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Archive for June, 2010

You already know how important it is to make healthy food choices for you and your family. But how can you fit the best choices into your busy life?

You’ll be pleased to discover that a hectic life doesn’t mean that every meal has to be fast food on the run! Sometimes it’s difficult to make healthy changes, but with a little planning and know-how, it can be done.

Here are some strategies to help you and your family make healthy choices:

1. Avoid temptation. It’s so easy to walk into the store with good intent, but walk out with bags full of unhealthy foods. Unfortunately, our wills are weak, especially if we’ve trained ourselves over the years to buy junk foods.

* Never shop when you’re hungry. This way you won’t pick out unhealthy choices because they look good at the moment.?
* Get rid of the unhealthy foods in your home. If they aren’t around, you won’t be tempted to eat them.

* Think of healthier alternatives to your family’s favorite unhealthy foods. Rather than high calorie chips, try trail mixes or rice cakes. Low calorie puddings or frozen yogurts are better alternatives to higher fat ice creams.

2. Eat fast and healthy meals at home. When you’re tired at the end of the day and you realize you still have to feed the family, it’s easy to go to a fast food chain and throw fast food on the table. It may save some time, but it won’t save your health – or your pocket book!

* The great thing is that there are many easy, fast, and healthy foods you can make at home. This takes some planning, but you’ll be more satisfied, save money, and be healthier as well.

* Look online for quick and easy recipes made with all natural ingredients. Many recipes can be made in 30 minutes or less and only have 5 ingredients. Taking the time to do some recipe research will save your sanity in the long run. Then once you find a “hit” with the family, store the recipe in a book or on your computer.?

* When you cook, make large batches and freeze the leftovers. This way, you’ll already have meals in the freezer that you can just thaw, heat, and serve. No muss, no fuss! This is the opportune way to enjoy “fast” food at home.

3. Eat Slower. Since the brain takes about 20 minutes to get the signal that the stomach is full, if you eat too fast you’ll pack in a lot more food than you need. When you’re still thinking you’re hungry, it’s easy to make the wrong choices about food. If you slow down while you’re eating, you’ll eat less and you’ll still feel full.

* Set a calming mood before sitting down for a meal. Avoid having the television on or eating as you’re rushing the kids out the door to another activity. Sitting calmly at the table will allow everyone to relax and enjoy their meal.

4. Make dinner time a social experience. Dinner should be about enjoying your company and taking pleasure in the foods you’re eating.

When you begin to look at mealtime as a social experience, it becomes easier to make the right choices about healthy foods. Suddenly you aren’t so worried about rushing through and making it quick.

Dinner becomes a great experience when you’re able to enjoy healthy foods together. Take time to eat as a family and enjoy a real conversation with each other. Talking will naturally slow down your eating pace, while also reconnecting you with your family members.

Using these techniques will bring all kinds of healthy benefits to your family and teach your children a healthy lifestyle. Healthy food choices are a possibility in your busy life if you take the time to plan ahead and make dinner time a priority in your home.

You probably expect to gain a number of things when starting a home business. You may expect to gain freedom or perhaps you expect to gain wealth. It is not uncommon to expect gains from your home business endeavors. Unfortunately many people gain something they do not expect or want when starting a home business. A number of home business owners are shocked to discover that a home business can cause them to gain weight.

Grazing Behavior

When you work at home, your kitchen is like a workplace cafeteria open twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. If you are not careful, you can find yourself running to the fridge or the cupboard for frequent snacks throughout the day.

Grazing behavior can be devastating to a person’s weight maintenance. Many people really do not realize how easy it is to rack up hundreds of extra calories every day just by grabbing a few handfuls of this and a couple of handfuls of that. Those calories quickly convert to extra pounds, and the home business owner is suddenly wondering where the extra weight has come from.

While a handful of chips here and a few M&Ms there may not seem like a big deal, when you add up the handfuls eaten throughout the day, throughout the week and throughout the year, you start to see the big picture – no pun intended.

Unhealthy Eating Habits

When you are serious about starting your home business, it is only natural for you to be extremely busy with home business activities. Because of this, many home business owners do not follow a healthy diet. Weeks and weeks of fast food, frozen dinners and quick-fix meals can really take a toll on your waistline and you definitely do not want to see what it is doing to your arteries and heart.

Glued to a Chair

If your home business involves hours upon hours of computer work and no time for anything else, you are not going to get the exercise you need and you are going to start packing on the pounds. Home business owners who do not make time for healthy activities and exercise almost always experience significant weight gain.

Think about the extra calories you actually burned just from working outside of the home. You had to walk from your home to your car and walk from your car to your workplace. Most people also walk to various locations throughout the day, whether it is to a meeting, someone’s office, the printer, etc. Then, at the end of the day you walked back to your car. All of that activity can add up to quite a few calories being burned. Once you start working at home, you are no longer burning those calories.

Avoiding Unhealthy Weight Changes

If you want to avoid the weight gain pit so many other home business owners have fallen in to, there are some steps you need to take.

First and foremost, make sure you eat right. That means eating three square meals a day with healthy snacks in between each meal. For those of you wondering, just because a potato chip is baked and not fried does not mean it qualifies as a healthy snack.

When your schedule becomes so busy you can barely keep your head straight, it may be tempting to throw in a frozen dinner, grab a burger and fries or order pizza every night. No matter how tempting it is, do not give in. For your body and mind to be performing at their best, you need nutritional meals rich in the nutrients, vitamins and antioxidants your body needs.

In addition to a proper diet, you also need to make sure you get the exercise your body requires. If you are stuck in front of the computer, get up every half hour or so to do some sit-ups, push-ups, or jumping jacks. Some home business owners even invest in treadmills and work out once or twice a day to keep their bodies active and in shape.

By taking measures to avoid significant weight changes, you will be able to stay in good shape and perhaps you may even find yourself getting into better shape than you were before you started your home business.