There’s nothing worse than winter tomatoes. They are tasteless! They lack the natural juiciness and flavor because they are picked green and allowed to ripen or try to ripen while in transport or on the supermarket shelves. For this reason, they are not and cannot be as nutrient rich as they should be. With the increased population demand for food and with the concretization of land and the decreasing amount of farmland, this is the end result. Unfortunately, there’s nothing we can do about this in winter.
That is why I can’t wait for the warmer months and summer to return when I can again grow my own vegetables. Many people are used to store bought vegetables that they forget or don’t know what freshly ripened vegetables really taste like and even smell like!
Here are my reasons why one should grow their own vegetables, consider vegetable gardening:
- vegetables are more tasty, juicy because they are allowed to ripen naturally on the vine
- you don’t need to use pesticide, so you know your vegetables are pesticide free
- vegetables are more nutrient rich
- convenience, you just go outside and pick the ripe vegetables you need and when you need them
- extra vegetables can be frozen for the cold and winter months and used in cooking for example, tomatoes, peppers, beans….
- gardening is great exercise, a great full-body exercise workout outdoors without feeling like you are exercising
- gardening is relaxing and a great way to relieve stress. It brings you in tune with your environment and you learn to appreciate where your food comes from and how it grows.
- alleviates the strain of crop production on our existing farmland because you are maximizing land use.
Nowadays, even for people living in apartments or condos, you can still grow your own vegetables. Some apartments/condos have rooftop gardens and some cities also have community gardens. I remember while visiting Greece, I went to the rooftop of the hotel where I was staying at to get a better vantage point for picture taking and I noticed that they were growing vegetables for the hotel restaurant!
My article began with a discussion focused on how terrible tomatoes taste in winter and how through home gardening vegetables can be more nutritious, tasty and beneficial to your overall health and fitness.
I was watching the news the other day and they had an excellent feature on Rapper Fat and how, why he decided to lose a lot of weight - a turnaround real life story from a celebrity. At one time he mentions that he was well over 400 pounds (I think he said around the 450 to 460 pounds) and eating everything he could get his hands on (steak, lobster all at once…) since he had the money to do so.
One may ask, why the change in attitude and decision to lose weight?
Sometimes tragic events in our lives help put reality into perspective. They make us realize, see more clearly and dictate what we really need to do.
In Fat Boy’s case, his closest friend who was also younger died of a heart attack. It was at this point that he decided to change his lifestyle. He didn’t want to go the way of his friends and he wanted his children to have a father who was alive.
So Fat Boy decided to eat healthy, eat smaller portions and to exercise. I saw a video of him on TV and now he looks amazing. He’s at or closer to his ideal healthy weight. He’s lost a lot of pounds and he is now committed to his new lifestyle. He also no longer has diabetes which he had since he was 14 years of age. Other health problems always arise from obesity.
Even if someone has a heart attack and survives the problem is that you will have to be on medication either for the short or long-term. The medical community, drug companies vouch that these drugs are safe but if you read the huge list of the side effects on the label, there are many possible side effects. In my opinion and from a logical perspective, these drugs in the long-term just cannot be good or healthy for you. My best advice is to try to live healthy and to avoid these possible future health problems. It’s your best bet and chance to live a longer and happier life!
To conclude, sometimes we unfortunately need reminders to change the way we live. We constantly hear reminders of the dangers of being obese in the news, from governments and medical studies and the negative effects it has on society and family, friends. Fat Boy has been able to lose weight. His example just goes to show that by exercising, eating healthy and sticking to your goals and being patient, anyone can lose weight and achieve a healthy weight naturally.
BTW, he also decided to keep the “Fat Boy” name because it’s easy to remember adn branding is very important to a person’s success - it’s all in the name. Just ask Lady Gaga.
Summer is approaching fast. Summer is less than a month away and you want to lose fat fast. Forget about diet pills. They are very expensive and don’t work for long-term weight loss gain. Also, forget about starving yourself. You may fool your body in the short-term but the weight you lose will only eventually or quickly return and you’ll be back where you started. You want a system to lose fat fast, effectively and you want to keep that weigh off for good!
Joel Marion has read over 878 research papers and has worked with more than 750 clients to perfect a fat loss program and system that will allow you to actually lose fat in 25 days and effectively keep it off for good. His unique and proven system called Xtreme Fat Loss Diet System.
This is the only program that will allow you to create a huge calorie deficit to promote the fastest possible fat loss while at the same time increasing metabolism through strategic and somewhat extreme diet and exercise strategies.
Modern life can be extremely stressful – juggling a career, family, friends and other worries such as financial or health problems means that our lifestyles are increasingly hectic. It’s no wonder that health conditions such as depression, anxiety disorders and stress related illnesses are on the rise.
When it comes to looking for help for these conditions, it can be an extremely personal and difficult thing to do, especially if you don’t know where to look. Many people dread the thought of taking prescription tablets to alleviate their conditions, but there are some natural alternatives.
5-HTP is one such natural supplement that has been found to alleviate conditions including depression, stress and anxiety as well as sleep related disorders and weight loss. 5-HTP is an amino acid that is only found in small amounts in the human body. It helps the body to create higher levels of serotonin and melatonin which are believed to improve your mood and manner.
Low levels of serotonin can cause migraines, food cravings for serotonin rich foods such as chocolate (often leading to weight gain), depression, insomnia and even aching muscles.
UK residents can buy 5-HTP over the counter at health food stores such as Holland and Barratt, although it is still advisable to consult a doctor if you suffer from any of the above conditions. It is advised that you only take a maximum of 100mg of 5-HTP daily and to consult your doctor if you wish to take more – this is because of the potentially serious serotonin syndrome which can affect some people severely.
Some studies have found that 5-HTP is highly effective in relieving tension headaches and migraines, it also has good results for patients who are unresponsive to prescribed antidepressants. It can also aid sleep quality and is beneficial to those suffering from insomnia.
Spring is finally here and you feel positive about the new season yet you still have about 10 to 15 stubborn pounds you want to lose before summer. You want to look and feel the best you can for the summer. The only problem is that you cannot shed those extra pounds or you’re not sure how to go about doing it. More importantly, you want to keep all that excess weight off for good. There is no use in losing weight when it could return eventually especially if you were to revert to your old ways. The goal is to take the excess weight off and keep it off for good.
Fitness trainer John Romaniello has come up with a system that will shed those unwanted pounds in the shortest period of time possible. He’s experienced the same problems for himself that I have already mentioned. He at one time had problems losing those extra pounds. When he did lose the weight it would eventually come back. Once he figured out for himself a solution and system to lose weight and keep it off for good, this is his end result:
As a personal trainer, John has trained and helped many clients towards reaching their fitness and weight loss goals, so he knows what he is talking about and his results speak for themselves. He’s helped a client add 20 pounds of hard muscle onto a skinny vegetarian body, while for another client who was a life-long and overweight couch potato, he helped him to lose up to 83 pounds through his Final Phase Fat Loss Program.
Whether you just want to look like John or look the best you can, the Final Phase Fat Loss Program can help you in just 6 weeks and it shows you how to do it.
Personally, I do not buy energy bars. I do not like all the questionable ingredients that can be found in the energy bars and some of them I find to be very rubbery, gummy - very hard on my teeth! I prefer to use protein powders.
In the video below, Kim Lyons does an excellent job in talking about energy bars. She looks at what she does and does not like about energy bars. She does this in sometimes a very humorous way. She looks at all the ingredients on the packages of various energy bars including ingredients with long and complicated names, the high sugar content or the sugar alternatives and sneaky ingredients.
If you do like the convenience of energy bars, she does recommend a couple: Larabar Fruit
and Gnu Bar
She also discusses the natural ingredients that energy bars should contain.
I just want my readers to know that the new Fast Track to Fat LossTeamwork Challenge is now open and that it is free to enter here. It’s a great contest and amazing way that is designed to keep you stay motivated and focused on really simple fat loss tasks in order for you to achieve excellent results.
Looking to tone your abs or lose that excess stomach fat? You may want to take a look at this free abs DVD called ABsolute Truth DVD. It will show you:
Which abdominal exercises are a waste of time and which exercises are actually worth doing
How to get amazing ab results with super short workouts
The most effective and the best combination of ab exercises
It also comes with other free bonuses like:
Burn Fat Fast Weight Loss Guide and Audio CD
A 1 month trial membership in my Health + Fitness Inner Circle
Archived videos
“Exercise of the Week” online videos
And other tools and resources
In this stair workout video Kim Lyons demonstrates exercises for the stairs that can be done outdoors or in your home. It’s especially great if you are doing some cardio exercise outside such as biking or running and you don’t want to come indoors for a workout. In this way you get to enjoy being outdoors along with incorporating some strength training exercises into your outdoor workout. This stair workout is great for toning and fat loss.
This video is excellent in the sense that Kim Lyons shows you several different exercises working different parts of your body both beginner and advanced exercise versions. She explains each exercise and how you should be properly performing them. Unfortunately I find that the video picture quality is very poor, very pixilated. Regardless, the content on this video is excellent!
She begins with the Windmill Pushup on the stair. She shows you the beginner and more advanced versions. They are basically the same. The only difference is that for the advanced version you are going more against gravity, therefore it’s a much tougher exercise.
She then shows you a calf workout and side lunges and encourages that you do some cardio in between these exercises.
Her final exercise (which is an advanced exercise and quite difficult) she calls Spider Monkey Stairs.
You may prefer to rest between weight training sets, but here is a great exercise with variations for your abs from Kim Lyons of Fast Track to Fat Loss. Not only does this exercise work your abs real hard, it also improves your balance and posture. Balance and form are really critical when doing this exercise properly since it is done on a bench. Kim Lyons does an excellent job in showing you how your body should be aligned when performing this type of abdominal crunch on a work bench at the gym or in your home. She also shows you the proper movement as well as variations of this exercise that will also work your obliques.
Also, doing a different exercise for a different part of your body in between your weight training sets is great if you are in a hurry and you want to do a quick and effective workout.
