20 Little Changes for A Healthier Life

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***RE-BLOG***

Just ready a brief snippet via slide-show called “20 Little Changes for a Healthier Life” provided by Men’s Health.  Clearly this piece was put together with smallsteps2health in mind, so I had to re-post it.  I’ll let you view the slideshow for yourself, but here’s a summary of the recommended changes:

1. Go Fishing Once Per Week (aka at least 1 serving of fish 1/week)
2. Dry Brush Your Teeth (or at minimum, brush and floss daily)
3. Never Skip Breakfast
4. Eat More Pasta (This one’s a trick.  The real advice centers around the health benefits of eating tomato sauce 2x/week… e.g. reduced risk of prostate cancer.  Here’s the deal, tomatoes are a super food, and strangely one of the only super-foods that’s better for you after it’s broken down.  Thus, you don’t really need to pasta to eat more tomatoes or tomato sauce.)
5. Judge cholesterol with contact lenses (interesting)
6. Decorate your plate (dark, rich colors tend to be better for you, particularly in the veggie category).
7. Protect Your Erection With Blueberries (How much did the blueberry farmers pay to have this one added?)
8. Request the Chilean Red
9. Lend a Hand (purpose and happiness are correlated with longevity — give back and pay it forward).
10. Crunch Away Back Pain (and if you’re up to it, go for super-crunches).
11. Order Thin Crust Pizza (a simple, lower calorie substitution).
12. Skip that Second Cup (of coffee – difficult one for me)
13. Save Your Marriage (a noble cause that is good for you)
14. Exercise Your Depression Away (Endorphins are great anti-depressants)
15. Fall Asleep With Cherries (who knew?)
16. Put a Shoe On Your Pillow (to test it’s support)
17. Kur Your Fatigue (very interesting)
18. Raise Your Rear View (Mirror – to help your posture)
19. Take Vitamin E and Aspirin Daily
20. Have A Banana (Maybe the perfect food for the human body)

So a list of potential small steps to consider and all in the spirit of linking a number of good decisions daily, to achieve better health.  Hopefully, there are at least one or two here that you can add to your repertoire.

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Small steps add up!!!

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Breakfast Should Help You

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We’ve all heard it, “Breakfast is the most important meal of the day”.  I believe this to be true, and research would also indicate that breakfast is a) your first chance to give your body what it needs, and b) is a chance to ‘fuel up’ for the day ahead.  Well, given this high level of importance, why has breakfast become associated with some of the most fatty, sugary, disgusting “dessert-like” items in the American diet?  Donuts, waffles, pancakes, hash browns…  come on.  Many items showing up on restaurant menus these days are one step away from carnival food, and you know that we’re all just moments away from “food technician” at Denny’s, McDonalds or the restaurant of your choice proposing a breakfast funnel cake, and there will be no difference.

Breakfast should help you, not serve as the cornerstone to an unhealthy diet.  Instead of a doughnut or bagel (which are about as bad for you as a doughnut), have an English Muffin with some peanut butter on it.  Eat some steel cut oatmeal, and throw on some almond slivers and blueberries.  A piece of fruit, some yogurt, or even a slice of lean meat on a piece of wheat toast.  There are a lot of options that are easy to make, good for you, and will give your body what it needs (aka fuel for the day).  I haven’t personally done this, but I have a few friends who have invested in commercial grade blenders, and they make fruit, veggie and protein rich smoothies to start off their day…  I may give this a try myself.

Find what will work with your lifestyle, level of effort your willing to put in, etc., but don’t given into the marketing or “quick serve restaurant” pull to eat things you know are terrible for you.  By the way, nobody needs to eat a “stuffed pancake”, as they’re unhealthy enough prior to stuffing.

Make an effort to start your day on a good note, and perhaps you’ll have more of them.

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Small steps add up!!!

Beware of Breakfast

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We’ve all heard the adage “breakfast is the most important meal of the day”, and over the years more and more research has proven this point.  I must admit that as a latch-key kid who was raised in the 70’s and 80’s, my parents were so busy that if I wanted breakfast, it was up to me.  Thus, I always opted for a little more sleep and my first meal of the day was lunch.  It wasn’t until I was in my 30’s and my metabolism started to slow down that I read up on things that would “speed it back up” that I added breakfast to my daily repertoire.

I’ve always been blown away that this incredibly important meal in America seems to be the most disgusting assortment of grease, fat and sugar you could imagine.  Whether it’s the 1,150 calorie “big breakfast” at McDonalds, or pancakes stuffed with cream cheese and topped with glazed fruit and whipped cream at Denny’s or iHop, it seems that many people kick-start their day with the dietary equivalent of a ‘dirty bomb.’  In a recent article from Lisa Collier Cool from Healthline titled “The Best and Worst Breakfasts for Your Health”, she covers some very interesting research from The University of Calgary demonstrating significant, immediate, negative effects from eating fat-laden breakfast foods (in the study the culprit is a ham, cheese and egg muffin sandwich.  The subjects in the ‘treatment group’ literally had impaired blood flow and other symptoms correlating with hardening of the arteries right after consuming the 900 calorie, 50 grams of fat, death-on-a-plate breakfast.

The “Best Breakfast” in the article was described as “lean protein and fiber in your morning meal, such as whole-grain unsweetened or low-sugar cereal mixed with non-fat yogurt, low-fat milk, or soy milk and topped with fresh fruit”.  The “Wost Breakfast”, with a more significantly negative impact on your health than the ham, egg and cheese sandwich or any of the gross items I described earlier…  drum roll please….  not eating breakfast at all.  Thus, little Mark Alders, sleeping in an extra few minutes each morning before heading to the school bus and skipping breakfast, would have been better off eating a pound of bacon (well maybe not).

The point is you need to eat breakfast, but it should be good for you and it should actually contain things your body needs to kick-start your day and keep your metabolism motoring.  Pass on the doughnut, scone, sausage mcmuffin, etc., and eat a handful of trailmix, some low fat yogurt, or even better some Muesli (the Swiss have it right and it’s probably the perfect breakfast).

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Small steps add up!