The Importance of Water in Your Diet Plan

There are many benefits of drinking water, from helping to accelerate weight loss to                                                                                         healthier and younger looking skin.

Unfortunately, most people are not drinking enough every day. Until recently,                                                                                                     water was the 2nd most popular  beverage in the US, behind sugary soft drinks. (1)

Water is one of the most important elements in the human body. It makes up about                                                                                                 60% of our bodies  more or less. Every single cell in your body needs water to                                                                                                         function properly.

At Lose Weight by Eating, we LOVE water and all it’s health benefits. It’s why we                                                                                                   have so many fruit infused water and detox water recipes, simply because it’s so                                                                                                 good for you and everyone can afford it.

Can drinking water help you lose weight? Spoiler alert, YES IT CAN! Keep                                                                                                          reading below to find out how drinking water for weight loss can help support your                                                                                  dieting efforts, cleanse your body, and much more.

.https://loseweightbyeating.com/benefits-of-drinking-water/

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Detox drinks

Detox Drinks: The Guide to Better Health and Weight Loss

Detox drinks have become very popular in recent years thanks to their numerous health benefits. Many doctors and nutritionists praise detox drinks as one of the easiest ways to rid your body of toxins, flush your liver, boost your energy, give your digestive system a break, and improve your overall health.

In a 2011 survey of 196 naturopathic doctors, 92% of the doctors reported using clinical detoxification therapy to treat a range of conditions from environmental exposures, general cleansing, digestive disorders, and autoimmune diseases. (1)

If you’re looking to use detox drinks for weight loss and better health, or just want to kick sugary drinks, you don’t need a doctor to help you get started, just keep reading below! You’ll learn the benefits of detox drinks, types of detox drinks, and how to incorporate them into your diet

What is a Detox Drink?

A detox drink is a drink recipe that helps your body rid itself of toxins, promote weight loss, boost energy, cleanse the liver, or any combination of these. They’re also known as detox cleanse drinks or cleansing drinks. They usually contains some combination of water with fruit, vegetables, herbs or other natural ingredients that boosts your body’s ability to eliminate toxins from your system.

Some of the more popular detox drinks include detox water, detox tea, detox juice, and detox smoothies.

Why Detox?

The world is full of pollutants – from the air we breathe, to the food we eat, and the water we drink. All around us, there are things that we ingest that our bodies can’t use or worse, do harm to our system.

When you detox, you’re giving your body, especially your liver, a chance rid itself of these toxins and get some recovery time in. If you constantly keep eating, drinking, and breathing these toxic substances without flushing them from your system, they build up over time and you risk health issues including cancer, reproductive, metabolic, and mental health effects. (2)

Other health benefits of detox drinks include:

• Reduces inflammation (3)
• Helps weight loss (4)
• Improves skin health (5)
• Boosts energy and alertness (6)

Try my FREE  Detox Diet Week: The 7 Day Weight Loss Cleanse for an effective 7 day detox diet plan including detox recipes.

Detox Water

At the top of the detox drinks list is detox water thanks to its simplicity and inexpensive ingredients. It contains very few calories because it is not derived from juice or blending. Detox regimens like “lemon detox” or “master cleanse” are based on detox water recipes.

Research has shown that drinking water is one of the best things you can do for better health. It helps fill your stomach so you don’t feel as hungry, and studies have even shown that just drinking water raises your metabolism! (7)

A basic detox water recipe consists of fruit, vegetables or herbs mixed with water. It’s literally that simple.

Popular detox water ingredients include:

• Lemon
• Lime
• Orange
• Strawberries
• Cucumber
• Mint
• Watermelon
• Mango
• Berries
• Grapefruit
• Cinnamon
• Rosemary
• Cilantro

How to Make Detox Water

It’s easy to make delicious detox water, just follow these steps:

1. Set ingredients into the bottom of a pitcher or infuser bottle.
2. Cover with ice about 4-5 inches, then fill the rest with water.
3. Set in the fridge for 1 hour then serve.

You can refill the container 2-3 times before it begins to lose flavor.

For a full list of 25 delicious detox water recipes, check out my Detox Water: The Top 25 Recipes for Fast Weight Loss post!

Detox Tea

The next most popular type of detox drink are detox teas. People have been using detox tea for thousands of years to help detox their bodies and improve their overall health.

Different herbs like ginger, lemongrass, dandelion, and milk thistle contain ingredients said to support a healthy liver, which is one of the main organs in charge of detoxifying your body.

One important note when it comes to detox teas, be sure to get organic ingredients and organic teas. When non organic tea companies dry and process the herbs they do not typically wash off the pesticides, so yep… you guessed it you are ingesting all those nasty chemicals. And if you are looking to detoxify your body those will only hinder your efforts.

Here are the most popular types of Detox Teas:

Green Tea

This very popular detox drink is believed to have been originated in China over 3000 years ago, and since then has spread to become one of the most popular beverages in the world. It’s especially popular in Asian countries, particularly Japan.

It contains powerful antioxidants that help reduce inflammation, blood pressure, and heart disease. (8)

Benefits of Green Tea include:

• Boosts your metabolism (9)
• Helps burn fat, especially belly fat (10)
• Improves immunity (11)
• Helps prevent Alzheimer’s and dementia (12)

Dandelion Tea

Dandelions are those little yellow flowers that pop up in your yard that you fight off all year. Few people realize that these pesky little plants actually contain a lot of health benefits and have been used as a detox drink for centuries.

Benefits of Dandelion Tea include:

• Helps cleanse the liver (13)
• High in antioxidants (14)
• Fights urinary tract infections (15)
• Natural diuretic (16)

Benefits of Ginger Tea include:

• Effective against nausea (18)
• Helps reduce muscle pain and soreness (19)
• Potent anti inflammatory (20)
• Helps lower cholesterol (21)

Milk Thistle Tea

Milk thistle has been used for by people in the Mediterranean for over 2000 years. The early Greeks wrote about its healing properties as far back as 40 A.D.

It’s been shown to be a powerful detox ingredient for symptoms and diseases, including cancer, high cholesterol, chemotherapy, diabetes, alcoholism, kidney stones, and more. (22)

Benefits of Milk Thistle Tea include:

• Powerful antioxidant (23)
• Natural liver detoxifier and damage healer (24)
• Helps lower cholesterol (25)
• Boosts skin health (26)

For more information on the benefits of Detox Tea, see my Detox Tea for Weight Loss and Beautiful Skin post.

Detox Smoothies

I love detox smoothies. When I feel bloated and need to flush my system out, nothing beats the effectiveness of a smoothie cleanse. They’re not only easy to make, they taste amazing, too!

A typical detox smoothie recipe is full of vitamins, antioxidants, fiber, and other nutritious ingredients that provide your body a detoxifying flush. They also contain large amounts of water, which helps to hydrate your body and boost metabolism. (27)

Here are my Top 20 Detox Smoothie Ingredients:

• Spinach
• Celery
• Lemons
• Limes
• Ginger
• Mango
• Cranberries
• Cilantro
• Fennel
• Watermelon
• Almonds (or almond butter)
• Dandelion greens
• Kale
• Green tea
• Watercress
• Arugula
• Wheatgrass
• Avocado
• Spirulina
• Beets

I recommend you use fresh ingredients, but you can also use frozen fruits and vegetables if fresh isn’t available.

How to Make a Detox Smoothie

Detox smoothie recipes are simple to make:

Step 1 – add all ingredients to blender

Step 2 – blend until creamy and smooth

Step 3 – drink!

If you want to make the smoothie colder, try these two options:

Option 1 – Freeze the fruit, or buy frozen fruit.

Option 2 – Add 1/2 a cup of ice.

IMPORTANCE OF POSTURE IN LIFESTYLE 

Body Language or Body Movements (Kinesics)

Body movements include gestures, posture, head and hand movements or whole body movements.

Body movements can be used to reinforce or emphasise what a person is saying and also offer information about the emotions and attitudes of a person. However, it is also possible for body movements to conflict with what is said.

A skilled observer may be able to detect such discrepancies in behaviour and use them as a clue to what someone is really feeling and thinking.

There are several different categories of body movement, these include:

Emblems

Gestures that serve the same function as a word are called emblems.

For example, the signals that mean 'OK', 'Come here!', or the hand movement used when hitch-hiking. However, be aware that whilst some emblems are internationally recognised, others may need to be interpreted in their cultural context.

For more about this, see our page on Non-Verbal Communication.

Illustrators

Gestures which accompany words to illustrate a verbal message are known as illustrators.

For example, the common circular hand movement which accompanies the phrase 'over and over again', or nodding the head in a particular direction when saying 'over there'.

Regulators

Gestures used to give feedback when conversing are called regulators.

Examples of 'regulators' include head nods, short sounds such as 'uh-huh', 'mm-mm', and expressions of interest or boredom. Regulators allow the other person to adapt his or her speech to reflect the level of interest or agreement. Without receiving feedback, many people find it difficult to maintain a conversation. Again, however, they may vary in different cultural contexts.

Adaptors

Adaptors are non-verbal behaviours which either satisfy some physical need.

Adaptors include such actions as scratching or adjusting uncomfortable glasses, or represent a psychological need such as biting fingernails when nervous.

Although normally subconscious, adaptors are more likely to be restrained in public places than in the private world of individuals where they are less likely to be noticed. Adaptive behaviours often accompany feelings of anxiety or hostility.

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Posture

Posture can reflect emotions, attitudes and intentions.

Research has identified a wide range of postural signals and their meanings, such as:

Open and Closed Posture

Two forms of posture have been identified, ‘open’ and ‘closed’, which may reflect an individual's degree of confidence, status or receptivity to another person.

Someone seated in a closed position might have his/her arms folded, legs crossed or be positioned at a slight angle from the person with whom they are interacting. In an open posture, you might expect to see someone directly facing you with hands apart on the arms of the chair. An open posture can be used to communicate openness or interest in someone and a readiness to listen, whereas the closed posture might imply discomfort or disinterest.

Mirroring

Notice the way a loving couple relate to each other. You might like to observe a close relationship in person or on television. You will see that the partners’ postures will match, as if one partner is a mirror reflection of the other. For example, if one partner drapes an arm over the back of a chair this might be replicated in the other person’s position. If one partner frowns, it could be reflected in the other partner’s facial expression. This ‘mirroring’ indicates interest and approval between people.

https://www.skillsyouneed.com/ips/body-language.html

calories intake

WHY COUNT CALORIES AT ALL?

There are plenty of people who can maintain a healthy body composition without ever counting. But for many others, it is incredibly valuable. Registered dietician Susan Hewlings, Ph.D., explains why in the video "All You Really Need to Know about Calories and Food Labels" in Bodybuilding.com's Foundations of Fitness Nutrition course.

"So, what are the advantages of a calorie-focused system? For one, it gives you an objective way to compare very different meals and make informed decisions about overall portion sizes. These can be some of the most difficult nutrition decisions to make!" she explains.

"A number can also help you see how what seems like a small indulgence can really add up," Hewlings continues. "For example, a can of soda a day may not seem like much, especially if everyone around you is drinking out of far bigger cups. But it's still 150 extra calories a day—and 150 of pure sugar, at that. Consumed regularly, that's enough to make a difference in how you look and feel—maybe up to 15 pounds of weight gain in a year."

While counting calories is a great place to start, the quality of your food, the balance of macronutrients, and the type and amount of activity in your life also matters plenty! So along with your caloric target, consider:

1. CALCULATING YOUR MACRONUTRIENT RATIO.

Calories aren't just calories! They're actually values that come from the macronutrients protein, fats, and carbohydrates (as well as alcohol). Splitting your caloric intake into a tried-and-true ratio is the next step after determining how many you need. Registered dietician Paul Salter can show you how in the article "Macronutrient Calculator: Find Your Macro Ratio for Flexible Dieting and IIFYM."

2. LEARNING ABOUT NUTRITION.

We created a nine-video course, Bodybuilding.com's Foundations of Fitness Nutrition, to help fit-minded people learn what they need to know not only about calories, but also the three macronutrients, how to eat for healthy weight loss or weight gain, and even supplements.

3. FOLLOWING A CONSISTENT EXERCISE REGIMEN.

4. LEARNING ABOUT SUPPLEMENTS THAT COULD HELP YOU NAIL YOUR GOALS.

Fat burners and pre-workout supplements are popular choices for people looking to lose weight. Creatine is a staple choice for people trying to gain weight. And protein is often a high priority for both camps. 

WHAT DO I DO AFTER A DIET?

If you've been eating less than you burn for a while, or if you feel like your body has stopped responding to a deficit, then the answer may not be to continue cutting. Instead, you may want to consider reverse dieting.

Here's why this approach works. You need to eat fewer calories than you burn to lose fat. However, if you restrict your energy intake for too long, this can eventually slow your metabolism in a process called "metabolic adaptation," which makes it difficult to continue losing weight.

To combat metabolic adaptation, you can gradually increase your caloric intake in order to raise your metabolism. Even though it sounds a little crazy to increase calories to lose weight, this ultimately helps you burn more calories.

To create an effective reverse diet, you could also do less cardio and more weight training, which will further optimize your metabolism to build muscle and shed fat. If you've reached a point with your dieting where you think you may need to reverse diet, do it strategically, like how registered dietician Katie Coles recommends in the article "The Ultimate Guide to Reverse Dieting," to maximize your results.

HOW DO I CALCULATE THE CALORIES IN MY FOOD?

In order for you to get the most out of the calculator, and macronutrients as well, you need to be able to match it up to the foods you eat. You can do this using food labels, or by weighing out your food and using one of the many online nutritional databases. Weighing food may seem like a lot of counting and not much fun, but it gets easier over time. Fitness coach Vince Del Monte says in "From Here to Macros: 4 Steps to Better Nutrition" that you quickly learn to "eyeball" quantities after just a few weeks of practice.

https://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/macronutcal.htm

GYM VS YOGA

GYM vs YOGA 

1. Yoga benefits the mind, body and spirit.

Yoga will help tone your body but while it’s doing that, it also helps you to be truly in the moment and infuses your spirit with positive energy. A gym workout is focused primarily on improving your body’s physical condition.

2. Yoga benefits your full body—externally and internally.

The twisting, stretching and folding of a yoga practice are good for the digestive system, the circulatory system, the lymph system and more. It’s a great way to detox the body and can improve your cardiovascular system. And all this while developing stronger muscles. A gym workout is focused just on strengthening muscles and boosting cardio.

3. Yoga teaches acceptance.

Yoga helps you believe you’re perfect the way you are—with your strengths and your weaknesses. It's true what they say -- yoga is not about self-improvement, it's about self-acceptance. Gym classes, especially boot camp style classes, are more likely to have you feeling like a failure if you can’t do everything.

4. Yoga is about focusing on yourself.

Many yoga studios don’t even have mirrors so you’re forced to think about where your body is and what each muscle and limb is doing, whereas gym classes have mirrors for you to see—and worry about—what everyone else is doing.

5. Yoga will make you lean.

By stretching your muscles as you’re strengthening them, your body will take on a leaner appearance. A gym workout filled with weights will cause your muscles to bulk up.

6. Yoga is more efficient.

Yoga relies on your own—your entire body—for strengthening. Gym classes use weights and other equipment. Through different asanas, your full body becomes toned and stronger by using your own entire body weight as 'weights'. By using only weights or other equipment, muscles are isolated and have to be worked individually in order to benefit, which takes a whole lot more time.

7. You can do yoga anywhere.

Yoga is a different experience in a yoga studio, but you can easily practice yoga at home, outside or in small spaces. All you need is about 6 feet by 4 feet and you have your own yoga studio. A gym workout requires more equipment and more space.

8. Yoga is kinder to the body.

This does not mean yoga is not intense. Just ask anyone who practices Ashtanga. Yoga builds heat and works your muscles, but you’re doing what your body allows you to do and not attempting to lift weights and pound on the joints—both of which can cause injury. Yoga also stretches as you move through the postures and a good yoga practice builds on itself to prepare the body for the next position.

9. Yoga eases your aches and pains.

A gym workout increases them. Yoga slowly stretches muscles and opens the energy channels of the body. The increased flexibility keeps muscles and joints lubricated and healthy. Weights and treadmill can cause strain which leads to soreness and injuries.

10. Yoga helps you breathe easier.

During times of stress, it’s easy to forget to breathe—really breathe, and not just shallow breaths. Without deep breaths, it’s harder to think clearly and fatigue can set in. Yoga focuses on the breath so that when you need it most, those deep breaths are the norm.

11. Yoga is calming.

We move through practice with a calm, relaxed expression. No grunting, no dropping weights, no clenched teeth or grimacing expressions like you see from gym-goers. The overall intention is to release tension throughout the body and mind.

12. Yoga reduces stress.

Many yoga classes include meditation, or at least Savasana. It gives you a chance to clear the mind of the stresses of the day. With practice, stressful situations can be dealt with more easily and overall stress levels decrease. The competitive nature of a gym along with the loud music and bright lights is more likely to increase your stress.

13. Everyone can practice yoga.

No matter your age or your health, you can practice yoga. Yoga has even been found to help people who have health ailments ranging from Parkinson’s to cancer. Gym workouts, in general, are not designed to be therapeutic, or senior-friendly.

14. Yoga improves concentration.

During a yoga practice, you focus on the breath, the posture and the gaze. Outside distractions are tuned out. While you can try and do this at the gym, this focus and silence is not exactly encouraged with all the other distractions around, like loud music, TVs, etc.

15. Yogis rock.

We’re a happy bunch! Wouldn’t you rather be around smiling, happy people? You'll get to be in an environment where people accept your, and everyone else's, curves and edges. There's no talk of who held what pose longer, no sense of competition. It's always good vibes all around!

Yoga and Meditation

Importance of yoga and meditation 

Yoga gives us relief from countless ailments at the physical level. The practice of the postures (asans) strengthenes the body and creates a feeling of well being. From the psychological view point, yoga sharpens the intellect and aid in concentration; it steadies the emotions and encourages a caring for others.

The practice of breathing techniques (pranayam) calms the mind. In the realm of the spiritual yoga brings awareness and the ability to be still. Through meditation inner peace is experienced. Thus, yoga is a practical philosophy involving every aspect of a person’s being. It teaches the evolution of the individual by the development of self-discipline and self awareness. Anyone irrespective of age, health circumstances of life and religion can practise yoga. Yoga helps to discipline our sense of power with the„power of our own.

If we peep into the benefits of yoga, they are numerous. It improve physical fitness, stress, controls general well being, mental clarity and greater self-understanding. People of all ages can do yoga and it can also be adapted for people with disabilities or special needs. The asanas enhance muscle strength, coordination, flexibility and can help to keep our body fit control cholesterol level, reduces weight, normalises blood pressure and improves cardiovascular performance.

Apart from these when people actively seek to reduce the stress in their lives by consoling the mind. The body often works to heal itself. In this sense yoga can be seen not only as a way to get into shape on several levels, but also as a tool for self-healing.

In today’s world of information and inter planetary voyages most of the people find it difficult to devote time towards their health and fitness. This has led to drastic increase in health problems and healths related stress—the number one killer in modern days. Unlike the early part of the century when in- fectious diseases were the leading killers, today’s health problems are mostly related to life style.

Cardiovascular, heart disease, stroke, and arterioschelerosis, chronic lung disease, diabetes, cirrhosis of liver, suicide and several forms of cancer are all related to unhealthy lifestyle and behaviour. At one point of time or the other, a doctor comes into the scene in every individual’s life. Yoga is also self-diagnosis, healing prevention and maintenance. Although it is not replacement of one’s doctor, yet it has been practised safely and successfully by millions of people who never had doctors, for thousands of years. With the help of yoga the doctor and the individual can both monitor the progress and the doctor will definitely learn from individual how beneficial yoga really is.

In the context of self-diagnosis yoga postures and exercises can be easily done and that too with minimal possible effort. The magic of yoga is that as we begin the basic stretches we can immediately discover where our deficiencies are. If we are really up to, then we should not be discouraged by this.

We can do yoga, as perfectly as possible with a modest amount of care and patience, yoga triggers our body’s natural adaptive and rejuvenating powers. Unless we use it we will lose it and if we start using it again we can get most of it back. Some people even claim that yoga gave them more vitality than they ever had in their lives. Even those who began later in life also benefited from its practice.

As we start practising simple asanas we will immediately find out what needs attention the most while giving it the attention it calls for. The effects are immediate and the results keep becoming more apparent. The longer and more often we engage in the pure self-indulgent healing art of yoga. The more it will have a healing effect on us. Yoga is no less magical than the power of life itself. It unlocks life’s wonder and unleashes hidden energies.

Why Meditation is Important?

The Benefits of Meditation in your life and Why Meditation is so important. This question is comes to everyone’s mind and they want to know what is Meditation and how does it help and what are the benefits of meditation. Today, most people are having a chronic negative stress in their lives and they are suffering from tremendously pressure at work, as well as at home. They can’t calm down their body and mind any more. And it’s proved that stress is one of the main causes for serious diseases like cancer or chronic pain.

What is Meditation?

Meditation is an ancient practice that helps to control our own mind and consequently our own life and discover ourselves. It is powerful and can be practiced by anyone, everywhere, is extremely beneficial and can help us to feel happier. It is a good tool to work against this vicious cycle to reduce the negative stress. It has a direct effect on the nervous system by reducing the body’s stress related chemicals like cortisol and increasing the production of mood enhancing chemicals like serotonin. Also it improves the health by strengthening the immune system, reducing the blood pressure and lowering the cholesterol levels. It is also possible to have a faster recovery from disease because of meditating regularly.

Meditation can help to stabilize and calm down these emotional overreacting. Furthermore, meditation can improve the quality of the sleep, the sleep gets more restful. So it is a natural treatment for people suffering from insomnia. Meditation is also seen as a natural prescription for people suffering from various mental diseases like anxiety or depression.

PATANJALI INTERNATIONAL  YOGA  CENTER 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2015/02/09/7-ways-meditation-can-actually-change-the-brain/