HOLIDAY GIVING GUIDE

The Heart of Gathering is a collage of a deer antler, tulip poplar seed pod, lichen, burning bush leaves spiceberry shells and hydrangea captured by Lancaster, PAbased artist Erica Millner. Millner specializes in wood, silver and brass jewelry, vibrant acrylic paintings and colorful murals. Her creative talents also show up in the culinary arena with food preparation, presentation and photography. See her work and connect with Millner at MioStudio.com.

by Sheila Julson

David A. Schwartz, DDS, offers general procedures including cleanings, fillings and cosmetic dentistry. His unique physiologic-based dentistry (PBD) approach focuses on returning the body to a natural state so it can heal and function properly.

PBD identifies how pain and headaches relate to a pathologic occlusion, or bad bite, often from improper jaw positioning. The doctor considers how physiology—the study of how living things and their parts function together—affects joint and jaw position, along with how muscles interconnect with the whole body.

Schwartz developed an interest in the profession during the eighth grade after he attended a dentistry presentation at a career day event. “Some kids have no idea what they want to do with their lives, but I knew I wanted a career where I could use my mind and my hands,” he recalls. “I felt that dentistry would be a great option.”

It was around that time that he learned that his paternal grandfather, who died before Schwartz was born, was a dentist. Schwartz earned a Bachelor of Science degree from Penn State in 1986 and went on to study dentistry at the New York University College of Dentistry, graduating with a Doctor of Dental Surgery degree in 1990.

After his licensure, Schwartz joined Dr. Ray Haslam’s practice in Hamburg, Pennsylvania. Haslam practiced mercury-free dentistry, an uncommon practice in 1990. “I hadn’t been trained that way, but Dr. Haslam convinced me that mercury wasn’t as safe as believed. I had an open mind, and thankfully, I did,” Schwartz says.

Schwartz later launched his own practice on August 1, 1994. A decade later, he learned about neuromuscular dentistry, an approach that focuses on the teeth, muscles, nerves and joints, and how they interconnect with whole body health. Through the Las Vegas Institute (LVI) of Advanced Dental Studies, Schwartz studied neuromuscular dentistry, later defined and differentiated by LVI as PBD.

“With PBD, we measure everything we can at today's level of knowledge to ensure we know where we are starting, and guide us to where the person needs to go. Traditional

dentistry makes a guess at the end point and hopes it will fix the issues,” Schwartz explains. “We find the reason and rationale behind oral health issues. We look at how posture affects airways, which is all related to growth and development.”

Oral health begins with the basics: exams, cleaning and tooth restoration using ceramic, non-metal fillings and materials. From there, Schwartz spends additional time with patients doing screenings and risk assessment.

Crooked or misaligned teeth can eventually affect the muscles and the jaw, Schwartz points out, leading to migraines, sleep disorders and temporomandibular joint disorder (TMJ). Schwartz has some of the latest technology that he uses in all of his work when treating headaches, TMJ and for corrective cosmetic dentistry and orthodontics.

“When we are able to put the pieces together and get to the root cause, we can set patients on the right path and start healing them,” Schwartz says. “I take time to talk to people and dive down to find root causes and make recommendations so they won’t need the same treatment in a different spot in the mouth a couple of ä years down the road.”

Schwartz says practicing PBD makes his heart sing. “Sometimes people choose to spend their money on a new car or clothes, but forget there are so many systemic illnesses that begin in the mouth. Gum infections can mean greater risk for stroke, diabetes, cancer or inflammatory disease. When we detect inflammation in the mouth, we can have the ability to control a great risk. A lot of it is treatable, and being a dentist, I’m on the front lines and can help people control these things.”

David A. Schwartz

David A. Schwartz, DDS, is located at 701 Jefferson Blvd., in West Lawn. For appointments and more information, call 610-670-6910 or visit SchwartzFamilyDental. com. See ads, pages 10 and 51.

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Marge Torchia, CRNP Peter Hurtubise, DO Lori Martin, BCNP

2435 Old Philadelphia Pike • Smoketown, PA 17576

by Martin Miron

Swamini Shraddhananda Saraswati is the co-founder and director of the nonprofit Kula Kamala Foundation & Yoga Ashram spiritual school of yoga, located for the last seven years in a 21,000-square-foot former elementary school in Alsace Township. A staff comprising three full-time and two part-time employees provides classes, courses and retreats in spiritual education, yoga and meditation, as well as professional training in yoga, yoga therapy, spiritual leadership and Ayurveda. There are also several independent teachers and volunteers that assist with day-to-day operations.

Saraswati holds degrees and certificates from academic and non-academic realms. About how walking the path of peace has inspired her life, she says, “I have taken the time to become deeply educated in the humanities, environmentalism, ecology, spiritualism, religion, psychology and mindfulness. I have educated myself in such a way that I find it easy to meet people where they are. I strive to listen consciously, to hold a compassionate space for students, clients and community members. I hold myself accountable. I strive to abide in the ethics I teach, from non-violence to non-grasping, and from contentment to devotion. I do not ask anything of anyone that I myself am not willing to do. I have faith in our individual and combined capacity to embrace a healing path and to heal. I am unapologetic in my faith in unity. I feel it is important to inspire people through example. I try to be very honest as to my own flaws and work to improve them. I do not dictate anything to anyone, I am not trying to ‘sell you’ on it. Yoga is powerful in its own right. I am simply inviting everyone to see for themselves.”

She cites the Bhagavad Gita, the Devi Mahatmya, and “any spiritual scripture that teaches our essence to be whole, to be based in love and peace and to be realized through unity” as major influences. Saraswati professes, “My personal mission is to walk the path of peace and share it with everyone I encounter: first, by continuing the healing journey of my own life traumas; second, to hold space for the healing journey of others; third, to serve the wellbeing of others where I am able.”

As a child, Saraswati wanted to understand the existence of everything from bugs and snakes to stars and galaxies. “I longed to know the source and the purpose of everything,” she says. “The idea of life itself intrigued me. I would spend hours reading encyclopedias and conducting ‘research’ that tracked the migration of birds, as well as the cooperative work of ants. I was taken by people’s stories. I wanted to know and understand where they came from, what they experienced in life, and what their dreams were. Why were we connected? How? For what purpose? I also loved to see people smile. I felt there was an unexplained bigger picture, which now I understand to be the sacred nature of existence itself.”

She shares, “My spiritual calling to know the Goddess, the Divine Mother, came at a very early age. Raised Catholic, I would sit in church in front of Mother Mary for what seemed like hours at a time. I would talk to her and felt in my heart she was listening and nourishing me. She has had a lot to share with me... As I grew up, my interests focused in the humanities and I eventually became an anthropologist/archaeologist. My studies were diverse. They explored powerbased relationships and food acquisition, gender roles and rituals, and human relationships to animals. My love for the Divine Mother, for people, animals, and all beings ... for the Earth herself, has led me to be where I am and to do the work I do today.”

As for the future, Saraswati shares, “I hope to be empowered to continue the work I am doing, to grow it into new areas and communities. I hope to teach more and more people about the path of peace, wellness and happiness. The reason I am called to follow this path is that the world has a yet untapped potential to nourish and support each and every one of us. Ninety percent of our suffering is unnecessary and can be avoided. That means there is within each of us a great potential to experience a lot more peace and happiness.”

The Kula Kamala Foundation & Yoga Ashram is located at17 Basket Rd., in Reading. For more information or to donate, call 484-509-5073, email Study@KulaKamala Foundation.org or visit KulaKamala Foundation.org. See ads, pages 4 and 54.

The American Academy of Pediatrics has long recommended that children between the ages of 6 and kaliantye/AdobeStock.com 12 years obtain nine to 12 hours of sleep per night for optimal health, yet kids are regularly getting less than this recommended amount. In a recent study published in The Lancet, researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine investigated how insufficient sleep affects children’s behavioral problems, mental health, cognition, brain function and brain structure over a period of two years. They concluded that children that get less than nine hours of sleep per night have notable differences in brain regions that influence memory, intelligence and well-being compared to those that get more than nine hours. As kids’ schedules get busier and they spend more time in front of screens, their average sleep time has decreased. According to the researchers, such insufficiencies in early adolescence can lead to long-lasting neurocognitive consequences.

Getting lost in our thoughts may improve problem solving, increase creativity, enhance imagination and provide a better sense of sergign/AdobeStock.com self-worth. But in the digital age, with immediate and satisfying input at a finger’s tap, it is possible to be “solitude deprived,” says Cal Newport, a computer science professor at Georgetown University and author of Digital Minimalism. In a recent study in the Journal of Experimental Psychology, psychologists asked a group of more than 250 university students to sit and wait in a quiet room without doing anything. Researchers found that the students underappreciated their enjoyment and engagement of “just thinking” and instead favored technology-driven distractions like internet news-checking. The results suggest an inherent difficulty in accurately assessing how engaging just thinking can be, and may explain why people prefer keeping themselves busy rather than taking a moment for reflection and imagination in their daily lives.

The idea that depression is caused by a chemical imbalance—specifically, a serotonin deficiency—has been popular and influential since the 1960s, leading to the wide use of antidepressants. A recent multiinstitution study led by the University of Reading, in the UK, and published in Molecular Psychiatryhas debunked this theory. The researchers did a systematic review of studies on the topic and found no convincing evidence of an association between serotonin and depression, and no support for the hypothesis that depression is caused by lowered serotonin activity or concentrations. The serotonin theory of depression has historically provided convincing justification for the use of antidepressants and may discourage people from discontinuing treatment, potentially leading to lifelong dependence on such drugs.

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