Eat Right, Live Strong
When you eat right, workout and get plenty of sleep, you’re doing the things you need to do to live strong in Lakeland, FL. The secret to healthy living, no matter where you are, starts with the food you consume. If you eat junk food that’s loaded with calories, you’ll put on weight and won’t provide the nutrients you need to build healthy cells and boost your immune system. Eating healthy means cutting out foods that have a toxic effect on your body.
Unhealthy food can cause you to consume even more unhealthy food.
Food high in sugar can be addictive. It actually releases opioids and dopamine in the brain and those make you feel good. They’re also released when taking addictive drugs. Eating sugar makes you want to eat more sugar. It also can cause joint pain, can make your skin wrinkly by damaging collagen, can cause insulin resistance, heart disease, kidney problems and affect your sexual drive. Foods in high fructose corn syrup mess with the hormones that make you feel hungry and full, leaving you to feel hungry and never quite able to fill that need.
Not only does unhealthy food cause you to gain weight, it also contains chemicals and toxins.
Have you ever read a label on processed meat or many of the processed foods commonly purchased? It often contains words that look like a chemistry lab experiment. Processed foods means foods that are altered chemically. If you make a roast, the meat is processed because you cook it, but that’s not the same as the processing required to make a hot dog. Processed foods are designed to make you want to eat more. The manufacturers create them to reward the brain and cause over consumption. Many of the ingredients aren’t found in nature and can’t be properly processed by the body.
Eating healthy means eating whole foods.
That fresh salad, the grilled chicken and fresh cooked green beans are all whole foods that provide nutrients without providing junk. Eating healthy means choosing food with a variety of natural colors. If your plate looks like a rainbow of whole foods, you’re doing it right. Each color of vegetable means a different phytonutrient that can help your body in different ways. When you choose healthy eating, you’re making a difference that can help you live longer, lose weight and keep it from returning.
- Not only are processed foods high in calories and low in nutrients, they’re low in fiber to help keep the digestive system healthy. Don’t forget what you drink counts too. Make it water, not soft drinks.
- A healthy lifestyle means more than just eating healthy, although that should be a top priority. It also means working out regularly. Exercise helps keep you younger looking, improves your mood and makes you healthier.
- Living strong means getting all types of exercise, including lifting weights. Strength building exercises can help make bones stronger and prevent injury. Flexibility workouts improve your range of motion and a good cardio workout makes you heart healthy.
- Sleeping is important for heart health. It also helps improve your mental well being.
Getting in shape for the summer means more than just working out. While you do have to move, in order to get the waist, thighs or overall body that you want. You have to eat healthy, too. It can start by eliminating processed foods and sugar from your diet and focus more on eating fresh whole foods. Whole foods can include poultry, beef, pork, seafood and fish you bake, broil, steam or grill at home. Whole foods have minimum ingredients and you know what’s in each one. Instead of chicken McNuggets, you eat a baked chicken breast. Forget about the fries and chips, have a baked potato instead.
While you’re probably aware that you’ll feel and look better when you workout and make lifestyle changes, did you know you can eliminate chronic disease? I see it happen frequently in the gym in Winter Haven, Florida. People often start out just to get into shape and then find that chronic issues that have bothered them for years seem to get better or disappear. It can be anything from chronic back or stomach issues to arthritis and diabetes.
If you want to eat healthy, the best way to get a head start is by planning your meals. It may sound like a lot of work, but after the first few weeks, it actually takes less work to plan your meals and cook them over the weekend for the week. That’s because you’ll be making extra and packing it in the freezer. Before too long, you’ll have several weeks worth of meals for those times when you’re super busy. It’s the perfect answer for those who work outside the home and a great reason to avoid takeout, when your meal is in the freezer and just a microwave minute away.
There are a lot of different levels of anxiety. Some require professional help, while others are more mundane, like fretting about things that might occur, but seldom do. No matter what type of anxiety your have, working out alleviates anxiety and can help tremendously. It doesn’t replace professional help for an anxiety disorder, but it can be a complementary treatment.
If you recently got bad news from the doctor that you’re prediabetic with insulin resistance or have family members that have suffered from diabetes for years, you can lower your risk of diabetes by adopting a healthy lifestyle. I’ve watched many clients in Winter Haven and Lakeland, Florida, FL change their health by changing their lifestyle. Both a healthy diet and regular exercise can help and boost your health in other areas at the same time.
A lot of clients in Winter Haven choose healthy eating in addition to exercise to lose weight. Making those lifestyle changes are important and the best way to succeed. There are some basics to for healthy eating, like eating whole foods and cutting out sugar, but also some rules for good nutrition for weight loss. It’s one reason fad diets won’t give you the results you want. You don’t get adequate nutrients for optimal health. Certain nutrients can also boost your metabolism and make weight loss easier.
I help clients in Lakeland stick with their goals with helpful tips. You can achieve your health goals too when you use them. It doesn’t matter whether the goal is to lose weight, build muscle or boost your cardio performance, these tips will help. Before you even set goals, learn to use the SMART technique to create them and give yourself a better chance to achieve them.
Wouldn’t it be nice if there were a simple pill that REALLY burned fat! Imagine sitting around not doing much and melting fat like a Hershey Kiss left in the attic. The truth is, fat loss is a byproduct of getting healthy. It’s fun to fantasize about taking a pill though.