The Benefits of Eating Six Small Meals Each Day

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Starving yourself is not a healthy way to restrict how many calories you consume. Research now shows that eating 6 smaller meals a day can help you achieve your summer weight loss goals, as opposed to the traditional thinking that 3 complete meals a day is best. You can seriously put your health at risk if you limit your calorie consumption too drastically.

More and more people are victims of a “roller coaster diet” while trying to lose weight. Diet plans that restrict your calories decrease your body’s metabolism, and as a result your body will experience starvation. When this occurs, your body doesn’t use a lot of calories, and that leads to extreme hunger.

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To increase your body’s metabolic rate, you should eat 5 or 6 smaller meals each day. Your metabolism will increase, and thus burn more calories all day long. You can further increase your metabolism by eating foods high in protein during your 6 meals.

Eating regularly will boost your metabolism due to the thermic effect of food.

You need a lot of calories to digest and absorb food, creating the thermic effect.

Different foods have different percentages of thermic effect, ranging from 3 to 30 percent. High protein foods have a 30 percent thermic effect. Some examples are turkey, salmon, and tuna. By simply digesting, 30 percent of the calories in these foods are burned. 20 percent of the calories found in fibrous and complex carbohydrates are burned during digestion. Some examples of these foods are corn, broccoli, green beans, and spinach. Foods with a very low thermic effect include refined carbohydrates and fats. This is the reason why dietary fat is stored so easily.

Your level of hunger will diminish while your energy level rises when you eat 5-6 smaller meals each day. You will also be able to maintain balanced blood sugar levels, which will help prevent hunger.

You can develop muscle to increase your metabolism. By eating regularly, you can maintain insulin levels which produce amino acids into your muscle’s cells, thus promoting muscle growth. Eating every 3 hours will yield a steady output of insulin. This is good for muscle growth and storing glycogen. As a result of eating healthy foods regularly, your summer weight loss goals will be easier to accomplish, and your body will be able to process vitamins and minerals more effectively.

The trick is to make sure you have a constant eating schedule. It might be difficult at first, but planning your meals will be well worth it. To prevent cravings and hunger, it’s good habit to feed your body foods that are rich in nutrients. A summer weight loss plan including a diet of healthy fats, vegetables, fruit, and lean protein is the best way to go. Eating such a diet with 5-6 meals each day can accelerate your muscle growth. It can increase your energy level, increase your metabolism, and you’ll burn half of the calories by eating regularly, and store very little fat.

Combine your diet with strength training and cardiovascular exercise to make it even more effective! Using these three methods, you’ll be on the fast track to burning fat and accomplishing your summer weight loss goals.

5 Best Healthy Foods For A Longer Life

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Living longer is about exercising and eating only healthy foods. The healthier the foods that you eat, the more likely you are to live a happy life for a very long, long time.

Obviously there are thousands upon thousands of healthy foods. Almost all vegetable that you may come across is likely healthy, as are the majority of all fruits. Natural grains tend to be in the upper pinnacle of healthy eating, etc.

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But what are the healthiest foods – the foods that if you eat them regularly you are guaranteed to get the most nutrients you can from your meal? What are the foods that everyone should be eating in order to live a long and healthy life?

The Healthiest Foods – a Countdown

Quinoa (Whole Grains)

Whole grains are vital for healthy living, and quinoa is one of the healthiest of those whole grains. A rather bland food overall, quinoa is very easy to flavor with things like lemon, garlic, oils, salt, and other flavors that make it taste significantly better. It is extremely high in both protein and fiber, and it is also a good source of iron and magnesium.

Cranberries (Berries)

Berries are another extremely healthy food. They have a number of antioxidants that are vital for healthy living. Cranberries are just one of several berries that are extremely high in antioxidants, but all berries have their benefits and should be eaten regularly.

Spinach (Greens)

Greens are a great source of protein, fiber, calcium and other important pieces of nutrition. Spinach is actually not quite as good for you as Kale and Collard Greens, but Spinach is more versatile and can be eaten in far more ways that just salad, so it can easily become a staple in your cuisine even when you want to mix it up.

Soy

Soy is simply a fantastically healthy food. It has fiber, vitamins, Omega-3, protein, calcium – almost everything that you could need from a meal. It can also be found in almost every different type of food, as vegetarians can find soy meats, soy cheeses, tofu and other food types that can all be used to get soy in every meal.

Salmon

Salmon, however, is like soy on steroids. Loaded with Omega-3 fatty acids, protein and other beneficial nutrients, salmon has almost everything that you need all in one grilled piece of fish. It is also low in fat and cholesterol (high in good cholesterol), and is a great addition to anyone’s diet.

All five of those foods are considered some of the healthiest foods in the world – but beyond that, they are all also incredibly versatile, so it is not too difficult to get them into your daily diet regularly. For anyone who want to improve their overall health and wellness and planning on eating a significantly healthier diet regularly, these foods are the first place you should go. They are simply loaded with all of the necessary ingredients that you need in order to improve your health.

Why Sleep Is Essential For Our Health

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In today’s modern society, there are lots of things to do that causes we always come to feel we do not have sufficient time to complete everything. It is not unusual for many individuals to go to bed until midnight and then wake up too early every day to fit in everything.

You may think that it is not such a negative thing. Okay, now let us take a peek at the significance of having a quality sleep for our overall health.

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Numerous aspects of sleep are still undiscovered at present, even though experts have been engaged in many different scientific studies for decades. Clearly, sleep has long been a mystery. Even so, there are a few facts to convince you that sleep is an important activity.

Simply have a look at a young child. When it happens to be the time for him/her to take a nap, soon you will have to deal with problems since the child will start conducting unpleasant things. Having said that, after getting a short nap, he/she will get back to be fun again. In reality, the same also happens for older people when they have sleep deprivation. Needless to say, they will not exhibit the same responses as toddlers will do, but similar things truly happen.

Some processes take place during sleep. A bodily chemical that influences growth, cell reproduction and regeneration in humans is issued while you are getting a good sleep. This hormone is very essential during the growth period of children. This clarifies the reason babies require sleep so many hours every day. HGH, or human growth hormone, is at the same time used for restoration of tissue structure that is the reason older people need eight hours of sleep every night for their bodies to get the rest they need to repair and re-energize.

Besides issuing HGH, while sleeping other important processes also take place. A system that protects against disease, for example, is affected by the quality of your sleep. Simply put, the body’s defense mechanism will not function normally in case you have sleep deprivation. It has also been known that acquiring a sufficient amount of sleep is important for an individual who wants to manage his weight.

In essence, the significance of sleep cannot be emphasized enough. Lack of sleep has unwanted side effects on your physical and mental condition such as finding it hard to concentrate and to make reasonable judgments. This can put you into a dangerous situation, especially when you must react to something extremely fast.

As just stated, sleep can be viewed as-as an activity for developing and rebuilding. It is needed to regain the energy that has been worn out all day. If you have quality, sound sleep, you will acquire an adequate amount of energy to carry out the new day’s tasks. Even so, bear in mind that the amount of sleep you must have may be not equal with others. Just make sure you always get the full amount of sleep required. If not, your system will begin asking for it.

How Food Affects Your Mood

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Few things affect our state of mind, aka our mood, as profoundly as food. Women being propelled by some mysterious hormonal force to eat chocolate during PMS is one good example. There’s just something in that chocolate that makes them feel so good!

Aside from the emotional ties around food, such as associating it with celebration or entertainment, there is also the physiological side that affects our mood. We’ve all seen children throwing fits in the cereal aisles or at the checkout stand where all the sweets have been placed for impulse buying. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never seen such outbursts in the broccoli aisle.

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People crave almost instinctively comfort foods which are high in carbohydrates, which the body immediately converts into sugar in the bloodstream upon consumption. Consuming processed and refined foods which contain exorbitant amounts of sugars and artificial ingredients and practically no dietary fiber renders the eater into a blood sugar nightmare.

Even cooked starches that some consider healthy such as potatoes, rice and pasta are converted into simple sugars quickly in the body. This gives an immediate burst of false energy and a short-lived sense of well being, followed by a nasty letdown and what some call ‘self induced hypoglycemia.’

In order to feel better after the letdown phase, which can make people feel exhausted, cranky and unable to focus, the body compels one to simply eat more of the substance that gave it that happy rush in the first place. Now we see how we get set up for addictions. Ever tried to be in a good mood, feel jubilant about life or get lots of work done when you are in the throes of caffeine withdrawal?

The main function of most anti-depressants on the market is to enhance the uptake of that famous ‘feel-good hormone’ serotonin. When this brain chemical is low, people crave carbohydrates and comfort foods in order to get it.

But if we learn how to nourish the brain properly, we need not suffer from nutrient or serotonin deficiencies and consequently we can avoid the addictions that keep us bound to the constant highs and lows. There is a sound and foolproof way to accomplish this.

One of the main reasons a raw vegan diet is so helpful in maintaining stable moods is due to the fact that there are no toxins, addictive substances or artificial ingredients in living foods. Moreover, raw foods are loaded with fiber to keep the intestinal tract and colon in tip top shape as well as clean.

If the colon is overloaded with waste, this waste is recirculated in the bloodstream again and again. How peaceful and blissful do you think you can feel with your body’s own waste nourishing your brain? Consumption of foods that are high in fiber and natural sugars also eliminates the wild roller coaster blood sugar swings which are notorious for ultimately depleting our serotonin supplies.

After a period of detoxification, which may sometimes be a bumpy road as our emotions are detoxified as well, the mind becomes clearer and sharper. Better health also brings an improved outlook on life and renewed hope that other improvements are possible. When we begin to look better, perhaps by dropping a few pounds or our skin clears up, we definitely begin to strike a more cheerful tone.

On a raw food diet, our brain becomes cleansed and nourished on a cellular level, our senses sharpen and we begin to see the sun come out in our life once again. Won’t you join me in eating naturally?