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Archive for May, 2010

Experts tell us we are what we eat. A disturbing thought when we consider how much sugar, fat and white flour is consumed daily, hidden in ready meals and fast foods. It’s time to change the bad habits we have developed over the last three decades and start eating to improve health, not destroy it!

A vital area of life that requires our attention is this….learning to answer hunger pains appropriately. If we neglect this, weight can increase and well-being may suffer.

Whether you need to lose weight, maintain weight or tone up your body; inappropriate eating habits can jeopardize your best efforts. This articles will help you start to understand how to manage hunger in a busy lifestyle.

If it’s sticky and sweet, made with sugar and saturated fat, then you must only eat it as a rare treat. Can the same be said for a delicious bowl of strawberries, or a juicy sweet orange? That is the problem here? Why do we choose cakes and chocolate over nature’s best offering?

If you do not have a genuine glucose imbalance, one cause perhaps is that sweet treats are deeply connected to our childhood, where frequently, ‘sweeteners’ were given as a reward for good behaviour, or to placate or console the unhappy child. Our memory will automatically associate sweet foods as a reward or a comfort. That bar of chocolate or sticky bun you devour mid-way through a stressful afternoon could be you rewarding yourself for hard work!

If you think you may be using sweet treats as a ‘reward’ or comfort and want to kick the habit, simply remember that putting on weight is NOT a reward. Then think of a reward that doesn’t involve food!

Guard yourself from the sweet snack attacks by being prepared and planning your day’s food patterns.

1. Incorporate protein in to your breakfast AND lunch. Protein is key to controlling carbohydrate cravings. The RDA of protein for women is 60 grams a day. For women wanting to lose weight, health professionals recommend approximately 100 grams of protein daily. Why? One of the principle advantages of protein is that it creates a feeling of fullness and satisfaction in the body that makes overeating much less likely. Source your protein from ultra lean sources so you don’t pick up unwanted calories and saturated fats.

Even better, than providing a sense of sustained fullness, protein can block the triggering effect that carbohydrates can have on the brain. If you eat protein with a carbohydrate it will reduce the cravings caused by eating the carbohydrate.

2. Never skip meals. Research has shown that people who skip meals are more prone to obesity than those who regularly eat 3 meals a day. In fact, people who space their daily food requirements by making appropriate use of healthy snacks do even better. Why is this? When you skip meals you are more likely to get hungry and fill up on easily obtained fast foods which are often trigger foods.

3. Drink 6 to 8 glasses of water throughout the day. For some people sugar laden soft drinks are a trigger food. Make sure you don’t get thirsty in the first place. Water creates a sense of fullness and has a host of other health benefits.

4. Plan the timing of your meals so that you don’t get hungry. Despite having three healthy meals a day, sometimes your work schedule can mean the spacing of those meals still does not guard against the carbohydrate cravings. If you have a long gap between meals, make sure you carry healthy snacks to cover the distance, otherwise hunger will set in

5. Plan your snacks. Plan out your weekly snack schedule with some delicious, healthy snacks. Purchase these with your weekly shopping so that you are fully prepared. If you need to, get up a few minutes earlier in the morning so you have time to prepare and take your snacks to work. Remember, healthy snacks don’t live in a vending machine! You are less likely to get hungry when you have a ready supply of healthy snacks.

6. Carry emergency supplies of nutritional protein bars in your handbag or brief case. When you feel a carbohydrate craving, eat the protein bar instead and wait 30 minutes before acting on the craving. More often than not the craving will pass and you will be in control again. This truly works.

There are many reasons why you may wish to lose body fat. Among the top are to simply look better and improve your overall health. Losing weight should always be regarded as a long term proposition. Quick weight loss plans can help you lose weight but will not give you the longer term results you crave and deserve.

I want “instant” not “fast”!

Fat will be lost in any diet where the calorific intake is lower than expenditure. However these “crash” diets and low-energy diets will result in a muscle loss in addition to the fat burned. It is estimated that the maximum fat a typical human body can burn in any one week is 2 pounds. This means that any weight loss over and above 2 lbs in a week will be mainly muscle or water.

Crash dieting slows down your metabolism . If you don’t eat enough food your ancient survival instincts take over and the body enters “starvation mode”. In this mode the metabolic rate slows to conserve energy and thus the speed at which weight is lost is reduced. Thus ultimately less fat is burned using “crash” methods.

In addition the body has lost muscle during this crash phase. Muscle burns calories and the more muscle, the more calories and burned. Crash dieting therefore delivers the double whammy of a drop in metabolic weight and a drop in calorie burning muscle tissue.

This is the reason why so many dieters who rely upon fad diets regain weight quickly after losing it. The only safe reliable and long term way to reduce weight is to do it over a period of time.

A gradual reduction in calories maintains muscle tissue, burns only fat and allows you to maintain a healthy lower weight in the future.

I was driving past the gym the other day and I was actually impressed at how full the building was with people diligently getting their workout for the day in. Perhaps it’s because it is summer time here in Los Angeles and everyone wants to look good for this time of the year.

Well, as motivating as this may be, and as much as I honestly applaud their efforts, I couldn’t help but wonder how many of these obviously dedicated people were concerned with not just the external appearance of health but the inside as well.

It is documented that people spend loads of money on the new weight-loss pill or supplement guaranteed to ‘make you eat less and increase your metabolism…’ and in spite of whatever side effects the product may contain, the average Joe, still thinks this quick fix will be worth the risk.

What most people fail to realize is most fitness experts and bodybuilders who may use or endorse such products have a tendency to atrophy and wear down prematurely as sooner or later, these bodies, enhanced by unnatural substances have a tendency to pretty much degenerate.

Sure everyone wants to have the six-pack and the toned arms and all, and that is fine and of course worth striving for if one so desires, however, what should be of more importance is how clean the inside of the body is. This determines perhaps more than is realized just how one feels and speaking of a six-pack, if one’s colon and visceral organs are free of excess weight and debris, naturally a decent looking mid-section will be evident. (Just food for thought)

The average person is constantly carrying 10-15 pounds of un-eliminated feces in their bowels. This in itself has a toxic effect on the blood stream. Experts in autopsy have stated that in 60-70% of the colons examined, foreign matter such as worms and decades old feces-stones have been found still present within.

Now, it’s not my intention to gross you out with the fact in the previous paragraph, but it is to hopefully make you realize how much more important it is to ensure that our insides are clean as we go about seeking to lose weight, at least the healthy way.

Now, it is important to know that healing properties, not the calories, as most diet fads state, is the main factor for choosing a diet for a safe and effective weight loss.

Therefore, fruits, some roots and mostly raw green leaf vegetables, which serve as nutrient giving items and intestinal brooms, should form the basis of a healthy diet when seeking to lose weight.

These substances will serve to naturally combat chronic constipation which is the main indication of a clogged up system. Moreover, these are the items that provide one with the most natural sources of vitamins, minerals and fuel for day to living and borrowing from a cosmic law of nature, since “you are what you eat”, it goes without saying that if you want a safe and healthy weight loss, these items are of course your best bet.

Sure, it is a great feeling to be able to see the awesome cuts in your ‘abs’ and arms when you look in the mirror, but feeling good on the inside as well and knowing that you are thoroughly cleansed internally should be of just as much importance as ‘getting ripped’ or slim.

Remember, the cleaner you are on the inside and the freer you are of toxicity the quicker you can and will attain your goal of being in shape.

Here’s to health and happiness.

Overview:

Low-cal diets and aerobics have been the typical “prescribed solution” to healthy weight loss. However, with numerous fad diets and a multi-billion dollar industry dedicated to weight management, shedding a few kilos should be easy. Sadly, the weight lost by dieters is almost always recouped. Consequently, many users fall into the “yo-yo trap,” a recurring cycle of weight loss and gain. There are several reasons why this occurs and why food restriction for the purpose of healthy weight loss should be circumvented. Each time the body is deprived of essential nutrients, whether from fasting or dieting, it guarantees survival by diminishing the metabolic rate in order to reimburse for fewer calories. Energy is stored so efficiently in fatty tissues that someone of normal weight can survive for weeks without eating.

Furthermore, the desire to binge after food restriction, although disheartening to dieters is another built-in survival mechanism intended to click on after a famine. Our cellular metabolism is too innocent to tell the difference between self-imposed starvation and life-threatening famine. One of the most healthy weight loss ways to treat obesity is to combine exercise with proper diet. It is not a matter of how much an individual eats, but what they eat is important. Rather than restrictive dieting, simply learning how to eat in a healthy and balanced way can have a major impact on weight control. Incorporating healthier eating habits into your lifestyle can improve your overall health and help you achieve a permanent and healthy weight loss.

Both natural alternative and conventional medicine agree that we should consume whole foods with less fat and animal protein, with the minimal amount of processed, adulterated, fried, or sweetened preservatives, and eat more complex carbohydrates, especially whole grains rich in fiber, and at least five servings daily of fruits and vegetables. Lowering dietary fat and increasing physical activity are the two key factors to realize healthy weight loss. Eating well-balanced meals at regular intervals during the day (usually four to five hours apart) stabilizes blood sugar and helps you manage your appetite.

Whole dietary fiber foods can have a major impact on weight gain as evident by the almost complete lack of obesity in cultures that consume a diet in fiber. Fiber has been shown to not only reduce serum cholesterol, but to also pull dietary fat from the body into the feces. Other benefits of roughage include increasing chewing time, thus slowing down the eating process and inducing satiety, preventing constipation and stabilizing blood glucose levels. Whole grains (wheat, oats, rice, rye, barley, millet) have the highest level of fiber, followed by legumes, nuts and seeds, root vegetables (potatoes, turnips, beets, carrots), fruits, and leafy, green vegetables.

To attain healthy weight loss alcohol should be shunned or minimized, since it has been found to act like a fat in the body and promote weight gain. Cigarettes, which are smoked by many people to control their weight, also appear to shove extra flab to the abdomen. Medical and scientific data also point to the advantages of moving towards a vegetable-based diet. A diet low in animal protein, along with exercise and stress-reduction measures, can actually reverse cardiovascular disease.

Summary:

Healthy weight loss yields a positive psychological gain, increases overall body fitness, tones the muscles and rouses self-confidence. Positive mental health is an essential part of the concept of total health. Healthy weight loss improves psychological health, which eventually, helps in sustaining the correct weight. It offers a general dietary and lifestyle pattern that favors weight maintenance even without strict calorie counting.

If you are looking into ways of how you can become fitter or how you can lose weight, this article may be of interest to you. It gives information and advice to help people to successfully lose weight and more importantly to keep this weight off in the long term.

I have had many issues with my own weight and have tried many different weight loss programs and diets. I have lost weight but then after only a short period of time, I would put all of the weight back on again.

A few years ago, I decided to try to reduce the amount I weighed yet again, but was determined that this time the fat would stay off. I had read many books on the subject of fitness and dieting and decided to follow some of the advice which I had learnt.

I wrote down all of the reasons I was trying to lose the excess fat. This is very important as it would be a constant reminder of what I am attempting to achieve and also about why I am attempting to achieve it. It would give me a huge motivation to stick to my weight loss plan. I would advise anybody who is also looking to lose weight to write a similar list as it proved to be very beneficial to me.

On my list I wrote about how I wanted to look and feel stronger and fitter. This I believed would help my self-confidence and self-esteem which were always fairly low. I had had enough of feeling ashamed of my weight and fat belly. I wanted to walk down the street feeling proud and assured.

I wanted to lose weight to avoid all the health problems that being obese can cause, as people become older. I am not sure about you but I rarely see a fat person who is in their seventies or eighties. I am hoping to live until a ripe old age and enjoy my retirement.

Next on my list was about the clothes I wear. Basically I am not able to buy the clothes I really want to as they do not really suit a person of my build. I often look at other people and am impressed with their clothes but then realise that they are a lot of thinner than I am. The clothes may look impressive on them but would not look the same if I wore them.

I also wanted to lose weight in order for me to look more attractive to members of the opposite sex. Being overweight I am sure has a bearing as to why I have not exactly been a stud in my life, well it is my excuse anyway.

The last reason on my list was about my general level of fitness. I love playing football and was a regular in the school football team. That was years ago, when ever I had played recently before writing this list, I had been out of breath after only about fifteen minutes. This was quite a shock for me and made playing the game far less fun and enjoyable. I wrote about how I would love to regain my fitness so that I could participate in this and other sports.

Once I had written my list, I would then read it on regular occasions and it would help me to keep motivated. I am not saying it was an easy road, however I eventually managed to obtain a weight that I was happy with. I am pleased to let you know that I have also been successful in keeping the weight off this time around.

In conclusion, if you are thinking about or hoping to lose some weight, I would recommend you to write a list of reasons why you are doing it. Keep these ideas in mind and if you start to be tempted by that fatty food, quickly read your list to remind you why you should ignore your temptations. Good luck.

There are a lot of people in the world who are trying to find ways to lose weight quickly. In this article I write about a simple diet that worked for me.

I have always had an ongoing battle with my own weight, however a few years ago I managed to lose those excess pounds.

I have always liked the wrong types of food and drinks and as a result have have always been on the large side. I have to be very careful what I eat as I seem to gain weight very easily. In my life I have tried many weight loss programs or diets, however I have always looked for a way of losing weight without having to resort to starving myself or by having to do huge amounts of exercise.

I am not sure if you are like me, but I have always been annoyed and frustrated with people who seem to be able to eat seemingly huge amounts of food, without getting fat. I am sure I eat half as much as these people but am still twice their size, it is not fair! That was until a couple of years ago.

I decided I needed to find my own weight loss program. I had to be realistic, I was aware that I did very little exercise and that I liked all of the wrong types of food. I loved the taste of fast food, this was only because of my busy lifestyle though. One of my biggest problems though was that I liked snack food, such as peanuts, chocolate and crisps. I also liked alcohol as this helped me to gain confidence.

I knew that most people would advise me to stop eating all of these fatty type foods, especially the pizzas and chips. They would also no doubt, advise me to join a gym and to go jogging every morning. Get real! Those gyms are full of thin people, if I go jogging I might get mugged, and I am sorry but life would not be worth living without my weekly pizza!

I decided that what I would do is to basically eat a healthy type breakfast, which would be cerial or toast. I would have a fairly light lunch, such as a sandwich, however for my evening meal I could eat whatever I wanted. The main thing and most difficult to implement would be the fact that I would be no longer eating between meals. The snacks had to go!. I am not trying to say that this was easy to do, however I had a need and was determined to lose weight.

For exercise I decided to leave the car at home, wherever possible, and walk to more places. I also started taking my children to the park more often. At the park we would play games such as football, cricket and baseball. It is amazing how much weight you can lose by having fun.

These things were what helped me to lose all of my weight and to reach a size I was happy with.