“Candida? What’s that?” I remember asking myself more than 26 years ago as I flipped through the pages of a Natural Awakenings magazine in Orlando. At the time, I was a curious reader, exploring new ideas about how the body can fall out of balance and what we can do to restore it. That curiosity played a role in leading me down a new professional path.

There was a local practitioner featured who talked about candida overgrowth and the many ways it can impact health. I had never heard of it. That one article sent me into the world of gut health, immune function, and natural healing approaches. I had no idea that this tiny organism would become the “starter culture” for everything that followed, including my decision a year later to publish this magazine.

Back then, integrative and functional medicine were just beginning to gain traction. But my mom was always health-focused and into in natural modalities, so it all just made sense to me. As Dr. Brent Bauer explains in The Power of Integrative Medicine: A Guide to Whole-Person Care [read at my-NA.com], the goal is to bring together conventional and evidence-based complementary therapies in ways that best serve each individual patient.

I like to think Natural Awakenings has helped move that conversation forward—one issue at a time. We’ve created space for people to learn, explore, and make informed choices that feel right for them. In this issue, Dean Mitchell shares how addressing candida begins with restoring balance in the microbiome and supporting the whole body, rather than simply chasing symptoms [page 24].

Speaking of starter yeast, Soulful Sourdough: Why This Bread Still Heals explores how every good loaf begins with a living starter, making this ancient bread both gut-friendly and deeply grounding [page 20]. Intergenerational Living: A Healing Model for Families and Communities looks at the healing wisdom shared through family connections [page 26], and Big Dreams, Little Hands: Vision Boards and Focus Wheels That Nurture Childhood Development offers creative tools to nurture emotional growth in children [page 16]. 

You’ll find more inspiration online at my-NA.com, including Strong for Life: The Power of Functional Fitness, which focuses on functional movement for daily life, and Holistic Health From Nose to Tail: Whole-Pet Strategies for Optimized Well-Being, a reminder that whole-body wellness applies to our animal companions too.

Here’s to another year of learning, listening, and supporting whole-person health.

Kris Urquhart, Publisher