The Benefits Of Eating A Raw Food Diet
August 26, 2010 by Joan
Filed under At Home, Diets, Health, Healthy Ageing, Mens Health, Mental Health, Womens Health
So I guess by reading this article, you may be asking what are the benefits to eating a raw food diet ? Well, the benefits of eating more raw foods are numerous and once you understand them you’ll probably wonder why you haven’t eaten more raw in the past. You’ll also think twice about eating dead cooked foods ever again.
Raw Foods Give You More Energy
I can’t tell you of one person I know that follows a raw food diet that doesn’t have more energy than the average person . I know that when I transitioned away from eating a diet made up of breads, dairy, and cooked foods, and adopted more of a raw foods diet, my energy went through the roof. And I’m not talking about the quick surge you would get from an espresso but alternatively long-lasting energy that enables you to do more with less.
An example, eating raw foods will allow your body to sleep less and have far more energy than you’ve ever felt before . When I’m eating at least 80% raw, I can easily function on just 4-5 hours of sleep. I literally bounce out of bed and don’t require any naps throughout the day. Oh yeah, did I mention that I workout every single day as well? Sometimes, even twice!
Energizing Enzymes
When following a raw food diet, there are several reasons why it will give you more energy . First, raw foods are rich in food enzymes. Enzymes are compulsory for every single reaction in the body. Unfortunately, our bodies only have a finite number of these enzymes, so when we run out, we run out of life! To add to this, when you heat foods above 118 degrees fahrenheit, you destruct the food enzymes that are naturally present in all raw foods. Therefore, if you eat a predominantly cooked foods diet, you’re not getting enough food enzymes, which means that your body will have to produce and use more of its own to digest and metabolize your foods.
The less energy you will have for activities if your body requires more energy to divert towards digestion . You will feel more lethargic and tired as your body is trying to breakdown “dead” foods and figure out what to do with them.
So the food enzymes apparent in raw foods are a big reason why it boosts your energy . They are the spark plugs and are intricately related to the next property that make raw foods so energy-boosting.
Life Force
When raw foods are left intact, they are also known as living foods . They are named “living” because they carry an incredible amount of life force.
Now, since every living being has an aura or energy field illuminating from their body, which foods do you think would enhance yours? Cooked foods that are dead or high energy raw foods ? I think we both know the answer.
As I like to say, “eat alive and you will thrive”.
Weight Loss and Beautiful Skin
The other highly sought-after quality of a raw foods diet is its ability to help you lose weight and beautify your skin . Almost all raw foodists have reported losing weight they could never lose. At the same time, they notice an instant improvement in their skin. They look younger and have a natural glow that comes about because of the “living” nature of raw foods, their abundance of enzymes, and of course the plethora of nutrients that are ingested when eating more fruits and vegetables.
You will find it easier to lose weight on a raw food diet because your getting more nutrients and, therefore, your body won’t crave “dead” foods. Second, the enzymes help to breakdown the foods you are eating and excess energy and fat stores in your body. Third, raw foods are water-rich, which helps you feel more satiated, as well as hydrated.
Many of these reasons also help us explain why living foods make you look younger and beautify your skin. Enzymes, life force, water, and high quality nutrients all play a role in natural skin care.
We could talk about the benefits of a raw food diet for hours but the only to truly understand them is to experience them for yourself. So why not take action today and enjoy the health, the body, and the vitality that you deserve!
Unknown Facts About Lowering Cholesterol Revealed By The Experts
August 26, 2010 by Joan
Filed under At Home, Diets, Health, Mens Health, Womens Health
You don’t know how much poison you swallow day in and out. Much of it won’t kill you right away, but it is accumulating over time, you could just drop dead one day and that would be the end of it, so you need to start to reduce high cholesterol right now. That’s the way it works with cholesterol.You don’t want to die young, do you? Well, that is exactly what is going to happen to you if you don’t do something about all that cholesterol in your system immediately. Talk to a doctor and take some action to get it under control. They should be able to work something out for you that will help to lower your cholesterol.
Folks make a big deal out of lowering cholesterol, and they are right to do so. Do you want to die, or don’t you? If you don’t, then you want to lower your cholesterol, and you can do that by paying attention to this article and taking action.
Increase your fiber! This is an important piece of information that I have to give a lot of Americans today that can help in reducing high cholesterol, because too many people don’t even have a clue about it. Increase your intake of fiber foods and check out the dietary alternatives you have available.With a healthy diet, you can lower your cholesterol to more acceptable and healthy levels. A detox diet, I know, could actually do the magic. Why don’t you try a detox diet and focus on eating only fruit and vegetables, and drinking water for a week.
Fiber is roughage, and is a kind of food that is good for you. In consuming roughage you get to get rid of cholesterol in your system. Your cholesterol levels aren’t going anywhere but up as long as you continue to eat all that junk food. The only way to do it is to lay off the grease and eat more healthy foods.
The level of cholesterol in your system is bound to affect you whether you like it or not. Besides the fact that it makes you susceptible to a lot of illnesses, it can actually end up killing you by blocking your blood vessels. That’s why you have to lower it.Your system can only take so much cholesterol before it shuts down and tries to reboot. The problem is that rebooting a human being is not that easy; oftentimes the fellow winds up dead. So instead of letting you body try to restart itself, why not restart on a diet that will lower your cholesterol levels but not bring you down.
Ways to get rid of belly fat
How to get rid of belly fat? This is one of the most common health-related queries performed on the Internet. Overweight affects millions of people all over the world because of the lack of physical activity, the food saturated with chemicals and the individual poor living choices.
You should consume fewer calories if you really want to stay slim and healthy. I don’t support crash diets, I’m only pointing to the fact that you are eating a huge amount of calories that serve for nothing. Depriving your body of nutrients together with the calorie excess can have very serious consequences for you body. No more fizzy drinks, sweets and junk food, and ‘the world will change for you’. Eat green food, natural drinks, fruits, cereals, seeds and lean meat.
The diet usually needs to be adapted to your specific individuality. Women have different needs than men, because of the different energetic requirements and the anatomical structure. Men depend on protein to achieve muscle strength, although they need to balance meat with fruit and vegetables. Women will often have chicken and fish, when men order red meat.
Starving yourself is not the same thing with keeping a diet. You will most likely react in a negative way if you can’t follow personal preferences. How to get rid of belly fat when you hate what you eat? The food choices are endless as long as you just aim at balancing your diet and eliminating all the artificial elements from it.
Beer is an enemy! This is one answer to the ‘how to get rid of belly fat‘ question that men find it unpleasant and often turn a deaf ear to. But, let’s face it! There is a very good reason why abdominal fat is also known as beer belly. Beer contains very many calories, but there is one other major problem about it. It causes the inflammation of the liver and the pancreas thus leading to bloating. Quit drinking and you’ll see a big difference in a matter of weeks. Then, your belly fat will stop being such a problem.
You won’t flatten your belly by working your abdominal muscles at the gym. Then, how to get rid of belly fat if exercises don’t work? Choose physical activities that work the entire body: this is case with cycling, swimming, stair climbing or jogging, or in other words, with anything that stimulates the cardiovascular system. You’ll see how the beer belly drops and the abdomen flattens nicely.
How to build Rid of Acne Quick in your house – That is the best Way to build Rid of Acne at home Quickly!
July 3, 2010 by Joan
Filed under At Home, Diets, Health, Mens Health, Skincare, Surgery, Womens Health
Acne is likely the greatest aesthetic dilemma of young persons currently.
But, how does acne occur and why?
The whole surface of our epidermis is covered by pores, which include glands. These glands create a a number of form of fat called sebum. When the glands produce the proper amount of sebum, every thing is okay. But once they turn into stimulated and begin to develop excessive sebum, the pores become clogged. This benefits from the accumulation of sebum and bacteria for the pores and skin, which leads towards the formation of pimples. The reason why acne happens while in puberty is mainly because at this age the sex hormones that stimulate the glands are most active.
At times, acne is really a chronic sickness (a lot of adults suffer from acne till the age of 30 or more), which thankfully seriously isn’t a serious dilemma as much as the physical well being is concerned, but regrettably can lead to a important blow towards the self-confidence of people. What’s a lot more, acne can cause ugly scars about the deal with or other parts in the human body which will continue to be there for the rest to your existence.
Thankfully, the scenario is much from hopeless. You’ll find one or two issue you can do to build rid of acne:
* Wash your face 2 times per day with soap and warm water (rubbing the skin color is usually a incredibly bad thought, simply because you might irritate it).<br> You also must wash your confront following operating out to obtain rid of every one of the sweat and dirt. Soon after washing your deal with, you really should dry it gently, but thoroughly having a clean dry towel.
* Do not let hair gels and hair sprays arrive into contact with your pores and skin.
* Ladies ought to stay away from employing cosmetics that are too oily.
* Stay away from touching or popping your pimples, because the bacteria will penetrate deeper to the pores and skin resulting in a lot more pain, redness and possibly even scars.
* Steer clear of meals that might have a damaging impact on your skin color. No study to date has shown that eating certain foods can aggravated acne, but if you have observed that a distinct food causes difficulties to you personally, it really is greatest to avoid it.
* Prevent strain, due to the fact even though it doesn’t actually lead to this ailment, it could aggravate it.
* Generally set sunscreen through the summer, as the sun tan might temporarily hide the redness of one’s pores and skin, but it may make the problem worse from the lengthy operate.
They are one or two very helpful ideas that could help you see some improvement, but the only way to have rid of this dilemma after and for all is usually to eradicate the root result in of this disease. You need to adhere to a holistic system that should increase your immune program and restore the natural hormonal balance of your respective entire body.
Wish to find out much more about remove acne. Then go to Sandy Jameson’s site on how you can select the finest acne face for your wants.
Cocoa and high blood pressure
September 26, 2009 by AnnA
Filed under Diets, Food & Nutrition, Medical Research & Studies

Now, I would have thought that a good cup of cocoa would certainly make you feel better but because of its high caffeine content I wouldn’t have thought of it as a treatment for high blood pressure.
But who am I to disagree with researchers from Harvard? It seems that although 3 in 10 of us in the UK suffer from the condition there is one place in the world where it is virtually unknown. The Kuna Indians live on a group of islands off the Caribbean coast of Panama and hypertension does not exist there. Once the islanders reach 60, they have a perfect average blood pressure of 110/70 which is something to be envied and they also have much lower death rates from heart attacks, strokes, diabetes, and cancer.
So what’s their secret? It is certainly not their salt intake as that is as high as in the UK, but because they drink 5 cups of cocoa every day. WE know that the flavonols in cocoa stimulate your body’s production of nitric oxide and that boosts blood flow to your heart, brain, and other organs. If you are taking a daily aspirin to thin your blood you might like to know that one study found cocoa thins your blood just as well. Certainly tastes better, and one Harvard Medical School professor claims cocoa can also treat blocked arteries, congestive heart failure, stroke, dementia, and even impotence.
No more to be said really, but I would stick to organic cocoa and I am not sure if the islanders make it with milk or not, but if you do then make sure that’s organic too so you get the maximum benefit
Weight loss doubled with a journal

I am keen on journals for all kinds of reasons: they improve mental health if you ‘mind dump’ your thoughts every day, expand your creativity and put you in touch with your deeper feelings and processes.
Now it seems it can also help you lose weight – in fact it can double your weight loss. By keeping a simple food diary, you can see clearly what you are eating rather than ‘guessing’. Strangely, guessing results in you thinking you are eating less and exercising more but by using whatever method works best for you – email, pen and paper, a spreadsheet – you get a realistic estimate of how you are really doing.
A US study showed that after 20 weeks of journaling, reducing calories by 500 a day and exercising moderately the participants had an average weight loss of around 13 pounds. But, the more that they wrote in their journals, the more weight they lost and that meant about twice as much as a control group who didn’t write a journal.
Men are better than women at dieting
September 12, 2009 by AnnA
Filed under Diets, Mens Health, Womens Health

Most men do not embrace the concept of dieting unless pushed to it by a health problem or a few gentle (ie nagging) remarks from their partner. But research shows that when they do decide to got it they are better at it than women.
Men have not been well served by the diet industry, partly because of inertia, but also because of embarrassment. The traditional dieting aids for women like slimming groups just do not attract men. Do not despair though because I have found a couple of resources that can really help.
First is a clever woman who realised men don’t like dieting in public, for example asking for a gin and slimline tonic still isn’t quite the thing – and actually from a health point of view that slimline tonic is worthless. It may have fewer calories but it also has a cocktail of chemicals in it – go for the real thing and get the benefit!
Jeni Blaskett decided to create a slimming group in which men would flourish and lose weight. One that meant that men could go about their daily routines without feeling they were losing face so she set up a website www.Beltdown.com exclusively for men
Beltdown’s key diet plan principle is unique, and couldn’t be easier to follow – ‘If you can’t wash it, try to avoid it’. So a cooked breakfast of eggs, bacon, tomatoes and mushrooms makes it onto the tick list, cake and biscuits do not. The website has plenty of info aimed specifically at men, such as which are the lowest calorie beers and curries, and the format allows for men to stay totally anonymous, whilst still getting the challenge, competitiveness and interaction of a group – but online.
If you have an internet connection, it costs £8 a month membership and is available 24/7 – so no more excuses skip over to www.beltdown.com
Men only
If you want a programme designed by a man who has been there and done that himself, then I can recommend Robert Paterson’s book ‘Warriors’. He found the same problems in going to slimming groups as Jeni describes so he put together a very successful programme that has all the elements needed for successful weight loss. It is particularly aimed at those who have found success in their careers but who, due to hectic lifestyles and lack of time, have lost their healthy body in the process.
He created a specially developed ‘business plan’ to show you how to: – Set targets you can meet – Devise sensible day-to-day eating plans – Motivate yourself when the going gets tough – Achieve long term success – Treat your body as your business
Robert was an international banker weighing 22 stone who lost 8 stone on his regime, and kept the weight off. He is now Chairman of the Emerging Markets Group and Chairman of Performance Consultants, Brasil. He is a spokesman for the British Heart Foundation and regularly competes in events to raise funds for them. You will find his book on Amazon by typing in his name and Warriors in their search box.
Alli – All it’s cracked up to be?
July 5, 2009 by AnnA
Filed under Diets, Vitamins & Supplements

This is the time when the diet industry is maximising it’s advertising as we approach the season of maximum exposure. Great if you are body confident, but the statistics show that the vast majority of women are unhappy with their weight, so the advent of a new ‘miracle’ diet product is greeted with delight, but is it justified?
Alli is on sale at pharmacies like Boots and has been highly featured in magazines as a ‘miracle’ weight loss product, but it is a drug and ought to be treated with caution.
What and how
The pills contain Orlistat that has been used for years but only on prescription to treat obesity. It works by attaching itself to some of that fat in your food and blocking it from being broken down by your body’s natural enzymes. It then passes the fat through your digestive system, into your intestines and eventually out through your bowels. So most of the fat you eat isn’t being absorbed by the body, so those calories aren’t heading for your hips. So what’s the problem?
It won’t get rid of any fat you have already stored, just new intake, so you still have to go on a low calorie diet and these are linked to weight re-gain and unbalanced hormones. Also, these pills strongly suggest you seriously restrict the amount of fat intake you have, but when you block fat from being absorbed in the body, you are blocking the valuable nutrients that fat can provide. You will see those effects in the deteriorating condition of both your skin and hair.
If you go over the fat amount recommendations with Alli you get something called “Treatment Effects”. This has been reported by women as meaning that you will spend a lot of time in the loo as your body rushes to expel the fat straight out of your system, and it will be mostly liquid. Effects include leaking, wet gas, and diarrhoea, plus a sense of urgency you could probably live without.
Risk links you don’t need
The National Cancer Institute in the USA reports a study showing significant increase in the incidence of aberrant crypt foci that are widely believed to be a precursor of colon cancer. There also appears to be a link between Orlistat and breast cancer that the FDA reported as being a higher relative risk of between four and seven times than in women not taking Orlistat. There is also a risk of liver damage from the prescription strength version of Alli available in the USA called Xenical. This is currently under FDA investigation and lists hepatitis as one of the side effects.
There is no doubt that Alli is highly effective for some people, but like all supplements and drugs what suits one may not be ideal for someone else. Popping a pill to lose weight is not a healthy option, sadly the only effective way to diet is to eat less of healthy foods, reduce saturated fats, sugar and alcohol and exercise more. Now if I could get that into a pill I would probably make a fortune!
Natural diet pills warning
February 15, 2009 by AnnA
Filed under Diets, Natural Medicine
Just because something says ‘natural’ on the packaging is no guarantee that it actually is – particularly if it is imported from a country with less stringent health regulations than our own. The easy availability of products on the Internet has made it even more important that you check the source of what you are buying.
Latest news from the USA has shown that popular weight loss products promoted heavily by sports people and TV personalities are seriously flawed and freely available without prescription from health stores or online. You would think if they are on sale in a health shop they would be ok, but the Food and Drug Administration says weight-loss capsules, called StarCaps, which are promoted as natural dietary supplements and contain papaya, could be hazardous to your health. That’s because they also contain a potent pharmaceutical drug called bumetanide, a strong diuretic. Using too much of this drug can lead to serious water and mineral loss because it decreases the amount of water retained in the body by increasing urination. This is a prescription drug which requires you to be monitored by your doctor for side effects which include severe thirst, dry mouth, mental confusion and muscle cramps/weakness. It can also mask steroid use, which is why it is on the list of substances banned by the National Football League, and why several players who had taken it failed a drug test when they tested positive for bumetanide. Why football players need diet pills is a bit of a mystery, as it’s hard to tell what size they are under all that padding, but presumably they had their reasons and several are now suing the health store chain that sold the supplement to them.
The FDA has found other similar ‘natural’ weight loss products – most of which are imported from China and Peru – and named Sliminate, Superslim and Slim Up among 69 tainted weight-loss supplements they have found so far. The problem is that many of these drugs do not fully declare their ingredients, which makes them illegal in the USA, but still available on the Internet. An additional complication can be if you are already taking prescription medication and some of these ingredients can interact with your drugs, and reported symptoms include high blood pressure, chest pains, palpitations or seizures. Because you don’t know exactly what they contain, they could have toxic interactions with your own medication and could make it difficult for your doctor to diagnose to diagnose patients.
As I have mentioned before, just because something is natural doesn’t mean you won’t be affected in an adverse way by it. The simplest things, like garlic for instance, can bring some people out in allergic reactions including sweating, increased blood pressure and faintness – and millions of people experience no effect at all. Garlic is in fact extremely good for the immune system, but there is no guarantee on how it will affect you personally. Losing weight is a good goal, but remember that natural weight loss usually involves eating less and exercising more, a cheaper – and safer – alternative to supplements all round.
Dieting? Train your tongue for maximum success
January 6, 2009 by AnnA
Filed under Diets, Food & Nutrition
Diets come and go, and are more or less successful, but according to neuroscientists we may be overlooking a vital factor. We tend to focus on calories and exercise and food generally – which are all good things – but a report in Science Daily has added another element. Research has shown that if you are overweight over a long period it gradually numbs the taste sensation to sweet foods. Now that may sound like a good thing, but it means in reality that you eat more sweeter foods to compensate. The scientists have shown that there is a critical link between taste and body weight so knowing that will help if you have a sweet tooth. There are two factors at work: obesity is often accompanied by a failure of the ‘satiety signal’, in other words knowing when you are full and also not recognising that your taste buds have been deadened so you don’t realise how much you are increasing your intake of sweet foods.
Solution? Start with portion control, and use a smaller plate, and monitor your sweet food intake so you can start reducing it.




