Peak Living

Peak Living Dr Gauri Mittal
MBBS, MD, PDCC Lifestyle Disease Management from AIIMS Rishikesh. MindBody-Lifestyle Educator at "Peak Living."

I teach and write about mind-body-lifestyle approach to health & well-being. I have done MBBS, MD and PDCC (Lifestyle Disease Management) from AIIMS Rishikesh.

This is the front page of Times of India today, promoting widespread general use of oxymetazoline - a decongestant nasal...
27/11/2025

This is the front page of Times of India today, promoting widespread general use of oxymetazoline - a decongestant nasal medication that works by narrowing blood vessels inside the nose.
1) Using this spray for more than a week causes "rebound congestion" which is a dependency on the drug. Relieving this dependency may need nasal steroid medication.
2) Oxymetazoline has drug interactions with MAO inhibitors. It is also given with caution in people who are hypertensives, heart disease or glaucoma.

This is an open advertisement for a drug without any clearly visible warnings or drug instructions. Is this ethical or socially responsible?

Breathing - A choking hazard in Delhi.
27/11/2025

Breathing - A choking hazard in Delhi.

25/11/2025

Less Alcohol = Better Blood Pressure Control.

25/11/2025

Use this prompt -->
"Deep Safety Check With Warnings and Alternatives"

1) Take pic or screenshot of ingredient list of whatever product you want to check.
2) Upload it to ChatGPT.
3) Type the above prompt.

Get more control over your safety and health

18/11/2025

We have confused stimulation with entertainment. Our minds are overloaded... while our bodies are forgotten. This is your reminder to touch the real world again. Entertainment should calm you, not exhaust you.
✨ Cook. Walk. Paint. Garden. Stitch. Breath. Consciously.
✨ Come back to your body.

Interoceptive awareness strengthens the neural connections between the insular cortex and limbic system, in the brain. T...
12/11/2025

Interoceptive awareness strengthens the neural connections between the insular cortex and limbic system, in the brain. This leads to better emotional regulation and consequently better autonomic regulation. Over time, stress response decreases, lowering cortisol levels and chronic inflammation in the body. This brings better mental and physical health.

We Are Not Doing Entertainment RightOnline media has turned our world into a predominantly mental world. There was a tim...
08/11/2025

We Are Not Doing Entertainment Right

Online media has turned our world into a predominantly mental world. There was a time when our routine entertainment was grounded in physical reality of the body like sitting together and talking to people in real life, walking with people, embroidering, gardening, listening to music, etc. Being children before the internet was a thing, for us entertainment meant sitting outside on the ground and playing with sand and mud, climbing on trees, playing with flower bushes, and talking to each other. Most things which keep us aware of the physical body are in today’s time missing, most of the time.

Being aware of the physical body strengthens the interoceptive sense which connects the brain and the body and makes us better at regulating our emotions, and brings more parasympathetic dominance or a state of relaxation by slowing down mental processes. This is the state of an “Earth” mind-body-personality.

Excessive mental indulgence brings a state of sympathetic activation or “Wind” mind-body-personality elements. It happens when we watch reels, continuously scroll through social media for more information like never-ending irrelevant news, messages, videos, tv shows. Our brain is continuously stimulated. Thousands of thoughts rushing through it stimulate the body’s sympathetic system or the stress response, thus turning our body-mind into a confused imbalanced pool of stress and hyperexcitability.

To slow down and ground ourself means working according to how nature intended our body-mind to work and not just how technology-driven society wants it to work. Replacing mind-based entertainment, at least to some extent, with body-based recreational activities like origami, other crafts, writing, singing, walking, embroidery, sewing, painting, cooking, gardening, listening to music, etc is a good way to increase mental stability.

Alcohol and High Blood Pressure: Lifestyle Intervention for HypertensionDrinking alcohol for a long time can seriously h...
05/11/2025

Alcohol and High Blood Pressure: Lifestyle Intervention for Hypertension

Drinking alcohol for a long time can seriously harm the body. It can damage brain cells, raise blood pressure, increase blood sugar, weaken immunity, raise cancer risk, and lead to addiction.
When we look specifically at high blood pressure (hypertension), alcohol can raise blood pressure not only with long-term use but even after short-term or occasional drinking.

For the brain, alcohol acts like a stress signal. It makes the body release more of the stress hormone cortisol. With long-term use, it also disturbs the system that normally controls how much cortisol is released.

In the blood vessels, alcohol allows more calcium to enter the muscle layer of the vessel wall. This makes the vessels tighten and narrow. Just like squeezing a water pipe raises pressure inside it, narrowing of blood vessels raises blood pressure.

With chronic drinking, alcohol keeps stimulating a kidney hormone called renin, which further increases blood pressure over time.

The inner lining of blood vessels (called endothelial cells) is also damaged by alcohol. This damage causes oxidative stress and makes the vessels lose their natural flexibility, so they tend to stay more constricted.

Alcohol also keeps the “fight or flight” (sympathetic) system of the body overactive. This not only raises blood pressure but also increases long-term inflammation, adding to heart and health problems.

So, people who have high blood pressure should avoid alcohol as much as possible. If stopping all at once feels hard, reducing intake gradually helps. Continuous drinking keeps the body in a stressed state, making it difficult for even relaxing yogic practices like yogic deep abdominal breathing or certain meditation practices to lower blood pressure effectively.

03/11/2025

How to control high blood sugar through lifestyle.
02/11/2025

How to control high blood sugar through lifestyle.

Anger: Overcoming the Lifestyle of AggressionCrookedness and unjust situations may, at times, trigger the emotion of ang...
08/09/2025

Anger: Overcoming the Lifestyle of Aggression

Crookedness and unjust situations may, at times, trigger the emotion of anger within us. It takes over our body and mind, making life difficult both for ourselves and for those around us. Ultimately, it hurts us by robbing us of peace of mind and alienating us from our near and dear ones.

But unjust situations and crooked behaviours are part of the darker side of the world that cannot be separated from life’s experience. We may try to counter them and raise our voice against them, but dwelling on them and allowing anger to boil within is both futile and harmful.

Ultimately, we must realize that keeping the mind simple and clear is more important for our long-term well-being, and we should take conscious measures to let go of anger.

These measures include distancing ourselves from confrontational situations, removing malice for others from our mind and becoming neutral towards them. We can also engage in activities that bring calmness, such as listening to peaceful music, doing creative work, or spending time with gentle, positive people.

Career Choice and how it affects our Lifestyle:-Most of us give 8-9 hours of each day to our professional career. This i...
08/09/2025

Career Choice and how it affects our Lifestyle:-

Most of us give 8-9 hours of each day to our professional career. This is mostly essential for financial stability, comfortable living and maintaining a healthy identity.
But, our choice of career is often led by such parameters which lead to long-term frustration, stress and feeling trapped.
Changing the parameters based on which we decide our choice of career thus becomes relevant. This choice should be based on the type of lifestyle a career offers. We need to choose the lifestyle most suited for our mind-body-personality type.
For example, choosing a post-graduation in a heavy surgical branch, because we think it is glamorous or like the prestige or money that can come with it, while ourselves being stress-prone and having a mind-body type which needs regular long hours of sleep, is a recipe for disaster. While, for somebody who is highly professionally-driven, focused and is able to compromise on sleep without it affecting their efficiency too much, it might the best choice.
Another example is, someone with a highly ambitious personality might get frustrated working as a teacher, while someone who is creative, sensitive and gentle might thrive in the profession.
Thus, to choose the career most suited for our long-term well-being, we should non-judgementally analyse our mind-body-personality type and then based on the type of lifestyle which each choice offers, choose the one most suited to us.

-body

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