Eat Less, Exercise More, Sleep More

Eating less & exercising more is something that every diet will suggest. But, sleeping more (ifyou don't sleep enough) is very important to get your metabolism in order.

I am going to sleep right now. zzzzzz.

Do not let one unhealthy meal affect your lifestyle

Once in a while, everyone will eat something unhealthy or overeat, this is normal. What's not normal is to make it a trend. Every time you think of that unhealthy meal or couple of meals, just remember, this can be a drop in a bucket if compared to your eating habits in the whole year. Go ahead & grab some cucumbers or carrots & eat them & you will start getting back to your new balanced, natural, and moderation lifestyle.

Watch less TV to loose weight!!

Watching TV less has helped me burn more calories because most of the activities that you would do would help burn more calories that watching TV.

If you weight 200 lbs & watch TV for 10 minutes you only burn about 16 calories, if you do gardening work, you burn 65 calories in the same amount of time !!

Check out this link for some more useful information about how many calories you burn when you do some activities:
http://k2.kirtland.cc.mi.us/~balbachl/calorie.htm

How my 1.5 year old taught me to loose weight

My 1.5 yr old daughter taught me how to loose weight by refusing to eat & being so active. This is keeping her in the 25% percentile or below on the weight scale as compared to other children her age. Here goes your diet; just do like my daughter: eat less and exercise more.

Hold on, I forgot to mention, if you wonder what fills her up: water, she drinks water all the time & this makes her not hungry. I am trying her techniques right now & it seems to work !!

Exercise is part of the balance

We will not be able to achieve complete balance in the diet without adopting a regular exercise routine. Being overweight, it's very understandable that you will not be able to exercise because you feel heavy or low energy, etc. But, you could start with the following schedule:
- Once/week for the first 3 weeks
- Twice/week for the next 5 weeks
- Then select your ideal frequency & stick with it.

The following exercises will help you without putting much strain on your knee if this is an issue for you like most overweight individuals (in the order of least strenous on the knee)
- Swimming
- Elliptical
- Biking
- Walking

Please feel free to post your comments or send me an email with your before pictures, I will keep them for you & then once you loose the weight, I will post them on this blog.

Good luck.

2 reasons why eating breakfast is critical for successfull balanced diet

Eating breakfast everyday has the following benefits:
1 . Boosts your metabolism, you will find yourself more productive & have more energy
2 . This will help you not to overeat on the next meal because you starved yourself in the morning, which would most likely mess your balanced diet.

If you are - like me - not very excited about breakfast, get yourself something quick like a granola bar or a handfull of dried fruits, the important thing is to get those early morning calories for your body to be able to function properly and in a balanced way.

Wear your 'feeling full' belt

Are you so hungry that you are afraid you will go and over-eat? I have a suggestion, go and get a belt (weight lifting back support or any other belt) and wear it around your stomach, then start eating. This will help you not over-eat & you will feel real good afterwards!

Deprivation & stravation are bad for you

Many "diets" nowadays fail because you deprive yourself from a specific type of food like fat, sugar, carb, or whatever. If you want to succeed on the long term, eat small portions of everything. That way, your body is not deprived or a certain type of food. Because, most likely, after 6 months, or 1 year, you will end up eating that food & gaining that weight back much faster than you lost it.

Starvation is also bad, because it will make your body super efficient & will preserve anything you feed it in the form of fat. Once your starvation is over, you body continues to be super efficient & you will gain more weight when you eat any little thing.

Over-Eating Over-Eating Over-Eating...

Over-Eating is one of the main reasons we gain weight; how to stop this bad habit? Here are some suggestions:
- Eating slowly will help you eat less
- If you have to overeat; select what you will overeat, get some lettuce, or tomatoes, you do not want to overeat chocolate or pizza!!
- Talk while you eat, this will help you slow down
- When done with your food & want to eat more, wait for 20 minutes & most of the time, you will realize that you are no longer hungry.
- Get a hot drink like green tea or get some unsweetened juice or some water with lime or lemon; this will moderate your appetite quite a bit.
- Eat more fibers, they will make you feel more full

Most of the time, when we over-eat, we tend to focus too much on the food, try to focus on somthing else like reading a book or browsing the internet.

Cheese lover? Read this

If you love cheese like me, you will need to make substitutions in your diet:
- Substitute whole fat cheese with lower fat cheese
- Eat more cottage cheese
- Eat more vegetables
- Eat more vegetables
- Eat more vegetables
...
I am talking about raw vegetables like snack to fill you up like carrots, cucumber, broccolli, tomatoes...
- This one is hard to get; but, try to find whole wheat pizza, if not make it at home

Educate yourself about nutrition...

Educating yourself about nutrition is way better investment of your time and much more fun than waisting your time shopping around for a diet. This will benefit you on the long term & loosing weight will be a side effect.

When you educate yourself about nutrition, not only will you benefit yourself, but, also the people around you.

5 ways to break the unhealthy eating cycle

My target was to loose 70 lbs; I lost 55 & I got really proud of myself & started this blog to help others who want to loose weight. Then I starting gaining weight, I gained about 6 lbs in the past 3 weeks. I am writing this as I beleive I managed to break the unhealthy eating cycle I was experiecing in the past 3 weeks; this is how I managed to do it:

1 - When I crave something sweet; I eat fruits or if I want more, I eat more fruits. This works because fruits are not as high calorie as ice cream for example. Let's say you grab a bag of hershey's kisses & you eat one after the other, before you know it, you had 500 calories & you are 350 calories over what you needed!! But, when you eat fruits, let's say you eat 3 apples, which is only about 195 calories, you are only 45 calories over & you feel full.

2 - You are now on a cycle of unhealthy eating & you want to finish this big bag of chips or finish a bag of nuts. Remember, nuts are good but in moderation. Now, you cannot achieve moderation because you are stressed out for example. The way to break this cycle is to choose the food you will overeat, grab a bag of baby carrots & try to finish it. You will get bored before you finish it & it won't be as dangerous (from the calorie count point of view) as a bag of nuts.

3 - Shop for healthy food; keep a lot of fruits arounds; if you don't have ice cream at home & you want to eat something sweet, you will grab a couple of fruits.

4 - Green tea is very useful when you are on an unhealthy eating cycle; if feels like it melts those fats away; at least for me it works nicely. I am talking about decaffinated green tea.

5 - Try to avoid watching TV; it encourages one to eat more snacks; instead go online or read a book or do anything that will keep those hands busy ;)

Eat Slower to achieve moderation

Eating slowly is one of the key habits that if you are able to get used to will help you eat more moderate portions. One way that would help you eat slower is opening a conversation while you eat. Also, chew slower & never speak when your mouth is full. Also, do not put more food in your mouth unless you are done eating all what is in your mouth.

Portion Control is critical to better eating

In order to achieve moderation while you eat, it's very important to control your portions; in other words you should always fill your plate or glass with smaller amount than what you think you need to eat. Especially if you are like me hate to throw food considering how many people suffer starvation in the US and around the world today. Anyway, not going off the subject too much, it will help you a lot taking smaller servings & if you are still hungry, have more. But, never fill your plate or glass too much at the beginning of your meal or even your snack. For example, if you will sit down to read or write or study & want some snack, do not grab the whole bag of chips or nuts, but rather bring a small plate & have a small portion because very often we get distracted with what we do & eat more than we need.

If you want to loose weight and looking for a diet read this

If you are overweight & looking around for a diet you need to reconsider. A diet - or at least the way they are sold today - are mostly like a band-aid or a reciepe for long term failure even if they work for the short term. The main issue with most of these diets is that they will not provide you with a well-balanced eating pattern. But, rather will tell you eat no carbs or no fat or whatever. This is not balanced, your body needs the fat & the carbs even if you are overweight. The key is to control the portions in a balanced way proportinal to how much overweight you are.

Let's agree on some points first; do you agree that obesity is some kind of disease? If you do, then read on. There was a study that showed that even if you are sick & crave for some kind of food, get some no matter what this food is. Let's apply this to obesity, let's say you are 70 lbs overweight & you are trying to apply the principles of my diet here but suddently you crave for an ice cream bar with caramel, nuts, and chocolate. That's totally fine, eat it & don't feel guilty about it. The fact that you crave it means that your body needs it. As long as you just eat one & have in mind that you are eating balanced, natural, and in moderation in general, you will be OK.

My point is, keep focused on eating healthy and apply these principles on a long term basis & exercise as often as you can. This will be your recipe for loosing those pounds for good. You may experience some minor increases of your weight along the way, but, that's normal & natural as long as you are loosing weight and feeling better on the long term. You will feel better because you are loosing weight without depriving yourself of any foods.

Keep positive attitude & good luck.

Do not waste your time or money on diet plans or pills

I have been trying to loose weight for over 7 years, until I figured this "diet" out; I realized I don't need a diet but rather a dramatic lifestyle change based on the concepts of eating natural food in moderation and balance.

We are much smarter than to need someone to tell you what to eat & when to eat it & you pay them for it! What you really need is apply my program. If you can excercise also along the way, that would be perfect, even a 20 minutes walk every day or every other day would be great.

We are more complicated than to just follow a simplistic 'low fat' weight loss program or 'low carb', you need a smart balance of natural (whole) foods in moderation & you will loose weight. Try it out for a month, not only will you loose weight, but, you will feel better & more healthy.

The great thing about my "diet" plan is that it does not tell you to stop one type food completely; this will guarantee that you won't crave that food later and jump on it like crazy & this is the key to maintaining the lost weight. A study showed that a crave means that your body needs it. For example, if you crave something sweet, your body needs it for whatever reason whether it's physical or emotional. How do you answer it based on the guidelines of my diet: eat what you crave, but IN MODERATION!! that way, you know you are not depriving yourself from something you may need or develop some vitamin deficiency or get hooked on vitamins or jump from one diet plan to another and so on...

Why other diets don't work

Most diets out there have what is called 'tubal vision' where they only focus on one aspect of your eating habits like fat or carbs or sugar and so forth. I will tell you from a logical point that these diets are just a band-aid; they will work for a short term & then you will be disappointed and go try another diet. That's why you need to start right here.

7 Reasons why you should eat more seafood

Seafood is often forgotten in our everyday diet. Try to get more of your protein from seafood; the following are some of the benefits from eating more seafood:

1 - Contains Omega-3 fatty acids that are good for you
2 - Easier to digest
3 - Offers large selection
4 - Better for your heart
5 - Some studies associate seafood with better memory
6 - Women who are or may become pregnant or who are breast-feeding may benefit from eating seafood. It is also highly recommended for kids under 12 (and over 12)
7 - http://www.rce.rutgers.edu/seafoodsafety/sslhi.html

Of course - following the natural diet - try as much as possible to get your seafood from the open seas (wild) rather than from farms.

It's critical to pick the right diet from the first time

A study links between failing diets & weakness in immune system. In other words, if you loose weight, then gain it, then loose it and so forth, this weakens your immune system. That's why it's important to not become a guinea pig for all these imperfect diets out there. There is only only perfect diet which the diet that our creator has for us; that's why you should eat balanced, natural (whole) foods in moderation.

Food substitutions - Try it out

I tried the following concept & it works very well; gradually substitute unnatural or processed foods with whole or natural unprocessed foods in your daily diet:
- Replace sugar with brown sugar or honey
- Replace mayonnaise with Mustard
- Replace white wheat with whole wheat (in bread, pasta, pizza,...)
- Replace candy with dried fruits
- Replace sweetened juice and soda with unsweetened Juice or even better with fruits
- Replace low-fat or zero-fat milk with whole milk (this one seems a little strange, but there are studies that indicate that whole milk is more nutritious for you & it also keeps your blood sugar levels more steady which lowers your craves for sweet food!)

Note: There is nothing wrong with eating any of the food items you are replacing occasionally as long as you don't make it a habit. For example, I love ice cream & I have some of my favorite once in a while.

Lifestyle not Diet

It's very important to understand that you will not loose weight or become more healthy unless you change your eating habits & make it a new lifestyle. Only then, it will be easy to achieve & loosing the weight will be a side effect of it. Do not focus on loosing the weight, it will happen automatically as you lead this new natural, balanced, and moderate lifestyle.

But, one very important thing to understand is you will loose that weight slowly; remember this is a natural not artificial solution & if you look at most things in nature, they happen gradually not suddenlty (at least constructive processes)

Do not beleive those ads that tell you you will loose 30 pounds in 1 month; they will be most likely based on a unnatural and/or non-sustainable process which most likely will balance itself quickly afterwards by gaining that weight again.

Ginger, Green Tea, and Honey

Ginger, Green Tea, and Honey should be part of your diet. I recommend decaffinated green tea though; it contains low percentage of caffeine (about 5%)

Avoid vitamins as much a possible

Try to avoid vitamins as much as possible & replace them with a balanced diet; it's better for your body. Vitamins tend to make your body lazy; in other words, if your body gets used to them, it won't be able to efficiently extract the vitamins from regular food. So, it's better to take them only if you have some vitamin defficiency.

Philosophy of moderation

There is a general philosophycal idea that - if considered in many aspects of our life - can help achieve a happy life & it is the concept of making a desicion by exclusion of extreme choices & picking a choice from the mid of the spectrum.

For example, if you apply this idea to food choices; there are 2 ends of the spectrum (or 2 extremes):
1 - Eat too much & unhealthy food (check out this movie: supersize me); the result is you will be overweight.
2 - Eat too lillte & eliminate 'unhealthy' food completely; the result is you will get some kind of vitamin deficiency or even anemia.

Of course, both extremes are wrong, obviously because they are extremes; this is a lot of times a good measure or guideline for many choices we face everyday to be able to reach the optimal (most balanced and moderate) choice in my opinion.

True Balance

In order to achieve true balance; I realized that I cannot stick with one diet, but, rather apply a mixed diet in other words, I would be aware of the calories I take and at the same time lower the amount of carbs (never eliminate your carbs consumptions to zero; this contradicts with the concept of moderation; your brain needs carbs)

Balance & Moderation

Balance and moderation are key to solving many issues we are having today in life. One of the main issues many people are struggling with are healthy diets. I was inspired by this diet by the teaching of everyday habits of the prophet Mohamed 'peace be upon him'

Let me give you a bit of background about myslef: I struggled with being overweight for more than a few years, I love food & I was on a vicious cycle of overeating & eating unhelthy food. The challenge is when you are overweight, it's very hard to break that cycle unless you do something dramatic. I was also not able to loose weight by exercising because my knee is injured & being overweight could aggravate it even more. So, I started analysing my eating habits & came up with the balance & moderation diet.

I will try to explain in this blog how I used balance and moderation to lose 55 pounds. The following are some of the fundamental concepts I used to make this work:

- I knew that I will have to loose this weight slowly in order to loose it forever; I lost 55 pounds in about 1 year.
- In order to achieve balance, I had to eliminate (as much as possible) processed foods from my diet (for example: sugar added juice, sweets, white bread...). Going natural is the best approach to achieve balance. If you look at nature, it's so balanced.
- Eat slower; this forces you not to over eat; it takes about 20 minutes for your stomach to tell your brain that you are full.
- Eat a balanced diet; which means eat a little bit of everything; do not rule any food out, your body needs a large variety, but, in moderation.
- Drink less (1/3 of your meal for drink, 1/3 for food, and 1/3 empty)
- Avoid processed foods or sugar added food; if you want any have some but in moderation.
- Eat more fruits & whole grains.
- Never fill your stomach 100%, always leave room to breathe.
- Use more olive oil in your diet
- Eat more dates (7 dates per day is ideal)
- Eat some fruit 15-20 minutes before your meal
- Don't starve yourself; if you are hungry, get something to eat (based on healthy guidelines above)
- Replace your food with organic alternative as much as possible