For the body, for everybody
Published Jan 28, 2018 12:05 am
By Kaye Estoista-Koo
Health and wellness continue to be an evolving trend this 2018 with more interesting concepts like biohacking taking their time in the spotlight. The industry also gets to benefit from the clear and loud voice of former Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) secretary Gina Lopez and her G Stuff Health & Wellness brand. G Stuff, which covers a wide range of products, is marketed to be good for us, the environment, and the community.
Eli Abella, a believer of biohacking, broke down the explanation to this terminology.
“It is essentially a way of teaching the brain its own language by manipulating the external and internal environments that affect every person,” she says. The different applications of biohacking are able to address myriad conditions, from depression to migraine, PTSD, and trauma, sleep disorders, anxiety, headaches, and more. One way to biohack is using light, she says, because it is the easiest way as our bodies already rely on circadian rhythm as we have evolved through the ages because of light.
That’s why at night, when someone opens the bathroom door and switches on the light, your body will become aware of the movement. It’s the presence of light, not necessarily because of the sound itself. Biohacking using red light, according to Abella, has been known to address conditions on a cellular level, offering healing and cell regeneration in bones, muscles, joints, anti-aging properties, scar reduction, muscle strengthening, wrinkle reduction, bone health improvement, and more.
As with any innovation, however, especially something as radical as biohacking, Abella advises careful and thorough consultation and research, as the way biohacking works with one person may work a different way with another.
Rhiza Gomez of Bulletproof Coffee shared the benefits of this certified, clean coffee made from organic, single origin Arabica beans. It comes with grass-fed butter, a super food packed with beta carotene and other vitamins as well as brain octane oil. Gina has personally vouched for this product as well, as it has helped various users with improved mental focus, fat metabolism, weight loss, energy levels, and curbing hunger pangs.
Oil pulling using olive oil has become a more mainstream health practice over the past years. G Stuff tapped into this traditional and powerful Aryuvedic method of swishing oil in the mouth to remove the body’s toxins and bacteria with a Virgin Coconut Oil (VCO) infused with Peppermint and Tea Tree Oil Pulling product. Different users have reported a variety of plusses to this interesting practice: anything from cleaner, whiter teeth, healthier gums, fresher breath to clear sinuses, allergy reduction, and more.
For Gina, what matters to her is “quality of sleep, it is not the number of hours.” Any product that can help her in this quest is something she keeps close to her chest. The Doterra Essential Oils are her essential go-tos. From Frankincense, which promotes overall wellness, to Peppermint, which works on healthy respiratory function—Gina even showed everyone the wonders two drops can do in one’s palm—to lemon for its purifying benefits, and On Guard for its immune function, the 12 variants are pure, safe, potent, and all-natural.
swears by these G Stuff products that help in her personal health and wellness
She likes supporting products that use moringa, another super food, because it supports farmers, one of her main passions as well. Moringa, known for its benefits to cardiovascular health, comes in homemade, but tried and tested formulations such as oils, personal body care products, or food products. This super food is touted for its nutritious profile and anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, and tissue-protective properties.
Yet another favorite is G Stuff Anvil Kopi, an 8-in-1 formulation that has moringa, grape seed, seaweed, gotukola, stevia, coco sap, and the agaricus mushroom. She likes it because aside from having low caffeine levels, this product also has organic malunggay extracts. It is also another way to support local farmers.
She has also started treating her dark tresses to the G Stuff Moringa Shampoo, which is a steal for P250 a bottle. “Admittedly, at the start I was hesitant because I thought it looked too green, it was very green,” she confesses. “But that is because it comes from the moringa leaves mixed with VCO. It’s better than many shampoos I have tried, especially when for travel purposes, I bring this with me.” At 64 years old, Gina’s crowning glory looks well-maintained, healthy, and vibrant, so she bears living proof of this shampoo’s results.
NATURAL BEAUTY Gina Lopez
At the core of her G Stuff Health and Wellness product line is Gina’s desire to build the country from the bottom up. All of the products have an origin in a farmer somewhere in the Philippines working hard to produce the base materials.
She connects her work here with her group I LOVE or Investments of Loving Organizations for Village Economics. “My focus is area development, where you take the area and develop it for the people. That explains why I hate mining because it kills rivers and streams,” she explains.
In I LOVE, the goal, simply put, is happiness. “Our key performance indicator is Gross National Happiness (GNH), because look at Bhutan, their goal is happiness, not money. Their king wants his people to be happy. With 97 percent forest cover, they have $2 billion every year in revenue, selling their water to their neighbors and providing free healthcare, free education, free everything for their citizens. They have very little crime! They reflect the truth that we are not material beings and we can be happy.”
From communities in Gubat, Sorsogon, and Palawan, to name a few, I LOVE has been investing in the people. Gina lives by a certain mantra: “Values are key, you can put money in the ground but if you don’t back it up with values, nothing happens, so I tell them, if they want to get drunk all day long, you are shortchanging your family.”
From putting up a capital of over just half a million, communities in Sorsogon have doubled that in a year’s time, simply by tapping into what they already had to offer: skin boarding, massages, transportation, and handicraft. Gina reiterates that the efforts are inclusive, involving the community top down.
With her other organization, I TRAVEL, donors and tourists can see exactly how the money goes into the community. She recounts how in another area, a really poor community, where the river is even more beautiful than the one in Bohol, the locals put up their own floating restaurant.
“We can get our country out of poverty if we help the community and take care of the environment.”
In an area in Palawan made up of 97 percent women, the community, through forced savings, was able to put up their own clinic, sari sari stores, and now, about eight years later, the whole community is bringing in revenues up to P29 million. Gina is ecstatic. “The place is already beautiful, because God has been spending millions of years making it beautiful. And now the people are benefiting, for example, bangkeros earn P10,000 a week working three hours a night for firefly gazing. Amazing right?”
With a keen sense of working against social injustice, her inner emotional charge is to ensure everyone in the country gets a fighting chance to better their lives—starting with responsible and healthy use and respect of the environment. She can’t stress enough the importance of making sure the natural resources in each area stay protected, even as they develop the communities to accept tourism and investors.
Her G Stuff advocacy works hand in hand with her I LOVE and I TRAVEL initiatives, ensuring that mindful health and wellness users become aware of what the country’s farmers have to offer while the latter two organizations affect real change on the ground, across the archipelago.
G Stuff is available in Power Plant Mall, Alabang Town Center, and of course inside the ABS-CBN ELJ Bldg.
Eli Abella, a believer of biohacking, broke down the explanation to this terminology.
“It is essentially a way of teaching the brain its own language by manipulating the external and internal environments that affect every person,” she says. The different applications of biohacking are able to address myriad conditions, from depression to migraine, PTSD, and trauma, sleep disorders, anxiety, headaches, and more. One way to biohack is using light, she says, because it is the easiest way as our bodies already rely on circadian rhythm as we have evolved through the ages because of light.
That’s why at night, when someone opens the bathroom door and switches on the light, your body will become aware of the movement. It’s the presence of light, not necessarily because of the sound itself. Biohacking using red light, according to Abella, has been known to address conditions on a cellular level, offering healing and cell regeneration in bones, muscles, joints, anti-aging properties, scar reduction, muscle strengthening, wrinkle reduction, bone health improvement, and more.
As with any innovation, however, especially something as radical as biohacking, Abella advises careful and thorough consultation and research, as the way biohacking works with one person may work a different way with another.
Rhiza Gomez of Bulletproof Coffee shared the benefits of this certified, clean coffee made from organic, single origin Arabica beans. It comes with grass-fed butter, a super food packed with beta carotene and other vitamins as well as brain octane oil. Gina has personally vouched for this product as well, as it has helped various users with improved mental focus, fat metabolism, weight loss, energy levels, and curbing hunger pangs.
Oil pulling using olive oil has become a more mainstream health practice over the past years. G Stuff tapped into this traditional and powerful Aryuvedic method of swishing oil in the mouth to remove the body’s toxins and bacteria with a Virgin Coconut Oil (VCO) infused with Peppermint and Tea Tree Oil Pulling product. Different users have reported a variety of plusses to this interesting practice: anything from cleaner, whiter teeth, healthier gums, fresher breath to clear sinuses, allergy reduction, and more.
For Gina, what matters to her is “quality of sleep, it is not the number of hours.” Any product that can help her in this quest is something she keeps close to her chest. The Doterra Essential Oils are her essential go-tos. From Frankincense, which promotes overall wellness, to Peppermint, which works on healthy respiratory function—Gina even showed everyone the wonders two drops can do in one’s palm—to lemon for its purifying benefits, and On Guard for its immune function, the 12 variants are pure, safe, potent, and all-natural.
swears by these G Stuff products that help in her personal health and wellness
She likes supporting products that use moringa, another super food, because it supports farmers, one of her main passions as well. Moringa, known for its benefits to cardiovascular health, comes in homemade, but tried and tested formulations such as oils, personal body care products, or food products. This super food is touted for its nutritious profile and anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, and tissue-protective properties.
Yet another favorite is G Stuff Anvil Kopi, an 8-in-1 formulation that has moringa, grape seed, seaweed, gotukola, stevia, coco sap, and the agaricus mushroom. She likes it because aside from having low caffeine levels, this product also has organic malunggay extracts. It is also another way to support local farmers.
She has also started treating her dark tresses to the G Stuff Moringa Shampoo, which is a steal for P250 a bottle. “Admittedly, at the start I was hesitant because I thought it looked too green, it was very green,” she confesses. “But that is because it comes from the moringa leaves mixed with VCO. It’s better than many shampoos I have tried, especially when for travel purposes, I bring this with me.” At 64 years old, Gina’s crowning glory looks well-maintained, healthy, and vibrant, so she bears living proof of this shampoo’s results.
NATURAL BEAUTY Gina Lopez
At the core of her G Stuff Health and Wellness product line is Gina’s desire to build the country from the bottom up. All of the products have an origin in a farmer somewhere in the Philippines working hard to produce the base materials.
She connects her work here with her group I LOVE or Investments of Loving Organizations for Village Economics. “My focus is area development, where you take the area and develop it for the people. That explains why I hate mining because it kills rivers and streams,” she explains.
In I LOVE, the goal, simply put, is happiness. “Our key performance indicator is Gross National Happiness (GNH), because look at Bhutan, their goal is happiness, not money. Their king wants his people to be happy. With 97 percent forest cover, they have $2 billion every year in revenue, selling their water to their neighbors and providing free healthcare, free education, free everything for their citizens. They have very little crime! They reflect the truth that we are not material beings and we can be happy.”
From communities in Gubat, Sorsogon, and Palawan, to name a few, I LOVE has been investing in the people. Gina lives by a certain mantra: “Values are key, you can put money in the ground but if you don’t back it up with values, nothing happens, so I tell them, if they want to get drunk all day long, you are shortchanging your family.”
From putting up a capital of over just half a million, communities in Sorsogon have doubled that in a year’s time, simply by tapping into what they already had to offer: skin boarding, massages, transportation, and handicraft. Gina reiterates that the efforts are inclusive, involving the community top down.
With her other organization, I TRAVEL, donors and tourists can see exactly how the money goes into the community. She recounts how in another area, a really poor community, where the river is even more beautiful than the one in Bohol, the locals put up their own floating restaurant.
“We can get our country out of poverty if we help the community and take care of the environment.”
In an area in Palawan made up of 97 percent women, the community, through forced savings, was able to put up their own clinic, sari sari stores, and now, about eight years later, the whole community is bringing in revenues up to P29 million. Gina is ecstatic. “The place is already beautiful, because God has been spending millions of years making it beautiful. And now the people are benefiting, for example, bangkeros earn P10,000 a week working three hours a night for firefly gazing. Amazing right?”
With a keen sense of working against social injustice, her inner emotional charge is to ensure everyone in the country gets a fighting chance to better their lives—starting with responsible and healthy use and respect of the environment. She can’t stress enough the importance of making sure the natural resources in each area stay protected, even as they develop the communities to accept tourism and investors.
Her G Stuff advocacy works hand in hand with her I LOVE and I TRAVEL initiatives, ensuring that mindful health and wellness users become aware of what the country’s farmers have to offer while the latter two organizations affect real change on the ground, across the archipelago.
G Stuff is available in Power Plant Mall, Alabang Town Center, and of course inside the ABS-CBN ELJ Bldg.