Check this out… here’s how to invigorate and rejuvenate your body, mind and spirit…with these super foods and eating smaller, more frequent snacks and meals. By eating smaller and more frequent meals this will help keep energy levels on an even keel and regulate your blood sugar levels to avoid spikes and dips. When you choose the right combination of foods, your body gets the much-needed boost it needs to sustain itself properly, even through those slumps later in the day. So definitely get rid of those high sugar junk foods and grab the following foods and get that boost you need.

Any fresh fruit, especially with skins or seeds like peaches, apples, pears, oranges, and strawberries, is a great source of vitamins and fiber. Fruit provides you with plenty of dietary fiber, niacin (vitamin B3), potassium, beta carotene and vitamin A, plus high amounts of vitamin C. Niacin is important for providing energy for cell tissue growth. Along with regulating fluid balance, potassium helps maintain the electrical stability of the cells of your heart and nervous system and is important for cell and muscle growth. Vitamin B12 plays a role in red blood cell formation, nerve function, and metabolizing protein and fat.

Dried apricots (which I love and snack on daily!) and almonds together provide a high amount of vitamin A, iron protein and dietary fiber. Both foods are low in cholesterol and sodium, and apricots are a great source of potassium, which is important in regulating your body’s fluid balance. The vitamin A in apricots contributes to healthy vision, bone growth, reproduction, and helps fight infection.

Raisins are a healthy, low-fat, low-cholesterol, and low-sodium snack with significant amounts of potassium, phosphorus, copper, and iron, and when mixed with low-fat yogurt, you also get riboflavin (vitamin B2) and vitamin B12, as well as a high amount of calcium, which is needed not only for strong bones and teeth but also plays a key role in the normal functioning of the heart and other muscles.

Baby carrots (can you believe these are my dog’s favorite treats?!) and sesame sticks are a tasty treat that will provide significant amounts of beta carotene, vitamin A, vitamin C, folate, vitamin B6, iron, potassium, copper, and fiber. Beta carotene helps protect against diseases like heart disease and some cancers.

Peanut butter (my dog’s second favorite treat – in Kong) on some whole grain crackers is an excellent source of protein, iron, niacin, and fiber. Peanut butter on celery is a classic snack, has great staying power, and the celery is stuffed with numerous vitamins, minerals, and is high in fiber.  Low-fat string cheese is a good quick source of protein and calcium. They come in easy-to-carry individual servings and you can add a piece of fresh fruit for extra fiber.

Try these out…replace those chips and donuts with these healthy power foods and then let me know how much better and rejuvenated you feel!

What’s Your Dieting Mindset?

When it comes to dieting, I’m a big believer in the fact that you have to be in the right frame of mind, have the right mindset. Too many people set themselves up for failure before they even begin. They just dread going on their diets and before they start, they are usually planning their mishaps along the way. Yes, I know, but it’s really true – far too many would be dieters are planning their first failure before even actually starting their diet!

I have no idea why we tend to do this to ourselves but it is something I’ve seen many times. The most popular notion is that one must binge on and eat up all the foods most loved and enjoyed before beginning the diet because after starting, these foods must be completely eliminated in order to shed those unwanted pounds. However, nothing could be further from the truth. Moderation is simply a concept that many of us just can’t embrace.

You really must change your way of thinking about food and your personal enjoyment of food in order for any diet to be successful. Food isn’t the enemy. And I think that’s a notion that not enough people really understand. Even the ‘tasty’ foods aren’t the enemy. The enemy is your personal inability to properly portion the foods you eat. The problem is that the majority of us eat the wrong foods far more often than we eat the right foods.

Our bodies need the nutrients we are lacking because we are not eating the required servings of vegetables and fruit each day. Our bodies know that something is missing and we feel hungry or deprived. If we were actually consuming the proper balance of fruits and veggies each day we would find that we were far less likely to feel hungry and far less likely to crave those foods that aren’t as healthy.

Portion control can be another problem. We live in a society of “up selling”. Super sized fries and empty calories by the gallon of your favorite cola are offered with almost every fast food meal that can be bought. Learn to say no to these things and avoid the super sized orders.

Embrace dieting as building a healthier you rather than depriving yourself of something. Don’t think of your weight loss plan as something negative but rather a positive force in your life to make changes for the better.

Watching your weight and counting your calories does not mean that you can never go over your allotment. The goal really is to find balance. If you learn to portion your food correctly, indulge in moderation, and incorporate enjoyable calorie burning activities into your daily routine you may be amazed at the results.

Reducing Holiday Stress – Three Basic Steps

So, this may be a little late for this Christmas season but we can apply these tips to any event we have coming up in the future and of course for all holiday seasons to come…

It goes without saying, most of us love the holidays and want to them to be a wonderful and enjoyable time. As a result, I think we tend to spend a great deal of time and effort engaging in various activities trying to make the holidays extra special.  Our desire to have the best holidays ever often delivers a result a little more different that we expect. Instead of enjoying the holiday season, we tend to spend it worrying about how to make our holidays perfect.

One of the main causes of holiday stress is that feeling that the things you must do are going to be greater than your available time.  Shopping, cooking, packing, wrapping and decorating suddenly take over what used to be your free time.  Special holiday events and parties may begin to take over your schedule, too. Haven’t you ever feared being the crazed shopper banging on closed shop doors on Christmas Eve or are certain you will be forced to take the family out for a Chinese dinner because there is simply no way to get everything done? That’s what I’m talking about…

There are tons of great resources providing quality hints and tips to reduce holiday stress, and if you feel yourself experiencing a great deal of pressure during the holiday months, you should definitely find some of these resources and consider the myriad of great ideas to make your days easier.  In addition to the many great suggestions these sources provide, there are a few basic steps you can take to make your to-do list seem more manageable and to reduce your stress level.

Adjust Your Expectations

Some may benefit from simply readjusting their expectations of the holidays.  The media and advertising industries can lead us to believe that any holiday celebration that doesn’t end up resembling a Currier & Ives print is a failure.  This, of course, is not the case.  It’s fine to strive for a wonderful holiday season, but it’s not necessary to create THE perfect holiday.  Instead of concerning yourself with every Christmas detail, you can reduce your stress level by focusing on the parts of the holidays that are most meaningful and important to you and placing less emphasis on other aspects of the season.

Start Early

We often laugh at the fact that Christmas decorations tend to go up in stores right after Halloween decorations disappear. Although we don’t necessarily need to take the not-so-subtle message of holiday commercialization to heart, we can learn a little something from the early decoration trend.  By starting our holiday preparations early, we can reduce the amount of pressure and stress of getting things decorated at the last minute. This year I started after
Thanksgiving and put a little up everyday. The house looks wonderful and there’s no rush or pressure.

Follow Santa’s Lead

Santa Claus, as the song tells us, makes a list and checks it twice.  If he left delivery of millions of toys up to his memory, he would probably be the North Pole’s most stressed resident. You can learn an important lesson from Santa Claus and can create your own organized list of holiday tasks and chores.

Although you may not want to over do it, it is a good idea to make a detailed list of everything you’ll need to do in preparation for the holidays.  If you can produce this list early, you’ll be able to schedule out everything in a reasonable manner, making sure you are not caught up in the hustle and bustle that makes the holidays so frustrating for some people. Tip: Save this list in a safe place for the following year, just make adjustments as necessary.

The holidays can be a wonderful time for fun and enjoyment.  Unfortunately, they can also become a high-pressure race for those who are not adequately prepared.  By carefully assessing your holiday needs and expectations, starting early and keeping an organized to-do list, you can make your holidays fun!

Happy Holidays!!