Diets, especially fad diets or “quick-fix” pills and plans, often set you up for failure because:

• You feel deprived. Diets that don’t allow certain types of food (carbs, fat, sugar) in moderation are simply not practical, not to mention unhealthy – eliminating entire food groups doesn’t allow for a healthy, well-rounded diet and creates imbalances in our bodies.
• You “plateau” after losing a few pounds. There’s actually a second component to healthy weight loss: exercise. Often your body adjusts to a new way of eating, and it’s only with increased physical activity that the pounds will continue to melt away.
• You lose weight, but can’t keep it off. Diets that severely cut calories, restrict certain foods, or rely on ready-made meals might work in the short term. However, once you meet your weight loss goal, you have no means of lifelong, healthy diet maintenance, and the pounds quickly come back.
• After your diet, you seem to put on weight more quickly. Restricting your food intake slows down your metabolism – another reason why starvation or “fasting” diets are counterproductive.
• You break your diet and feel too discouraged to try again. Just because you gave in to temptation and overindulged, doesn’t mean all your hard work goes down the drain. Healthy eating is about the big picture – an occasional splurge won’t kill your efforts. And again, diets that are too restrictive are conducive to cheating – when you feel deprived, it’s easy to fall off the wagon.
• You lose money faster than you lose weight. Special shakes, meals, and programs may be cost-prohibitive and less practical for long-term weight loss and healthy weight maintenance.
• You feel isolated and unable to enjoy social situations revolving around food. Without some practical, healthy diet strategies, you may feel lost when dining out or attending events like cocktail parties or weddings. If the food served isn’t on your specific diet plan, what can you do?
• The person on the commercial lost 30 lbs in 2 months – and you haven’t. Diet companies make a lot of grandiose promises, and most are simply not realistic. Unfortunately, losing weight is not easy, and anyone who makes it seem that way is doing you a disservice. Don’t get discouraged by setting unrealistic goals!

Why do some weight loss programs succeed?

While there is no “one size fits all” solution to lifelong, healthy weight loss, try these tips:

• Lifestyle change – Permanent weight loss is not something that a “quick-fix” diet can achieve. Instead, think about weight loss as a permanent lifestyle change. You are making a commitment to your health for life. Various popular diets can help to jump-start your weight loss, but permanent changes in your lifestyle and food choices are what will work long term.
• Find a cheering section – Social support means a lot. Programs like one  in your gym or with your personal trainer use group support to impact weight loss and lifelong healthy eating. Seek out support, whether in the form of family, friends, or a support group, so that you can get the encouragement you need.
• Commit to a plan and stick to it – Experiment until you find a good, long-term plan that helps you lose the weight and maintain that loss in a way that works for you. If you cut out just 100 calories a day you could lose 10 pounds in a year. Remember, one 12 oz can of soda can contain 150 calories.
• Lose weight slowly. Losing weight too fast can take a toll on your nervous system, making you feel sluggish, drained, and sick. When you drop a lot of weight quickly, you’re actually losing mostly water and muscle rather than fat. Aim to lose 1 to 2 pounds a week to ensure healthy weight loss.
• Stay motivated and keep track – Short-term goals, like wanting to fit into a bikini for the summer, usually don’t work as well as goals like wanting to feel more confident or become healthier for your children’s sakes. Keep a food journal or weigh yourself regularly. Find and use tools that help keep you motivated. Stay focused: when frustration and temptation strike, concentrate on the many benefits you will reap from being healthier and leaner.

Myth: Cutting carbohydrates helps you lose weight
Doing it the wrong way can also make you feel rotten and unhealthy. Carbs are to this decade what fats were to the last: food demons. Truth is, though, you need them for energy. And, like with fats, some are better than others. Experts suggest a minimum of 130 grams of carbs a day—a far cry from low-carb diets that start with 20 grams or less. Short-term effects of such diets include fatigue, constipation and irritability; long term, you could be putting yourself at risk for heart disease and colon cancer.

Fad diets aside, what may matter most is how refined the carbohydrates are. The best idea is to cut back on refined carbs such as soda and foods made with white flour, while loading up on healthier carbs like whole grains, fruits, and vegetables.

Myth: Diet foods help you drop pounds
They can actually do the opposite. You may be doing yourself more harm than good by scanning labels for the lowest calorie and fat counts. Prepackaged diet foods can have a lot of sugar and trans fat.

As with carbs, it’s the quality of the fat, not the amount, that makes the difference. Monounsaturated fats (found in nuts, olive oil, and avocados) and the polyunsaturated variety (in corn, soybean, and safflower oils) help your cardiovascular system, improve weight loss, and are crucial for absorbing beta carotene from vegetables like carrots. Trans fats and saturated fats, on the other hand, have been linked with heart disease and even cancer.

A recent study found that replacing just 30 calories of carbs a day with the same amount of trans fats nearly doubled the risk of heart disease. Replacing the same ratio of carbs with monounsaturated or polyunsaturated fats, on the other hand, lowered the risk of heart disease by 30 to 40 percent. So consider boosting your good fats by adding nuts to your morning cereal or avocado to your salads. Just watch your daily calories to keep them in check.

Myth: The more you cut calories, the more weight you’ll lose
That can actually hurt you. Cut your calories too far—below 1,200 a day—and you’ll end up with a double whammy that quickly decreases your metabolism and muscle mass. To get the most out of the calories you do eat, choose whole foods such as produce, fresh meat and fish, and whole grains that are as close to their natural state as possible. They have a higher “nutrient density” than refined foods, because they pack more vitamins and minerals into fewer calories.

Myth: Dairy makes you fat
Cutting dairy just shoots you in the foot (and fat cells). Combined with calorie control, a dairy-rich diet can nearly double body-fat reduction and weight loss and help prevent weight gain. Part of the reason is the hormone calcitriol, which helps conserve calcium for stronger bones while telling fat cells to convert less sugar to fat and burn more body fat. The result is leaner fat cells and a leaner you. Stick to the government’s latest dietary guidelines, which recommend three servings of low- or nonfat dairy a day.

Myth: Brown equals whole-grain
There are lots of whole-grain poseurs out there. Look for labels where “whole-wheat” or “whole-grain” top the list. It’s worth the extra effort: More and more research is finding that whole grains reduce your risk of many chronic ailments, from obesity and diabetes to cardiovascular disease. The extra fiber in whole grains is key: It makes you feel full, which means you eat less. It also helps level out the peaks and valleys of insulin that a meal produces. An added boost: Whole-grain foods tend to be higher in vitamins B and E than refined grains.

Physical fitness is very important for our health and well being! That’s what we’re being told. That’s great! But what in the world is it? Don’t you think that if we’re going to explore the possibility of doing something about it, then we need to know what we’re talking about?

Here’s A Definition . . .

The President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports Research says, “Health related fitness consists of those components that have a relationship with good health . . .

The Components Of Physical
Fitness Are . . .

Aerobic Endurance – the ability to do moderately strenuous activity over a period of time. It reflects how well your heart and lungs work together to supply oxygen to your body during exertion and exercise. (This keeps the pump pumping properly.)

Muscular Endurance – the ability to hold a particular position for a sustained period of time or repeat a movement many times. This could be the capability to hold a two-pound weight above your head for five minutes or the effort required to lift that weight 20 consecutive times.

Muscular Strength – the ability to exert maximum force, such as lifting the heaviest weight you can budge, one time. It is possible to have muscular strength in one area, say your arms, while lacking strength in another area such as your legs.

Flexibility – the ability to move a joint through its full range of motion. This is how limber or supple you are. (Wouldn’t it be nice to bend down and pick something up without struggling?)

Body Composition – the proportion of fat in your body compared to your bone and muscle. It does not refer to your weight in pounds or your figure. (But if the ratio is good, you will look and feel better.)

Balance – the ability to maintain your body in its upright posture, especially when abnormal stress (such as tripping) might cause you to lose your balance.

Metabolic fitness – the ability of the body to efficiently burn fuel (food) for energy. (Maybe you can eat that doughnut without it immediately going to your waist.)

Why Do I Want To Improve My Physical Fitness?

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Exercise more. When you walk, run, or lift weights, you increase the energy required of your body, which raises your metabolism then, and for hours afterward.

“It’s not a huge spike, but it makes a difference,” says Gary Miller, PhD, associate professor of health and exercise science at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.Work out with weights. During weight training, muscle tissue is stressed; afterward, it’s repaired — which raises metabolism.

A woman who strength trains three times a week for six months can build enough muscle to burn 10 to 32 extra calories a day, according to Robert Wolfe, PhD, professor of geriatrics at the University of Arkansas.

Practice portion control. This helps ensure you don’t overload your metabolism with a surplus of unusable energy (that is, food).

Use a food scale or measuring cups to identify proper portions. Or use your hand as a guide. A fist equals a serving of fruit, a cupped hand equals a serving of cereal or grains, two cupped handfuls equal a serving of leafy green vegetables and an open palm equals a serving of meat.

Eat smaller meals more often. Some experts recommend eating smaller meals throughout the day, known as grazing. “Grazing helps normalize blood sugar levels rather than producing three large spikes, which is what happens eating three meals a day,” says Nick Flynn, PhD, associate professor of biochemistry at Angelo State University in San Angelo, Texas.

Determine the amount of calories you need at Mypyramid.gov. Then keep that number in mind as you transition from eating three ordinary-sized meals to five smaller ones.

Laugh it off. When researchers from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, put people into a “metabolic chamber” (a small room that measures heat output in order to calculate a person’s metabolic rate) and showed them funny videos, the subjects’ metabolic rates rose by 10 to 40 calories. It’s a small increase, but every calorie counts for those seeking weight loss, says lead researcher Maciej Buchowksi, PhD

Copyright Cooking Light Magazine

Oatmeal
Start your day with a steaming bowl of oats, which are full of omega-3 fatty acids, folate, and potassium. This fiber-rich superfood can lower levels of LDL (or bad) cholesterol and help keep arteries clear.

Opt for coarse or steel-cut oats over instant varieties — the coarse and steel-cut contain more fiber — and top your bowl off with a banana for another four grams of fiber.

Salmon
Super-rich in omega-3 fatty acids, salmon can effectively reduce blood pressure and keep clotting at bay. Aim for two servings per week, which may reduce your risk of dying of a heart attack by up to one-third.

“Salmon contains the carotenoid astaxanthin, which is a very powerful antioxidant,” says cardiologist Stephen T. Sinatra, MD, the author of “Lower Your Blood Pressure In Eight Weeks.” But be sure to choose wild salmon over farm-raised fish, which can be packed with insecticides, pesticides, and heavy metals.

Not a fan of salmon? Other oily fish like mackerel, tuna, herring, and sardines will give your heart the same boost.

Avocado
Add a bit of avocado to a sandwich or spinach salad to increase the amount of heart-healthy fats in your diet. Packed with monounsaturated fat, avocados can help lower LDL levels while raising the amount of HDL cholesterol in your body. Health.com: What puts you at risk for high cholesterol?

“Avocados are awesome,” says Dr. Sinatra. “They allow for the absorption of other carotenoids — especially beta-carotene and lycopene — which are essential for heart health.”

Olive oil
Full of monounsaturated fats, olive oil lowers bad LDL cholesterol and reduces your risk of developing heart disease.

Results from the Seven Countries Study, which looked at cardiovascular disease incidences across the globe, showed that while men in Crete had a predisposition for high cholesterol levels, relatively few died of heart disease because their diet focused on heart-healthy fats found in olive oil. Look for extra-virgin or virgin varieties — they’re the least processed — and use them instead of butter when cooking. Health.com: Good fats vs. bad fats — what to eat

Nuts
Almonds, walnuts, and macadamia nuts are all full of omega-3 fatty acids and mono- and polyunsaturated fats.

Almonds are rich in omega-3s, plus nuts increase fiber in the diet, says Dr. Sinatra. “And like olive oil, they are a great source of healthy fat.”

Berries
Blueberries, raspberries, strawberries — whatever berry you like best — are full of anti-inflammatories, which reduce your risk of heart disease and cancer.

“Blackberries and blueberries are especially great,” says Sinatra. “But all berries are great for your vascular health.” Health.com: How I survived a heart attack at 43

Legumes
Fill up on fiber with lentils, chickpeas, and black and kidney beans. They’re packed with omega-3 fatty acids, calcium and soluble fiber.

Spinach
Spinach can help keep your ticker in top shape thanks to its stores of lutein, folate, potassium, and fiber.

But upping your servings of any veggies is sure to give your heart a boost. The Physicians’ Health Study examined more than 15,000 men without heart disease for a period of 12 years. Those who ate at least 2½ servings of vegetables each day cut their risk of heart disease by about 25 percent, compared with those who didn’t eat the veggies. Each additional serving reduced risk by another 17 percent.

Flaxseed
Full of fiber and omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids, a little sprinkling of flaxseed can go a long way for your heart. Top a bowl of oatmeal or whole-grain cereal with a smidgen of ground flaxseed for the ultimate heart-healthy breakfast.

Soy
Soy may lower cholesterol, and since it is low in saturated fat, it’s still a great source of lean protein in a heart-healthy diet.

Look for natural sources of soy, like edamame, tempeh, or organic silken tofu. And soy milk is a great addition to a bowl of oatmeal or whole-grain cereal. But watch the amount of salt in your soy: Some processed varieties like soy dogs can contain added sodium, which boosts blood pressure.

Copyright Health Magazine