In search of safe and healthy alternatives to traditional health supplements, Shimbo gives three items from Guna Nutraceuticals a try.
Health is something you should never take lightly, yet it’s also something so many of us do to the point that change only seems to occur when something goes wrong.
For me, an immature 40-year-old, that time is right about now.
In my search for slightly cleaner living, I decided to try a number of different supplements to see not only what’s out there on the market, but also what makes sense for someone who is really bad at picking the thing that works best.
This week, I came up on Guna Nutraceuticals, an Italian company that’s making a push in the U.S. with a few products that honestly deserve a look.
I chose three products based on things that I feel I could use a little help on: blood pressure/healthy cholesterol, respiratory issues, and an edge when it comes to my brain.
First up is Omega Source, a daily dietary supplement that claims to help maintain normal blood cholesterol levels and promote normal blood pressure. Certainly lofty goals if there ever were any.
Let’s take a look under the hood. The active ingredients in Omega Source are Vitamin B6, Folic Acid and Omegas 3, 6, and 9 fatty acids. It’s the Omegas, we’re often told by health gurus, that help maintain and protect the heart. While it would be better if you got your omegas from eating more fish, the reality is that it’s going to be easier to turn to a supplement, and Omega Source is about as good as any.
Omega-3 is where you get the blood pressure relief, omega-6 helps with promoting healthy cholesterol and while omega-9 is considered a non-essential monounsaturated fat, the combination of the three have been shown to reduce plasma triglycerides by 19 percent and “bad” very-low-density-lipoprotein (VLDL) cholesterol by 22 percent in patients with diabetes.
In other words, it certainly doesn’t hurt.
The ask is three chewable tablets to be taken after or during a meal once a day. If I’m being honest, I think the biggest problem with this is just remembering to do it, or at least it was for me.
While the taste could certainly be better, the benefits outweigh any inconvenience, and that leads me to recommend Omega Source, which you can order here.
Now I’ve been a sufferer of sleep apnea for a few years now, and routinely use a CPAP machine to effectively treat the disorder.
That said, sometimes I have issues with sinuses at night, so I’m always interested in using something that can help keep me clear at night.
For that reason, I chose Breathe Easy, a powder supplement to be taken twice daily with a glass of warm water. Interestingly enough, it was easier for me to keep up with Breathe Easy since the best way to follow a routine for it is to do it when I woke up and before I went to bed.
The powder itself is a mix of premium botanicals, including Noni, Red Poppy, Plantain, Rosemary, Grindelia, Propolis, Sundew, Licorice, Everlasting and Mallow, there’s nothing in Breathe Easy that raises any red flags, and honestly, after using it for a week straight, I noticed much easier breathing at night, finding myself actually breathing through my nose as opposed to through my mouth, and if you’ve ever used a CPAP, you know there’s nothing worse than waking up with a case of dry mouth because you couldn’t breathe through your nose.
I’m not going to call Breathe Easy a miracle cure-all by any stretch of the imagination, but I definitely noticed just enough change to make a recommendation. If you’d like to try it yourself, follow this link.
Finally, I–like many of you–spend the majority of my day plopped in front of my computer toiling away at work. If I’m being honest, it’s easy to fall into a bit of a brain fog from time to time.
I’m always on the look out for some newest, latest nootropic, hoping that this one will be the thing that keeps my brain awake when the day is long enough to start to shut it down, which for me is usually just after one or two in the afternoon, after which point I’m usually pretty useless.
What I don’t want is the jittery feeling of slamming a Red Bull, much less something harder in the form of Adderall.
This is what attracted me to Brain Booster, a once-daily supplement that contains green tea and Withania plant extracts with Selenium, N-acetylcysteine, Manganese and Coenzyme Q10.
But again, the question is, “Does it work?”
Surprisingly, I think it does. Now maybe we can attribute it to the caffeinated effect of green tea, but being alert wasn’t the main thing here. After about a week of taking Brain Booster, I started feeling not only more awake because, you know, caffeine, but also markedly more alert.
Of the three Guna Neutraceuticals products I tried, the clear winner has to be Brain Booster. In a way it feels like lightning in a bottle to help drag you over the hump of the mental fatigue that occasionally creeps in at the end of the day. Follow the link to snag a box of your own!
Supplements aren’t for everyone, and they certainly aren’t meant to cure things you should already be taking care of, but as we get older we should also be getting wiser as well, and good supplements can provide a little boost as needed to get the whole health thing on track.
Next week, I’ll have another supplement I’m trying out to share. See you then!
Hashim R. Hathaway (Shimbo) is the host of the Never Daunted Radio Network, and proud father to NeverDaunted.Net. You can reach him on Twitter @NeverDauntedNet