Our smarty pants brains have built us an amazing world of skyscrapers, airplanes, sex tapes, and Targ-ette. This quick communication world filled with instant gratification is truly amazing, but sometimes sucks the spirit out of our pretty and leaves it a sticky facade of Orgasm blush and Addict lip gloss.

Keeping in touch with the basic elements of the planet keep us calmer, more grounded, and better able to radiate that beauty from within to be and look exactly how we want. Last night a summer storm rained down outside and the sound felt so nice. I slept the best I have in weeks and woke up ready to (happily) get some shit done.

Earth: Eat food that grew from it! Fresh foods filled with tasty nutrients grow happy, pretty people. Take some time to ride out of the city or take a stroll through your local forest every once and a while to tap into the smells and sounds of the Earth too.

Air: Take a couple minutes to learn to breath deep into the lungs. Put a hand on your tummy and practice inhaling and exhaling until your feel the rise and fall of the breath on your tummy, not your chest. Open a window once in a while and let the fresh air blow through those fluorescent-light grown fake plastic weeds in your brain. Chill at a park while feeling the breeze blow over your skin or ride a bike to feel the wind through your hair.

Water: Drink it. Soda and other bottled substances are just fine in moderation, but the majority of your hydration should come from water. Water is also such a calming element to enjoy, from taking a bath or swim to buying one of those trickle fountain things. Water is my favorite element and it’s kind of cheating, but I downloaded some of those creek, ocean, and rain sounds to listen to at night for when it’s not really raining.

Fire: Keeping in touch with the elements of the planet should light a fire under your ass to make you want to be the person you feel you were meant to be! But in addition to that, lighting a candle for dinner or sitting by the fire place in the winter are really nice ways to bring fire (safely) into your daily experience.

A great way to jam-pack all the elements into a weekend is to go camping this late summer or early fall. From beaches to mountainous creeks, there’s tons of camping locals all over the country for a quick, fun, cheap, and sometimes exciting mini-break.