Improve your Posture!

 

Whether your at home or at school poor posture can affect you! Here are some tips to correct it before you experience long term pain!

Weight lose tips

Making small changes to your lifestyle could really pay off! Drinking water instead of soda, could help you to lose up to 15 pounds a year! Check out all the other cool things you can do too!

Health and Fitness

 

Today people are being pressured to lose weight. If you just want to lose a few pounds or many here are some tips for success. 

Vitamins and Minerals

Today most people know that vitamins and minerals are an essential in maintaining a healthy diet. But what most people don't know what foods the vitamins come from. Here is a simple picture that showcases what food provides each vitamin/mineral. If you are lacking one, just look at this chart, and eat more of that specific food. Good luck on consuming your vitamins and minerals!

Foods to avoid

Certain junk foods are notorious for being high in calories, fat and sodium, but what many people forget is that the are other types of processed foods that are just as harmful to a person's health and waistline. Unlike candy, chips and cookies, some processed foods can be disguised as foods that are good for you. Many even claim to be a good addition to your diet when, in reality, they are providing poor nutrition and helping to create bad eating habits.

The first step to creating a healthier diet is to find out which processed foods are the worst for you and stay away from them whenever possible. The following are some of the top processed foods to avoid.

Margarine
Though it was once touted as a healthy alternative to butter, margarine isn't good for you by any means. Margarine has tons of hydrogenated oils and trans fat. Too much could increase triglycerides and raise your bad cholesterol levels. Use real butter instead (and try to do so sparingly). Even better, use olive oil whenever you can as a substitute.

Soda
Soda is one of the worst processed products out there because it offers almost no nutritional value. In addition, regular sodas are loaded with added sugar and can cause weight gain or even metabolic syndrome. Water is your best drink option. If you crave more flavor, have the occasional glass of juice or add some citrus or cucumber to your water.

Frozen Dinners
Frozen dinners may seem like a convenient and easy way to serve a meal, but the trade-off is that you'll be consuming lots of fats, especially trans fats. They also tend to contain MSG, which has been linked to health problems like Alzheimer's and mood swings. Use fresh foods to create meals instead whenever you can for better flavor and a healthier meal.

White Bread
Bread can be good for you -- if it's made from whole grains, that is. White bread (along with white flour, rice and pasta) is made with refined whole grains that have lost most of their nutrients. Buy products made from 100 percent whole grains instead.

Canned Soup
Some canned soups seem like a healthy choice, especially when they contain lots of veggies. However, most canned soups are loaded with sodium and have a high fat content, making them an unhealthy option for a meal or side. Instead, try making your own soups at home. You can easily make a large batch and then freeze extra servings for convenient use later on.

Processed Meats
Processed meats are one of those foods that can really seem like a healthy choice, at first, but in reality they are also bad for you. In fact, eating processed meats can increase your risk of certain types of cancer. They are also high In sodium, saturated fats and calories, which is bad news for blood pressure levels. Processed meats include hot dogs, sausage, ham, bologna and packaged lunch meats. Substitute processed deli meats with fresh cuts of meat from a deli or butcher whenever possible.

Potato Chips
Potato chips are one of the worst offenders for processed foods. They are bad for your health and may increase your risk of becoming obese. They're also a light, salty snack that people tend to overeat. Try unsalted nuts for a healthier snack, or at the very least choose baked varieties of chips rather than traditional potato chips.

Boxed Meal Mixes
Like frozen dinners, boxed meal mixes can seem like a great way to make a healthy meal more convenient to make. However, these boxed foods are also bad for your health because they lack many of the nutrients that fresh foods contain. In addition, most have added sodium and fat. Use fresh ingredients instead and learn to use herbs and spices to bring flavor to your meals naturally.

Canned Pasta
Canned spaghetti, ravioli and other pastas are not healthy for you. They're loaded with additives, sodium and fat, which doesn't compensate for their convenience. Make fresh whole-grain pasta instead. For an even healthier meal, make your own sauce from scratch.

Cookies
Most of the cookies, cakes and other sweet packaged snacks you'll find on the shelf are unhealthy. They have too much sugar and are made with refined flour. This is a no-brainer, but some people mistakenly believe that making their own at home with common flour is better. Unfortunately, common flour is also refined. To make healthier sweet snacks, bake cookies with whole-grain flour instead.

Keep in mind that not every processed food is a bad one. For example, some cereals and juices have added vitamins, minerals or fiber which helps to fill nutrition gaps in our diets. Just make sure that you pay attention to all of the ingredients and nutrition data information on any processed food you choose (a fiber-enriched cereal isn't great for you if it also contains tons of sugar). In moderation, certain "good" processed foods can be acceptable in a balanced diet.

Article Pulled from here.

metabolism

Are you familiar what your metabolism is ? If not, here is a great picture that explains a great overview!

Rules for running

The 10-Percent Rule
Increase weekly training mileage by no more than 10 percent per week.

The 2-Hour Rule
Wait for about two hours after a meal before running.

The 10-Minute Rule
Start every run with 10 minutes of walking and slow running, and do the same to cool down.

The 2-Day Rule
If something hurts for two straight days while running, take two days off.

The Conversation Rule
You should be able to talk in complete sentences while running.

A recent study found that runners whose heart and breathing rates were within their target aerobic zones could comfortably recite the Pledge of Allegiance. Those who couldn't were running faster than optimal.

The Left-Side-Of-The-Road Rule
To keep safe, run facing traffic.

The New-Shoes Rule
Replace running shoes once they've covered 400 to 500 miles.

The 10-Degree Rule
Dress for runs as if it's 10 degrees warmer than the thermometer actually reads

For the full article click here.

How to avoid processed foods

Avoid Boxes, Bags and Cans

Obviously, if something comes pre-packaged, it has been touched. Commonly, food manufacturers dehydrate, bleach, enrich salt, sweeten, and fatten food to compensate for the nutrition lost during the process it took to put the food into the box. Though boxed, canned and frozen foods are very convenient, they're not healthy for you in the long run.

For example, white bread barely contains any natural nutrition. The vitamins found in it, as well as the sugar and salt, are added back after they are stripped during processing.
A better solution is to purchase whole-wheat bakery bread that is made fresh at the store—it's more likely to be made from natural products.

Stay Away From Anything White

What does white bread, white rice and white all have in common? Bleached and enriched wheat flour or grain. These are some of the most highly processed foods on the planet. Though naturally white things like potatoes and eggs are fine, the food manufacturers really modify wheat flour and rice in these products.

To create the white appearance, the flour or grain (rice) is bleached. This process strips all of the fiber and nutrients from the grain, and thus the taste.  In order to make the food product "nutritious", the manufacturer adds fiber and vitamins, most of which your body will not absorb because they're not naturally occurring. A lot of sugar, salt and trans fats are also added to bring back the flavor.
Your best bet is to buy products that are whole-grain, and contain unbleached, unenriched grains like whole wheat, brown rice, oats or quinoa.

Shop on the Outside Edge of the Store

One of the easiest places to find unprocessed, healthy, whole foods is to purchase most of your groceries on the outside edge of the store. The edges are where you'll find produce, meat, eggs, dairy and seafood. These items are not processed, or if they are, they're minimally processed.
Of course, you will need to go into the center isles for some things, but staying on the outside of the store for most of your shopping will keep your cart full of nutrient-dense foods.

Don't Buy It If...

If the Label has More Than Five Ingredients

The more ingredients the food has in it, the more it has been processed. For example, look at Quaker Oats, their oatmeal in 1910 only had one ingredient—oats. By 2008, Quaker Oats had added sugars, unnatural fiber (guar gum), flavors, salt and trans fats to their Instant Oatmeal in an attempt to keep up with the flavorful times.

Though both are oatmeal, the 1910 version is far more nutritious than the 2008. It contains natural carbohydrates (not sugar), natural fiber (not synthetic), and needs no preservatives (instead of salt). The one ingredient is only oats, and you can still find the 1910 Oatmeal on shelves in stores today.

If Any of the First Three Ingredients End in "Ose"

 "Ose"  stands for sugar. Many sugars used in the food industry are highly processed, high in calories and are really bad for you. Sugar is added back into foods when the food is processed so much that the flavor is removed. One of the easiest ways to add flavor is to add sugar. A natural and unprocessed food like fruit or oatmeal (the slow-cooked kind) should hold their natural flavor and not need added sugars.

If the Food Label Is Not Clear

What language is the food label written in? Are they real foods or chemical descriptions? Are you eating a color? This is a big question to ask yourself when you read the food label. Healthy, whole-food is just that, food. If you have to ask yourself what is actually in the food you are eating, it's mainly man-made.

If You Have a Coupon

Cheap food is just that—cheap. If it doesn't cost much to make the food, it does not cost much to buy the food. Most likely there is not much nutritional quality to the food because it doesn't have quality ingredients, like whole grains or natural meats.

Article found here.

Target Weight

Are you where you should be? I know i'm not. But I know with time I may. I've lost 50 pounds. That's a great start right? :)

Water Intake Facts

 

All the great reasons you should be drinking water daily! 

Check it out!