like a blimp,” and then what?
We wake up in sugar coma.
When I was young, I used to over-exercise. Now, you’ve got to run ten miles or otherwise, you have to live with it. I guess I’ll go buy bigger sized clothes. Either way you’ve got the shame, the guilt, the pain, the physical discomfort. Not to mention physically being more at risk for diabetes, cancer, heart attack and all that. Not to mention the addictive factor that you’re probably going to do the same thing again and again because you’ve got that habit queued up in the brain. How do we break free from this? We make our mental movies, which is all that hypnosis is. When they come to me in hypnosis, it’s a new mental movie. The movie cannot stop right after you’ve gone to that cookie jar. It needs to continue and then you remember.
There was a time I was addicted. I was using ice cream because that was my favorite food. I would eat ice cream a few times a day when I lived in New York. All I thought about was the taste, the texture and also all the emotional attachments that society puts on. Let’s say a food like cookies, pizza and ice cream. When you’re with other people, it’s the fun thing to do. When you’re by yourself it’s the love and the soothing. I haven’t had ice cream in decades. How did I do that? Even serving ice cream to my kids it’s still around. It’s like when you break up with the ex-boyfriend, it’s like, “I’m done.” If I analyze how did I do that, which is what I teach to others. It’s the mental movie.
Some of our greatest pain and suffering comes from always comparing. Share on XThe ice cream is no longer associated with love and comfort because we’re always going to want love and comfort. We can’t get rid of that. What’s going to give it to us? Now, when that movie plays, it’s like, “Those cookies are going to make us feel disgusting.” The problem with dieting is you tell yourself you want it and then you eat it. You tell yourself, “You can’t have it,” or you need it and feel bad. Those are the only two options. With my work, what I am helping people do is not want it anymore. To look at the cookie with a new eye, the way you would look at the ex-boyfriend. I’m not interested. It’s a complete reframe.
For your readers it might seem like, “How could that ever happen?” The wonderful thing is that the mind is powerful. We can change where we associate pleasure and where we associate pain. Even if you think in your own life, for any of the readers. I know for example myself, I sucked my thumb as a child. I never thought I could break that habit. Many of us have habits. We used to suck our hair or whatever it was. Bite our nails, or smoke. Most people have in their memory, a time when they had a habit and we’re able to break it. They have to realize they have the power, they have the strength, they have the resources, we just need to move it into this area of their lives.
You help people to rewrite the end of the story and to recognize that that’s not the end of the story and that there’s more to it and then to hold that bigger picture and then develop the habits that are going to help them to find ways to cope with that feeling of, “I’m really wanting that love and comfort right now. This cookie is not going to give it to me. I recognize that now. I’m going to find another way.”
That’s the key. If it was always going to be that conscious battle like you’re describing now, life would be unbearable. The good news is if we could have done it with a conscious mind alone, we would have. That’s what I love about the power of hypnosis, the subconscious mind. We’re going to a deeper level within ourselves. It’s taking that elevator down and connecting to a place of great wisdom and great inner power that has that ability to shift the picture and change our minds so that we’re no longer in that struggle. If we were sitting face-to-face and you put a bowl of ice cream in front of me, there would be no feeling like if I was on a diet. “That looks good, but I can’t have it.” No. It would be as if you put a piece of cardboard in front of me. It would mean nothing to me.
Since I have that personal experience, I love sharing that with others and teaching them. That’s what people have said to me. Over the years, so many decades, they say to me, “I don’t want those cupcakes anymore. I don’t want those cookies anymore.” I walk into a party and it’s not about the food. It’s about the heart connection. It’s a total reframe. Are we going to that party because it’s going to have all these trays of food? Are we going there to connect our minds and hearts with people that we can love and appreciate?
When we have that awareness, we’re not getting that through the food.
It’s said it, it’s changing, it’s reframing so we eat only to live, not live to eat. To feel that, you’ll feel good when you eat food that nourishes you. I never thought 20, 30 years ago that I could prefer a salad to pizza but I do.
When you feel that nutrition that comes from eating fresh, high water content food and how nourishing that is and hydrating it is, how life-giving that is, it feels so good.
The great news is the subconscious mind goes along with all of it. It doesn’t care. The subconscious mind is like a computer. If you go to your computer, your computer doesn’t care if you go on Excel, whether you pull up Chrome or PowerPoint. It doesn’t have a preference. Whatever you pull up, that’s what it’s going to do. It’s going to do it well. Think of the mind like that. We have all these different programs. Yes, there’s still that program in there like, “Ice cream taste good,” but when you’ve run that program enough times and you realize where it leads.
It’s like in your neighborhood, if you keep walking down a dead-end road. Every time you get to the end you realize, “I have to turn around and walk all the way back,” and you start to realize, “What roads in this town are taking me to somewhere that’s going to be fun, interesting and fabulous?” That’s what we’re going to do in our own minds. We don’t want to deny. We can’t get rid of these other pathways. Instead of focusing on the pathway that we don’t want, we strengthen a new pathway. That is the pathway of feeling strong, feeling confident, feeling happy, feeling empowered and in control of our life and our habits.
Can you give us an example? You’ve mentioned a couple times about taking your power back. Can you give us an example from a case study or one of your clients has given testimony on? You’ve got a ton of them on your website, of a way that taking their power back has transformed their lives?
I have many examples in the area of weight. A lot of people who have been overweight for a while, they learn to live with it. They develop other aspects like their great personality or successful in their work. I’ve had people come to me for hypnosis and cut and tell me the next day. They didn’t lose a whole lot of weight in 24 hours. The next day people are saying, “There’s something different about you. You always look great.” This is an inner shift. I had a woman come to me. This woman is powerful out in the world. She has a PhD, she runs a huge department for the government with medical research, powerful woman.
When it came to food, she is probably at least 60 pounds overweight. She came and then we did a follow-up. She was amazing, beautiful. She’s sitting there in tears but good tears, tears of joy. She’s still obviously quite big. It’s only been three, four weeks. She’s down about twelve pounds so far. It’s still great because I’m not an advocate of 30 pounds in 30 days. That’s what people want. I’m an advocate of permanent weight loss, enough of the suffering. Even twelve pounds in a month is incredible because even a pound a week is an excellent goal for permanent weight loss, which is the goal.
Self-inquiry takes much courage, but the outcome is wonderful. Share on XShe came to me a month ago. She was drinking wine every night. She was extremely productive, leading departments, very functional in the world. Still she loved to have a glass of wine or two at night. That was one thing that she thought, “I don’t know if I’m going to be able to give that up.” She came yesterday, she said, “I have not had any wine in the whole month.” She says, “I don’t even miss it,” and that’s what we’re talking about. That’s the key. It wasn’t like, “I want it but I’m white knuckling it.” She says, “I’m putting in my wineglass some Slender Cider, maybe some lemon, some seltzer water. Making a little concoction and I’m sipping it.” She says, “I’m as happy as can be.”
She was talking about how she travels on business. She’s got a big job. She’s going to San Francisco. She had also gone during the month. She said, “Everyone else was eating potstickers,” she called them. I guess it’s from a different part of the country. I said, “What are potstickers?” She said, “You know those gyoza,” She’s like, “I used to love those.” She goes, “All I thought about what was wanting to eat these.” She said, “They don’t even look good.” She said, “I’ve got a double serving of the cucumber salad. I had that with the kebabs,” and she said, “I was fine. I was perfectly happy.”
It was wonderful to hear. I didn’t put her in any diet. That was what this comes to using the tools I give. It’s all about listening to your body. What does your body need? You said, before we talked about what’s driving me, “What does my body need?” and to look at food spiritually, every food is a vibration. Does it lift me up? Does it bring me down? How am I going to feel after I eat this? She was already there. She said, “I thought that I would need you more.” She goes, “I feel like now I have the tools and I’m moving forward.”
That’s taking your power back. I have the tools. I know that I have choice. I can have something besides that. Having that shift come from inside rather than the diet that’s going to help you lose 30 pounds in 30 days as you’re white knuckling it through. Once you let go of that white knuckling, then everything comes back. The weight comes back with even more than where you were before. That way there we have to yo-yo. You mentioned your Slender Cider. I know you’ve got some products. Can you tell us a little bit about your supplemental products that you have that helped people to curb their appetites and the various other things that you have?
The first thing I created, and this was totally by accident, was Slender Cider. It’s a formula of herbs in a base of organic apple cider vinegar. It tastes great, but it’s in a base of cherry concentrate and lemon concentrate. The Green Slender Cider also has grapefruit concentrates. The regular is pure cherry concentrate. No natural flavors, no artificial anything. Everything comes from the trees and the plants. The herbs were all organically grown. There was a formula of eleven herbs. I set out to create this product that was using the herbs and the apple cider vinegar in my own kitchen. When I came up with this formula and people tried it, it was unanimous. You’ve got to bring this to market.
People say that it cuts their cravings, cuts the appetite on the physical level. When I work with people in hypnosis, I’m working on the emotional, the mental and helping to shift those beliefs, those patterns we’ve been talking about. There is a physical component too. You have to detoxify the body. Some detox, especially for people who are sensitive like me, I could never even a follow through in most of those detoxes. What I love about Slender Cider is it’s gentle. You sip it throughout the day in between whatever you’re eating. There’s no special diet. You don’t have to stop eating. You sip it throughout the day. It is cleansing, it is alkalizing.
I can attest that it tastes good. I’ve used it, I love it. I love the taste of it. It is cleansing. It has a cleansing effect. The herbs all are purposeful. This is one of the things I love about you and admire about you. This elevates my trust factor with you in a huge way. I know that you take painstaking efforts to get the absolute best quality of products and ingredients that make up your products. That you won’t settle for anything less.
You’re strict about what you will put into your products because you’re strict about what you will put into your body. You want the things that are going to give the utmost support. Going with all organic, nothing artificial, no “natural flavors,” nothing under that heading that could be who knows what. Things that are identifiable, pronounceable and I trust. I trust if you bring a product to market, that it is going to be something that I can trust. That I would put into my body.
There is an infinite space that surrounds us that were all resting in. Share on XI feel the same way. As we started out on this talk, I was so sick. I had been religious about what I put into my body and been careful. I don’t want to have anything with binders, fillers and preservatives. Most of the food that I eat is whole food. You have to do the best you can. I feel that way about my products. I feel delighted that through the research, I’ve been able to find amazing organic sources. I found that unfortunately in my research along the way, even things that are labeled organic sometimes they do have that catchall term natural flavors. You have to be careful because there’s no regulation on that. It could be chemicals. It could be in anything. All the ingredients are going to be nutritious for the body. That is the Slender Cider that I’m thrilled. My clients have been using that along with me. People order it even by the case and people love that.
This is completely new. I never expected to go into because honestly, over the years there have been many supplement companies that have approached me. I never stood behind any supplements. There are of course things I’ve taken but to be honest, it hasn’t been any one thing that I’ve been able to continue to take. I have found that the best thing for me and for many people is to get your nutrition through whole, clean food. I have glaucoma. I was putting drop in the eye each day.
My doctor had said to me, “Your pressures are elevating. The drops look like they may not be working. We’re probably going to have to increase your meds or there are some surgeries we can look at.” That was all I had to hear. I would do whatever I needed to, but I did not want to go that route. My husband encouraged me. He had been talking about cannabis. I said, “I don’t want to do any substances. I don’t.” I started researching CBD and came to see, “CBD has all the medicinal components of the plant, but it doesn’t have any of the psychoactive components.”
I tried it for my glaucoma and I went in to see the ophthalmologist. He said, “Whatever you’re doing, your pressures are down. They’re where they need to be. You’re all set.” I was excited. I went to look the CBD on the market and to see what products are out there. Unfortunately, what I discovered was in the entire industry, because it’s pretty new. It’s only now legal. In 2014, President Obama signed what was called the Farm Bill, making CBD, which is called industrial hemp, legal in all 50 states. What I saw was that a lot of marketers out there are using the word hemp. They’re using it interchangeably with CBD, which it is not. All CBD is industrial hemp but all hemp is not industrial hemp.
Some hemp could be hemp fiber, hemp seed. It may not necessarily have the medicinal value. What gives it the medicinal value is when it’s full spectrum and it has all the cannabinoids, all the terpenes in the plant. What the cannabinoids are is our body has an endocannabinoid system that was only discovered by researchers in the 1980s. There are receptor cells within the body and they go from head to toe. We have receptor cells throughout our body. Our body makes its own cannabinoids. There are enzymes in the body that eat up those. They eat up the cannabinoids quickly. When our bodies are rich in cannabinoids that are attaching to those receptor cells, the body achieves homeostasis or balance.
That’s in many areas of health. Sometimes people will say, “How can CBD help in many areas?” which it does. The receptor cells are throughout the body. What CBD does is it helps inhibit those enzymes that are eating the body’s own cannabinoids. The body’s own cannabinoids are able to function at a more optimal level, and then you’d feel healthier. You may sleep better. It can affect your mood positively. It’s amazing for pain. For me it was the glaucoma. There’s research about MS and cancer, many diseases and many illnesses where CBD can be helpful to different degrees. A lot of the CBD that was being sold out there, all the great benefits but low potencies. Sometimes marketers were even saying, “We only have 100 milligrams or 200 milligrams of CBD, but we supercharge it with sunflower oil or something else.” In the end it was not going to have often high potencies of CBD.
I launched it in the brand Rena’s Organic. It is the highest quality, medical grade CBD at the best potencies. To make it easy for consumers, I say read the label. The label will say how much actual CBD. Is it full spectrum? Is it organic? Is it super critical CO2 extracting? Which is a more expensive extraction method, but it’s a way to make sure that all the cannabinoids are intact. You’re not heating it. You’re not putting in any chemicals. It’s a clean way to extract out the CBD and the other cannabinoids. I would be reading labels here and seeing even with some of the chiropractors. In many of the chiropractic offices are selling CBD cream at levels one through five. You would think level five is the highest. It is, but they start at 50 milligrams of CBD. Their highest level is 200 milligrams of CBD, this is for pain relief cream.
I wanted to do a lot better than that. I created pain relief creams at 1,000 milligrams. I wanted to have a lower one for people who needed that 500 milligrams. My 500 milligrams pain cream is the exact same price as what they’re selling with 200 milligrams. By keeping my overhead low, I’m hoping to spread the word that people can get these high-quality products. CBD is an expensive ingredient. I want to make it affordable for people and I want them to get the real thing.
I’ve got some of the CBD cream for my 95-year-old father who has arthritis. He gets neck and shoulder pain. He had been battling with this neck and shoulder pain for a while. I’d been putting some different things on it and it helped a little bit. I put that CBD oil on it, the cream. We got the 1,000 mg. I figured, 95 years old with arthritis and he’s got some serious bone-on-bone issues with his knees. We used that and within one application. I barely dipped a little spoon in it, wiped off the spoon and put on his neck and shoulder there one time.
That was all I needed. That was it. I used it too because I spend a lot of time on my computer. I get shoulder pain. I used it too and it was amazing. It was helpful. I’m sensitive to energy. I do energy work all day. It felt like it was clearing out so much of the energies that were stuck in my body, especially in the neck and shoulders. I felt it shifting the vibration throughout in a positive way. I want to let people know the resources that you have. You have a cream, a tincture and a super food for that.
The tinctures are amazing for sleep. Some of the tinctures out there, 50 milligrams, 100 milligrams, 300 milligrams. My tinctures start at 300 milligrams, 600 milligrams and 1,500 milligrams, very high quality. The 1,500 milligrams tincture, you put it under your tongue, it’s amazing when it comes to sleep issues and pain issues.
Which one would be for glaucoma?
It’s tough for something like glaucoma because you don’t feel anything. You don’t know if something’s always working. I always suggest start with a low dose and then see how it goes. It’s a little bit of a pain in the neck because you have to go to the doctor. He has to read your pressures. Unless you happen to have a home instrument that can read your pressures, I don’t know of any such. That’s how I did it. I wasn’t taking a lot.
Trauma is the ultimate disempowerment. Share on XYou would do the tincture for the glaucoma and figure out your dose?
For sleep, it’s a little easier to figure out your dose. You want to take the least amount that you need. With the cream, you can use a small amount. With the 1,500 milligrams tincture, depending on how sensitive you are. I sometimes will take a few drops of that, and I’ll sleep amazingly well. Sometimes I’ll even take up to half a dropper full. That’s all I need because I wake up feeling good. Sometimes if you take too much, how do you know? Nothing bad happens.
There are no harmful side effects to CBD. What can happen is you are too tired. You wake up, you’re tired. You want to wake up feeling energized. You have to find the perfect amount of dose. What I’ve been doing is taking one dropper full of the 300 milligrams. I’m taking less. The quality is good on this CBD that I’m taking a dropper full of the 300 milligrams for sleep at night. It helps with the hormones, and I’ll sleep amazing. I used to wake up, go to the bathroom. Now I sleep through. It’s almost a miracle. I drink a lot of water, too.
I had a couple of experiences where I had pain. One was a tooth abscess on New Year’s weekend and there was no doctor to see me until Tuesday. It started Saturday morning. My whole teeth blew up. I didn’t take any pain medication. I just was taking the 1,500 milligrams full dropper full. I took it two or three times each day, so Saturday, Sunday, Monday. It knocked out the pain and I wasn’t too tired. It was what my body needed to take the edge off because I had this whole infection going. On Tuesday morning they did the surgery.
Real quick, tell us about the Super Food.
I have the Super Food and the Super Cider. The Super Food is great. It’s a powder that you mix in water. I find the Super Food and the Super Cider are more energizing. The tinctures are great for sleep, pain and general balance. What I love about the Super Cider, because it has seven other cannabinoid herbs like turmeric, Echinacea, black pepper, Cacao, these are all good for the immune system and for balancing. Plus 400 mg of full spectrum, medical grade CBD. Every tablespoon is 25 milligrams of CBD and it’s in the base of organic apple cider vinegar and pure cherry concentrate. There’s no other sweetener in it. Not even stevia, but it tastes delicious. It’s the cherry mixed with the herbal formula that gives it it’s delicious flavor. People love that. That’s my premium product because I created it. It’s also the best thing for weight loss because of all the other components in it.
Is that one a concentrate also? Like you’re Slender Cider is a concentrate.
Yes. This tastes good that I drink it by the shot. I take a tablespoon. I don’t even mix it. I’ve done shots of the Slender Cider too and I love it. It’s different, but I like Slender Cider especially for weight loss to mix it with water and sip it throughout the day. With the CBD Super Cider, you’ll have to try it. Take a shot.
Rena, I thank you so much for all that you’ve shared with us. Your wealth of knowledge, information on the scientific, on the body, mind, subconscious mind, the heart, the spirit. I love the way that you bring it all together. You’re helping to make our world a better place by helping all of the people that you help. The programs, the products and everything in place.
Thank you, Debra. It’s been a pleasure. You too, I admire your work and it’s an honor to be here with you.
Thank you, everybody. Stay tuned. Have a great day.
About Rena Greenberg
Important Links:
- Rena Greenberg
- Rena Greenberg Hay House author
- Rena’s Organic
- Dr. Lester Fehmi
- Susan Shor
- While We Were Silent
- Slender Cider
- Green Slender Cider
- www.joyfullylivingwellness.com
- Self-Care for the Soul Facebook
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- Self-Care for the Soul YouTube
