Just because a food seems healthy doesn’t mean it is. Peer into a bowl of cereal. What might seem like a healthy, good-for-you breakfast may not be what you’re sitting down to eat.

Most of us have experienced something we can't quite explain. Call it synchronicity, déjà vu, or even an honest to goodness extra-sensory phenomenon—we all know That Feeling, that moment when we realize we're not in Kansas anymore and that the meaning of life is little more than a giant freaking mystery, even especially when we're caught up in the daily distractions. Seeking to separate from the surplus of modernity's veiled illusions and experience the power of a wildcrafted Amazonian medicine reportedly capable of great healing and insight led me on a South American journey. The medicine is called Ayahuasca.

Welcome to a new year. Here's to hoping it brings you joy, love and good health. And while I can't help you much with the joy and love, I can give you a few tips on how to kickstart your health and detoxify from all that chocolate and champagne. Here's a basic detox plan for the new year -- how long can you stick with it?

Surely Dickens penned, "it was the best of times, it was the worst of times" in the dead of winter. Surely winter offers us many benefits (retreat and introspection, fire-roasted chestnuts, snow days) and of course, many detriments as well (darker and shorter days, slipping on ice, frostbite). And no matter whether you love or loathe wintertime, there's no question that it's harder on us than those other three seasons. But, we can have bit of summer, spring and fall during winter's coldest hours in the form of pure essential oils.

Somewhere along our American Journey, we've convinced ourselves that birds make for a healthier meal option than cows or pigs. But nothing could be further from the truth; in fact, eating chicken may hold more dangers than its fellow barn mates. While organically and ethically raised animals are always a better option than not, there's still plenty of reasons chicken is not a health food. Here are eight.

Being that I did not own a car for a dozen years, the automobile app revolution had been completely passing me by. Now a resident of Los Angeles, I had no choice but to return to the wheel. While I was initially happy with simple evolutions, such as seat warmers, an entire species of in-car programs have been brought to life. I was told that Angelenos live in their autos, which helps account for the fact that 6,000 deaths and 500,000 injuries are now caused each year due to texting and chatting while driving. Fortunately, Ford's latest "connectivity solutions" should not bring about such toxic habits. In fact, they are all about warning you about toxicity.

Crushed shells and bones along with sticks, barks and leaves were the first human forays into oral hygiene that later gave way to the more modern toothpaste applications popularized in the 19^th century. The significance of oral health is not to be overlooked; dental issues can cause—or be indicators of—other more serious health problems that lead to early death and a number of preventable diseases. But modern toothpaste is loaded with artificial ingredients, chemicals and fillers—even some of the natural versions—and the $12 billion global toothpaste industry sends hundreds of millions of bottles, caps and boxes to landfills each year, not to mention the excessive toll factory production of any kind takes on the planet. Opt instead for a lower-impact, more effective and easier way to boost your oral health than toothpaste and give your mouth something to really smile about.

A miserable winter cold can prevent you from doing all the things you love: going out with friends, enjoying the outdoors, getting intimate with that certain someone... Lucky for you, those same activities can actually keep a cold from surfacing in the first place. In fact, there are plenty of ways to ward off sickness that might seem more like plain old fun. Here are a few.

The calendar only recently changed from fall to winter, but watch out -- cold weather blues and blahs are sneaky little devils. The grumble-y feelings in your brain tend to spread throughout your body and infiltrate your psyche with ease this time of year. Stop those silly, out-of-character feelings by taking up one (or all) of these winter blah busters, and change your lifestyle in a snap.

You never know when you’ll be in an emergency-snack-needed situation. Okay, sometimes you know it’s coming (the two o’clock hour at work...), but what happens when you’re on an all-day errands extravaganza or you miss the bus at the end of the day and have a wait ahead of you? It’s good to have a few purse-worthy snacks on hand to avoid getting, shall we say, moody.