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Top 5 Foods that Make You Happy

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Top 5 Foods that Make You Happy

It is quite normal to feel low sometimes. It might be due to seasonal changes, or right after the realization that weekend is nearly over, or sometimes without any reason. In an effort to battle those blues people often go for comfort food such as binging on 2 liters of ice cream or a big double-decker fatty burger with lots of fries. However, these can act as temporary mood-boosters but eventually will lead you to pay afterwards. Here is the list of top five healthy food items that can elevate your mood granting you sustainable happiness.

Food # 5: Mushrooms

Mushrooms are delicious. Amazingly, they are rich in Vitamin D and selenium which includes them amongst foods to eat to improve mood. Both of these components are known for enhancing mood. On the other hand, deficiency of selenium can lead to greater risk of depression, anxiety and fatigue. Several studies reveal that around 11 million Americans suffer from seasonal affective disorder. You can recover from it with an adequate intake of Vitamin D. Therefore, adding mushrooms into your regular diet and not only in pizzas can help you remain cheerful for longer.

Food # 4: Berries

Berries are phenomenal and without any doubt can be added to the foods to eat to make you happy. All types of berries are known to be rich in plenty of flavanoids, anthocyanins, and phytochemicals which act as antioxidants diminishing the oxidative stress in brain and body. This reduces aging of the brain, in turn improving cognitive functions and overall mental wellbeing. So, next time when you are upset just go and make yourself a delicious smoothie and then enjoy a happy day ahead.

Food # 3: Oats

Oats are said to be epic mood boosters and are amongst the topmost foods to eat to make you happy as they have low glycemic index which slowly releases energy keeping you happy all day long. Additionally, oatmeal consists of tryptophan and omega-3-fatty acids which are directly linked in producing happy hormones which grants one feeling of contentment and happiness. Recently published book named Thrive: Finding Happiness the Blue Zones Way reveals that people who consume oatmeal as their breakfast are comparatively 20 to 30% happier throughout the day from those who eat bacon, meat, or eggs.

Food # 2: Dark Chocolate

Hearing the name of dark chocolate only brings a big smile on one’s face. Yes, there is a very big scientifically proven connection of dark chocolates with our good mood. Dark chocolates, particularly those which are high in cocoa but low in sugars are known to be healthier and mood elevating. Dark chocolate has the potential to stimulate our brain in the right way and release endorphins, the feel-good hormones that slow down the production of cortisol, the stress-causing hormones. Also, dark chocolate possesses large quantities of magnesium which has a major role in the development of serotonin, the happy-mood brain neurotransmitter.

Food # 1: Banana

Banana is the number one food amongst foods to eat to improve mood as eating it can instantly make you happy. It is rich in tryptophan which is later converted to serotonin. Increased levels of serotonin makes one feel happy and tryptophan regulates blood sugar and produces stress-relieving relaxation. Tryptophan also helps people to sleep peacefully. Many doctors recommend patients with insomnia to consume banana on daily basis.

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Intuitive Eating for Weight Loss

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Intuitive Eating for Weight Loss

Eating Disorder Statistics reveals that at least 30 million people in America are suffering from eating disorders. Also, many individuals, particularly women, are increasingly going through anorexia nervosa. Surprisingly, almost half of the U.S. population of teens has adopted unhealthy weight control behaviors such as skipping meals, smoking, deliberate vomiting, and taking laxatives to avoid weight gain.

Additions to this alarming situation in the country, people are 24/7 being misguided and manipulated through unhealthy recommendations by models and celebrities such as, crash or fad diets.

However, doctors and lifestyle experts are trying their best to increase the awareness in the people regarding healthier ways to control or reduce their weight.

One of the best ways suggested by various nutrition experts is the intuitive eating for weight loss.  Read below to gain the better understanding of what intuitive eating is and how it can be helpful to achieve healthier weight-loss.

What is Intuitive Eating?

Basically, intuitive eating as the name suggests focuses upon listening to your own intuitions when it comes to eating without restricting yourself from any particular type of food. This type of eating allows you to eat “everything” in moderation as a response to your body’s natural hunger until you have sufficiently achieved the satiety.

The goal of this type of eating is to make sure that you are not left with a calorie deficit or are deprived of the required nutrients your body needs. Fortunately, intuitive eating promotes peace-making with all types of food without forbidding any.

However, taking care of eaters emotions does not at all mean that a person is allowed to do binge eating, rather this particular technique of eating encourages one to eat consciously by making them determine their satiety cues.

Importance of Intuitive Eating

The whole idea of allowing one to eat a balanced diet comprising of all the essential nutrients including enough fiber, water and minerals is to ensure that people do not fall into any type of deficiency during their journey to lose weight.

For an instance, there are certain “diets” that do not allow consuming carbohydrates at all. On the other hand, intuitive eating allows person to ingest carbohydrates in moderate amount by taking few bites from the whole-wheat grain bread guaranteeing the benefits of having carbohydrates such as, improved digestion due to dietary fibers, controlled cholesterol levels, and a healthy cardiovascular system.

How Intuitive Eating Help one to Lose Weight?

The anti-dieting approach which promotes mindful eating actually trains your body and mind to understand your body signals and differentiate hunger from fullness. This in turn helps you to inhibit taking extra calories that would turn into fat.

Intuitive eating helps you to consume the adequate amount of calories which is efficiently utilized during regular physical activities.

Most importantly, this type of eating diminishes the production of stress hormones in your body which is the major cause of overeating and cravings for sugary and processed foods.

Eventually, intuitive eating leads to contentment and positivity, better body acceptance, higher self-esteem, healthy eating habits, and overall lower body fat percentage. Your healthier mindset towards each food helps you to adopt healthier lifestyle instead of falling into yo-yo dieting.

The best part about intuitive eating for weight loss is that its benefits are long-lasting and the acquired good change is for long-term and permanent, unlike crash diets.

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Why Don’t Fad Diets Work?

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Why Don’t Fad Diets Work

Remember the story of a tortoise and a hare which taught us that “slow and steady wins the race”? All of us agree with this proverb but surprisingly, when it comes to shedding away the extra pounds while trying to get slimmer, all of us can’t wait. We just want immediate results.

Clearly, the goal nowadays is no longer to just lose extra pounds and acquire the healthy weight; actually the goal is to look exactly like the popular super model on the front page of a fashion magazine. Hence, unsurprisingly, around 85% dieters in America are reported to be women.

Read further to know why fad diets don’t work and what are the actual do’s and don’ts of a healthy and effective diet plan.

Origination of Fad Diets

Did you know that a celebrity can earn up to $3million for endorsing a diet?

The desire of today’s women to look exactly like a fashion celebrity is making them go extreme lengths which has given rise to a big industry that manipulates the public to gain huge sums of money. Fad or crash diets are also the creation of this industry.

Goal of a Fad Diet Plan

Fad diets are designed as quick fixes that promise dramatic results and by asking you to strictly limit the food choices or by recommending you to eat one food over and over again. Also, there are several fad diet plans which urge people to have no more than 500 calories a day. The reason why fad diets don’t work is because they set unrealistic expectations and offer unrealistic tactics to achieve results—both of which cannot be repeated throughout life.

Types of Fad Diets

There are number of crazy fad diet types including grapefruit diet in which you only have to consume grapefruits all day long, and then there is a cookie diet for cookie lovers who cannot eat anything else but cookie. Also, there is a ridiculous diet called HCG diet in which one consumes 500 calories per day with an injection or pill of hormones that comes from pregnant mare’s urine. One of the fad diets also suggests eating cotton balls.

Consequences of Fad Diet

Eliminating the essential macronutrients from the food can cause severe health complications and malnourishment. Henceforth, the person on fad diet feels exhausted, hungry, and has no energy to perform daily tasks.

Plus, the apparent weight loss is due to the loss of water which then eventually leads to the loss of muscles but not due to the fat loss.

Furthermore, to provide quick superficial results, these diets causes manipulation of hormones and chemical balances which can be very dangerous.

Moreover, results are only there until you are associated with fad diet. It is impossible to continue the crash dieting for long-term and once you quit it and come back to your usual eating habits, fat come inevitably and very quickly.

Better Solution:

Remember, being calorie deficit is not the goal. However, Fad Diets only promote the idea that consuming fewer calories will eventually lead you to lose weight. But our body needs nutrients, too. It needs vitamins, minerals, and fiber.

Dr. Carol Landau, Clinical Psychologist and a Lifestyle expert suggest that one should keep the fad diet aside and rather acquire a common-sense eating plan which involves eating “everything” in “moderation” and limiting the overconsumption of processed food, sugars, and saturated fats.

People trying to get rid of the extra inches on their belly or trying to maintain a healthy weight must opt for healthier lifestyle that balances food, exercise and adequate rest.

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Diets That Work Long Term

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The obesity epidemic is becoming worse day by day in North America, according to the latest CNBC News. Currently, the average percentage of obese adults in the U.S. is around 40%. Moreover, recent studies reveal that the Average American Women’s (AAW) clothing size is no longer the 14 and has become 16. This is with an increase of approximately 2.6 inches in the average waist size of womencompared to three yearsback in North America.

According to a Harvard School of Public Health report, apart from genetics, the main reason for increasing obesity rate and its related risks is an unhealthy diet comprising more of sugary beverages and refined big meals and lackof fresh fruits and raw vegetables, collectively known as the traditional Western style meal.

In this post, I will be reviewing threediet plans in detail that are famous for long-term success rate particularly, in North America.

Diets_that_work_long_term

1.   Eat Clean Meal Plan

As the name suggests, it typically involves removing all the junk and processed food from your diet and instead focusing more on eating food in their natural state as best as possible. This makesit the one of the best diets that work long term.

Pros:

  • No as such hard and fast rule, one can be totally vegan, a weight lifter, or a yogi and can still eat clean
  • This balanced diet approach makes sure that one’s body gets adequate nourishment it needs

Cons:

  • Time-consuming as requires meal preparation
  • Requires looking at labels
  • Total elimination of highly processed meal

2.   Mediterranean Diet

This popular diet that works long term, focuses on gradual weight loss, improved cardiovascular and brain health . Additionally, it is known to reduce the risk of cancer and diabetes. The fundamentals of this diet focus upon eating “real” food comprising all the macronutrients.

Pros:

  • No need to count calories
  • No restrictions for taking carbs
  • Big bowl of salad and vegetables as starter
  • Fats are not forbidden. You can have extra virgin olive oil, avocadoes, and nuts.
  • You can have dairy in moderation

Cons:

  • Exact quantities are not mentioned which can be confusing as diet only suggests” low” to “moderate intake” or “often” consumption of variety of foods
  • Wine is allowed which can be very risky for the patients with pancreatitis or increased levels of triglycerides

3.   Weight Watchers Diet Plan

This long term diet works by encouraging one to havebalanced diet by motivating and challenging them through its unique point system.

Pros:

  • You can eat anything at anytime. No fixed meal plan.
  • A simplified version of calorie counting
  • You can eat more if you go for foods with lesser SmartPoints such as, fruits and vegetables

Cons:

  • You cannot eat exceed the SmartPoints assigned for the day
  • You can feel hungry whole day if you did not plan your servings appropriately
  • Costly in long-term

My outlook about the long-term fitness regime:

No matter which diet plan you adopt, keep in mind that there is nothing like “make it all or nothing”, that is one should alwaysfind ways to work social situations. Failing to eat right once should not make you binge the whole weekend.

Mostly, it is said that “abs are made in the kitchen or it is 70% diet and 30% gym”, however, I believe it is your 100% dedication towards both, diet as well as the gym. Thus, eat right and then workout to kill off those extra calories.

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Fitness Tracker that Looks Like Jewelry

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Gone are the days when people used to wear jewelry just as an accessory. Now, it is the era of the smartphones, the IoT, smart-appliances, and smart-jewelry as well. Thus, your bracelet or necklace canbe a multipurpose device which would track your complete fitness activity, while still being stylish and playing the role of the accessory. The craze of attractive fitness trackers is rising worldwide, and so is the confusion to decide which one is the best. Here is the review of 3 best Fitness Tracking Jewelries.

BellaBeat Leaf Activity Tracking Jewelry

BellaBeat Leaf Activity Tracking JewelryPros:

This incredibly smart minicomputer is a health tracker with a shape of a leaf which can be bought for around $150. It can be worn in a multiple of ways including as a fancy bracelet,as a necklace, or as a clip. It is very light weight and made up of American wood and silver which makes it quite appealing to the eco-friendly consumers as well. You can easily clip it on your shirt or trouser to avoid being  distracted.

BellaBeat Activity Tracking Jewelry operates with the help of app which is installed in your smartphone as per the instructions written in the manual. This fitness tracker that looks like jewelry consist of all the activity tracker specifications such as, tracking sleep patterns, number of footsteps, breathing rates, calories count, etc. The Unique Selling Point (USP) of this device is that it is women-oriented and its hardware and software are designed to suit women’s charming personalities. Thus, this fitness tracker device also consists of female reproductive health tracking as well. It suggests some commendable breathing exercises which help to reduce stress and anxiety immediately.

There is also an in-built alarm inside the leaf which vibrates gently to wake you up. Remarkably, this fitness tracker provide one with motivating compliments on achieving goals and also help them to make new daily goals. The main aim of the BellaBeat Activity Tracking Jewelry is to remind one to keep their health and fitness as their top-most priority which is usually forgotten by the people having busy schedule.

Cons:

The activity tracker is not water-proof so people who indulge into water sports quite often cannot get the accurate tracking details. It lacks auto-synchronization. Also, sleeping patterns are only tracked on the basis of one’s movements and not according to brain activity.

FitBitFlex Activity Tracker

FitBitFlex Activity TrackerPros:

The company is the pioneer in the industry and offers various types of sport bands to track the activity of the individuals. Battery life is up to 5 days and thus, has to be charged using a charger. The activity tracking bracelet is made up of rubber, has small LED screen, and uses custom straps. The Unisex Activity Tracker’s worth is around $150 and the leather strap costs up to $70. The device functions to fulfill all the specification of a good fitness tracker by tracking calories, sleeping patterns, and steps. It is very beneficial for those who are not already active but are planning to have a healthy and active lifestyle. This smart bracelet helps the wearer by setting goals and motivating them by daily challenges and by providing them the opportunity to compete with their friends on social media.

Cons:

People who are already active do not feel the need to wear it as they do not require any additional tool for motivation. Also, tracker just tracks the movement and not shaking hand vigorously would add to the steps.

SwarovskiShine Activity Crystal

SwarovskiShine Activity CrystalPros:

This blingy fitness tracker looks like an expensive jewelry consisting of a modular system and a very simple smartphone app. It does not at all look sporty and can be worn with stylish and glittery party gowns. Swarovski Shinesolar powered costs around $170. The battery life is up to 3 to 4 months. It comes with custom straps facility. One of the best features about this fitness tracker that looks like jewelry is that it is a solar powered tracker. Also, it consists of all the fitness tracker specifications including step count, calories burned, heart rate, sleeping pattern, etc.

Cons:

The app has very simple features which might not excite extremely fitness conscious people.

Also, finding out how much calories burnt can be done by writing it down on a paper and getting an estimate manually which would not require such a high-tech device.

With this, we come to the conclusion of this review. We hope you now have a better idea about the three accessorialsmart devices and make a better decision about which one fits your bill.

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