Archive for October, 2007
Tuesday, October 2nd, 2007
My must-haves for healthy weekly food preparation.
These are the things I ideally have on hand every week. Buying this much organic depends on my food budget that week. I decide what kind of meat/fish/dinner dish I’m going to have that week or a specialty ethnic meal and then I’ll get the things I need for that. Everything I cook must take less than 30 minutes to prepare and 30 minutes to cook. Sometimes I’ll get things ready before hand (chopping veggies, pre-cooking chicken, etc.) so all I have to do is throw it in a skillet or the oven, then it’s a lot quicker!.
Nuts: almonds, walnuts
Organic Raisins
Organic Whole Milk Yogurt
Plain Enhanced Soy Milk
Canned legumes: black, navy (organic)
Whole Grain or Rice Pasta (We’re off the white stuff @ home!)
Brown Rice (I also buy the Bhutanese Red Rice from Harris Teeter and mix them. It’s nutty and luscious!)
Plenty of greens for salads, sandwiches and stir frys: Spinach, Mixed Greens, Arugula, Romaine, Red, Cilantro to name a few
Garlic!
Red and Yellow Onions
Bell Peppers (organic if I can get them on sale!)
Broccoli or Green Beans, Red Cabbage for salads, sometimes squash
Small Red Potatoes
Baby Organic Carrots and Celery: Great for stocking lunches
Just make sure you have a variety of colors in your veggies and you eat them!
Cereals Buy low sugar, and the least processed, most whole wheat you can. Buy organic when possible
Oatmeal
Whole wheat Eggos
Frozen organic berries
Cheeses (to add to certain dishes) Definitely pick up the bagged grated.
Lunch meat: Usually turkey and as unprocessed as I can find and afford that week
Eggs
Regular Cream Cheese
Real Unsalted Butter
Olive Oil
Annie’s Salad Dressing or Paul Newman
Organic Peanut Butter
Organic Apples (because we eat the skin and we have them everyday
Bananas
Avocado
Grapefruit
Tangelos
Kiwis Just make sure you have a variety of fruit all year, they’re within easy reach and you eat them!
Canned tuna (Light, packed in water. Have 1 x week, usually as a snack with crackers)
Whole Wheat or Rice crackers
Whole Wheat Bread
Some kind of cookie for Kids lunches: One or two
Some type of chip for kid’s lunches (just pack small portions)
Main regulators of a healthy metabolism, leading to the perfect weight:
Eating lots of fresh and minimally processed foods
Drinking plenty of water. Make it your main beverage!
Monitoring Junk Food Intake and making healthy choices for snacking
Greatly reducing Sugar consumption
Staying away from “Diets”!
Maintaining an active lifestyle
Getting enough sleep
Finding ways to cope with stress besides food and anger
Live a life filled with joy, inner peace, meaningful work, and loving and serving others
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Monday, October 1st, 2007
There are two things I can always count on in the fall: more clients at the gym and more people dieting. Angst over body shape and size, fueled by trying to live up to impossible standards, gets worse as we look ahead to the upcoming holiday season with all it’s temptation and stressors. For our kids, peer-comparison and parental expectations create more stress, not only over body image but academic and athletic performance. And as anxiety increases, self-control decreases, as well as overall health and well-being.
Americans spend 42 billion a year on dieting and diet-related products, more than the federal government spends on education. Talk about funding neighborhood schools! Instead, by our words and actions, we encourage children as young as 8 to buy into the tragedy of measuring self worth by the numbers on the scale and their ability to be “perfect”. The results have been an explosion of eating disorders in every segment of the population, but especially teenagers and young adults, accompanied by poor self-esteem, shame, fatigue, self-mutilation, mental disorders and disease. If you’re my age, you grew up in a time when kids and families ate well, got plenty of exercise, were healthier and more content, and obesity was a rarity. And no one was on a diet.
We have allowed food manufacturers and advertisers to usurp our responsibility as parents to provide practical guidelines for healthy eating to the next generation. Faced by an onslaught of processed foods over the last two decades, we’ve seen our waistlines expand and the rates of all major diseases dramatically increase. Could there be a connection? Processed foods are sweetened and salted and artificially flavored to appeal to our taste buds, so we’ll want to eat them compulsively. And these companies aren’t concerned with your health; there’s a lot of money to be made by using artificial ingredients and super-sizing portions. Real food, with real flavors and natural vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and fiber are much more satisfying, so we need and eat less. Real will always be the healthiest choice.
According to cross-cultural studies, Americans are the world’s most anxious eaters. We worry more about food and derive less pleasure from eating than any other people on the planet. We’re also fatter and sicker than any other developed nation. Perhaps a connection? Eating should be about pleasure, not fear or obsession. We’ve forgotten when food was good for us and we approached the dinner table with hunger and thankfulness.
When media saturates our homes with images of unattainable thinness and “perfection”, courtesy of digital manipulation, we have not only failed to turn away from the foolishness of striving for the “image”, but have chosen to embrace the unreal for ourselves and our families. We are a nation of plastic food and plastic surgery, endlessly unsatisfied and insecure.
What about embracing our uniqueness? What about fulfillment and pleasure? Not just in eating, but in every part of who we really are. It’s not only time to approach the table with gratefulness, but the rest of our lives, to build a foundation for life that is real and lasting, not fake and temporary. And to teach the next generation to be not only wiser than us, but healthier too.
Start your own revolution!
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Monday, October 1st, 2007
In this new column about integrated wellness—body, soul and spirit—Carol will talk about different aspects of health, while encouraging us to live the best life possible
In my last column, we started exploring the idea of change in our personal lives. Businesses fail without keeping up with changes in technology and services, and our personal lives can be ruined if we don’t learn to make the inside-out changes that bring renewed health and vitality to our relationships, our physical health and our work.
We may think we can change our lives by focusing on outward appearance: a buff bod, a brow lift, a new hair color or by changing spouses/significant others, but at the end of the day, or the surgery, or the relationship, we’re still left with our selves.. By creating new positive thought patterns, we change the framework that defines how we see the world, how we speak and how we act: who we are.
The mind is like the rudder that guides a ship, and where your mind goes, your life with follow. So instead of accepting the “I hate myself, I’ll never be successful, I always make mistakes” kinds of thoughts, we insert “I love myself, every day I’m learning how to be better at ___, mistakes are inevitable - but I’m learning, failure leads eventually to success.” And it’s just as important to speak those powerful thoughts out loud to yourself, and to others, as reminders of our potential and to teach others how to treat us.
Remember our pattern for success?: Will→Actions→Results. Will means you’ve defined the areas where change is necessary, made a commitment to live differently, and your rudder (mind) is turning your life towards a new direction.
If you’ve had trouble with this step, maybe you need to hit the pause button. Don’t get ahead of your soul, slow down. If your definition of success is how busy you are, this won’t be easy. But without giving yourself time to reenergize, not only are you more vulnerable to impulsive behavior, but as your emotional energy runs out, so does your willpower. Make a habit of creating breathing space in each day, giving yourself permission to do nothing for at least 10-15 minutes. Stare off into space, take deep cleansing breaths, find quiet and solitude, meditate, pray, and don’t answer your cell phone. Stop doing and just be. As your energy is renewed, you will be able to think more clearly about your life and be able to implement and sustain change. Research has proven that taking small breaks in our day makes us even more productive when we need to be.
Actions follow your thoughts, back up your intentions for your life. Without action, there are only unfulfilled wishes. Anyone can talk about changing, but you’re actually doing something about it! There’s an emotional struggle here, no doubt about it, but with consistent practice you will leave old habits behind and eventually see the Results that you could only visualize before. Seeing something thru to completion will give you courage to persevere in different areas of life, through many tough changes.
Go make it a great day!
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