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Get Fit Fridays


Fitness Classes have been suspended until further notice.

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Step Up Your Exercise Routine

Aerobic exercise gets your heart pumping and your lungs working, which strengthens them and helps them get better-oxygenated blood out to your cells. And the more oxygen you provide to your cells, the more energy, immunity, and endurance you’ll build up. All of which lead to a sexy, healthy body!
But don’t get bogged down in the old standards: You’re not limited to jogging or aerobics classes for cardio. Anything you want to do that gets you up and moving, from step classes to elliptical trainers to bicycling to jumping rope can be the key to improving your cardio strength. Here’s how to pump up your exercise routine.

•Aim for at least 90 minutes of cardio exercise per week. You should be engaging in moderate aerobic exercise for at least 30 minutes, at least three times per week — though the more you can do, the better. Ninety minutes per week is the minimum you need to keep your heart healthy and to speed up your metabolism so you can drop that weight.

•Mix it up. Doing the same old routine can get boring after a while. Choose new walking routes, add in a belly-dancing class in place of your spinning class, or go for a swim instead of a trip on the StairMaster.

•Keep challenging yourself. After a few weeks of the same routine, your body will plateau at the new level of fitness — if you want to progress even further, you’ll need to push yourself. That may mean increasing the speed at which you exercise, the amount of time you spend working out, or the challenge of the routine. So, if you’re a walker, you’ll need to pick up the pace, walk longer, or look for a hillier route. This will ensure that you continue to build the strength of your heart and your lungs.

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The Sweet Potato - A Near Perfect Food?

This amazing vegetable not only tastes great, but it’s also packed with nutrition. Here’s why:

Sweet potatoes contain significant amounts of antioxidants, including glutathione, which acts as an antiaging wizard in your body by fighting off free radicals (thank you, glutathione!). Also loaded with vitamins and minerals — such as beta-carotene, vitamins A, B, and C, manganese, copper, and iron — sweet potatoes are an excellent source of fiber, which helps to improve your digestion. And they taste great, too!

Unfortunately, the sugar content of these sweet potatoes places them a little high on the glycemic index. Obviously, the standard marshmallow preparation has to go. Sweet potatoes are already, well, sweet. So, you certainly don’t need to melt sugar on them! And, of course, buy them in the produce section, not in the can aisle. Here are a few simple (and delicious) ways to cook with these nutritional powerhouses:

•Sweet potato fries: Slice the sweet potatoes into narrow strips, then roast them in a hot oven with a little rosemary, pepper, salt, and a drizzle of olive oil until they’re tender. They’re a perfect substitute for the french fries you might be craving.

•Roasted sweet potatoes: Pierce with a fork, then bake for an hour at 350°F. Slice open, season with sea salt, black pepper, and butter. Perfect!

•Mashed sweet potatoes: Boil the sweet potatoes until they’re tender, and then mash them (perhaps with a little drizzle of milk, butter, sea salt, and pepper).

As with all carbohydrates, starchy vegetables like sweet potatoes need to be consumed in moderation. When eaten correctly, they provide a myriad of health benefits. And they’re so easy to prepare! The above recipes are delicious. Give them a try!

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Is Your Weight Loss Stalled?

More Weight Loss Tips

How to Food-Shop for Weight Loss

Making poor food choices can be all too easy — especially when you hit the grocery store and see aisle upon aisle of delicious, but dangerously unhealthy, foods. If you want to eat more healthfully and lose weight, consider revamping your grocery shopping list and start choosing the most nutrition-rich products at the store. Here’s how to do it:

•If it’s bagged or boxed, don’t buy it. Odds are, if the food comes in a bag or a box, it’s been processed and contains chemicals and preservatives that could add to your body’s toxic load.

•Shop the perimeter of the store. The healthiest foods — fresh produce, meats, and dairy — are often located in the outer aisles, while the interior of the store is stocked with the processed foods that will add to both your toxic load and your waist line.

•Check the labels. If it lists something long and unpronounceable, put it down. If you can’t read it and say it, you probably don’t want to eat it. (There are exceptions to this rule, since some healthy ingredients have long unrecognizable names.)

•Look for clean foods. Choosing organic produce, grass-fed beef and lamb, organic chicken, wild-caught seafood and natural pork will limit your exposure to toxins.

•Avoid refined carbohydrates. White flour, white rice, corn, and most sweeteners are Insulin Triggers that can cause your body to store all the calories you eat as fat — and make it hard for you to burn your stored fat as energy. Look for whole-grain breads and pastas to help avoid the insulin rush.

•Choose the best beverages. Water is the best and healthiest drink, but decaffeinated teas and Swiss Water decaffeinated coffees are also good choices. Avoid sodas, whether regular or diet — the regular kinds are loaded with sugar and trigger an insulin surge, and the diet ones are full of chemicals and toxins you want to avoid.

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The Trouble With Artificial Sweeteners

In theory, artificial sweeteners should be a win-win for people who need to lose weight — you can continue to eat the sweet foods you love without the added calories of sugar. Unfortunately, sticking with these types of sweeteners often leads to weight gain — as evidenced by the large numbers of overweight and obese people who drink diet sodas and eat artificially sweetened foods; furthermore, they can do more harm than good.

There’s mounting evidence that these products can severely impact your health. Here’s how:

•Artificial sweeteners may trigger cravings for other sweet foods. Your body looks for nutritional value in everything you eat or drink. It will absorb the nutrients, discard the remainder, and store what it cannot use or eliminate. Chemically laden diet sodas and other artificial sweetener–laced foods generally lack nutritional value, but what they don’t lack are toxins, which will be stored in your fat cells. In addition, when your body is not fed nutrients, it asks again and again for more food, triggering heavy-duty cravings for fattening, sugary foods. This certainly isn’t what you expected when you picked up those diet foods and drinks!

•Artificial sweeteners can mess with your metabolism. Food additives containing excitotoxic chemicals (toxins that damage nerve cells), such as aspartame and MSG, can cause changes to your brain that can increase your risk of developing metabolic syndrome, making it far more likely that you will become obese and have difficulty removing the weight with diet and exercise — the result of which may be type-2 diabetes. This risk increases if you began eating these chemical additives at an early age.

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Food For Thought

Don't drink diet soda. Why? Your body is designed to pull nutrients from the food you eat. But diet soda — which is made from chemicals — doesn't have any. And so your confused brain keeps telling your body that it needs to be fed, even when it doesn't! Want something bubbly? Try seltzer water with a twist of lemon instead!

Fish is an excellent source of omega-3 fatty acids. However, not all fish is good fish. Choose cold-water varieties for maximum health benefits, such as wild-caught salmon and sardines. Eat only minimal amounts of fish that tend to be high in mercury, such as tuna, swordfish, and halibut. Fish get exposed to mercury from polluted water. Then, when big fish eat smaller fish that have been exposed to mercury, they absorb the entire load of mercury that the smaller fish has eaten during its lifetime. In this way, the small fish adds to the big fish's mercury buildup, and the big fish adds to our own. Yuck!

All those spices and herbs in your spice rack can do more than add a little extra kick to your meals — they can rev up your metabolism and improve your health at the same time. Many spices are considered superfoods because they are full of antioxidants! Consider adding two to three spices to all your meals to make them not only taste great, but also help detoxify your body at the same time. (Don’t you just love nature!?) Here’s a list of some of the herbs and spices that will give a healthy (and flavorful) boost to your foods.

•Basil is rich in antioxidants like vitamins A and C.
•Black pepper increases the hydrochloric-acid production in your stomach, aiding digestion.
•Cayenne pepper is a cardiovascular booster.
•Crushed red-pepper flakes contain capsaicin, a potent anti-inflammatory.
•Cumin primes the salivary glands and improves digestion.
•Curry powder combines all the benefits of cumin and turmeric in one quick pinch.
•Dill is a potent antioxidant and a good source of calcium.
•Fennel boosts levels of vitamin C and contains anethole, a phytonutrient that can prevent cancer.
•Garlic can help regulate the number of fat cells in your body and protect your cardiovascular system from disease.
•Lemon and lime brighten up the flavor of plain water — and boost your intake of vitamin C.
•Mint can help fight cancer.
•Nutmeg can help you get sleepy at night.
•Onion offers similar cardiovascular benefits as garlic.
•Oregano is, pound for pound, one of the most antioxidant-rich foods around.
•Paprika is an excellent anti-inflammatory and antioxidant.
•Rosemary may be a weapon in the fight against cancer by preventing carcinogens from binding to cells.
•Sage contains the same cancer-fighting compounds as rosemary.
•Tarragon can aid digestion and help improve heart health.
•Thyme is a relative of mint and a potent antioxidant.
•Turmeric has been shown in several studies to have anti-inflammatory properties — and could help protect against degenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and heart disease.
•Vanilla is not only a sweet flavoring but also a stellar antioxidant.

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How To Drink Water To Lose Weight

Get The Details

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Prayer and Weight Loss - Read More

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One Woman's Struggle To Shed Weight, And Shame

Hear Her Story

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How to Lie to the Bathroom Scales

1. Weigh yourself with clothes on, after dinner...as well as in the morning, without clothes, before breakfast, because it's nice to see how much weight you've lost overnight.

2. Never weigh yourself with wet hair.

3. When weighing, remove everything, including glasses. In this case, blurred vision is an asset. Don't forget the earrings, these things can weigh at least a pound.

4. Use cheap scales only, never the medical kind, because they are always five pounds off...to your advantage, of course.

5. Always go to the bathroom first.

6. Stand with arms raised, making pressure on the scale lighter. (Waving them is optional but occasionally helps!)

7. Don't eat or drink in the morning until AFTER you've weighed in,completely naked, of course.

8. Weigh yourself after a haircut, this is good for at least half a pound of hair (hopefully).

9. Exhale with all your might BEFORE stepping onto the scale (air has to weigh something, right?)

10. Start out with just one foot on the scale, then holding onto the towel rack in front of you, slowly edge your other foot on and slowly let off of the rack. Admittedly, this takes time, but it's worth it. You will weigh at least two pounds less than if you'd stepped on normally.

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TAKE A PROACTIVE APPROACH TO YOUR HEALTH
by Denis Waitley

Think of your body as a high-powered, finely engineered transportation vehicle, like a space shuttle. Instead of liquid hydrogen, your body is powered by your own intake. The food you eat is the fuel that energizes the vehicle. What you put in your fuel tank is burned by your high performance activity or - in the case of low-octane, junk food - is deposited in your engine. Think of your mind as the driver who takes control of and steers your body to victory or hits the wall. Your body is very much like a car. Drive it without proper fuel or maintenance and it will fall apart. You take it for granted to get you where you want to go, until it breaks down. Then it disrupts your way of life.

Like your car, your body only speaks to you by exception. You only notice it when it is damaged or inoperative. But, unlike your car, the spare parts business for your body is not a viable option at present.

To combat disease and aging, you need to keep your bones, joints and muscles flexible and strong. The right exercise means weight-bearing exercise, not simply aerobics. The International College of Sports Medicine has now added exercise with weights to its long-time recommendation of aerobic exercise. First, check with your physician who can assess your general condition and advise you about healthy levels of activity. Second, be aware that the effectiveness of exercise depends as much on enjoyment as on the nature of activity itself.

Just as important, if not more important than daily exercise, is proper nutrition. What you eat has a major impact on degenerative diseases. Do eat a low fat diet. Keep your fat intake to 15 percent of all daily calories. This will keep you lean and boost your immunity. Do eat a low salt diet. Use a potassium-based salt substitute on the table and in cooking. Do eat a high-fiber diet. Fiber protects the colon from cancer, lowers cholesterol and stabilizes blood sugar. Eat 40 to 50 grams of mixed fibers daily, as in whole grain breads and cereals, especially those containing oat bran, vegetables and fruits. Do eat a low-sugar diet. Use a little fructose in place of table sugar. Eat complex carbohydrates in place of sugar and look for carbohydrate drinks sweetened with zylitol. Do drink clean water. Drink bottled or home-distilled water, as much as eight glasses per day.

Do eat an alkaline diet. Our high-fat, high-sugar diet creates acidity. So many people are now acidic that we spend hundreds of millions of dollars on antacids every year.

Do take daily nutritional supplements including essential multi-vitamins, antioxidants and minerals. Current research confirms that we can no longer get the essential nutrients from our food alone. We must supplement even the best diet with nutrition to promote resistance to disease. Do eat the right kinds of foods and stay away from the fast-food, fat-food drive-throughs. You are doing yourself and your children a dangerous, long-term disservice by developing the habit of eating high-fat, nutrition-poor meals. Make your health your top priority. You can’t buy your health or life back after years of neglecting it while you earn your living.

Action Idea: List one activity you will begin to do tomorrow to improve your health and increase the quality and quantity of your life.

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