Stay Centered with these Free Apps & Services

Published on March 27, 2020March 30, 2020 by Dan

With the recent disruptions in almost all aspects of our daily lives, it’s becoming increasingly important to take conscious steps toward keeping our minds, bodies, and emotions in check. We have compiled a short list of apps and services which can help you keep your world running smoothly during this chaotic time. As we previously announced, full access to the Sky Tripping app is free while the pandemic is underway. Check out the links below, and let us know in the comments if you find any other tips on great sites, apps, or services that everyone should know about.

MENTAL HEALTH

Sanvello for Stress and Anxiety — A simple, beautifully designed experience to help users manage stress and anxiety, Sanvello has opted to make their app and services free for all while Covid-19 crisis is active. It includes tools to help users actively engage in practices which help improve their mood and wellness, as well as community interaction so you’re not alone (even if you do happen to find yourself physically isolated).

Headspace — A household name in meditation, Headspace has committed to being there for us to help calm the chaos while Covid-19 is underway. The content called Weathering the Storm is available to all. Jump in and give it a try if you’re finding your emotions straying or your mind running all over the place. A few minutes of self-care can’t hurt.

The Holistic Psychologist — Not an app, per se, but this instagram account is a tremendous resource for those wanting to engage in “the work”. If you are ready to take ownership of your emotions, thought processes, and life direction, this is a great resource featuring bite-sized tips encouraging healthier patterns of thought and response. A definite must for those of us wanting to maintain productive relationships with self and others.

STAYING CONNECTED AT A DISTANCE

Spokt Private Family Sharing — Keeping up-to-date on family health and status is a high priority for many while uncertainty looms. Spokt is similar to Facebook Groups, but private and secure. Spokt gives you a Hub (your own private space) to share videos, photos, and text updates for the whole family to see and discuss. In order to get a free hub set up to stay connected during the Covid-19 disruption, contact the Spokt team here.

eFamily.com — Similar to Spokt, eFamily is providing full accounts at no charge for family and friends to stay in touch for the time being. Email help@efamily.com in order to get free access.

PHYSICAL HEALTH

Down Dog Yoga — Speaking of social distancing, are you missing the physical grind at your local gym or studio? Are you into Yoga? This might just be the app for you. Down Dog is available for free right until at least May 1st. Download. Stand up. Get moving. With data showing that moving can improve both physical and mental health, this is a simple way we can all stack the odds in our favor while things are in flux.

7 Minute Workout — Just because you have more time every day doesn’t mean you have to spend your whole life getting fit. And with studies showing that short, focused workouts can rival longer traditional workouts, this app gives you a chance to get active without getting overwhelmed.

LEARNING

Virtual Museum Tours — I’ll admit, this sounded dumb to me. I shouldn’t print that, but there it is. However, with the gentle insistence of my wife over a few day’s time, I finally succumbed — in no small part because I noticed the screenshot featuring the Uffizi Gallery in Firenze, Italy, a place I wandered for hours on my recent trip to Italy. I’m glad I gave in. After downloading the Google Arts and Culture app, the family went on a virtual adventure soaking in the art found inside the 36,000 year French Chauvet Caves. We were mesmerized by simple, informative, and beautiful works of ancient creation. 5/5 recommended!

Duolingo — This app is highly recommended and one we’ve personally used to supercharge our own language learning (I personally used the Italian Course prior to my recent trip to the land of romance). Simple to use and gamified for fun, now might just be the perfect time to dig into that second language you’ve always wanted to learn but never had time for (until now).

Khan Academy — Khan Academy is one of the most well-known names on the web for expert education at just the right price: free. Jump in and exercise your brain. It may not sound like much, but engaging your brain in developing new skills or knowledge is an important element in mental and emotional health.

Making time to check in, practice a little self care, and maintain good emotional, psychological, physical, and social health will pay huge dividends right now. This won’t last forever. Things will look up. Keep yourself in a healthy place. Take a few moments for yourself throughout the day so you can be ready for opportunities as things begin to look up. You’ve got this!

Staycation to Cabo?

Published on March 27, 2020March 27, 2020 by Dan

CABO GREENS > CORONA BLUES

Quarantined? Practicing your social distancing? Following a shelter-in-place order? We have a dose of good news for you: our newest batch of films (and our first international volume) titled “Cabo San Lucas” just launched. Revive your senses as vivid blues colliding with fiery oranges create explosive color combinations that would make even Michael Bay swoon. Travel along the Baja California shoreline in this tropical exploration of Mexico’s western peninsula, highlighting some of Cabo’s most iconic landscapes from all new heights.

And that’s not all. Since our last announcement, we’ve added two more volumes: Sierra Nevada and Monument Valley. For a limited time, anyone can preview these films once you create a free Sky Tripping account either in the Settings tab inside the iOS or Android App — or in a web browser at https://skytripping.com/join.

When you use Sky Tripping every day – even for a minute or two – you can significantly lower your stress levels and increase the amount of time you stay focused throughout your day. It may not sound like much, but the compound effects of our novel, nature-based meditation app can add up quickly resulting in noticeable, lasting benefits.

These newest films are available to watch today, and are also available as meditation scenes within our Micro Meditation feature (side note: with our latest app update, you can choose an expanded meditation time range between 1 and 60 minutes).

Alternatively, you can enhance the energy of your next get-together, yoga session, or moment of relaxation by streaming our cinematic films on your Apple TV.

As always, we are hard at work on our next volume, but we couldn’t keep these latest films to ourselves any longer

Stay safe (and sane)!

Stop Drinking So Much Water!

Published on April 23, 2018November 4, 2018 by Dan

I’ve been told all my life to drink at least 8 glasses of water per day. This advice pervades our society, do you know where it comes from? The answer: A paper published in 1921 in which the author measured his urine, sweat, etc. He figured we lose a little more than 3% of our body weight each day, which is about 8 cups. One guy weighing his pee. That’s science.

Many of the more recent papers published encouraging more water consumption have been funded by bottled water businesses like Nestlé (Water: neglected, unappreciated and under researched). That’s right, the people who sell you Crunch bars and chocolate milk mix are concerned about your health!

I can imagine the comments section already: “What did water ever do to you?”, “Were you not loved as a child?”, “Hitler didn’t want people to drink water either! Are you some kind of Nazi?”

Ok, ok, put away your pitch forks and torches. I’m honestly not making an argument against water. Spoiler alert! The guy in 1921 wasn’t far off: Men should probably drink 6-11 cups per day and women drink 4-7 (Water, Other Fluids, and Fatal Coronary Heart Disease).

I’m sometimes baffled by how much disagreement exists on even the simplest issues. That’s the real reason I am writing this. I had stumbled upon a dissonant voice about my health which brought confusion to me.

Last year I had a few minor back injuries—the kind where I’d say “I threw my back out.” After each injury, for a few days, I would ask my wife to get the baby out of the car seat and carry the water bottles in from the garage for few days until things got back to normal. She either felt sorry for me or got sick of me being a weakling and started asking me to plank with her for a minute at night. I took the hint, it’s hard to plank for a minute but before bed she’d ask me, “Do you want to plank with me?”

I’d lie and answer, “Yes.”

I had no idea if it was doing any good. We didn’t plank every night but probably more often than not she’d count to 60 as we faced the ground together. After a few months I noticed I hadn’t thrown my back out. It could be luck but I feel like the planking probably did strenghten me and prevented injury.

Tiny habits can build if you let them and so I found myself on Youtube yesterday learning about the health benefits of planking… Then youtube started recommending videos with titles like “The WORST Ab Exersize Ever (STOP THIS TODAY!)”. It had a thumbnail of a man planking. The video is delivered by a very fit young man telling me not to plank. Is it possible that 99% of everybody is wrong and he is correct? How can you be sure? Do I need to perform primary research and clinical studies to find out? It’s an exhausting rabbit hole to inhabit.

And it’s everywhere. Vegan and paleo diets are almost diametrically opposed, yet we almost can’t avoid testimonials from practitioners of both diets. Are they both independently the one true diet for mankind? Can different things be good for different people? Or is there a single silver bullet? Are the millions of healthy people eating both grains and butter just lying to themselves about how good they feel?

What I’ve found and what helps me rise above this noise and confusion is to regularly cut it out. Cut out everything for a few moments every day.

Listen to your body. Give it a chance to talk to you. Close your eyes and breathe. If your body isn’t talking to you maybe that’s okay. Do some research, try to muddle through somehow. Pay attention to what works for you. How do you feel after that 20oz Coke? You feel fine? Then maybe that’s okay. Did you feel a crash? Maybe that drink isn’t for you.

I’ve found a lot of success with small scale 1-person experimentation. Healthy habits make room for more healthy habits. Don’t worry whether you are doing the one best thing for you right now. If you want to feel healthier pick something small and make a habit of it. Do something small everyday for a week. Pay attention but don’t overreact too early. Respond to the feedback you get from yourself. Keep streaks alive, unplug from the noise and listen.

RELIEVING STRESS, THE NATURAL WAY

Published on July 21, 2016September 21, 2020 by Dan

Our lives are chock-full of things that can stress us out. Demanding jobs. Performance reviews. Deadlines. Bills. Social media shaming. Polarizing hashtags, news, and political punditry — the list goes on. These daily pressures are about as common as tap water.

We wrote a previous blog post revealing the hidden secret of stress. We show how leveraging stress (rather than fearing it) can have considerable health benefits.

But what if we could do one simple thing every day to tame the stress in our lives? Science reveals that upping our dose of nature can radically reduce mental and physical stress.

Our team has experienced plenty of stress in our own careers despite the fact that we love what we do. The science behind natural stress relief surprised us. But even before we truly understood these studies, we observed that nature played a role in regulating our own stress levels. That, in turn, led us to develop the Sky Tripping app which harnesses the power of nature in reducing stress.

Nature exposure is a powerful weapon against overwhelm. People living near green space report less mental distress than those in urban areas.¹ Hospital patients with window views where grass and trees are visible experience faster recoveries.² Students attending schools with green space perform better than those without.³ Short doses of nature—even images of it—can calm people down and sharpen their performance.⁴ In studies from Norway to South Korea, findings are the same: nature is the natural stress-buster.

Nature isn’t just pretty. MRI scans show that nature is good for the brain. When volunteers looked at scenes of nature, their anterior cingulate and insula are activated.⁵ These areas of the brain deal with empathy and altruism. Study after study shows that even pictures of natural environments can work wonders.

Unfortunately the opposite is also true: exposure to urban settings creates stress. The same study showed that urban scenes caused more blood flow in the amygdala.⁵ The amygdala processes the common “fight or flight” responses such as fear and anxiety.

Humans need exposure to forests, beaches, rivers, trees, and things that grow. We often find ourselves nature-starved without even knowing it.

In 2008 a major shift occurred. For the first time in human history, more humans live in cities than the countryside.⁶ In the US, over 80% of the population lives in urban areas, and in many other countries the percentage is greater.⁷ More people than ever find themselves living without easy access to a natural environment.

But as these studies show, the benefits of nature exist even when you’re not physically there. Remember that hospital patients only needed a view of trees and grass. The MRI volunteers were only shown pictures.

Experiencing the outdoors virtually will improve your emotional well-being. It can also reduce your chances of depression, anxiety, heart disease, migraines, and more.⁸ It has even been found to increase attentional capacity, positive emotions, and ability to reflect on a life problem.⁹

RELIEVE STRESS
AND GAIN AN
EDGE WITH THE
SKY TRIPPING APP.

Download Sky Tripping today and experience the peace and tranquility of immersive aerial videos in nature. DOWNLOAD TODAY»

Learn More

Sky Tripping offers stunning aerial views of some of the most beautiful places on Earth. The films include natural audio tracks which further maximize the stress-reducing benefits. Our users report a powerful relaxation effect and a decline in stress levels as they use our app. Sky Tripping is available in the App Store for iOS and the new Apple TV. Set daily reminders to take a short break while you reap the healing and restorative powers of nature.

Reducing stress is a worthwhile pursuit, but eliminating stressors isn’t enough. Preparing yourself for unforeseen challenges is the key to maintaining mental and physical wellness. Meditation, deep breathing, and walks in nature are all great options for managing stress. Tools like Sky Tripping give you the help you need to develop habits of calmness and focus — no matter what life throws at you.

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1. University of Exeter Medical School, 2014, see also: School of the Built Environment, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, 2013

2. Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences, Oslo, Norway, 2015

3. PNAS 2015

4. Matilda van den Bosch, Psychology & Behavior 118, May 2013

5. Korean Journal of Radiology, 2010

6. http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0112/p25s02-wogi.html

7. US Census Bureau

8. Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences, Oslo, Norway, 2015

9. Oberlin College, 2009