5 Tips for Effective Weight Loss

If you are trying to lose weight, here are five weight loss tips that will help you get on the right track – and just as important -stay there.

1) Get enough sleep every night

A lot of people seem to think that sleep is just for babies and kids. As an adult, it is just as important to get the proper amount of sleep every night. I know life can be busy – trust me, I do! It’s important to make sleep a priority, since it allows you to get the energy you need for exercise. When you are sleeping, your body naturally creates a hormone that regulates your appetite for the next day. This means that if you have enough rest each night, you are less likely to crave and munch on unhealthy snacks.

Did you know? With the right type of exercise, such as Interval Training, you actually end up burning the most calories from fat when you are at a resting state, such as when you are sleeping. If that doesn’t convince you to get enough shut-eye, I don’t know what will!

Getting enough sleep each night is the first step to successful weight loss.

2) Replace all – or most – of your drinks with Water 

Liquids are one of the easiest and fastest ways to down calories, and before you know it, you have over done it. It may not be easy at first, but if you are serious about your weight loss, you should swap the soda, coffee, alcohol, and sugary juices with water. Easier said than done, I know. What I also know is this: The healthy benefits of ditching the other drinks for more water is worth it.

If you are looking for more flavor than water, you can try herbal tea that has no caffeine in it. This is a great way to enjoy flavor, benefit from the healthy herbs, without any unnecessary calories. Herbal teas tend to be zero calories.

3) Make exercise a part of your regular routine

Exercising needs to be a part of your life. Something that you just “do” rather than continually think about doing. Doing and thinking about doing are two very different things!

If you make exercise a habit, or in other words, a part of your life, you will eventually lose the weight and keep it off. A big reason why people who lose weight and gain it all back  is because they stop doing the healthy habits that got them there in the first place.

You shouldn’t wake up every morning asking yourself whether you should workout or not. Get in the mind set that exercise is just something you do every day (or on a regular basis), and it’s not a choice. Come up with an exercise schedule and stick to it, even after you have reached your weight loss goals. You may be able to turn the workout intensity down a notch or two, but exercise shouldn’t be completely eliminated once you are done losing weight.

Exercise should be enjoyable for you. If you hate running, you should consider swimming instead. If you like to dance, sign up at a dance studio and shake those hips! If you are hating the exercise you are doing, you need to find a new exercise that will be more enjoyable. Exercise may not be easy, but you shouldn’t hate it.

4) Fuel your body with healthy food

First of all, if you want to lose weight, you must eat. Don’t skip meals, and don’t starve yourself. That’s not the answer if you are trying to effectively lose weight and remain healthy. In fact, if you skip meals, your body tends to hold on to it’s fat reserves,where it will be almost impossible to lose your excess fat.

Here are some tips to eat healthy, and start losing weight:

Eat fresh fruits and vegetables throughout the day. This is your new snack food, so ditch the Fiber One bars and start eating real food!

Eat healthy protein sources such as beans, fish, chicken, and raw nuts.

Start eating healthy carbohydrates, since this is a major source of fuel that your body with use for energy during your workouts. You can ditch the refined and processed breads, such as white bread, since it actually makes you gain fat – especially in the stomach area.

Stop baking or eating foods that contain processed sugar, corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, or artificial sweeteners. These types 0f processed sugars turns into fat and usually lands in the stomach area, just like processed breads.  I know that this one if a major change for most people – myself included – but I believe the healthy benefits are well worth the effort to eat healthier. If it helps, remember that processed sugars turns into fat that ends up around the abdominals, which doesn’t help with your goal of flat abs, does it?

In addition to eating healthy food, find out how many calories you need every day, and how many you should eat for weight loss. If your body burns more calories than you consume in a single day, you will lose weight. If you aren’t eating enough calories though, you end up going into “starvation mode” and stop losing weight. It’s all about finding the right balance.

5) Don’t go on a “Diet”

There are more overweight and obese individuals now than ever before. Are we lacking in diets? There are thousands of diets out there for you to choose from! The reason why diets don’t work is because most people are looking at diets as a “get thin quick” scheme, and it just doesn’t work that way.

If you are looking to lose weight and actually keep it off, ditch the “diet” and adopt a healthy lifestyle that you will continue, even after you are done with your weight loss journey.

More than 5

You can definitely lose weight with more than just these five weight loss tips, but I thought I would narrow the list down to these very important five items. You have to start somewhere, right?

Some of these tips may have been a “duh” moment for you. I’ll let you in on a little secret. There is no secret to weight loss. Yes, there are certainly some strategies that are more effective than others, but for the most part, you know what you need to do to be healthier and lose weight, if needed.

Now that this was a nice little reminder on how to lose weight (or just be healthier!), it’s time you do something about it. Knowledge is useless without action.

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Tags: diet, exercise, Fitness, Healthy Food, Nutrition, sleep, water, Weight Loss

Healthy 72 Hour Backpacks

In case of an emergency, it’s smart to plan ahead so you will have some basic supplies available to you and your family. You may decide you want more than just a 72 hour backpack, but the backpack is still a great way to help you get started with some emergency preparedness essentials.

You can buy your own 72 hour backpack that has most everything in it, but a lot of them come with unhealthy food (lots of sodium, sugar, etc.), so I have come up with a list of items you may want to include for you and your family.

The items listed below are meant for one adult.

Water

This is one of the most important things you can have in any emergency kit. You can survive up to three weeks without food, but you can only survive three days without water. Because you never know what you will need your 72 hour backpack for, it’s important that you prepare the best you can.

Plan on needing at least 8 cups (64 ounces) of water each day. Since this is for a 72 hour backpack (3 days), you should pack 24 cups (192 ounces) of water. If you can carry more water, that would be ideal.

Food

In the event of an emergency, you need to provide your body with as much nutrients as possible, versus loading up on sugar and sodium. Here are some ideas on what you may want to consider packing in your own 72 Hour Backpack.

• Fruit such as Raisins and Fruit Leathers that have no added sugars.

• Food Bars such as LaraBar® or CLIF® Bar

• Protein such as Jerky, Nutrition Bites, or unsalted mixed Nuts or seeds.

• Gum and/or Mints.

I have a reminder set for every six months so that I can rotate my food out before it expires. Buy food that you already eat and enjoy!

First Aid

You never know what you will need, so plan for the worst and hope for the very best. In addition to supplies, it would be helpful to have safety instruction as well, such as CPR training.

• Standard First Aid Kit

• Prescription Medications and Vitamins

Helpful Supplies

In addition to having a sturdy backpack that can carry everything, there are some supplies that you may want to consider packing in your 72 Hour Backpack, depending on space available and how heavy the items are.

• Flashlight

• Radio (battery operated )

• Batteries

• Flares

• Water-Proof Matches

• Whistle

• Dust mask

• Swiss Army knife

• Toothbrush and toothpaste

• Sturdy shoes, a change of clothes, and a warm hat

• Emergency Blanket

• Extra prescription eye glasses, hearing aid, or other vital personal items

Special Circumstances

If you have a child that is too young to carry their own backpack, make sure you include their food and water in your own 72 hour backpack.

Very young baby’s may need a formula and a bottle, or baby food available to them in case of an emergency. Plan ahead, and update your backpack to fit the needs of your families.

Get Started Today

You can start putting your 72 Hour Backpack together today. There are plenty of resources that can help you learn about what additional items you will want to add to your 72 Hour Backpacks. I just touched on mainly the food and water portion of the backpack, but there is so much more than is involved with putting your backpack together. Start small, and work your way up.

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Tags: 72 hour backpack, emergency preparedness, First Aid, Food, Healthy, water

Benefits of Interval Training

We all know that exercise is essential for controlling blood sugar, normalizing insulin levels, and getting or staying in shape. There are different techniques that can help you exercise, and Interval Training is one of them.

What is Interval Training?

Rather than just doing cardiovascular exercise, Interval Training is a type of physical training which involves bursts of high intensity work and then followed by periods of lower intense workouts.

Interval Training can be used with different types of exercise methods, such as running, stair climbing or cycling.

Most adults should be able to handle this type of exercise, but if you have a known heart condition, you should see a doctor (cardiologist) first to give you the clear to start incorporating Interval Training into your exercise routine.

How to Incorporate Interval Training

During your Exercise:

1)  Choose an exercise  such as the treadmill, stationary bike, elliptical machine.

2) Warm up.

3) Exercise: Workout at an intense pace for 30 seconds, then recover with a lower intensity for 90 seconds.

4) Rinse and repeat for 8 sets, for a total of 16 minutes.

5) Cool down.

Important: You can do Interval Training one or two times per week in replacement of your regular exercises during the week. You shouldn’t do Interval Training more than two times per week, due to the extreme intensity and strain that is placed on the body. As Interval Training can be very healthy for you, you don’t want to over train, since this increases your risk of injury.

Before/After  your Exercise:

Sleep! You need to be well rested to maximize the benefits of your workout.

Drink plenty of Water . Don’t drink soda (especially diet), sugary juices, or vitamin water.

Eat a well-balanced diet, and be sure that you are consuming a proper amount of calories. It’s very important that you stop eating Junk Food and Candy! Proper nutrition is vital for exercise, especially when you perform an intense workout such as Interval Training. Sugar and grease are the last things your body needs.

What sets Interval Training Apart

Improves Aerobic Capacity – Helps to increase the length of workouts and at varying intensities.

Boosts Fat Burning – With the intense workouts mixed in with regular paced exercises, most people will notice a decrease in body fat.

Increases HGH – Interval Training helps to increase the Human Growth Hormone (HGH), which is a natural growth hormone which aides muscle strength.

Boosts Metabolism – Interval Training helps with burning fat throughout the day by increasing your metabolism.

Start seeing the results of a healthier lifestyle with Interval Training! Who’s ready to start?

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Tags: Aerobic Exercise, boost metabolism, Boosts Metabolism, cardioligist, cardiovascular health, cool down, diet, elliptical machine, exercise, Fat Burning, fat loss, Fitness, Healthy Diet, Healthy Eating, HGH, Human Grown Hormone, intense workout, Interval Training, Nutrition, stationary bike, treadmill, warm up, water

Treatments for Dry Skin

There are several reasons you can end up with  dry skin. Depending on the severity of your dry skin, you can end up with the ever annoying itchy skin or sadly suffer from cracks and bleeding skin.

I’ve listed some some easy ways you can naturally treat your dry skin, and if you have cracked or dry skin…please act sooner rather than later.

Lather up

Dry skin can be easily relieved by lotion or aloe vera gel (known fact, right? Read on…).

Lotion is an immediate relief to dry skin, but it doesn’t necessarily resolve the underlying issue. It’s important to find a lotion that is all natural and paraben-free. The only way to know if your lotion of choice is really safe is to read the labels.

Stay Hydrated

A sign of dehydration is dry skin, so be sure to drink plenty of water every day.  Avoid sugary or caffeinated drinks, since these types of drinks don’t quench your thirst since they cause you to become dehydration.

Get more Fat

Yeah, you read that correctly. One of the reasons why you might be having dry skin is because you aren’t consuming enough healthy fat. One way you can do this is by eating foods that are high in Omega 3, such as Salmon, flaxseed, walnuts, and even coconut oil.

Humidifier

The lack of humidity, especially common in the Winter months, is definitely a cause for dry and itchy skin. I suggest that you have a humidifier in your bedroom to allow your skin to get moisturized throughout the night.

Now that you know how to take care of your dry skin, you can enjoy your healthy and hydrated Skin – all year long!

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Tags: coconut oil, dry skin, fat, flaxseed, healthy fat, humidifier, hydtrated, itchy skin, lotion, Omega 3, salmon, walnuts, water

Healthy Tips for Thanksgiving

Here are some healthy tips to help you survive on Thanksgiving Day…

Exercise

A great way to start your Thanksgiving day is to exercise. If you plan on consuming more calories because of this traditional high calorie meal, a hearty workout will be very beneficial for you, including your waistline.

Exercise is a great way to start your day, which can also help you maintain healthy choices throughout the day.

You may want to focus on an cardiovascular workout, such as swimming, jogging, or using an elliptical machine. All would be great ways to burn a lot of calories for the day.

Drink Water

Just like any other day, it is important to drink plenty of water to keep your body hydrated. A benefit to drinking enough water is that you eat less than you would if you were dehydrated, which helps keep you full so you don’t overeat.

Healthy Snacks

Snacking throughout the day is great – only if you munch on healthy foods like fruits and vegetables. Remember that Pumpkin pie is a dessert, not a healthy snack to curb your appetite.

Portion Control

Did you know that the average Thanksgiving meal can be 2,000 calories or more? The reason for this isn’t necessarily for what is being eaten, but how much of it is eaten. Be sure to eat a healthy breakfast and snacks before your Thanksgiving Lunch or Dinner. This way, it won’t feel like this is the first and only meal you have had all week.

Healthy Thanksgiving Meal…Mostly!

Be sure to fill your plate with mostly healthy foods rather than piling it with high calorie, fattening, or sugary foods. This way you still get to enjoy some of your favorite traditional food without over indulging.

Remember that treats like candied yams should remain a treat and not become the main course.

Satisfied, not Full

Thanksgiving meal isn’t a race to see who can eat the most in the shortest amount of time. Like any other meal, you shouldn’t continue eating after you are satisfied.

To avoid this painful scenario, be sure to follow these tips:

• Start with just a small amount of food on your plate. If you put a lot of food on your plate from the start, you are more likely to finish your plate, even if you are completely satisfied or full. If you finish your small plate of food and you are still hungry, go ahead and add more food to your plate. It’s easier to add food to your plate later than to test your self control.

• Eat slowly!  It takes about 15 to 20 minutes before your stomach realizes that it is “full”.  At that point, the sick feeling of overeating is unavoidable. It’s Thanksgiving, and it’s OK to eat slowly and enjoy your family and friends.

• Stop eating once you are “Satisfied”. This is a signal that your body gives you letting you know that you have enough food.

Enjoy your family and friends, and have a Healthy Thanksgiving!

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Tags: cardiovascular, drink water, elliptical machine, exercise, Healthy, healthy meal, Healthy Snacks, holiday, jogging, low calorie, portion control, satisfied, small plate, snacks, swimming, Thanksgiving, water, workout