Archive for February, 2010
REMOVE TRANS FATS FOR BETTER HEALTH
Not all fats are bad.
Actually, certain kinds of fat play an important role in health.
Fats supply the body with energy, provide the building blocks for cell membranes and help key systems in the body to function properly.
They also help the body absorb certain nutrients such as vitamins A, D, E, and K. it’s important to understand the difference in saturated, unsaturated and trans fat.
Lately, though, you’ve probably been hearing more about trans fats. Before making any decisions about changing your diet, you need the facts about the role of fats in a healthy eating plan.
Polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats are beneficial forms of fat that promote health. These fats help lower blood cholesterol and reduce the risk of heart disease. It is recommended that a person has daily fat intake between 20 to 35 percent of total calories.
With most fats coming from sources of polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats such as fish, nuts. And vegetable oils (such as soy bean, canola, and peanut oil).
Saturated fats and trans fats can both increase blood cholesterol levels especially the bad LDL cholesterol and increase the risk of heart disease. It’s important to limit the amount of these fats in your diet.
Saturated fats are found mainly in meat, poultry, butter, whole milk and coconut, palm and palm kernel oils.
The guidelines recommend limiting intake of fats and oils high in saturated and/ or trans fats by choosing foods low in these fats.
CAN YOU RESHAPE THE BODY AT WILL (part 5)
BE HAPPY WITH YOURSELF
Loving your body means accepting the dive4rsity of human bodies, and recognizing that no one should be discriminated against because of the shape of their bodies.
It means celebrating your uniqueness and your many abilities. And making friends with the mirror on the wall.
Throw away the scale. Weigh yourself only when medically necessary. Even then, you can choose to ignore the number if you want.
Reject fattism in yourself and in others. Recognize that healthy, beautiful bodies came in all shapes and sizes and are gifts from heaven with your help.
Invest time and money in yourself rather than in the diet industry. Spend your money on beautiful clothes, jewelry, haircuts, manicures, and massages – not on trying new diets.
Surround yourself with size-friendly people. Choose friends who accept you that way you are and support the lifestyle changes you want to make.
Stand tall and proud. Straighten your stance and feel energy, strength and confidence flow from your head to toes.
Put your mind in touch with your body to heighten your confidence and body awareness.
Clothe your body in beautiful, comfortable clothes that fit.
Read magazines that feature large, fashionable men and women in all kind of clothes.
Be patient with your self. Old habits die hard and changes may take a while to become permanent fixtures in your life.
CAN YOU RESHAPE THE BODY AT WILL (part 4)
CELEBRATE SUCCESS NO MATTER HOW SMALL
Maximize you safety and comfort. Search pout the right stuff; in your food choices look for equipment that works, explore shoes that fit, clothes that move with you and location that feel safe when exercising.
Be flexible and jump into a variety of physical activities. Dance, garden, bike, swim, walk or lift weights – anything that you enjoy and that fits your lifestyle.
Listen to your body. Take rest days and change your activities based on what feels good at the moment. Before you know it you are fitting better into your clothes and you are in full control of your self.
CAN YOU RESHAPE THE BODY AT WILL (part 3)
INTEGRATING THE NON-DIETING APPROACH
Size acceptance in clinical practice and health promotion emphasizes the inherent pleasure and the many health enhancing benefits of a pleasurable activity.
This includes sports, fun exercises like ballroom dancing and any movement independent of any reduction in weight.
It encourages social suppor5t, size acceptance, positive self esteem and healthy and sensible eating. Dieting and weight preoccupation is discouraged and weight is not measured.
So change the exercise word into enjoyment, just move it.
ENJOYMENT, NOT EXECISE
Change the “E” word in exercise to enjoyment. Choose physical activities that you love to do and you’ll never forget to exercise a day in your life.
Moving your body means returning to the joy of childhood play. Means forgetting all the rules and sweating off via exercise. Change the concept from grueling work-out to zestful play time.
Feel the power. Celebrate the inner strength and sense of well being that come from allowing your body to experience the joy of movement.
Make fitness a priority. Plan family and personal vacation around fitness, or incite a colleague to “do business” over a walk rather than over lunch, coffee or drinks.
CAN YOU RESHAPE THE BODY AT WILL (part 2)
DISCOVER NUTRITION ANYTIME, ANYWHERE
Feeding your body simply means learning to enjoy the power of positive eating. It means learning to relate to food as a nourishing friend rather than a fattening enemy.
Following are some ways to feed the body:
• Slowdown and savor the flavor of food. Treat every bite as a gourmet feast/
• Eat when you are physically hungry and stop when you are satisfied.
• Plan ahead. Take time to plan meals and snacks for yourself.
• Recognize the flexibility of normal eating. Normal eating means you eat little too much sometimes, and eat just enough on another.
• Enjoy fresh foods, fruits and vegetables; salads with vinaigrette dressing, high complex carbohydrates like rice, pasta, noodles and corn; meat, poultry, fish and low fat dairy products.
• Experiment with new foods and new menus. Taste-test the amazing variety of options in the groceries. Learn to read labels, the calories per serving is important (not the sugar or no cholesterol).
• Dump fad diets forever! Eliminate the word “diet” from your vocabulary and form your mind-set. Use new eating pattern in lieu of the dieting word.
CAN YOU RESHAPE THE BODY AT WILL (part 1)
People have always been obsessed with thinness. The proliferation of slimming centers, abusive use of diet pills and overflowing weight reducing meal replacements available in the market are sure signs that many people are still captivated by those fashion model like figures.
Fat people are viewed as unhealthy and unsightly for some. There’s “fat discrimination” among us. We have stereotyped fat people as ugly, lazy, unhealthy, having no willpower and deserving of less respect because they have brought these problems on themselves by overeating.
Millions of people, men and women alike, have devoted their lives trying to lose weight only to spend those years in frustration and despair.
Recent advances in the treatment of excess weight and obesity have created a new approach on size acceptance or self acceptance.
This new paradigm in managing the situation has changed the way people view fatness.
Instead of nagging people to become thin help them accept their body size and try to control weight gain.
Bridging the mile: Survival Tip #3: Claim Your Independence
Communications consultant Carissa Reyes*, 27, who has been in an LDR for one and a half years, suggests that rather than viewing the distance as an inhibitor in the relationship, view it as a chance for personal growth. She says, “being apart is difficult, but I’ve also come to appreciate the space that it gives me to become my own person. Exploring the world without him makes me feel like a more confident woman, and that I have more to give in our relationship.”
In his book, Long Distance Relationship: the Complete Guide, Dr. Guldner explains that there are two types of loneliness: emotional loneliness, which “occurs whenever we feel an answered need for intimacy, and social loneliness, which is a yearning for casual relationships with others.” While it is a given that LDR couples experience the first, they unfortunately fall victim to the second because of their self-enforced isolation. Take charge os your social life and get involved. Dr. Guldner writes, “Minimizing the amount of social isolation will lessen (but not eliminate) your feelings of emotional loneliness.” In other words, celebrate your independence.
*Names have been modified upon request.
Bridging the Miles: Survival Tip # 2: Communicate Creatively and Courageously
According to the Center for the Study of Long Distance relationships, the biggest challenge facing LDR couples is “maintaining the feeling of simply being part of one another’s lives.” This is a fact that 26-year-old marketing manager Cesca Silvestre, who left a two-year LDR last year, knows all to well. She shares, “you don’t have shared experiences, shared memories, so how can you grow together?” She also explains that the 12-hour time difference was a difficult challenge to overcome. She says, “When you’re with someone, he is there for you at your happiest pr lowest moment, but in my case, when something great or bad happened, he was asleep. Suddenly, he lost his role in my life. I felt that I was single.”
There are many ways to accomplished regular communication and many couples are helped by the sheer wealth of technology available. However, sometimes a simple phone call, text message or on-line chat isn’t enough. When LDR couples communicate through the phone or the internet, the challenge is to become more expressive – and since they cannot physically show affection, they must find new and innovative ways to show how mush they care. Take graduate student Anne Elicao, 26, as an example. She and her long distance boyfriend play online games like Literati and Warship on Yahoo. “It breaks the monotony of just yapping away on the phone all the time. We play for prizes, which we can claim the next time we see each other,” she says.
LDR couples should also discuss issues as they rise and to not wait for the perfect moment. Because of separation, many couples tend to shy away from bringing up sensitive topics, but some things must be said Merchandising Manager Sophia Delgado*, 27, shares from experience, “Since we’re in an LDR, we want to deal with issues right away. We have to make the most of our time as much possible we are in good terms when we sign off.”
Bridging the miles: Survival tip #1: Keep It Real
Posted by: jhanok in Uncategorized on February 16th, 2010
Though love is reputed to be blind, never enter an LDR blindly. Talk realistically and openly about your options for the future as a couple. Try to pin down each of your expectations and lay down the ground rules. Most especially, pin down a time frame for being apart. A long distance relationship is not meant to become a permanent arrangement. Clarifying expectations help curb disappointment in the future.
Dr. Gregory Guldner, director of the Center for the Study of Long Distance Relationships and author of Long Distance Relationship: The Complete Guide, cites that nearly 70 percent of LDR couples who don’t talk about their plans break up within six months.
Planning is the key to building a successful foundation for a long distance relationship. As someone who has been in an LDR for two and a half years, 24-year-old social entrepreneur Josephine Perez* puts it eloquently when she says, “what makes [LDRs} easier is having a plan knowing when you’ll see each other next, taking steps towards being in the same time zone, working towards [being together] and dealing with the uncertainties that come along with it as partners. It’s easier when you have a goal, short-term and long-term.
Bridging the miles
Posted by: jhanok in relationship on February 15th, 2010
Tried and tested ways to keep you and your man as close as two peas in a pod despite the gaping distance.
As leap and bounds are made in the fields of transportation and communication, people become increasingly mobile, affecting not only their options for work and education, but also their relationships. Where the playing field was once simply made up of your neighborhood ( and perhaps nearby cities), love can now blossom with partners literally from either side of the world further boosting the possibilities of a successful long distance relationship (LDR, for short). If you find yourself quite unexpectedly in a long distance relationship, we’re going to discuss the three ways to make it last: in a few days.