Eat, Sleep and Play to Be Young and Fit

Paleo Lunch :

People have never been fatter, sicker and weaker than they are now. Whenever I travel to the US I am blown away at how many people are fat and grossly out of shape. Canada is getting there too but seems to be a decade behind or so. I was in Walmart here in Calgary the other day and literally became worried about Western Civilization.

Eat, Sleep and Play to Be Young and Fit

Why are fat kids drinking slurpies while their parents load the grocery cart with cheap processed poison a common site now? Obesity and diabetes are epidemic in North America. Why? Unfortunately the common response to being obese seems to be taking drugs and then as a last resort surgery. It drives me crazy!

The solution to the obesity epidemic is so simple and free that I don't understand why this is even a problem. Hey, I was fat too, and after a little reading and self searching I have never struggled with my weight again. All we have to do is look back before our world changed and conspired to make us fat and weak for profit. Look back at how people lived before being 30% body fat was considered normal.

Before the industrial revolution:

Eat
People ate unprocessed foods. They did eat a lot of grains, but their grains were actually wholesome and were eaten to fill a hungry belly more than anything else. Meat was craved, and veggies were always beside them.

Do not listen to anything you ever see on TV about food, especially supposed health food. If it comes in a wrapper and has any chemicals in it, it is not healthy or natural, despite what Kelloggs and General Mills would have you believe.

I am a big believer in the Paleo diet and as a result think you should only eat what nature has provided humans for thousands of years.

Eat This:

* natural or organic meat
* tons of veggies
* some fruit
* nuts
* natural full fat yogurt
* berries
* fish, especially fatty omega-3 fish like wild salmon

Do not eat this:

* grains
- don't believe the hype, even the most natural grains are filled with phytoestrogens and phytades which actually prevent the absorption of nutrients
* milk
- it is basically chemical sugar water now, it is so far removed from what comes out of a cow that I don't think anyone should drink it
* anything processed (in a package or wrapper)
* alcohol, obviously
* sugar
- it promotes cancer in the body and actually feeds cancer cells
* corn
- it is a grain not a veggie
- corn derivatives like high-fructose corn syrup are killing our children with obesity and as a result diabetes

I should mention that nobody is perfect when it comes to eating well, especially me. The idea is to stay as true to a natural diet as possible so when you do screw up at a party you are not going to fall into a diabetic coma.

Sleep
Before TV and computers do you know what people did when it got dark? They slept! They slept for about 10 hours a day compared to our current norm of 5-7.

In fact, Sleep is so important to weight loss and physical health that preventing it was a favorite torture method of the Soviets. Your body needs sleep to recover from damage and stress, it is how you repair yourself. Forget about late night TV and go to bed early. You will lose weight and feel better almost immediately.

Did you know that Cuban Olympic weight lifters used to sleep 9 hours a day and then nap for 3 hours? I leaned that from Dan John's site. They did this to recover from the stress of training and to keep their weight down to stay competitive in their class. I actually tried this for a few weeks a while back and never felt better. It was unreal!

Exercise/Play
Imagine a world of no cars. A world where if you needed to go across town you actually walked there, even if it took a few days. Maybe you rode a horse instead, but that is still fairly physical. Not to mention that they actually had to physically work each and every day just to survive. From hunting to building to carrying things, people burned some serious calories just living. Today people sit on their asses all day and then might hit the gym for an hour or so before going back to sitting. Unless you are moving for 8 hours a day you are sedentary, so stop thinking your 3x a week gym schedule should be getting you lean!

You need to train hard and often to really be physically fit. Unless you are an elite athlete you should vary your activities as much as possible. I recommend six days a week of good solid activity and one day a week of pure rest. Our lives are incredibly sedentary so six days a week of varied activity will not be too much as long as you are sleeping and eating correctly. Before you surf along to a website that tells you it is OK to not exercise often and you can have abs too, remember that you can make exercise fun. It doesn't have to be a chore. Here is some direction:

* Sprints, 1-2 time a week
* Lift heavy stuff, 3 time a week
* Lift light stuff for high reps, 2-3 times a week
* Long slow cardio, hiking or biking, not jogging, 1 time a week
* Play, 1-4 times a week
- sports, goof around on a jungle gym, just have fun with your workouts!
* Take the stairs
* Walk or bike to work
* Go for a walk at lunch time
* Find excuses to exercise without exercising!

To sum it up, being healthy and looking like it too is really simple.

Eat a diet consisting of natural foods that are high in nutrition and low in empty calories.

Sleep as much as possible, 10 hours is a good start. Just turn off the boob tube and go to bed! Maybe even bring your spouse with you there a little early;)

Exercise hard and often but make it fun. Join a sports team, go for hikes with your significant other, and don't be afraid to lift some iron to keep that muscle on. Vary your activities so you aren't bored and going through the motions.

In summary, do exactly the opposite of what all the fat people are doing and you will look and feel great.

Original article source: http://kettlebellplanet.blogspot.com/2010/05/eat-sleep-and-play-to-be-young-and-fit.html

“ How to pack a delicious day's lunch and snacks in minutes 100% Guaranteed ”

Read more

Weight Loss and Fasting: The Solution

Paleo Lunch :

When considering weight Loss and fasting....the following point is key: use intermittent fasting to gain back control when you veer off your paleo diet track or simply want to enhance or accelerate weight loss. It's simple, pro-active and empowering. Take a deep breath and push the reset button. Here's how.....

Weight Loss and Fasting: The Solution

Intermittent fasting is about taking a break between meals. Allowing your digestive system to rest and to build up hunger. During holidays and celebrations the temptation is to overeat. Even if we are still eating paleo food there are plenty of ways of overeating "paleo" food including baked goods which take us a long way from the diet of our ancestors. Er...Paleo Cakes and frosted muffins anyone?

There comes a time however when it is appropriate to draw a line under that! Conventional wisdom suggests we do this by entering into a "detox" - a period of calorie restriction and vigorous daily exercise: that we eat less and exercise more. But you don't go to the garage to put less fuel in your car and expect it to do more for you? Exercise makes you hungry! Exercise makes you ravenous and if you are not careful you will find yourself back at square one. Exhausted, hungrier than ever and chained to a never ending tread mill that you simply don't enjoy.

There is however, another way and it's not a new idea. Conventional dietary wisdom wants us to eat three meals a day (breakfast, lunch and tea) and to supplement this with snacks. When using intermittent fasting as a weight loss tool, we might eschew breakfast and not consume our first meal until past 1pm. If you add this to the time spent asleep in bed since your last meal then you can see an estimated total fasting time of 14 + hours.

In this fasted state (also known as ketosis) you will find that your body will naturally work harder to provide energy to it's tissue from your fat stores. Hold onto your hats you are now in fat burning mode!

The point is that you are not eating less but the time window in which you eat has been reduced. In ancient tradition every fast was broken with a feast. Well, I'm not going to argue with that! There is no reason to eat less if you are following paleo guidelines in your diet. Simply eat when you are hungry and stop when you are full! Try it and see - it is impossible to overeat fat! Hormones produced naturally when real food is consumed actually manage the whole process for you so don't worry.

If you were following a diet based on calorie restriction you might miss a meal to count the correct calories but you would not replace that missed meal with additional calories at a larger "break fast" for example. So you might think you are doing the same thing but in one you would be working with your body to trigger fat loss and in the other you would be fighting against your body and it's natural hunger to produce weight loss. In one you will experience a profound sense of well being, an absence of hunger and a curious kind of symmetry with those who have lived before and who knew how to satisfy hunger. In the other you would be hungry, period. And miserable. And cross.

Early man did not eat three meals a day. Whose idea was that anyway? Early man underwent numerous short periods of fasting and ketosis and many paleontologists believe that this ketogenic adaptability was instrumental in human evolution. It is a normal healthy state and it triggers fat burning. So whether you're looking to get back on track, enhance or accelerate the fat burning, weight loss and fasting are an excellent partnership Try it and see.

“ How to pack a delicious day's lunch and snacks in minutes 100% Guaranteed ”

Read more