Principles of Sustainable Lifestyle Change.

We live in a quick-fix society. We want instant results with minimal pain, effort and sacrifice. When it comes to our health and appearance, we’re accustomed to looking for a pill or procedure, and many practitioners are quick to prescribe them. But if the root cause of the problem or challenge is not addressed, drugs, surgery and treatments can simply mask the underlying issue, leading to more of the same – a vicious cycle. Observing the following principles will make lifestyle change enjoyable and help you obtain optimal health, lose weight and feel better every day.

1.      Find your perfect fit 

Each of us is unique – metabolically, psychologically, and circumstantially. For this reason, there’s no single diet plan that works well for everyone. “Each person needs to find what works for him- or herself by seeking professional nutritional advice. This is the 1^st principle that will enable you start the lifestyle journey in the right direction by avoiding unnecessary trial and errors. If you have a clear vision of the journey and what you want out of your journey then you are pointed in the right direction to achieve that success.

 2.      Unparalleled  Commitment

Permanent lifestyle takes time and effort — and a lifelong commitment. Make sure that you're ready to make permanent changes and that you do so for the right reasons. To stay committed to your lifestyle, you need to be focused. It takes a lot of mental and physical energy to change your habits. If you don’t have the commitment you will withdraw physically and mentally from your daily tasks and not be able to achieve success!

3.      Motivation 

Why are some people able to maintain their healthy new lifestyle indefinitely while most others peter out after a few weeks or months? This is currently one of the hottest questions in research. Lifestyle changes begin with setting solid intentions, only then will you have the commitment to stick with your new course of action. Intention is the strong, motivating “why” for doing something.

 4.      Change your perspective

It's not enough to eat healthy foods and exercise for only a few weeks or even months if you want long-term, successful lifestyle change. These habits must become a way of life. Lifestyle changes start with taking an honest look at your eating patterns and daily routine bearing in mind your destination. Remember that you're planning to change your life. It won't happen all at once. Stick to your healthy lifestyle and the results will be worth it.

 

 

Lifestyle change has its rules, and also a language!

Rules, rules, rules! A game is only as good as its rules, and how well we play the game is defined by how well we follow the rules. A few years ago I decided to learn about the game of golf. So, I asked a friend to take me to his club. When I went to the club, I quickly learnt that there were many, many rules covering not only how you play the sport, but also how you dress and how you "talk" to other golfers.  When I was at the club, it was like I was in a new world. They could easily tell that I was not part of them by the way I talked and the words that I used. The same applies to lifestyle change. Think of lifestyle change as a journey on a super highway. Traffic rules and regulations are not made just for the sake of having rules, but they are for our own safety. If we don’t follow the traffic rules strictly, then how will they help us in our safety? It is kind of chain reaction. If you break a traffic rule, out of 10 people near you at least 3 to 4 will break the rule and many others thereafter. Traffic rules help bring sanity and reduce road carnage. Being healthy often seems incredibly complicated. There are advertisements everywhere and various experts giving conflicting advice. However…being healthy does not need to be complicated. People were much healthier in the past, before all the dieting and “health products” took hold of our society. The rules haven’t changed since then… our genetics are the same and what worked for us back in the day can also work for us now. To gain optimal health, lose weight and feel better every day, then all you need to do is follow simple rules. 

 

In my next post, I will OUTLINE THE BASIC RULES OF SUSTAINABLE LIFESTYLE CHANGE and take a look at why rules are important and how they can make lifestyle change more enjoyable!

Healthy and Disease-free Lifestyle

Do you have a dream deep in your heart that you want to lead a healthy and disease-free lifestyle? Would you like to lose weight, manage diabetes, acidity, back pain etc.If you do, have you taken the first step necessary to achieve it? Taking the first step is perhaps the most difficult thing to do in achieving a dream. There are a lot of mental obstacles that make it difficult to take that first step. You should not wait until the situation is perfect because the situation will never be perfect. No matter how or when you see it, there will always be something that make you think again. The best time to start is now.  Check my next post as I explore how to start this life transforming journey!

Young women and beer bellies

By CAROLINE NJUNG’E

“Have you noticed the growing number of teenage girls with love handles nowadays?” read the email from a colleague.

‘Love handles’ are just a polite name for a potbelly if you’re wondering.

It was interesting because I too had noticed this. Young, flawless faces, but when your eyes dropped to the midsection, the shock of protruding, sagging bellies that looked out of place in an otherwise young-looking body.

Jennifer Muiruri/ Nation 
http://www.nation.co.ke/Features/saturday/Young-women-and-beer-bellies--/-/1216/963230/-/sc5ofpz/-/index.html

I forwarded the email to a couple of colleagues and friends and surprise, surprise; they too had noticed the increasing number of young women struggling to cover bellies that threatened to spill over from the waistlines of their trendy jeans.

“Blame it on junk food, alcohol, our nyama choma culture and what I call the couch potato syndrome,” says Kepha Nyanumba, a nutritionist

with AAR.

According to Kepha, most of today’s young people have embraced an unhealthy lifestyle, a disastrous menu of junk food, too much red meat, excess alcohol and fizzy drinks coupled with inactivity.

And how true that is. Wander into any pub in the city centre on a Friday or Saturday evening and you will notice groups of young girls, most of them in their late teens or early 20s downing bottle after bottle of beer.

Nyama choma is no longer the elderly man’s meal, so they will have already had their fill of roast meat to ‘line’ the stomach as they prepare for a long night.

Most of them would also tell you that before popping into the pub for the ‘main course’, they had passed by a fast food joint for a plate of chips and fried chicken.

Exercise is, of course, a foreign word in their vocabulary.

“Fat tends to be stored around the waist in women,” says Kepha.

Forget aesthetics for a moment, most of the body’s vital organs are found here, and too much fat deposit around this section interferes with their proper functioning.

Unknowingly, while these young women meet every weekend to “do Nyama” or join the long queue of predominantly young people who take advantage of a weekly offer to ‘buy-one-pizza-get-one-free’ at a popular fast food restaurant in the city centre, they are setting themselves up for future infertility, and diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, obesity and a host of cardiovascular diseases.

It is also worth noting that the rate of metabolism in men is higher than that in women. According to Kepha, men break down fat faster than women.

This means that when women in their early 20s compete with their male companions for the two kilos of nyama choma and ugali, which they then wash down with several bottles of beer, the damaging effects of this deadly menu are likely to show themselves sooner in the fairer sex.

Kepha points out that though your average young woman is conscious of her looks, this does not make her immune to the lure of junk food, which, besides being tastier, is also cheaper than nutritionally-healthy food and therefore friendlier to their pockets.

“Generally, most young women are conscious about their looks and will do just about anything, including starving themselves to portray a certain image.”

Take bulimia nervosa for instance, which Kepha singles out as common in young women. It is characterised by recurrent binge eating, which one then tries to compensate for by fasting, vomiting, or over-exercising. It, of course, does not work because the damage is already done.

What is the way out then? There is no short cut to losing weight unfortunately, or getting rid of the dangerous fat around the waist. You just have to eat healthy and exercise.

Unless young women embrace a healthy lifestyle now, the problem will be much more than an expanding waistline.

HOW SAFE IS THAT PLATE OF MEAT?

 

Nairobians are best known for their love for nyama choma. But the question is; how safe is the meat they so much love?...http://nairobinews.nation.co.ke/how-safe-is-that-plate-of-meat/

Vitamin D Pills

No health shield from vitamin D pills: study

Oily fish and eggs are rich in vitamin D, an essential nutrient that contributes to healthy, strong bones and helps to control the amount of calcium in the blood. Vitamin D supplements have no significant effect on preventing heart attack, stroke, cancer or bone fractures, according to a review of scientific evidence published Friday. .. http://www.nation.co.ke/lifestyle/health/No-health-shield-from-vitamin-D-pills-study/-/1954202/2158336/-/evtfc2z/-/index.html

Overweight and Obesity Statistics

The number of overweight and obese adults in the developing world has almost quadrupled to around one billion since 1980, says a report from a UK think tank.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-25576400