Health Through Diet: Back To The Basics
March 8, 2011 By
The western world is one filled with technology and wonderful incites into medicine. Much relief of ailments can be found at local stores as ‘over-the-counter’ medicine. Greater ailments can be healed through wondrous medical procedures and prescription drugs. If I have a headache I would be able to grab some sort of aspirin or other headache medicine at almost any household in the US. Have you ever wondered why you got a headache? Did you just assume it was stress related or caused by someone at work? This may help us find a weak link in the western health field.
The pill you took to relieve your headache contained chemicals that close pain gates in your nervous system. The body was not taken into consideration in any form and the underlying problem was not addressed, therefore the symptoms were repressed and nothing more. Our bodies are not designed to have any functions replaced with synthetic chemicals; instead our powerful adaptive bodies are designed to only ‘welcome’ the help of synthetic chemicals. Therefore, we see we cannot put our health entirely into the hands of synthesized chemicals, if we could, pills would exist to replace our eating. If we come to realize our bodies must carry the weight of healing and health, then we must be proactive in the health of our bodies. The Chinese say “to treat someone who is already sick, is to start making weapons after the war has already begun.” This is the true incite into preventative maintenance into our bodies. The US didn’t seem to start promoting healthy living till obesity turned epidemic. The main concern to correct said epidemic was diet, I think they are on the right path.
Diet, did you freak out when you saw that word? Did you gasp just thinking about depriving yourself of food, or starving your self to lose some weight? All of the definitions of diet that is food related are basically defined as: what and how much food you eat. So when I say diet, most people think about a period of time that they are constricting their intake of food or certain food, and not what they eat in general. Everybody everyday should be dieting to be certain they are getting what their body needs, not what their mind wants.
For Americans a simple daily diet seems too easy since billion is what Americans spend trying to lose weight each year. In an age of synthetic drugs and a ‘want it now’ mind set, no one can lose weight without some diet pills and a Fad diet plan, can they? Well, of course they can, and as a matter of fact chances are they will not be successful on the fad diet. Hillel Schwartz writes “Dieting makes everything worse” and goes on “for the chances are high that fat people will fail”. I don’t think Hillel was told ‘If first you don’t succeed try, try again’. Try a different diet; go on the diet plan that reflects you. The body needs balance to be healthy and lose weight and cannot do this on overly restrictive diets, as they often cut out too many foods or even whole food groups. Many studies suggest that the weight someone is at has a large basis on genetics. This is true and that is why “there is no one specific diet best for all people”. From this we must be able to assume that we will not find the best diet from a book, the internet, and certainly not celebrities.
Celebrities seem to be thin all the time and endorse products that supposedly helped them to lose weight. Whether this is the reason the US spent so much money on weight loss products or not I am unsure, but you don’t need much money for a healthy diet. A balanced diet will also be a low-cost diet! You need to buy food anyway and grains, beans and local vegetables in season are the cheapest food items. Our biggest investment we need in diet is one of persistency, an answer common in Chinese to most ‘how’ questions.
Don’t worry if now diet confusion is setting in. Diet is not as complicated as you may have been led to believe. To support this statement one could find a good basis of diet in places of ethnic background that has been around for over 5000 years. If you would put your health in the hands of one surgeon over the others based on experience like I would, then you can see a good reason to look for a diet from a place with 5000 years experience. After all a culture doesn’t survive for thousands of years without in-depth incite on health with diet being the staple.
People everywhere are having trouble finding the best diet because of the “absurd situation” of trying to break food down to components and place them in a good-bad category. Just as in my example earlier with the headache, our approach in the western world isn’t taken into consideration the ‘whole.’ Components don’t exist alone in nature; they are part of a whole. And whole is exactly what our diets should contain, whole grains and whole pure foods. Maoshing Ni points out that most treatments are rendered useless unless we have incorporated the correct diet and lifestyle changes to partner with the treatment. Foods have properties, and they can help or hinder you current state of being.
We don’t need pills, books, treatments, and medication. We need to get back to the basics- diet and exercise; every diet related item lists those two words hand in hand. Then we need to look at instilling good values in our youth. As children grow they urn for wholesome and pure simple substances, don’t replace those with sugar and processed foods. Even the surgeon General is taking the approach to have adults lead the example to children in health and fitness, maybe to kill two birds with one stone. Step back from technology and look around the world for guidance. We need not try to rewrite how to maintain everyday health, when it’s already been successfully done for the last 5000 years. Diet is the cornerstone of our issue in America and also happens to be the cornerstone of preventative health. The USDA turned to the Chinese culture when they saw they needed to replace the ’4 food groups’, the same culture that tells us to have preventative measures, and if we look harder we may find how get back to the basics in order to contain our new disease – Health and Obesity.
Doctors in China in history used to be ranked highest based on their patients not getting sick, not how many they have healed. Preventative care is something that countries need to foster. Healthcare cost that are killing families could drop if preventative measures were taken. You don’t need a big bank account to be healthy, and you don’t need to follow a bunch of directions because eating healthy is the cheapest way to shop! The US puts almost 90% of its grain into feeding livestock, this is the inexpensive food that is healthy for us and is the food staple in other countries. Currently there is no ethnic backgrounds that:
Eat only raw
Are Vegan
Don’t eat carbs
Intentionally eat under 1500 kcals
Etc……
This is no ploy for a diet plan, as I’ve stated before everyone is different. Instead I am urging wholesome foods. Oriental Medical Practitioners are schooled in wholesome diets. Check out an acupuncturist finder to find an OMD or Licensed Acupuncturist in your area.
Health, Exercise for Sleeping Better in your Life and as a Power Source
January 29, 2011 By
a) Sleeping Better In Your Life
The amount of physical exercise that you exert during the day is one of the key ingredients to helping you get a good sleep at night. The more active your body is during the day, the more likely you are to relax at night and fall asleep faster.
With regular exercise you will notice that your quality of sleep is improved and the transition between the cycles and phases of sleep will become smoother and more regular. By keeping up your physical activity during the day, you may find it easier to deal with the stress and worries of your life.
Research and studies indicate that there is a direct correlation between how much we exercise and how we feel afterwards.
You should try and increase your physical activity during the day. The goal here is to give your body enough stimulation during the day so that you are not full of energy at night. Your body requires a certain amount of physical activity in order to keep functioning in a healthy manner. It is also important to note that you should not be exercising three or four hours before you go to bed. The ideal exercise time is in the late afternoon or early evening. You want to make sure you expend your physical energy long before it is time for your body to rest and ready itself for sleep.
You should attempt to exercise at least three or four times a week for a period of 30 minutes or so. You can include walking or something simple. If you prefer, you can include strenuous activities such as running as well. The goal here is to increase your heart rate and strengthen the capacity of your lungs. By adding a regular exercise activity to your daily schedule will help you to improve your overall health and help you emotionally as well.
Along with running and walking there are several other physical activities that you can add to your daily life to increase your level of physical activity. If you are battling not sleeping, you will find aerobic exercise to be the best. Your goal with exercise is to increase the amount of oxygen that reaches your blood stream. Overall, there are many types of aerobic exercise for you to choose from. The activities include running, biking, using a treadmill, dancing, and jumping rope.
There are some non aerobic exercises that you may find beneficial to help you solve your amnesia.
Yoga, Yoga is an exercise that has a stimulatory effect on your nervous system, especially the brain. Yoga utilizes breathing techniques and yoga postures to increase the blood circulation to the brain, promoting regular and restful sleeping patterns. The regular practice of yoga will help you to relax as well as relieve tension and stress.
Tai Chi, Tai Chi is an ancient art of breathing and movement that was developed by the Chinese monks. The movements involved are slow and precise, which is ideal if you have joint pains or you are unable to participate in high aerobic exercises. Research has shown that Tai Chi can help with insomnia by promoting relaxation.
ot have any time to exercise on a regular basis, you should try to sneak moments of activity into your schedule. Whenever possible, you should take the stairs instead of the elevator, as little things like that will do wonders for your body.
You should also park your car around the corner and walk that extra block or two to get to your destination. As you may know, there are many small things you can add to increase the activity in your life. Your overall goal here is to have a
healthy and well balanced life, with plenty of sleep.
b) Power Source
This day and age it can be very difficult indeed to go to the gym. Life is very hectic and busy, which will create a serious challenge for remaining consistent with exercise each day. Exercise is however, just what we all need to reduce stress, and give the body the extra energy it needs to carry out normal living.
The best results of exercise are achieved through the use of refined techniques, functional exercises, cardio, the right nutrition, variety, awareness, consistency, and motivation over a period of time. The refined techniques mean correct form to isolate muscles or to target areas of the body. Efficiency is need to ensure stimulation of the muscles. With weight lift training, which is also known as resistance training, you will need to eliminate any type of momentum.
It is also important to move the weight about using a full range of motion. Full range of motion causes the muscle to contract for the right amount of time and help to ensure the right length of the tendons. The goal here is to strengthen the joints of your body by stimulating the muscles.
Cadence is also helpful, as it is a term that refers to the rate in which the resistance or the weight moves. The best results with cadence are gained by slow movements which will cause the muscle to contract for a longer period of time. You can mix in a series of fast and slow cadence, which is very beneficial with sports type training.
Using the correct angles will achieve muscle isolation in target areas and help to decrease the risk of injuries, which is great for those using heavy weights. Functional type exercise is a popular technique that will stimulate the core and torso of your body while you work on another muscle group at the same time. As an example, when you perform a dumbell press while lying on an exercise ball. Your abdominal muscles and the core muscles will contract to hold your body into this position, while your chest and tricep muscles will push the dumbells up. This type of exercise and challenge will cause maximum stimulation to your body and keep the workout interesting and refreshing.
Cardio is another exercise that is great for the heart and lungs. The total number of calories you burn is very important along with maintaining the right heart rate. The formula for your heart rate is 220 minus your age times 60 for the lower number, then 220 minus you age and times 80 for the upper number.
This is also known as fat burning zone. Cardio will also de-toxify the body and help to strengthen the immune system along with other benefits. The muscles will contract and pass the lymph along, which will allow the immune system to clear away dead cells and bring new ones in.
Anytime you exercise, warming up is very important, as it will prepare your body for the more demanding workout of cardio. You should always allow 15 – 30 minutes prior to weight lifting and 10 – 15 minutes prior to cardio exercises. You should also stretch as well, as this will help get the blood flowing through your musles and get them limber as well. An ideal schedule for working out is to warm up then follow with cardio. You can lift weights on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday then cardio only on Tuesday and Thursday.
Even though you may think your schedule is simply too busy to maintain a schedule for working out, you will find that adding exercise will actually add more time, as you will have a lot more energy in your normal everyday life. You can think of exercise as the batteries that will help to give your life power.
Related Exercise Articles
Health, and the Many Reasons to Exercise in your Life
January 27, 2011 By
Most people need to follow some sort of exercise program, in order to stay healthy. Here you will find a few good reasons why you should start exercising now.
a) Contributes to fat loss, it is well proven from scientific research all over the world that physical exercise contributes to weight loss. If you burn more calories than you consume through nutrition, you will lose weight. When you exercise, you burn more calories than when you do not. It is really simple, the more you exercise, the more weight or fat you will lose.
b) Prevent disease, the chances of developing several various diseases has been proven to decrease when exercising. These
diseases include heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and the stroke.
Around four out of five deaths caused by heart disease and cancer, are linked to factors that include stress and lack of exercise. People all know that diabetes increases the chance for heart attacks and strokes. What this shows, is that many of the risk factors and diseases caused by not exercising are working in conjunction to damage your health. To prevent this from happening, start exercising.
c) Improving disease, many severe and minor diseases can be improved or even healed through regular exercise. These even
include the diseases listed above. By following a regular plan, you can also decrease HDL cholesterol levels, decrease triglyceride levels, and decrease your blood pressure as well.
Exercising on a regular basis will also reduce the risk of prostate cancer for men, breast and uterine cancer for women, and much more. All of this is scientifically proven, which is why you should start exercising today.
d) Enhance your state of mind, everyone knows from the many scientific studies that regular exercising will lead to an increased release of endorphins in the body. These chemicals will fight depression and make you feel happy. The body releases these endorphins only 12 minutes into the workout.
There is another chemical known as serotonin that is increased during and after a workout. The increased levels of serotonin in the central nervous system is associated with feelings of well being and decreased mental depression. The chemical can also help you sleep better at night.
e) Enhance your wellness, when you are in great shape and well fit, you will have more energy and you will notice that your overall mood is improved. You will have experienced that you can stretch beyond your own limits and you know that you can do more than you thought possible.
f) Persistence, exercising regularly will give you more energy, which can help you be more productive at home and at work. Exercising can help give your new goals a sense of purpose and give you something to focus on and aim for. This can help you increase your persistence and prevent you from going off track while you aim for your goal.
g) Social capabilities, after a workout on a regular basis you can boost your self esteem. This can help you look better and you will be more comfortable as well. Exercise will also help you to become more active and meet new people, which will prevent you from feeling isolated and unsupported. Exercise will also increase your interests in sex, and can help you to improve your marriage or your partner relationship.
After knowing all of these tips and reasons to exercise, you should not hesitate to get out there and exercise. You can exercise at home or go out there and join a gym. There are several different ways that you can exercise, all you have to do is select a few that you like. Take a little bit of time out of your day and start exercising, you will feel better than ever before and your body will thank you.
Related Exercise Articles
Exercise and Physical Activities ? Health Benefits
January 23, 2011 By
Regular physical activity provides enormous health benefits. It helps reduce heart disease, cancer, type 2 diabetes and many other diseases and metabolic conditions. Regular fitness exercise is also highly beneficial for weight reduction and weight maintenance, and may improve brain chemistry to reduce depression. By contrast, health studies that have monitored the wellbeing of large groups of people over many years clearly show that inactivity significantly increases the risk of overweight, obesity and chronic diseases.
New brain cell development, improved cognition and memory. Exercise stimulates the formation of new brain cells. Researchers found that the areas of the brain that are stimulated through exercise are responsible for memory and learning. For instance, older adults who engage in regular physical activity have better performances in tests implying decision-making process, memory and problem solving.
Heart Disease and Stroke. Daily physical activity can help prevent heart disease and stroke by strengthening your heart muscle, lowering your blood pressure, raising your high-density lipoprotein (HDL) levels (good cholesterol) and lowering low-density lipoprotein (LDL) levels (bad cholesterol), improving blood flow, and increasing your heart’s working capacity. Optimizing each of these factors can provide additional benefits of decreasing the risk for Peripheral Vascular Disease.
Cholesterol lowering effect. Exercise itself does not burn off cholesterol like it does with fat, however, exercise favorably influences blood cholesterol levels by decreasing LDL (bad) cholesterol, triglycerides and total cholesterol and increasing HDL (good) cholesterol.
Physical activity helps to reduce body fat by building or preserving muscle mass and improving the body’s ability to use calories. When physical activity is combined with proper nutrition, it can help control weight and prevent obesity, a major risk factor for many diseases.
Exercise has also been found to increase levels of “brain-derived neurotrophic factor” (BDNF). This substance is thought to improve mood, and it may play a role in the beneficial effects of exercise. BDNF’s primary role seems to be to help brain cells survive longer; so this may also explain some of the beneficial effects of exercise on dementia
Among the symptoms of depression are feelings of worthlessness and hopelessness. Physical exercise often leads to a sense of accomplishment that can increase good feelings about yourself when you need it most. Exercise can also help you feel better about your appearance and your self-worth. Meeting small goals is an excellent way to start boosting self-confidence with the feeling of accomplishment you take in completing challenges.
The health benefits of exercise are explicable in terms of favourable physiological, psychological, and biochemical changes and improvements in function. Their scope is greater than has been supposed. Motivating sedentary people to pursue these benefits is not straightforward. They are reluctant to undertake even moderate exercise, and they become immediately aware of their limited tolerance for physical work and the discomfort that it provokes. It takes several weeks of regular exercise to see an improvement in their capacity for effort and for there to be a training effect.
It was found that exercise had the strongest effect on boosting patients’ physical function, such as improving their ability to climb stairs or walk a certain distance. It improved patients’ body composition, increasing the percentage of lean muscle mass to total weight. Exercise reduced some symptoms, such as nausea and vomiting and pain, and modest improvements were seen in fatigue, mood and quality of life. Given the relatively small benefits for exercise identified by their analysis, the researchers suggest combining exercise with other inventions designed to improve cancer patients’ physical and mental health.
