Getting to Know the General Motors Diet

Have you been to the grocery store lately? What did you notice? Perhaps you saw a recently added aisle displaying organic fruits and vegetables. Did you ever wonder why that aisle is there? Why wasn’t it there years ago?

According to recent studies, obesity is one of the top two killer conditions in America today (next to diabetes). Obesity leads to other serious health problems, such as heart failures and cancer. One way to avoid obesity is to engage in regular exercise and to eat a balanced meal. This is the reason why grocery stores nowadays have special sections for all natural products, including fruits and vegetables.

Without a balanced diet, regular exercise will not be as effective as you would have hoped. But then again, with all the diet plans and programs followed by people these days, how do you know if one is effective? How do you choose diets that work?

The GM Diet Plan

There is one way to tell if a diet program is effective or not, and that is its longevity. If a one diet program was able to carry its name for several years, it means a lot of people has tried it and that it has worked for them. There are only a few health programs that pass this criteria, and one of them is the GM diet plan.

The GM diet plan or the General Motors diet is perhaps one of the oldest diet programs in the world. Initiated by the General Motors company for their employees, this diet plan has already helped thousands of people all over the world for several years.

Basically, the GM diet requires eating fruits and vegetables for one full week or for seven days straight. There are specific instructions and portion advisory from day one to day seven, but the entire diet program aims to cut between 10 to 17 pounds from your original weight.

NIH Tips to Help You Get More Exercise

You know you need exercise. Regular physical activity helps you control your weight, lower your risks of chronic diseases like high blood pressure and type II diabetes, and can even make you feel happier and more energetic. If you are like me, though, you don’t always get the amount of physical activity you need. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) recommends the average adult should get two and a half hours of moderate physical activity per week.

Who is the NIH?

The National Institutes of Health is a branch of the US Department of Health and Human Services. Their primary mission is sponsoring research to help people live longer, healthier lives. Research can’t make a difference if people don’t know about it, so getting information and recommendations out to the public is an essential part of their mission.

Tips to Help You Get More Exercise

The NIH has published a booklet, Tips to Help You Get Active, to help people overcome various obstacles that stand in their way. You don’t need to read the whole thing, though, because many of the suggestions are the same, regardless of the problem. I’ll summarize the most important ones for you.

Start Slowly

This is the most important tip if you are out-of-shape, even if you starting an exercise they you used to do with your eyes closed.  The slower you start the less your chances of injury. Don’t be that guy or gal who enthusiastically starts a vigorous exercise program, works hard for a day, and then gives up for feeling so horrible the next day.

See a Medical Professional

If you have any medical conditions, this is the most important tip. Light physical exercise like walking is not usually a problem, but you should definitely follow your doctor’s advice for length, type, and intensity of workouts, even if you are healthy but are a man over 40 or a woman over 50.

Find Something You Enjoy

While different activities do have some different benefits, being physically active what is most important. Light exercise you do every day because you are having fun will pay off much more than vigorous exercise you only manage to struggle through a couple times a month.

Take a Class or Join a Fitness Center

Having a fixed time or place to do your workouts can help motivate you, especially when you know you’ve already paid the membership or class cost. Fitness centers can also provide environments that are more comfortable for your workout during hot summers or cold winters. You may also feel safer exercising in a group.

Use a Physical Trainer

Not only will using a physical trainer help motivate you to exercise, they will help make sure you don’t injure yourself by showing you the proper ways to warm up or use equipment. Also, if you already have an injury, they will customize your workout around your injury.

LowFatDietPlan.org is a site dedicated to providing readers with the most up-to-date diet and fitness research so they can include only the most effective strategies in thier diet plans.

Health Foods: Simple Ways to Eat more Fruits and Vegetables

Everyone is told to eat fruits and vegetables, beginning at a young age.  The up to date dietary guidelines recommend Americans to get at least  five cups of fruits and veggies today.  Many people are surprised by this because an astonishing amount of them don’t even get half of that.  Because of today’s fast and processed foods, they usually take priority over health foods in some households.  It can be hard to incorporate fruits and vegetables into your diet if you’ve never done it before.  There are plenty of ways you can “sneak” them into your diet and after getting used to it, you won’t ever crave processed foods again!

Fruits and vegetables are essential for our bodies to function.  They provide us with fiber, keeping our digestive tract healthy and preventing digestive illnesses.  They are anti-oxidant rich and will possibly prevent cancer and other chronic diseases such as heart disease.  Fruits and veggies are filled with vitamins and minerals that our bodies need to function.  If you eat them regularly along with other healthy foods, you are likely to maintain your weight throughout your lifetime.  All of these are great reasons to learn to incorporate them into your diet.

At breakfast, you can add fruit to your regular piece of toast, or eat it separately.  Add berries to your oatmeal or cereal.  Chopping vegetables and adding them to scrambled eggs is a great way to get an early morning energy burst.  Make a fresh smoothie with your own ingredients such as: fresh fruit, skim milk or yogurt.  You can even add vegetables to the mix by blending them along with the fruit.  Limit juice but if you must have it, make sure it’s 100% instead of sugary.

Incorporate a handful of fruits and veggies to what you eat for lunch.  If you’re a sandwich eater, load it with fresh vegetables such as lettuce, spinach, tomatoes, mushrooms, sprouts, onions or peppers.  If you crave unhealthy, crunchy snack foods this is a great way to get rid of that habit.  Salads are already a healthy, veggie filled lunch food (if you eat it without croutons and tons of fattening dressing) but you can make it even healthier by adding fresh fruits.  Fresh fruits that go well with salad include: grapes, apples, oranges or pears.

Make ½ of your plate full of fruits and veggies at dinner.  Add them to recipes by chopping or slicing them.  Experiment with different ways of cooking vegetables like steaming, roasting or stir-frying.  Add side salads to your dinners.  Eat veggie pizza instead of plain cheese pizza.  Mashed potatoes, rice and other dishes taste great with vegetables mixed in.  Instead of eating dessert after dinner, make it a priority to eat a piece of fruit.

Fruits and vegetables are high in fiber, water and several nutrients.  Because of their make-up, they keep us full for a longer time.  You will become accustomed to eating healthy and will eventually not crave unhealthy food as often.  If you substitute fruit for sugary snacks, it is likely that your sugar cravings will subside.  Try the ideas listed above to integrate fruits and vegetables into your diet and decide which ones you like best.  If you enjoy the healthy food you eat, you will stick to it.

Brianna Elliott is a third year dietetics student.  She had grown a passion for nutrition in her years of studying.  She loves fruits and vegetables and thinks the amount of people who don’t get enough of them is devastating because of the good they do for your body.  Brianna also writes blog for PSCLife.com – a health & nutrition e-commerce store which carries Tyme Zyme enzyme supplement and Nutamax’s Cosamin ASU for sore joints and achey muscles.

The Drawbacks of Meal Replacement Shakes for Weight Loss

Almost everyone I know is in search for a quick and permanent solution to lose weight. But what you have to remember is that losing weight does not happen overnight. It takes time and you need to be really disciplined to stay on track with a diet plan. The newest trend in the diet industry these days is called the liquid diet weight loss program. You can guess from its name that it involves replacing your meals with liquids such as soups and shakes. Although this diet plan aims to provide you with all the essential nutrients, nothing beats the good health that real food can provide. The lack of solid food in the body will weaken your immune system and make you prone to illnesses.

Meal replacement shakes for weight loss might perfectly fit your busy schedule, but are they really the ideal way to shed off some pounds? You should think it over and over again before deciding to use the liquid diet. Although it is generally marketed to be a safe and convenient way to lose weight, it does not mean that it will work for everyone. Studies even show that people who used this diet plan regain up to 75 percent of the weight they lost in only a short period of two to three years.

One of the disadvantages of this program is that it often fails to educate people as to how it really works. In a nutshell, it is replacing two of your regular meals in a day with liquids. But you are still advised to eat at least one real meal to keep your body’s well-being. You should also know that this one real meal should be composed of healthy foods only. Some people fail when they try out this diet plan because they still fall into their habit of unhealthy eating during their one real meal. Just remember this, the best combination to lose weight is to have a healthy lifestyle, proper diet and regular exercise.

Two Tips to Help You Lose Weight and Still Eat Out

One of the biggest stumbling blocks that people run into when they try to lose weight is how to eat in a restaurant. Sure, you may know the answer to, “How many calories should I eat a day to lose weight?” but it isn’t solve the problem of applying that knowledge to a difficult setting. It is unrealistic to expect you to never eat another meal in a restaurant, so it is important that you learn how to eat out and still eat healthy. In order to help maximize your weight loss efforts, the following tips have been provided.

Instead of choosing a traditional side order of potatoes, rice, or pasta, ask for extra vegetables instead. The simple carbohydrates found in these sides are the bane of any serious weight loss effort, as the body very easily converts them to fat. When found in a restaurant, they will also usually be filled with butter and salt, which makes them taste great, but also makes them even more unhealthy. In order to provide you with a contrast, a large serving of steamed vegetables may contain less than a hundred calories.

As soon as you receive your meal, as for a box or doggie bag. Before you take even a single bite, pack away half of your meal and put it away. The conditioning to clean our plates can be quite strong, no matter how much food has been piled onto it. Restaurant portions also tend to be quite large, so this is a guaranteed formula for overeating. Eating portions that are far too large is the single most common reason why eating out creates problems for people who are trying to lose weight.

You don’t have to give up on losing weight just because you have to eat in a restaurant. While it is certainly more difficult, there are many different things you can do to cut down on your calories and still eat a healthy diet. Diets that work need to take everything into account, and will not work for long if they require you to consume all of your food at home.

Eat For Good Health and High Energy

Years of research and hundreds of hours, the calculating power of the computer has been applied to the task of finding many new high-protein food combination’s from vegetable sources, and dozens of brand-new free smoothie recipes have been created based on discoveries.

People have been searching for years how to find the ideal diet. As any successful dieter can tell you, and they represent only a tiny percentage of perennial dieters, the way to lose weight and keep it off is to eat for good health and high energy, rather than for quick weight loss. Starve yourself and you will eventually binge and regain the weight. Eat to feel well and you will be rewarded with long term positive changes.

This is the only diet that will work over a lifetime for everyone. In addition, this diet uses the insights of behavioral psychology and nutrition science to lead binge eaters, sweets addicts, and compulsive but previously unsuccessful dieters step by step to a new perspective on food and new, healthy eating habits they can adopt at their own pace.

Thousands of people in the USA started The Master Cleanse program designed to eliminate toxins that are built up in the body, and millions of other people who are concerned by the statistics on heart disease and hypertension and want to find out how to lower the amount of cholesterol and saturated fat in their daily diet.

Many people request specific detailed information in order to move toward a healthy lifestyle. People with certain medical problems should consider removing red meat and other animal proteins from their diet. Some of these medical problems include hypoglycemia, obesity, digestive disorders and other colon problems, gout and elevated cholesterol.

At the end of the day, you are what you eat. Adopting new lifestyle together with healthy diet is the first step to your healthy well being.