Diet Pills That Work

Lifestyle modifications are the foundation of any successful long-term weight loss plan (eating less and moving more), but requires daily focus and discipline. It’s not surprising that Americans want some sort of miracle cure packaged nicely in one little healthy weight loss supplement. As time goes on and technology improves, people become more and more willing to look for a fix rather than a solution.

Since there are too many choices out there to compare regarding healthy weight loss supplements, it all comes down to two questions: Are Weight-loss supplements safe? and Do they work? The answer is in the ingredients and the testimonials of people who have taken them.

All -natural products will not get people addicted to anything outside of wanting to live healthier. So many medications and drugs people take come wtih complications and side effects. What happens when your body gets something all-natural is that it begins to heal itself in a non-addictive way.

Many weight loss programs encourage users to reduce their calories and exercise more for the best results. While most people can benefit from both of these lifestyle changes, what you want are all-natural healthy weight loss supplements that work regardless of physical activity. After all, some of us can’t exercise due to an injury, and some of us have severe asthma, or other health challenges.

You must also stay away from any one miracle product claiming to solve all of your problems. The human body is complex and requires targeted products that focus on individual areas in order to aid the body as a whole. Doctors can only give people the best estimate of their problems, so how could a little pill perform mircales that humans can’t?

Since the soil today is depleted of minerals and animals are injected with hormones, the foods that we once thought were healthy aren’t so much anymore. Fruit and vegetables get picked way before they have had a chance to properly grow just do they can make it to the grocery stand, and we are missing out on all the nutrition we should be getting. Healthy weight loss supplements are the only way to finish the job.

Most of the time people try to take shortcuts by taking weight loss pills without eating properly, thinking it’s better to find an easy way out tha to get to the root of the problem. When it doesn’t work out, they blame the pill instead of themselves for making poor choices. This is how people have come to think that weight loss supplements are a scam.

There is nothing wrong with being skeptical, but most companies that provide good quality healthy weight loss supplements have scientists developing their products for your benefit. Take advantage of that. They are providing you with something you cannot find in stores. It always amazes me how people can be so skeptical about products that contain all-natural ingredients, yet they will devour double cheeseburgers and french fries without even thinking about it…and they already know it’s bad for them!

With proper nutrition and targeted healthy weight loss supplements using all natural ingredients, your body has the ability to do amazing things. It can heal itself quicker than someonewho is eating poorly, and it is the only way a person can become well enough to stop using medications. I personally lost 70 pounds and have kept it off for over 15 years and stopped taking my prescription asthma medications simply by providing myself with proper nutrition using healthy weight loss supplements.

Losing weight is definitely possible with all-natural healthy weight loss supplements, but in order to keep it off for good you must learn to make it a lifestyle change and continue on a healthy path to overall wellness. You cannot take supplements designed to help you lose weight, then go out and eat junk food all day long. It just will not work.

The best thing you can do to begin to understand how all-natural healthy weight loss supplements work for weight loss is that they provide proper nutrition, and what happens when you give your body the right nutrients and vitamins? It naturally begins to lose weight and heal itself. The only scam going on is when you try to trick your body into thinking it can function properly without proper nutrition.

No matter what stop light your car is parked at, chances are good that you can look over at any of the four street corners and see a fast food restaurant. Despite all of the technical advances and knowledge we are equipped with to help us lead healthy lifestyles, temptation is keeping our nation fat and a soaring need for healthy weight loss for over 65% of Americans. One cheeseburger won’t hurt us in the long run, we say, but ten years later we wonder how we became obese.

Another factor helping America achieve the status of being the fattest nation in the world, and an alarming need for healthy weight loss, is fad diets. We eat cheeseburgers, tacos and fried chicken at all of these fast food restaurants, then jump on whatever fad diet train that conveniently passes by in order to try and cheat our way back to good health. All it seems to be doing is making us even fatter.

I struggled with being overweight for twenty years before finally realizing that cheaters never prosper, and it goes double when dealing with your health. I spent over $2,000 on various weight loss programs only to lose 60 pounds and gain back 80 pounds. The only logical solution I could come up with was that there was something wrong with me personally or I was using the wrong weight loss programs.

But thankfully, I’m not the type of person who gives up. When I finally woke up and realized that there will never be some sort of miracle cure packaged nicely in one little healthy weight loss supplement that will help anyone lose weight, things became clear. In order to lose weight and keep it off for good, I had to face the fact that lifestyle changes must be made and I had to find a healthy weight loss program that would work for me.

Lifestyle modifications are the foundation of any successful long-term weight loss plan (eating less and moving more), and they require daily focus and discipline. I had chronic asthma all of my life and could not exercise or even breathe heavy, yet I still found a way to lose 70 pounds 15 years ago and have been medication free ever since. For me there was no other choice. It all came down to making simple decisions on a daily basis.

The way I lost weight was by replacing high-fat and high-sugar foods with proper nutrition and targeted vitamins made from all natural ingredients. Specifically, I began replacing unhealthy meals with a soy-based protein shake that gave my body all of the proper nutrition that a huge high-calorie meal gives you, minus the salt, sugar and fat. Proper nutrition and less calories equals healthy weight loss. Did I give up the foods I love? No. I just don’t eat them quite so often.

One of the biggest misconceptions that I have encountered since beginning to help people in their healthy weight loss journey is that all you have to do is eat vegetables and fruits to get the nutrition you need. Although these foods are a much healthier alternative than low-fat potato chips and cookies, you still have to eat too much of them to get the nutrition of a scientifically formulated protein shake.

Calories are calories no matter what the food source is, and the more you consume, the more you will gain weight. One 200 calorie soy-based protein meal replacement shake, for example, could be packed with all the nutrients found in eating 2,000 calories worth of food.

The human body is complex and requires many different needs for all of your problems which cannot be solved with one little weight loss pill. Treating each organ individually so that it functions at its optimum performance is the safest way to achieve an overall wellness of the body. By taking an all-natural products targeted to help me breathe better, I was soon able to get off all of my asthma medications while achieving the weight loss I wanted.

Another reason why I was successful at losing weight and keeping it off was because I had a support system. My coach had been where I was, and struggled in the same ways to achieve weight loss. Because he was part of the program I began, my coach’s success was dependent on my success. And that is why I am so successful at helping people lose weight now. I have been there before and I know what it’s like.

The best part about the meal replacements and supplements I have conditioned myself to take every day to keep me healthy is the cost. It is cheaper for me to get the best nutrition possible into my system than it is to buy the extra value meal at any given fast food restaurant. How can you beat spending $3.50 per meal without putting your health at risk.

It is important that you understand the importance of making healthy choices as a new way of life. It is extremely difficult in America today to find the road to good health and stay on it, but you must if you want to achieve healthy weight loss and keep it off for good. Do not let poor food and diet choices rob you of living the best life you can live. For things to change, you’ve got to change.

This interview is an excerpt from Kevin Gianni’s The Healthiest Year of Your Life, which can be found at http://thehealthiestyearofyourlife.com. In this excerpt, Jill Fleming shares on weight loss results; how to achieve them and how to keep them.The Healthiest Year of Your Life with Jill Fleming, a certified nutritionist and author of Thin People Don’t Clean Their Plates.Kevin: Why don’t you tell me about results? I love hearing results. I love hearing about results. Why don’t you tell me one or two success stories that people that you’ve basically helped them change their lives?Jill: When I teach 8 week weight loss classes, which I do in my local community, I continue to monitor people after they’ve completed the class and the time they started the class to completed the class and we did this with measuring tapes and weighing and then I continue to track them for two years after taking the classes.Kevin: Two years? Wow!Jill: Two years. Yes, because beyond two years people moved and it was hard to get hold of them and then they didn’t want to come in and we had 92% success rate, which is exciting, which is how I knew I needed to put the information into a book, because so many other people could benefit from this information. When I speak in settings with large audiences the funny thing is to me that I’m up there talking to them about how they can improve their health and lose weight and feel better and have more energy and usually about one or two just really intensely take the information to heart and I will get an e-mail a month later that will say I’m 56 years old — I just got this two days ago – - 56 years old and never thought I could lose weight and gave away all of my smaller sized clothes and now lost 25 pounds and I have more energy than I ever had. Everyone’s asking how I did it and it was all because I added breakfast. It was all because I added more fruits and vegetables and had a smoothie and a salad a day. All because and they took away one or two nuggets of what we were talking about where they were weak in their Wellness Triangle and improved it to reach their ultimate goals. They’d given up. They thought they couldn’t do it.
In my local community I had a guy that when through my weight loss class and then he took it again and he took it a third time. He lost 115 pounds and just e-mailed me probably a month ago and said that he’s maintained 105 but the other 10 came back on and he’s going to get that 10 back off again and the interesting thing is he’s within about 10 pounds of his ideal body weight. He was planning to go through gastric bypass. I talked him out of it, because he loves food. He loves to eat as much as I do and I said if you love to eat, you’re really going to be giving up that choice. You’re going to be so limited in the amount and the types of things you can eat that it won’t be an enjoyable lifestyle for you. He agreed. He loves to go out and barbeque. He just has a little bit less of the fattier foods and he really went to town on the vegetables.Kevin: Okay.Jill: Exercises everyday and has tons of energy and he is definitely a role model that I keep coming back to him and saying how did you do that again? What are you doing?Kevin: Yeah.Jill: Tell me how you did that again? What was the piece of information that stuck out for you? But the interesting thing is that it’s different for every person.Kevin: Yeah.Jill: So what Dennis had to do versus what I had to do versus what someone else who wants to lose weight has to do, you can take all the information and see which is going to most affect your life in the positive direction.Kevin: And how did you measure the 92% success rate? What were the criteria?Jill: They could not gain more than 2 pounds back of what their final weight was.Kevin: Wow.Jill: The majority of people went on to lose even more weight, because they only had them, well we did an 8 week class with a one month follow up, so we only had these people for three months, but the changes that they made in three months were changes that they’ve kept for a life time. They said they could never go back to their old way of eating because they had too much information one and number two, they felt too good.Kevin: WowJill: And that’s the big thing. It’s not just about looking great in your skinny jeans. It’s about the energy that you have. You don’t need to fill your body with caffeine and chemicals to stay awake and alert. You can do it naturally.Kevin: Yeah. In a world where the studies say that 98% of people who lose weight gain it back a 92% success rate is just absolutely incredible.Jill: I think the big part of the success we had with our classes was that I was able to individualize and help people see how they could fit their lives into the plan. Not just switch from their life to the plan, but incorporate little things from the thin choices routine into what they were already doing. If they weren’t eating breakfast that was an easy one and I didn’t give everything all at once. I said lets work on breakfast and water today. Those are the only things that you’re going to work on this week and then come back and we’ll see how that feels and then start adding something else. So I think I think that’s the big part. Looking at the person and seeing where is the stress in their life and if they’re a stress eater, they’re eating for reasons other than true hunger. You’ve got to help that person realize what they can do to get the stress either out of their life or to help relieve it. Maybe they just need to do some meditation or take a yoga class. Their stress comes back under control and they’re better able to make choices in the other areas of their life.Kevin: And it’s probably not just about — I don’t actually know this. It’s not about what kind of stress or what they’re doing. It’s just about them recognizing it. Correct?Jill: Yes. Yes and if you’re turning to food, because you’re depressed maybe we need to look at the depression. What is the reason? Is it you’re living in Wisconsin and you don’t have enough sunshine in the winter? Maybe you need a sun lamp as opposed to turning to the food. I went through that about two years ago. We had 25 days without sun and I was just depressed and I was just craving chocolate and I thought what is wrong with me. I gained about 7 pounds and I just couldn’t get out of it. Well, I realized that it was a lack of sun, so I went on a vacation. As soon as we got about the clouds in Minneapolis and the sun was shining in, I was just drawn to the window and I realized that sunshine is a big part of my health, so I needed it. So I regularly schedule vacations in the middle of winter to get out of out of the cold and that helps to keep my stress level down, because I turned to food when I was feeling depressed.Kevin: It’s amazing how the health clues kind of unveil themselves as you continue on.Jill: Yeah and it was so interesting to me that no one else was impacted by this lack of sun in my house. I was the only one, so I just thought that I was crazy. I thought do I need drugs? What do I need? Do I need more chocolate? All I could think was that I needed chocolate, because I couldn’t think clearly.Kevin: Right.Jill: But it’s amazing, that sun. I thought, okay. That’s what I needed and I’m learning and you learn more about yourself everyday I think. You just have to be open to it and listen to what your body’s telling you.Kevin: Yeah. That’s incredible advice. Why don’t you –Jill: It could just have been the vitamin D that I needed, but I’d rather lie on a beach and think about it.Kevin: Yeah. Get your 15 minutes in.Jill: Exactly.Kevin: Where can someone go to find some more information about you and what you – why don’t you tell them what you have to offer?Jill: Okay. I have a website called simplelifestylechoices.com. You can also get there through thinchoices.com and you can get the book, Thin People Don’t Clean Their Plates, there and it doesn’t say this on the website, but anyone who ever orders a Thin People Don’t Clean Their Plates book, it’s been instructed that they will also get a Lifestyle Diary sent out with that.Kevin: Oh, cool.Jill: The Lifestyle Diary is so important and it’s just a small, probably 5 inches by 4 inch book that you can stick in your purse or carry in your back pocket and you just write down what you’re doing. For people who that just want to go to the website and get the free download, it will come out on a full size 8×11 paper but just start writing down what you’re doing, keeping track of it. Track it for a month. You’ll probably after three or four days of tracking see where you can make improvements and once you start doing that it will almost seem too easy and then please do e-mail me at jill@thinchoices.com, because I love the success stories. They just keep me motivated and that’s why I continue to do what I do.Kevin: Great. Well, Jill, thank you so much for that information. I know how valuable your time is and I want to thank you for sharing this information with us.Jill: You’re welcome. It’s very its fun. It’s always fun sharing your passion with others that it can help.Kevin: Yeah and I think what you’ve talked about really seems so easy and I think really it kind of is.Jill: It actually is so easy. I think we’ve made weight loss much more difficult than it needs to be. Stop dieting. Start listening to your body. It’s truly all about your choices.

Over the next few pages I will help you to understand a few pointers that will hopefully promote your efforts to shed pounds in a nutritious and effectual manner.
The first thing I’d like to see you do is to assess the amount of food that you are eating on an average day right now. Start out when you wake up in the morning and just follow through with your day without changing anything. You should make a strong attempt to eat the same foods as you would ordinarily be eating on any other day, and keep track of precisely what you are consuming plus the exact quantities that you consume. Most people agree that this activity calls for a high amount of seriousness on the part of the dieter. It is very important that you remind yourself that you have decided to lose weight the healthy way, and to abide by a sensible weight loss system.
This will end up being a great deal better for you over the long term than the newest crash diet program or weight loss pill. In all honestly, the entire activity will take no longer than a few minutes total, for the powerful long-term advantages that it will extend. While you are getting ready to go to sleep that evening, you will want to count up the actual number of carbs, protein, fat, and calories that you managed to eat during an average day. You need to be as precise as possible so that you will have an accurate perception of where you are at presently and what details of your present diet would likely be the most advantageous areas to get to work on.
There are same basic, simple, natural maneuvers that you should follow that will help you to drop the amount of food-energy that you are taking in in an ordinary day so that you can start losing weight.
The thing you’ll do can be to actually increase the quantity of protein that you consume in an average day. Medical research has proven that increasing your daily protein consumption without changing anything else will often cause significant fat loss, due to the fact that protein-rich foods are quite a bit more satisfying than anything else you could eat. As you start eating more protein, you should work on gently minimizing the amount of sugar and carbohydrates you are eating. Clinical studies have demonstrated that starch makes you feel less satisfied. This is why you will find that you usually eat a bigger portion of food for lunch if you have a glass of soda together with your lunch.
In addition to making these changes in your diet, you can dramatically improve your ability to burn calories by increasing your total muscle mass. The best way to do this is by lifting weights. Weight training can be extremely enjoyable since you don’t have to do it more than a couple times a week and the benefits can be seen and felt pretty quickly. The best way to do weight training is to do nice, slow exercises just a few times until your muscles are unable to continue. Drink a strong protein shake before and after each workout to speed up the rate at which your body builds muscle.
Doing cardio is simply not an effective way to lose weight. The reason for this is that you are not actually burning as many calories as you would expect to burn doing these exercises. Also, this type of exercise mostly burns off the sugars in your blood, quickly increasing your appetite and thus causing you to consume more calories after your workout. For this reason, doing cardio is not recommended unless you just really happen to enjoy it.
After one week of following this simple plan, you will likely be pleased to find that you have lost a pound or two. This is a nice easy pace to lose weight at, and it is good to keep this in mind so you will not get caught in the trap of crash dieting. The latest fad diet would probably take the pounds off more quickly, but you would likely damage your health and regain all the weight after a short period of time. If you continue to lose weight at this rate of just a pound or two per week, you will soon find that a year has gone by and you have lost a huge amount of weight–more than 50 pounds–by barely even trying.

Over the course of this article I hope to introduce you to some ideas that may increase your ability to reach your target weight in a salubrious and effectual manner.
An excellent way to start is to measure the amount of calories that you are eating in a single day. Begin when you wake up in the morning and just live out your day without making any special considerations. I want you to make a real effort to eat exactly the same as you would normally eat on any other ordinary day without changing anything, and take down a record of precisely what you put in your mouth plus the quantities that you consume. You’ll agree that this assignment requires a lot of seriousness on the part of the dieter. It is extremely important that you remind yourself of your decision to improve your health while losing weight, and to follow a level-headed weight loss system.
This type of system will end up being a lot more beneficial as time goes by than some new instant-gratification diet program or weight loss supplement. The fact is, the entire exercise will take no longer than 10-15 minutes out of your day, even for the many long-lasting benefits that it will extend. When it is time to hit the hay, take a moment to count up the total amount of calories, carbohydrate, protein, and fat that you consumed as the day went on. It is necessary to as precise as it is possible for you to be so that you will have a reliable picture of where you are starting out from and which characteristics of your present eating habits will end up being the most useful targets to work on.
Next, there are a few natural, easy actions that you need to follow if you are to diminish the number of calories that you are putting into yourself in an average day in order to initiate weight loss.
The tactic you can employ will be to actually raise the number of grams of protein that you consume in an average day. Scientific studies have demonstrated that increasing your daily protein levels in your diet without changing anything else frequently results in significant weight loss, due to the fact that proteins are a lot more filling than other foods. As you increase the amount of protein you are eating, try slowly lessening the amount of other carbohydrates that you are eating. Clinical studies have demonstrated that sugar can actually increase your appetite. It is a common experience that you usually eat a larger serving of food if you have a glass of soda pop along with your lunch.
In addition to making these changes in your diet, you will also want to increase your body’s ability to burn fat by gaining new lean muscle mass. This is done through weight training. Weight training can be extremely enjoyable due to the fact that you don’t have to do it every day and the benefits can be seen and felt pretty quickly. The best weight training technique is to do nice, slow exercises just a few times until your muscles are unable to continue. Load up on protein, and especially glutamine immediately after you finish working out to get the best recovery times.
Cardiovascular exercises have not been shown to be effective in promoting weight loss. The reason for this is that you are not actually burning as many calories as you would expect to burn doing these exercises. Additionally, cardio tends to reduce your blood sugar levels, quickly increasing your appetite and making you likely to eat more food than you otherwise would have. Because of this, doing cardio is not recommended unless you just really happen to enjoy it.
after just 7 days of following this plan, you will typically have lost a couple of pounds! This is a nice easy pace to lose weight at, and it is good to keep this in mind so you will not get caught in the trap of crash dieting. Of course you can lose weight more quickly using less sound methods, but you would likely damage your health and most likely stop losing weight very quickly. As you continue to steadily lose just one to two pounds per week by following this plan, you will soon find that a year has gone by and you have lost more than fifty pounds with very little effort!

Are you tired of trying to figure out the perfect combination to lose weight? Overwhelmed and confused by conflicting information and the never-ending parade of fad diets and magic pills that are going to help you lose 10 pounds in 3 days? With all the information out there, it is nearly impossible to sort through it all and figure out what actually works.

That’s where I come in. I am going to give you 12 straightforward tips that will help you lose weight and get rid of that extra fat. I will simplify all the information that took me over a decade to learn, so that you can make your goals a reality for once and for all.

However, before you even start this journey, you have to WANT it! I am a personal trainer and in my business I have heard every feasible excuse as to why my client CAN’T lose weight. They can’t figure out what they’re doing wrong which usually comes under the heading “making excuses”. I’ve heard every one ranging from “it was the weekend” to “I can’t control myself in the late afternoon” to “I HAVE to have a snack before bed”. I’ve heard them all and the bottom line is you are either committed to losing fat and getting fit or not! Let’s face it—every week there is a weekend and if you blow it during the weekend, that is HALF of your week. Do you realize that? Still wondering why you can’t lose weight? I know this sounds harsh, but the truth is anyone can find a reason NOT to do something and somehow, justify it. You must come to terms with the fact that the only effective way to lose body fat is to put in the effort, nothing else.

That being said, I am going to give you no nonsense, realistic tips on how to do this.

1. Set realistic goals

First and foremost, you need to set realistic, attainable goals. I’m not talking about planning to lose 20 pounds for the wedding in three weeks. That’s not going to happen, atleast not in a healthy capacity that will result in true weight loss. You need to set specific goals with a set time frame and continue to change them as you accomplish each one. For example, plan to lose 1-2 pounds a week for the next month. That means by the end of the month you should have accomplished a weight loss of approximately 8 pounds. Make that your goal and then next month modify it or just continue on that path.

Whatever your goal is, the most important thing is that your goal is attainable so you don’t set yourself up for failure right from the start.

2. Gradual Changes get BIG results

I believe making changes over time is the key to achieving your weight loss goals. If you decide one day you’re going to change everything, you will fail! You may be motivated for a little while, but within a short time, you will feel miserable and deprived and eventually give up. This is the problem with going on a “diet”. It is short lived and whatever you lost, you will ultimately gain back.

It is about a lifestyle change that can be accomplished by making small changes over time. These small changes will bring on big results, as well as become a way of life.

For example:

Week 1: Try cutting out anything “white”, meaning white flour product, white rice and white sugar. Replace white flour products with whole-wheat flour products. Include whole grains and lots of vegetables with meals.

Week 2: Modify your behavior at one specific time, that is particularly difficult for you. For example, if you know you always blow it at dinner, make some changes. I know when I’m sitting at the table with my family, I often grab for seconds just simply because the food is there. So what I try to do now is measure out what I’m going to eat and stop when my plate is empty. I even go as far as clearing my plate from the table. Believe me, it’s difficult to eat when I don’t have a plate or silverware (although my 10 year old son might disagree!). My point is, identify your biggest challenge and make a change that will enable you to gain control over it.  

Week 3: Cut out all sugary/high caloric beverages. These are empty calories that add up. Try water, green tea, etc.

Get the picture? This way by the end of a couple weeks you’ve cut out 10 things without even realizing it. Now you are on your way to eating healthier and losing weight with out feeling deprived because nothing was drastic.

3. DON’T Starve Yourself

The worst thing you could do is decide you want to lose weight and stop eating. You cannot starve yourself and expect to melt the pounds away. I don’t care what common sense says, it does not work! Your body adapts to circumstances and the bottom line is if you suddenly reduce calories, your body goes into starvation mode and hoards the excess calories you’ve already stored in your fat cells. It also slows down your metabolism, which means that when you go off the diet, you will likely gain back all the weight, plus excess weight you wouldn’t have gained had you not gone on the diet in the first place.

4. Eat More to Weigh Less

How can eating more help you lose weight? It’s simple. Our bodies perform much better on a more frequent feeding schedule. Instead of spreading your daily intake over three meals, I am going to tell you to eat 4-6 small meals a day, every 3-4 1/2 hours, which will keep your metabolism charged and help you burn off more calories. The key being SMALL meals. I often hesitate telling people to eat this often, because if you don’t understand portions, eating this often can backfire when you’re trying to lose weight.

A good gauge of how much a portion is, is as follows:

The easiest way I know to follow the 4-6 meals a day plan is to eat a healthy breakfast, lunch and dinner and then have a mid morning snack and mid afternoon snack. The meals should be small and packed with high quality, nutrient dense food, including lean protein, fruits and vegetables. I don’t suggest eating before you go to bed, but if you must, try to keep it healthy and try to have it at least two hours before you go to bed.

5. Never Skip Breakfast

The biggest consequence to skipping breakfast or any meal is your metabolism slows down. Your body needs calories to function efficiently and it functions best when it is refueled first thing in the morning. If you don’t, your body will downshift and your metabolism will slow down, as previously mentioned. So, if you are trying to lose weight or even maintain, the last thing you want is a slower metabolism!

6. Write Down EVERYTHING You Eat

At some point in time, I have told most, if not all of my clients, to write down EVERYTHING they put in their mouth. Many of them tried it for a little while, while some couldn’t be bothered. I am now here to tell you, in the struggle to lose weight, picking up a pen might be just as useful as putting down the fork. In fact, a recent study was done showing that people who kept daily food diaries lost twice as much weight or more as those who didn’t keep a tally of their meals.

The reasons for the success are as follows:

A free website, I highly recommend, is FitDay.com. I find it extremely user friendly and very eye opening. Each day you must enter exactly what you eat and it actually determines calories, as well as percentage of protein, carbs and fat you’ve consumed during the day. It is not only very interesting to see what you ACTUALLY eat in a day, but also very educational. I think it gives people a real understanding of how they eat, as opposed to how they think they eat. It makes it easy to see where changes need to be made in order to get results.

7. Eat Enough Quality Protein

What I mean by quality protein, is lean protein; chicken breast, turkey breast, fish, eggs, egg whites, etc. Not only does it burn more calories digesting it than carbs or fat, but it also creates satiety so your hunger is satisfied longer.

In addition, protein is a building block for maintaining and building lean muscle and it is important to understand that the more lean muscle you carry, the more calories you burn even while you sleep.

8. Consume Fiber

It is important to consume fiber, as there are numerous benefits, which include lower cholesterol, reduced risk of heart disease and improved absorption of minerals and other nutrients. In addition, fiber also slows down the digestion process, which helps you control your appetite and cravings, as well as it helps you feel more full delaying hunger from one meal to the next.

9. Cut out processed foods

You need to get rid of processed or junk foods, period. In a nutshell, processed food lacks nutrients, causes fat gain and cellulite, weakens the immune system, weakens organ function, raises your risk of cancer, etc. Need I say more?

Be weary of the foods that are labeled, “diet”, “healthy”, “low-fat”, or “fat-free.” If you look at the ingredients you will likely find many that you can’t even pronounce, not to mention, in order to make all those foods “low-fat” or “fat-free”, they must replace the fat with something. That something is SUGAR! The truth is, you’re better of eating some fat, as opposed to all the chemicals and sugar in processed low-fat or fat-free food.

Sugar is poison! Aside from it depressing your immune system, contributing to hyperactivity, depression and anxiety, reducing HDL’s (good cholesterol) and elevating LDL’s (bad cholesterol), as well as numerous other problems, it also contributes to weight gain and obesity. So, if you’re going to do anything today, focus on cutting out sugar. Start paying attention to labels and steer clear of the “fat-free” processed foods.

10. Drink Water

Water is the most important element to total health and fitness. After all, your body is 65-70% water and your muscles are over 70% water. But the best thing about water when it comes to weight loss is its ability to curb your appetite and hunger. I suggest 6-8 8 oz. glasses for the average person, but if you’re trying to lose fat and maximize body leanness, I would consider doubling that. Don’t wait until you’re thirsty, to drink. It means you’ve waited too long.

11. Exercise: Cardio

I can’t stress enough how important it is to get some form of cardio in. If you are currently sedentary or have not exercised in some time, it is important to start off slow. Talk to your doctor and figure out a program that will work for you and try to perform it 3-5 days a week. Walking is a great way to get yourself up and moving so you can start seeing results.

However, if you are already in some sort of exercise routine, I suggest “interval training” which is the most effective way to burn calories and lose fat. Interval training is defined as short, high intensity exercise periods alternated with periods of rest.

An example on a treadmill (individual in good shape) would be as follows:

The total workout should be 15-20 minutes in duration. Keep in mind, the key to burning fat is intensity! So based on your individual fitness level, push yourself on the “high” intervals to a subjective 8-9 out of a level of 10 and on the “low” intervals a level of 3-4 out of 10.

12. Exercise: Strength Training

Incorporating some form of resistance training is not only an extremely important factor for weight loss, it has numerous other benefits which include: reduced blood pressure, lower cholesterol, strengthening of bones, as well as it increases calories burned which promotes weight loss. The more muscle you have the more calories you burn. Even while you sleep, muscles are responsible for more than 25% of one’s calorie use. So, in short, an increase in muscle tissue will in turn increase your metabolic rate.

I hope these tips were helpful. If you would like additional information on “interval training” or “resistance training” check out my website at www.NewBeginnings-PersonalTraining.com

Feel free to contact me anytime if you would like further suggestions or workout ideas. Good luck and keep in mind that I am always here to help!

This interview is an excerpt from Kevin Gianni’s Renegade Roundtable, which can be found at http://www.RenegadeRoundtable.com. In this excerpt, Phillip McClusky shares what he tells the others he coaches who want to lose weight the healthy way.
Renegade Water Secrets with Phillip McClusky, who lost 200 lbs. and found health and happiness in a raw food lifestyle. He is the host of www.lovingraw.com.Kevin: Let’s kind of turn the tables here because now you’re coaching other people on how to lose weight. Someone comes to you, 300 pounds, kind of like the lovely woman out in Israel who’s listening to this call right now at 3 o’clock in the morning, probably 4 o’clock now, she’s got a client who’s 300 pounds, the client is diabetic, has dropped their blood sugar and all. How do you coach someone through that? What’s like one or two or maybe three tips, principles, that you would coach someone doing that? Because I know there’s a lot of practitioners on this call.Phillip: Well the first thing that I really aim for in any kind of coaching I do is I want to discover the reason why. Anybody can say, “Make a better food choice.” And we might know that up and down. Even when I was overweight I kind of knew that me eating a large pizza for dinner is not the best food choice and that having a salad is better. We can have the knowledge, we can read books up and down and we can know every single thing there is about health and nutrition but still eat the pizza. So I want to really discover with a client what’s the reason why we’re choosing that pizza and how can we break that pattern? Is there a trigger involved with that? Does eating a giant bowl of pasta remind us of family and of love and of sitting around the table with family? And does every time we want that feeling of that we go for pasta? Do we have an emotion that’s associated with food? Is there a way to break that trigger? Is there a way to separate that emotion? So those are some of the things that I look to do first. Find out what’s behind there. Is there a lack of self love and subconsciously we have that going through our mind and so we tend to abuse ourselves? We know it’s time to eat but we just want to keep hurting and hurting and filling and filling. Is there a big void there that we’re just trying to compensate for and really fill ourselves up with?
So I kind of go onto the emotional aspect of it first and kind of really discover what’s behind all that. Once we find that place and we’re able to pick out some of those different things, then we can actually start to say, “Okay, now we’re in a space where we want to love ourselves so we want to do the best things for ourselves. We’re no longer trying to hurt or injure ourselves. Now that we’re making good choices for ourselves and things that are going to help us, let’s figure out what are some of those good choices. ” That’s when a food routine comes in and figuring out how we can slowly bring ourselves to the next level as far as maybe losing some of the things that we’ve been consuming like sugars and gluten and some of those things, a little bit at a time. And then seeing if we can bring in some friendly foods and some fruits and vegetables and work in some of those things right off the bat.
So it’s a slow process. I’ve known people who have gone overnight and have no issue, but not everybody’s like that. Finding out where you’re client’s really at is the most important thing. I don’t believe there’s any cookie cutter formula for anything. That’s why a lot of times when some of the raw food authors come out with the book and they say, “You have to do it this way, ” is I think that works for that person that way, and it works for a lot of people, but it doesn’t work for everybody that way. So I’m a firm believer of educating myself and encourage people to educate themselves about all the different styles of raw foods and different ways of eating and then just working intuitively with themselves.
The first step is discovering why we do it. The second step is after we’ve discovered the emotional issue finding out what some good choices are to sort of replace some of those negative foods or bad foods that we’ve been eating. And then as a third step learning to use our intuition and teaching the client how to make choices based on their own body, not on anybody’s rules that they’ve set about for them but literally just making choices based on your own body.
Maybe your body hasn’t had greens in 15 years and you’re body is just craving that chlorophyll and just really wants it. Somebody might have green juice every day and a green smoothie every day and a salad with a bunch of different kinds of greens and their body is just craving that. For that person that’s going to be right. But if I just say, “Okay, you need to do the exact same thing that Phillip did, or the exact same thing that this person or that guru did,” then it’s really me just putting somebody on a program that may or may not work. I want them to find out what’s going to be the best for them. That’s kind of what I guide them along with and bring them to a space so that they can kind of discover themselves, because I don’t want to be another guru or take the place of another doctor and just tell them what to do. This is all about self-empowering and about you really finding out what’s best for you and going from there.Kevin: So we have about two or three minutes left. I did want to ask one last question and then we can talk about what you’re doing about your website and the book, the project that you’re working on. The question is this, you’ve lost 200 pounds, do you feel like you can accomplish anything?Phillip: Absolutely. And I feel that everybody can once we set our mind to it. I’ve really moved from a space of hopelessness and depression and not sure if I was going to live to a space of feeling limitless about every single thing in my life and knowing that there’s nothing that we can’t accomplish if we put our mind to it. I believe that’s not just for me that’s for every single person here. There’s nothing that any of us can’t do. Weight is the smallest thing. Once I lost the weight it opened my world up to a whole new world as far as changing jobs and relationships and priorities and my outlook on life and spirituality and just coming up to a place of feeling confident and strong and being able to speak in public and give lectures and motivational talks and different things. I would have never been able to do that before. I never had the confidence to do that or the willpower to want to get up on stage or share. I might not have even cared enough, to be honest with you. It’s put me in such a new space.
So many people just relate raw with food, and it does have to do with food but once you start to rid yourself of some of those old foods and some of those dyes and pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, all those different things, dyes, colors, chemicals, that really are just poison to the body and kind of dumb you down to an extent, once you get rid of those out of your body you start to discover who you were really meant to be and the purpose that you were here for. It puts you in a space of really having the best day ever, living in a limitless life and just knowing that anything is possible.

In the past, weight loss has been over-emphasized, and body fat has been under-emphasized. Since muscle weighs more than fat, is possible to lose fat and not weight if you’re following a diet program that involves exercise. Losing weight may not  be the most urgent problem. You might just need to remodel your body by gaining muscle and losing fat.

With high protein shakes, daily exercise and fruits & vegetables, my body fat decreased from 25 to 16 percent, and my waist changed from a 40 to a 34. I lost 70 pounds but what’s most important is that my shape changed as I lost weight around the middle and gained muscle in my arms. I did not lose that much weight, but my health improved out of proportion to where I lost my weight.

Shapes can be deceiving, but for your personal shape there is a best weight based on the lean-to-fat ratio. You can categorize shapes into two types: The shape you can change, and the shape you can not change. It is important to know the difference.

If you don’t like your shape, you can’t change it by taking a magic pill or buying an exercise machine you see for sale on tv. There are probably several things wrong with your diet and lifestyle at the very same time. You need a personalized plan specifically tailored for you.

Apple shaped people have upper-body fat. The fat cells in the upper-body are there to help both men and women withstand periods of starvation. Too much of this fat can cause inflammation in various tissues, including the heart. You can’t lose these special fat cells just by dieting. You have to change your lifestyle and exercise to build some lean muscle.

Lower-body fat cells are resistant to exercise and diet, and make a body shaped like a pear. If women have low metabolism, they won’t be able to lose weight even when they cut calories. You have to take special steps to get enough protein to control your cravings and maintain or build muscle to get the shape you want.

 Here are 5 steps to change your shape so it will be easier for you to lose weight and keep it off for good.

Step #1: Proper NutritionHigh protein meal replacement shakes taken twice a day, made with fruit in a blender, will not only provide you with all the nutrition you need on a daily basis, but you’ll begin to notice how your lifestyle will change as your body heals itself. It will satisfy your hunger and help you gain control of your food choices during the day. You’ll lose weight and water and will feel better right away.

Step 2: Personalize Your PlanFigure out what your trigger foods are. Simply put, which foods make you want to eat and eat and eat until the bag is empty? For me, it’s any kind of cracker. Write down these kinds of obstacles. You don’t have to give them up completely, but when you do eat them, give yourself a smaller portion so you don’t over-indulge and ruin your progress.

Step 3: Be ready For RoadblocksIf you know there will be times when you are out shopping, dining out, traveling or at a holiday party, think in advance about what you will do to limit yourself to bad foods. One place you know you can always eat right is at home, so eat something before you venture out. It will curb your cravings and temptations for bad foods.

Step 4: Target Your ExerciseDid you know that long periods of slow exercise burns fat, but short bursts of energy burns carbohydrates? When you don’t eat enough, your body uses protein from your muscles for fuel! Determine what your diet consists mostly of (fats or carbohydrates) and plan your exercise routine according to how you will use fuel most efficiently.

Step 5: Increase your confidence from personal success stories of people who have achieved the success you are striving for. Visualizing your own personal success is just as important as eating and exercising correctly. Be realistic. You may have to work a lot harder than someone else, so don’t beat yourself up if it takes longer than you think.

Follow these steps and you will soon be on your way to changing your body shape. No matter what supplement program you decide to use to help you get proper nutrition, make sure it comes with a personal coach to help you along the way as well as a money back guarantee. That is how I was able to lose weight and keep it off for good, and you can do it too.

For those of us looking for quick weight loss, Halloween can be a scary experience! While just one night of indulgence in Halloween candy might not be enough to break your belt, dipping into the leftover stockpile for weeks on end will surely derail your diet or weight loss program.

In 1921, in Anoka, MN, the United States enjoyed our first recorded instance of a Halloween celebration. Annual candy consumption has climbed almost unabated since then. According to the Census Bureau, Americans eat nearly a half-pound of candy each week for an average of 25 pounds of candy a year. Candy is big business, with the United States boasting 1,040 manufacturing establishments producing chocolate and cocoa products in 2001. These establishments employed 45,913 people and shipped $12 billion worth of goods that year. Another 616 U.S. establishments manufactured non-chocolate confectionery products in 2001. These establishments employed 26,400 people and shipped $7 billion worth of goods that year (source: census.gov).

The overwhelming popularity of the South Beach Diet, Zone Diet, and Atkins Diet has prompted low-carb weight watchers to eat less candy. Overall consumption has actually declined over the last few years; as recently as 1997 the average annual candy consumption was a sky-high 27 pounds.

The Problem:
Most people on a diet plan or weight control program look at candy as little brightly-colored fat bombs. That assessment isn’t far off the mark, either, with most candy packing little nutritional value and a ton of calories.

Some of the more popular Halloween candy has too many calories to be included in any healthy diet:
Twizzlers 1 treat size pkg.= 45 calories
Almond Joy 1 snack size bar = 90 calories
Milk Duds 1 treat size box = 40 calories
Butterfinger 1 snack size bar = 100 calories
Milky Way 1 snack size bar = 90 calories
SweetTarts 1 treat size pkg. = 50 calories
1 Tootsie Pop 1 pop = 60 calories
1 Tootsie Roll 1 small roll = 13 calories

Note: Calorie content is based on 1 serving of Halloween ’snack’ or ‘fun’ size packages, not full size servings found in the candy aisle.

While just a few pieces of Halloween candy won’t obliterate your diet program or weight loss plan, it’s the temptation to keep having ‘just one more’ that will pack on the pounds. It only takes nine small fun-size candy bars to put on a quarter-pound of fat. Besides candy, Halloween threatens many other high-calorie treats like Caramel apples (243 calories), 8-oz. apple cider and a cake donut (319 calories), or a slice of pumpkin pie (240 calories).

The Solution:
Is it possible to cope with the menace of Halloween candy without taking all the fun out of the holiday? Absolutely! If you’re looking for fast weight loss, and don’t want Halloween to bring your fat loss to a screeching halt, consider these healthy Halloween tips:

1. Walk with your kids while they’re trick-or-treating. A 165-lb. woman strolling along (walking slowly) for one hour will burn approximately 150 calories (source: caloriesperhour.com).
2. Out of sight, out of mind. When the kids have unloaded their stash, store it in an airtight container and put it in the cupboard. A bowl full of candy on the counter is an open invitation to have ‘just one’, but a stockpile you can’t see is less tempting.
3. If you’re going to give out candy to trick-or-treaters on Halloween, don’t buy it until October 31st. Having a candy supply in the house before Halloween only entices you to have some early.
4. If you must buy candy before Halloween, buy a kind you don’t like. Again, this will reduce the temptation for you to dig in.
5. Hosting a Halloween party? Supply vegetables, healthy dips, and low fat snacking alternatives instead of candy.
6. Set a Halloween candy deadline by which all Halloween candy must be either consumed (by the kids) or it will be thrown away. Saving that candy for weeks, or even months, only keeps temptation in the house.
7. Put more emphasis on dressing up in a great costume, and less on candy. This is especially true for the kids, who often view Halloween as a candy free-for-all dream come true.
8. By hosting a party on Halloween night, you can control the menu and have fun with friends at the same time.
9. Focus on Halloween activities other than eating. There are lots of options available, from hayrides to haunted houses to bonfires.
10. Candy has a long shelf life, and there’s no reason why you couldn’t put some of it in airtight bags and store it in the freezer. Allow the kids to take out one bag every two weeks until it’s gone. This tactic will at least space out the temptation and minimize candy binge eating.

Of course, the absolute best way to avoid weight gain, and perhaps even achieve some easy weight loss, during the Halloween season is to bump up the amount of exercise you’re getting. There’s no better way to lose weight fast than a healthy diet and regular exercise.

Make sure the workout you’re doing includes both aerobic and resistance training, as it is critical to get both types of exercise to maximize weight loss. It’s also important to exercise for at least thirty minutes, three times per week, which is the most recent recommendation by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (source: cdc.gov).

A fantastic strategy is to find the best weight loss program for you now, before Halloween hits. The reason is that the last three months of the year are packed with holidays, special dinners and seasonal treats. Starting with Halloween candy and ending with Christmas fudge, many people find that they’re packing on more pounds during this period than they do any other time of year.

Joining a gym is an excellent way to combat Halloween and holiday weight gain. Finding a good gym to join now will not only help keep off those holiday pounds, but will even make you slimmer by New Years.

San Diego’s Top Certified Personal Fitness Trainer Reveals the essential strategies for lasting weight loss and lifelong fitnessby oksanapet16 Tips for getting maximum Weight Loss and Fitness results in minimum time *Do you want to improve the quality of your life? *Do you want to look and feel better than you have in years – maybe better than you ever have before? *Do you want to protect yourself from disease and injury? And do you want to live a longer, more vital life? I’m confident that you answered “YES!” to each of those questions, just as have the hundreds of individuals I’ve counseled, coached, and trained in my career as a Certified Personal Fitness Trainer and Health Expert. Right now I’m going to reveal to you the 16 essential strategies that have enabled my clients to achieve these important goals. These simple strategies can be immediately implemented into your lifestyle with little sacrifice on your part (okay, if not eating artery clogging fast food burgers and fries is a big thing for you, then maybe you won’t look at that sacrifice as “easy,” but I guarantee you it will add quality years to your life). Why believe me? Because I have been training people for 14 years. Because I’ve seen people fail and others succeed. Because I’m the only person in San Diego who has 15 years of solid medical training, a NSCA CPT, and I am also a Certified Master Fitness Instructor through the Prestigious Coopers Institute. Because all of my Personal Training Clients are happy and getting good results. I am giving you this information because I’m tired of seeing people getting ripped off and wasting their time and energy on the latest “Miracle” diet or device. I’m tired of seeing slick marketers make a lot of money by selling people lies that won’t help them. So let’s get right into it. Read on to discover… 1. How to Stay Motivated.One of the biggest problems most people have is that they work out great for a couple of weeks, then just fade away. The people who stick with it are those who have these two things in common: * They don’t follow a set routine. Routines always become boring. They also set you up for repetitive stress injuries. They don’t work either. Your body quickly adapts to any routine and doesn’t need to change any more to keep up. * They get on an effective exercise program, so they get good results. The people who lose their motivation are the people who get frustrated because they are not getting good results. When you are getting good results, you will be so pumped that it’s actually hard to quit. A good fitness instructor will help you with both of these items. 2. Don’t make it so hard.Most people think of exercise as torture. They imagine that you must sweat and groan for hours every day to get in good shape. Not so, my friend! Two days per week of 30-minute low-intensity cardiovascular exercise (walking, jogging, biking, swimming); and two days per week of 30-minute light resistance training (using weights or resistance machines) is adequate in the beginning. As you become acclimated to the lifestyle shift, you can add more days and get improved results. But beware: if you try to do too much too fast, you may end up quitting altogether. If you’ve tried and failed doing it alone, then I suggest you get a training partner or personal trainer who will help you sustain your motivation. 3. Your exercise program needs only three things. If you skip any one of these three, your results will suffer. * Resistance Exercise. This will raise your metabolism and cause you to burn more calories all day, even when you are asleep at night. * Cardiovascular Exercise. Your heart rate during cardio exercise should be 60% to 80% of your maximum heart rate. The simple formula for calculating your 100% maximum heart rate is 220 minus your age. If the intensity of your exercise increases your heart rate beyond 80%, slow it down a bit. If your heart rate isn’t at least 60%, quit loafing. Your personal trainer can supply you with a simple heart rate monitor you can wear during exercise so you always stay in your peak fat-burning range. * Proper Nutrition. A good, hard workout can burn maybe 300-500 calories in 30-45 minutes. It only takes one Big Mac to flush your entire workout down the toilet. 4. Don’t waste your time working small muscles with isolated movements.If you don’t enjoy doing resistance training or are pressed for time, concentrate on working the largest muscle groups with compound resistance movements. When I see overweight people doing wrist curls or lateral raises, I wonder why. It’s generally just a lack of understanding of how their bodies work. Most people want to lose fat and tone and firm their bodies. The way to do that is to use resistance (weights or machines) to train the large muscle groups. Men should be concentrating on legs, chest and back. Women should concentrate more on their legs and back. The best exercises for legs are lunges or squats (your personal trainer will show you the proper form and then monitor you during the exercise) and leg press. The best chest exercise is bench press, and the best back exercise is the seated row. All of these are compound movements, which means they incorporate multiple muscle groups. 5. Always, always, always stretch.Stretching improves flexibility, blood flow, muscle recovery, low back pain and a host of other things. Additionally, stretching can prevent injury, make you sleep better and improve your performance in all sports. Always stretch, but be certain not to stretch cold muscles. You should always warm up before stretching. However, it is very important that you know how to stretch. Never bounce! Your personal trainer will show you the proper execution and timing of your stretches. 6. Don’t do traditional sit-ups. Unless you are super athlete with an incredibly well-developed midsection, sit-ups can lead to a strained lower back and possibly lumbar injuries. But it gets worse. Rather than hitting your abdominal section, sit-ups can shift exercise tension to your hip flexors – which defeats the purpose. There is so much misinformation about how to strengthen, tone, and firm the midsection, it’s almost frightening. It is very difficult to learn proper abdominal exercise technique by reading about it or watching it demonstrated on a video. You need to do it with supervision and get feedback about your form from a knowledgeable source. And keep in mind that you use your abdominal muscles in almost every single movement you make. Strengthening your abdominal region is the single most effective way to prevent, or recover from, low back pain. 7. Set realistic, attainable goals.You must have tangible, quantifiable, short-term, and long-term goals for your fitness program so you can gauge your progress. It’s crucial to have a “baseline” before you begin, so you can measure success. Your personal trainer can give you a complete fitness analysis (you need this!) that will aid you and your trainer in developing a personalized fitness program, which addresses your particular needs. Having goals, particularly short-term goals, allows you to track your progress and keep motivated when times are tough and you don’t feel like exercising. Keeping a journal of your cardio and resistance training workouts, as well as tracking what you eat is truly a fitness success secret. Just remember that your goals should be realistic and attainable. The best way for you to understand what is realistic and attainable for you is to talk to a fitness professional – not to buy into the “hype” of infomercial’s, diet and fitness products that blatantly mislead. 8. Set exercise appointments with yourself.Use your day-timer to set appointments for exercise – and then stick to them. You wouldn’t miss a business meeting or client appointment, would you? So don’t miss your exercise appointment with yourself. Nothing is more important than your health. Nothing. Everything else will crumble around you if your health goes south. So make your exercise appointments a priority. If you find it difficult to keep these appointments, then consider hiring a personal trainer who will hold you to your commitment. When you have money invested, and someone waiting for you to show up – you are much more likely to actually show up! 9. Remember the benefits of exercise.Remember that feeling of euphoria you experienced after a particularly good work-out? You experienced that feeling because the most powerful “feel good” drug in the world – endorphins – were coursing through your veins. If there is a panacea, it’s exercise. Nothing feels better than the post-work-out high you experience after exercising. Revel in that feeling. Let it wash over you and truly experience it. Etch that feeling in your brain. It will fuel your motivation on those inevitable days when you just don’t feel like exercising. Being physically fit affects every single aspect of your life: you sleep better, eat better, love better, overcome stress better, work better, communicate better, and live better! 10. Exercise correctly.So much time is wasted doing, at best, unproductive exercise, or at worst, dangerous exercise. Get educated on how to exercise correctly. And the absolute best way to do that is to hire a personal trainer to develop a program for you and then teach you what to do and how to do it right. Personal training does not have to be an ongoing process. You can hire a personal trainer for whatever length of time you need to learn the ropes. It could be five sessions, or it could be fifteen sessions. It’s completely up to you. But statistics prove that those who understand how to exercise correctly, get better, faster results. And that’s what you want, right? Results! 11. Enjoy yourself.The most difficult thing is actually getting into your running shoes or going to the gym. But once you begin your work-out, relax and enjoy the process. Don’t fight it. Make exercise your personal time. When you are exercising you can focus completely on yourself. Yes, exercising can and should be somewhat rigorous (depending on your level of fitness), but it is just that investment which makes it supremely rewarding. As with anything, if you are in the moment, you can fully appreciate the experience and truly enjoy the process. 12. Americans eat too many carbohydrates for our lifestyles.I’m not advocating the high protein, high saturated fat diet that you hear so much about (frankly, its dangerous). But I am advocating minimizing your intake of bread, pasta, rice, potatoes and, of course, all sugary drinks. We are no longer an agrarian society participating in manual labor. Most of us are fairly sedentary throughout the day and therefore do not need the high levels of carbohydrates to sustain our energy. Additionally, carbohydrates are addictive. The more donuts you eat, the more you want. The bulk of your carbohydrates should come from vegetables and fruit. And those with high water content, such as cucumbers, grapefruit, tomatoes, cantaloupe, strawberries and even vegetable soups (watch out for high sodium), will fill you up nicely. By the way, numerous studies have conclusively proven that the quarter of the population eating the most vegetables get half the cancer of the quarter eating the least! 13. Deep-fried food has no nutritional value – none!Almost every food, whether it’s steak, chocolate or red wine, has some nutrients to contribute. But one thing is absolute: fried foods are garbage. Potato chips, French fries, onion rings, breaded chicken strips and all the rest of the deep-fried junk are pregnant with saturated fat and calories, and they contain almost zero nutritional value. If you’re trying to lose weight and/or reduce fat, simply eliminate fried foods completely from your diet. Yikes! That stuff is scary. 14. Never, ever skip breakfast.If you want to maximize your fitness results or fat-loss efforts, you’ve got to eat breakfast. Even if you don’t exercise at all – breakfast remains the most important meal of the day. Your breakfast should contain complete proteins and complex carbohydrates (if you’re trying to lose weight, you should eat the bulk of your complex carbohydrates at breakfast and lunch and only have vegetable carbohydrates at dinner). A great breakfast is oatmeal (not the pre-packaged, pre-sweetened kind) with a little honey and banana and a protein drink. Or try scrambled egg whites with Healthy Choice turkey sausage. 15. Drink plenty of fresh, clean water.Yes, I know that you’ve heard this over and over again. But there’s a reason for that – it’s the gospel truth! The recommended amount is approximately eight glasses, or 64 ounces, of water every day. When you are exercising, you need to drink even more. Over 75% of your body is water (even bone is more than 20% water). When you don’t drink enough water, and substitute diuretics like coffee, tea and caffeinated sodas, you dehydrate your body, your blood doesn’t flow properly, and your digestive system doesn’t operate smoothly (among other problems). Even a small deficit of water can radically affect how your body performs. Here’s a good rule of thumb: if you’re urine is a dark yellow and/or has a strong odor, you’re not drinking enough water. Drink up! 16. Eat regularly throughout the day.Fasting or overly restrictive diets will enable you to lose weight – in the short run, because the weight you lose is primarily water weight and lean muscle mass. In the long run, it has exactly the opposite effect you want. When you restrict your diet, your body instinctively thinks it’s being starved and shifts into a protective mode by storing fat. Energy expenditures are fueled by your lean muscles. Therefore your body fat remains essentially the same and you lose vital fluids and muscle instead. The less muscle you have, the slower your metabolism becomes, and the less fat you burn. Instead of eating three big meals (or worse yet, one HUGE meal) eat five or six nutritionally balanced “snack/meals” each day. This keeps your metabolic furnace stoked, so you burn more at a faster rate. I know, it’s counter-intuitive, but it’s true!There you have it. 16 essential strategies for an effective weight loss and fitness program that will have you looking and feeling better than you have in years – maybe ever! I realize that starting (or re-starting) a productive and effective health and fitness program is not easy. That’s why I encourage you to get help. If you’re sick, you go to the doctor. If you’ve got a tax problem, you see an accountant (or an attorney!). Have a toothache? You’re off to the dentist. So why is it that so many people attempt to solve their health and fitness problems without consulting an expert? I don’t know exactly, but I encourage you to make the investment in yourself – in your quality of life – by hiring a certified personal fitness trainer to educate you and help you get started (because the hardest part is just getting started and sustaining your motivation until fitness becomes habitual). Once you develop the habit, which can take as little as thirty days, your whole life will change for the better. If I can be of any assistance to you, please don’t hesitate to call me. I’m happy to speak with you and give you my recommendations without any sales pressure (I hate it when people try to “sell” me, so I wouldn’t try that on you). Please E-mail me to obtain any additional information you may need. Thank you. Best in Health,Rivak E. Hoffmanhttp://www.somagenesis.com

About the AuthorExperience: 12 years and counting.

I’m not just your average trainer. Some trainers don’t look like trainers. Many lack the medical aptitude and experience to design and implement a safe and effective exercise program, and that’s a bad sign from the start. Some train their clients exactly as they train themselves. Many hurt their clients and send them back to their sedentary lifestyles.

Myself, I think “outside the box” and bring life to others. I don’t duplicate fitness programs and my training programs are constructive, not destructive. Each and every client I train has a unique experience. With the overwhelming, conflicting advertising and marketing campaigns in the health and fitness industry, the average consumer becomes confused and disoriented in their eating habits and exercise programs. I find it a personal challenge and responsibility to weed out the fact from the fiction. A hypothesis is only a guess until proven with real statistically proven hardcore research with large sampling. Solid facts also come from anecdotal experience and documented evidence over time.

Moreover, I have trained my mind and body for sports competition since age 13. I have learned how to incorporate my vast levels of knowledge in nutrition, resistance training, and sports-specific training techniques towards further achieving new goals and winning races.

18 years tenure as a board certified medical professional in General Medicine and Neuro-Ophthalmology gives me the expertise to analyze and evaluate metabolic and systemic medical factors that often complicate weight loss, weight gain, and metabolic problems. These factors seriously complicate the ability to lose weight, and most trainers do not have the knowledge to solve these dilemmas.

With my diverse background in both medicine and as a personal trainer, I can create a healthy, strong, high performance body, which will look awesome and perform to higher levels. My unique style as a fitness instructor coupled with my medical knowledge allows me to methodically design a safe, effective, and productive exercise program to suit your goals.

Here’s an overview of my experience and credentials:

National Strength and Conditioning Assoc.

Certified Personal Trainer Credential of Distinction

Coopers Institute of Aerobic Research

Master Fitness Specialist

American Academy of Health Fitness and Rehabilitation Professionals Medical Exercise Specialist

American Academy of Health Fitness and Rehabilitation Professionals Post Rehabilitation Conditioning Specialist

Member American Academy of Sports Medicine

Member National Strength and Conditioning Association

Member American Academy of Ophthalmology

Member Joint Commission of Allied Health Personnel in Ophthalmology

BS Biology University of Connecticut

Graduate Physician’s Asst Program

US Army Academy of Health Sciences Fort Sam Houston, TXArticle Source: OnlineEarnings Article Board