Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Adopting Healthy Eating Habits

Eating healthy is critical whether your goal is weight loss, fitness or a healthier lifestyle in general. However, you don’t have to meticulously count calories or starve yourself to be healthy; rather, you need to provide your body with ample nourishment. While junk food and sugary treats might present challenges and temptations, adopting correct eating ideas and strategies will help make healthy eating a natural habit.

Below is an overview of basic tips and suggestions to help you stay fit and eat healthy.

Learn to Love Your Veggies Include as many vegetables in your diet as you possibly can. In addition to vegetables being packed with more nutrients and fewer fats and calories than meat-based dishes, vegetarian foods also offer a lot of variety and can be a real treat for the taste buds.

Get Creative with Fruits Fruits have natural sugar and can quell a sweet tooth. But if the sucrose from the fruit alone is not enough, add a little honey to sweeten it further. The sweetness from these choices is healthier than refined sugars, and the natural sugars in fruit and honey have far fewer calories.

Eat the Rainbow If you’re concerned about whether or not you’re eating enough from each of the food groups, try seeing each meal as a rainbow. What colors are missing? What colors are present? Are you eating many colors, or do you tend to focus on just one? If your plate usually looks like a multi-colored painting, then you’re likely consuming the minerals, vitamins and nutrients your body needs.

Drink Water or Fresh Juice with Crushed Ice Instead of Fizzy Beverages Although this may sound too easy to be worthwhile, it does have legitimate merit. Crushed ice gives water a slightly fizzy texture that can meet your need for carbonation. If you drink a lot of sodas because of their sweetness, add fresh juices to your water and crushed ice.

Employ Positive Affirmations If you have a problem with willpower and find it difficult to stick with your plan to eat healthy, consider reciting positive affirmations every day to help make eating healthy a natural instinct. Although this may sound too simple to be realistically effective, the truth is that the simplicity of the act is where the power lies. Perhaps the example that follows will illuminate this concept for you.

If someone tells you day in and day out that you are unattractive, over time you will begin to believe that assessment. Similarly, if you tell yourself that you’re ugly over and over again, you will begin to feel ugly regardless of how physically appealing you may actually be. Positive affirmations function the same way, in that telling yourself over and over that you enjoy being a healthy eater will cause you to embrace and believe this statement over time.

Continue reading here.

Friday, June 24, 2011

Sussing Out Your Sixth Sense

What we commonly refer to as our "sixth sense" goes by many different names: gut feeling, inner voice, instinct, intuition, subconscious. Regardless of which term you prefer to use, this sixth sense is not some magical or mystical power that only a few people are blessed enough to possess; rather, it is as common and natural as the other five senses we automatically accept as being valid and real because of our experience.

Theories about Intuition
One of the most common ways in which people "explain" intuition is to relate it to the scientific understanding of energy. For instance, we know from the Law of Conservation of Energy that energy can be neither created nor destroyed; as such, everything that exists in the universe is energy in some form. Moving to a more metaphysical understanding of this concept, we can see that all human interaction – whether physical or mental – is essentially interaction between and among different energies. In this way we can sense the energy that surrounds us with our bodies as well as the energy of every situation we visualize with our minds – and THAT is how our sixth sense manifests. An awareness of the reactions of either/and our bodies or minds – no matter how subtle – to those we meet and the situations in which we find ourselves can lead to an accurate understanding and interpretation of the meaning of these reactions.

Others describe this sixth sense as our ability to tap into "universal knowledge." Similarly to those who subscribe to the aforementioned energy concept, those who embrace the concept of universal knowledge in relation to the sixth sense believe it allows us to access the past, present and future knowledge of the all-knowing Universe that is not bound by constraints like linear time. In this sense we are all able to make more appropriate or advantageous life decisions because we're all blessed with some degree of this sixth sense; as such, our primary goal should be to master the interpretation of the simultaneously subtle-yet-obvious cues of intuition.

Continue reading here.

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

The Law of Attraction and Building New Relationships

While it's undeniable that being in a loving relationship can be incredibly fulfilling and full of positives, it's also undeniable that finding relationships like that can be difficult. We've all experienced the defeated and heartbreaking feeling of rejection or an otherwise failed relationship, and most would agree the risks of these unpleasant experiences are worth it if it means finding real love and joyous fulfillment. That said, it's this end point that it can take an entire lifetime for some of us to reach.

While some might claim that finding love boils down to fate and being in the right place at the right time, others would argue that we exercise some control over what – and whom – we attract into our lives. If you're in the second camp like I am, you understand that your thoughts and actions determine your fate. Whether you call it the Law of Attraction or fate or something else, these are the factors at work in finding fulfilling relationships.

Attracting Fulfilling Relationships
It's likely you were drawn to this article either because you're dissatisfied with the state of your current relationship or because you experienced a significant heartbreak in the past. Regardless of from which perspective you’re coming, the first thing you'll have to do is wipe your slate clean in order to attract into your life the love you deserve. It doesn't take a relationship expert to realize that dwelling on past betrayal and hurt isn't helpful but instead makes it more difficult for you to move on to something positive. Comparing potential romantic interests with a past lover simply brings the past into the present and prevents you from exploring the potential of new relationships.

Continue reading here.