The Single Biggest Error People Make About Nutrition Bet you thought I was going to tell you something about which foods are bad to eat, didn’t you? Nope. The biggest error people make about nutrition has nothing to do with food. It has nothing to do with vitamins. It has nothing to do with supplements. It’s much more basic than that.
What is your take on spinning? A complete waste of time. Counter productive at best. Want fat legs keep spinning. When fitness Chrissy May hired me to get ready for her Oxygen magazine photo shoots, I first asked what her current exercise was. She told me that spinning was part of training program and yet complained that getting lean legs was her biggest challenge. I told her to drop the spinning immediately, and that she would see results in a matter of a few days. She was quite reluctant, claiming that spinning “made her legs feel tighter”. In my usual diplomatic style, somewhat to the right of the Attilla the Hun, I countered that insanity is defined as doing the same things over and over again and expecting different results.
ZONE BULLETS Understanding the Zone By Barry Sears The central theme of The Zone is to understand the importance of thinking of food hormonally, rather than calorically. Once you do so, you begin to understand why virtually every dietary recommendation of the U.S. Government, and leading nutritionists, are hormonally wrong … maybe dead wrong. An example of caloric thinking is that “if no fat touches my lips, then no fat reaches my hips.” Hormonal thinking, by contrast, says that insulin makes you fat and keeps you fat. This new hormonal thinking also explains the dietary paradox why Americans are eating less dietary fat than they were 15 years ago, but are becoming more obese. The following is a summary of the key concepts and ideas presented in The Zone. It is impossible for dietary fat alone to make you fat. It is the hormone insulin that makes you fat and keeps you fat. How do you increase insulin levels? By eating too many fat-free carbohydrates or too many calories at any one meal. Americans do both. People forget that the best way to fatten cattle is to raise their insulin levels by feeding them lots and lots of low-fat grain. The best way to fatten humans is to raise their insulin levels by also feeding them lots and lots of low-fat grain, but now in the form of pasta and bagels.
ou Are What You Eat – Processed Foods Paul Chek [This article is an excerpt from the newly released nine-hour CD/Workbook program “You Are What You Eat!” by Paul Chek.] Do me a favor before you read the next paragraph – go to your cupboards and refrigerator, and take a look at how many packaged food items you have in your kitchen. While you are there pull out a desert item (i.e. ice cream), a boxed item (i.e. breakfast cereal) and any other item you have that is flavored (i.e. salad dressing) and take a look at the labels. After reading the ingredients list, ask yourself: How many words am I unable to pronounce? Which of these ingredients have I never heard of and/or have no idea what it is? Go take a look at those labels and, when you come back to finish this article, I will tell you why you may be having such a hard time flattening your abs, and why, even if they are flat, you may feel so dull every day!
You Are What You Eat – Animal Products Paul Chek [This article is an excerpt from the newly released nine-hour CD/Workbook program “You Are What You Eat!” by Paul Chek.] While there is a drive to eat more grain products than many natural health professionals feel is ideal for the human body based on developmental design, it is safe to say that most of us still see meat as the main staple of our diets. Meat was essential to human survival because it serves as condensed energy and nutrition to whoever consumes it. Plant eating animals convert plant nutrition in to proteins and fats, which are stored in their bodies and becomes available to us in the form of organ meats and muscles. In many parts of the world, it was fish and animal meat sources that allowed us to survive through winter months prior to domestication of animals, farming practices and the development of food preservation technologies. Figure 1 The meats we consumed to nourish our bodies for millions of years were purely organic – strictly farmed by the principles of Mother Nature and not by man! Plants consumed by the animals we ate came from unadulterated soils, resulting in only the best food being consumed by the animals that became our food. The principle of the food chain – soil microorganisms and organic matter feeding plant, plants feeding animal life, plant and animal life feeding human beings – is a chain that, by design, results in the health of any successive life form being only as healthy as the life forms which it feeds on. This cycle is referred to by many as “The Wheel Of Life” (Figure 1). Right up until about 1900, we lived at the top of an organic food cycle that was free of pesticides and relatively free of disease in comparison to today’s food chain. A huge percentage of the meat eating population are not cognizant of the current health crisis that begins with our eroding and highly polluted soils – soils that are literally swimming with chemical fertilizers and pesticides, being applied at the rate of over 1 billion pounds a year in the US! The result of conventional chemical farming practices is an enormous reduction of organic material in our soils, which starves the microorganisms to death, and leaves only 15 percent of the microorganism population compared to that found in organically farmed soils. Losing the soil microorganisms to feed and protect the plant life results in the rearing of animals and humans via the consumption of severely nutritionally deficient foodstuffs. In fact, commercial animal farming tactics today have resulted in the production of meat for human consumption by the use of disturbing tactics! For example:
Paul Chek [This article is an excerpt from the newly released nine-hour CD/Workbook program “You Are What You Eat!” by Paul Chek.] The story or grains is part and parcel with the story of bread, neither of which the human machinery are designed to function optimally on. While I’m sure this comment is a surprise to some of you, significant amounts of scientific evidence suggests that for all of human evolution, right up until approximately 10,000 years ago, the primary staple in the diets of most civilizations was animal meat. There were times when meat was scarce for a variety of reasons yet in, general our consumption of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds was seasonal and supplementary. Most of the animals we ate, such as deer, were plant eaters. These animals served to condense nutrition in their meats – one pound of meat contained the nutritional equivalent of several pounds of vegetables. Such a nutrient-dense source of nourishment allowed us a to have sustenance during the winter months when we had minimal food storage methods other than the cold itself. Although many argue (mostly from an emotional bias) that we must have carbohydrate sources to function, current biochemistry reveals that we do have the capacity to convert some fat molecules (glycerol) into carbohydrate (1). While there are many controversial theories as to why we began farming, it is more commonly agreed upon that we began farming practices, or nurturing the growth of specific plant species and domesticating animals no longer 20,000 years ago and more likely as soon as 10,000 years ago (2). During this time, there has been a progressive increase in the consumption of grains and grain-based products, yet this time period is but a flash in the scope of human evolution, during which our digestive machinery was formed.
op Ten Sleeping Myths By: Maura Dipasquale MD Myth #1: Snoring is annoying (to other people) but is not a serious matter. Wrong. It is true that for lots of people snoring is a harmless thing, but for some it can be a symptom of a life threatening sleep disorder called sleep apnea, especially if it is accompanied by severe daytime sleepiness. Sleep apnea is characterized by pauses in breathing that prevent air from flowing into or out of a sleeping person’s airways. People with sleep apnea awaken frequently during the night gasping for breath. The breathing pauses reduce blood oxygen levels, can strain the heart and cardiovascular system, and increase the risk of cardiovascular disease. Snoring on a frequent or regular basis has been directly associated with hypertension. Obesity and a large neck can contribute to sleep apnea. Sleep apnea can be treated; men and women who snore loudly, especially if pauses in the snoring are noted, should consult a physician. Myth #2: Sleep less now, catch up later.
29 Secrets to a Good Night’s Sleep If you are having sleep problems, whether you are not able to fall asleep, wake up too often, don’t feel well-rested when you wake up in the morning, or simply want to improve the quality and quantity of your sleep, try as many of the following techniques below as possible: My current favorite for insomnia is Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT). Most people can learn this gentle tapping technique in several minutes. EFT can help balance your body’s bioenergy system and resolve some of the emotional stresses that are contributing to the insomnia at a very deep level. The results are typically long lasting and the improvement is remarkably rapid. Listen to White Noise or Relaxation CDs. Some people find the sound of white noise or nature sounds, such as the ocean or forest, to be soothing for sleep. An excellent relaxation/meditation option to listen to before bed is the Insight audio CD. Avoid before-bed snacks, particularly grains and sugars. This will raise blood sugar and inhibit sleep. Later, when blood sugar drops too low (hypoglycemia), you might wake up and not be able to fall back asleep.
Lose Weight While You Sleep! October 03, 2005 By Jonny Bowden, M.A., C.N., C.N.S. OK, OK, I know the title of this column sounds hokey, but don’t worry, this isn’t the script for a late night infomercial advertising some miracle fat burner that won’t work or some magic exerciser that does all the work for you while you just sit there and watch the scale numbers shrink. The fact is you really do have a serious ally in your quest to lower body fat, and you’re probably not taking advantage of it. It’s not something most people think of when they think about weight loss, it’s free, it’s widely available, and it really does have something to do with sleep. And all you have to do to take advantage of it is make yourself feel better. Interested?
A combination of high and low intensity may be the best and most effective means of fat loss but conventional wisdom still insists that fat burning stops when your heart rate goes above 75%. Some gurus even say that training above the so called “target zone” causes muscle loss and fat gain. As explained in “Forget The Fat-Burn Zone” (Article #10 on this site), total fat burn is actually higher when exercise intensity is high. Happily, people are getting the message. A 45-year-old policeman in charge of his department’s physical assessment program read my article and wrote asking whether high-intensity intervals might motivate his officers and help them do better on their semi-annual fitness tests. “The vast majority,” he lamented, “work out for two weeks before the test, then go back to beer and TV.” Admitting that he’s not exactly “the poster boy for fitness” himself, he also wondered if intervals might be the answer for his own fitness regimen. I reiterated that high-intensity intervals are a more effective and a far more interesting way to train. However, I warned him that people who are out-of-shape should feel their way along and check with their doctor if they have any health concerns. I suggested that he and his officers gradually ease into intervals once or twice a week, along with a walking program. “Take it easy at first,” I told him. “Experiment with varying intensity, perhaps one minute harder followed by a minute or two at a moderate to easy pace, and see how it goes compared to steady-state exercise,” I recommended.
