What is the best weight loss diet?

I am an office worker, I usually eat in the restaurant at noon (no time to cook by myself), and after get off work every day, I don’t have the energy to go to the gym.

‘Under such conditions that are not conducive to weight loss’, I spent a month I have lost 20 pounds, so I think I have a good say on this issue.

1. A weight loss diet does not mean skipping meals

I follow a rule to eat every day: eat full in the morning, eat very nutritious and healthy at noon, and do not eat or just eat some fruit at night.

• You must eat some carbohydrates (rice, noodles, bread) every day. The best time is noon, but you can't eat too much. For example, 30% of a bowl of rice is enough.
• If you feel hungry at Night, you can eat a little fruit, but you can only choose one fruit every day, such as a cucumber or an apple (do not eat fruits with high sugar content: grapes, cantaloupe, durian).

2. Chew 30 times each time-slow down the eating speed

Some people eat food very fast when they are hungry, so that the stomach is full and you are still eating, which will generate extra calories to consume. So slow down the speed of eating, it’s best to chew 30 times each time

3. Stand more and sit less as much as you can

People who work in the office need to sit for a long time. After sitting for a long time, your butt and waist will become wider, so you can set yourself to stand up and move for 5-10 minutes every 40 minutes. You can kick kicks, do squats, or go to the bathroom. Don't stand there and play with your phone!

4. Eat more light things

I have not looked for scientific evidence for this, but my personal experience tells me: eating too much salt, chili, sugar and many food seasonings can easily make people fat, the skin becomes worse, and the skin of the body is sagging and aging.

5. Record weight changes every 4 days (or longer: 5 days, a week)

Don't weigh yourself every day. Your body needs a process of adaptation. Everyone's metabolic capacity is different. So there is a great possibility that you persisted for three days, but the number on the scale did not change. This will cause your confidence to be greatly affected, and may make you overeating or giving up.

I followed the above 5 points for a month. I reduced my weight from 60KG to 50KG. I don’t advocate thinness is good-looking. Everyone has the right to choose, but my choice is to make me a thin person. So if you want to wear small-sized shorts and curvy clothes like me, then you can try my method, which should bring you satisfactory results.

Rita Zheng

Banana Soothie - The Best Diet for Morning

I think a smoothie is a great way to get a lot of good nutrition in one go. I usually drink one for breakfast. I get about 5–6 servings of fruits and veggies with this smoothie. Here are some benefits:

• You can get a good mix of all the macro-nutrients (carbs, fat and protein) along with vitamins, minerals and fiber from whatever fruit and veggies you put inside.
• Quick to prepare - takes less than 5 minutes to make
• It goes down very easily and you don’t feel heavy after consumption
• Tastes great!

I also include kefir, which tastes similar to yogurt (sour) but has some more benefits:

• Has a more runny consistency, already smoothie like to begin with
• Contains more probiotic (micro-organisms/good bacteria) strains than yogurt (around 40 compared to around 5 with yogurt)
• Probiotic strains in yogurt are more likely to pass through while probiotic strains in kefir are more likely to colonize your gut, providing longer term benefits

I take kefir to keep my gut (gut flora) healthy. The probiotics inside kefir see to that. Your gut is more important than you realize. Having good gut health offers many benefits:

• Prevents harmful bacteria from spreading - the good bacteria in your gut can inhibit growth of harmful bacteria by taking resources or by secreting substances that damage or kill harmful bacteria
• Stronger immune system - can help regulate production of antibodies in your immune system and can create a selective barrier in your stomach that prevents the passage of harmful bacteria into the rest of your body
• More efficient metabolism - you can more efficiently convert carbohydrates into energy with the help of gut flora
• And the coolest (though not as well understood) benefit: a better brain.
• There have been studies to suggest that having good gut flora can increase mental stability, reduce anxiety and depression and may help people with schizophrenia, autism and Parkinson’s.
• It may also increase certain aspects of memory

There’s my long rant on kefir. So, finally, my daily morning smoothie (reduce amounts if you need less). This comes out to be around 300–350 calories:

Ingredients

• 1 banana
• 1 cup of frozen mixed berries (raspberries, blueberries and blackberries)
• 1–2 cups leafy greens (usually both kale and spinach)
• 1 cup low fat kefir
• 1/2 cup water

Throw it in a blender until smooth and enjoy!

By Joshua Yi

Whats the best diet to start the morning.

Believe it or not, but the habits you have in the morning can play a very important role if you try to lose weight in a healthy way. Although many people do not realize this, those first acts of the day are essential to provide the body with the right amount of energy and to start the metabolism.

There isn’t a best diet for morning, but there is a best diet for you. Every person is different and even though we’ve been told for years that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, there are a lot of benefits to skipping breakfast like with intermittent fasting. 

For those who do eat breakfast some feel better when they eat a high protein breakfast like scrambled eggs, others might function better when they eat a breakfast that contains carbohydrates and a moderate amount of protein like a bowl of oats with full fat milk.

This makes it more exciting as there is less pressure to follow “the perfect diet”. You will be able to tell what approach you like the best and what gives you the most energy. In terms of weight loss, you want to aim for a breakfast that will keep you full and consists out of whole foods. Processed foods can interfere with hormones and often contain ingredients like high fructose corn syrup that can mess with weight loss and trigger fat storage.

Although there isn’t a best diet for the morning, there are really bad options out there. High sugar cereals, low fat yogurt, muesli, granola bars etc. all contain a ton of sugar. Watch out for All Bran type cereals as well. They are often loaded with sugar. It is unfortunate as these are often perceived as healthy breakfast options. This is known as the health halo effect where companies market these foods as healthy to trick you into buying and eating more.

If you stick to whole foods like oats, vegetables, eggs, avocado, wholegrain bread, you should be fine in terms of knowing whether it is healthy or not. All you have to do is experiment and find the one that works best for you.

Some people are hungry in the morning and it has been demonstrated, that to start with a lot of water, wait a bit then eat fresh fruits or a yogourt is quite satisfactory for many people.

You will need to learn to listen to your body. It knows exactly what you need and apart from processed food, it will show you naturally what natural food are good for you at a certain moment and you will be attracted by them.

If you do strength training daily then you can have:

1. 4 egg whites omlette + 1 multigrain toast + 1 tsp Peanut Butter
2. Oats + Soy Milk + Crushed apple / banana
3. Oats cooked with veggies + Greek yogurt
4. A multigrain sandwich with cottage cheese and salads

If you don't do strength training then you can go for

1. Oats + Veggies + 1 toast
2. Stuffed Chapati + Yogurt
3. Veggie Poha + Curd
4. Sandwiches + Fresh Fruit Juice

If your focus is on gaining muscle mass then go for a protein rich diet in the mornings always.

Is there an ideal daily routine for working professionals

 There are many factors to good health but one of these is a healthy good routine in the morning. Answer to this question won't do justice without taking into so many factors, like what lifestyle, are you going through. Like where do you live, what are your food preferences, how many people at home, what other responsibilities and what other stress one handles. And not to forget the health issues one is already aware of.

 

This calls for a bigger discussion :)

However, here I try to suggest some guidelines for a realistic routine:

1. Ensure 8 hours of sleep (at least 6 to 7 on workdays and rest catch up on holidays.)
2. Eat healthily -
   - breakfast to include fats and carbs.
   - Lunch to include a full meal.
   - dinner to have no carbs and rich protein.
3. A simple work out once in 2 days. even a 5 min plank can help wonders.
4. Give yourself a personal time of at least 30 mins which includes no thinking for 5 mins.
5. Make time for family and work, but at any given point of time, only one can be a priority. remember that and never forget it.
6. Treat yourself something to eat and feel nice about once every week. this boosts happiness.
7. Have one hobby to pursue, be it reading or art or even cooking.

Let me know if this helps.

How to have a healthy diet routine for healthy skin by Sunny Nguyen

There are a lot of reasons you are not feeling healthy and the first and fore most is your diet. Health and Beauty are interrelated. If you want to have healthy looking skin, then you need to follow a good hygiene as well as a discipline in your diet. 

By consistently practice and adjust your habits with high commitment and discipline, you can get the look you want be it feeling healthy or fit. 

At first, it needs a lot of attention to stay healthy. As times goes by, it will gradually become a habit, a daily routine that you just do unconsciously.

1. Start from your shopping habit

Every time you buy food at a supermarket or go to a restaurant for a night out or attend a party with friends, always remember to choose a healthier option!

At supermarket: instead of buying packaged and processed food, purchase whole food and fresh vegetables instead. Try to stay away from the areas that display those kind of products. And never store snacks, candies and sweeten food in your house. Never please.

When there are healthy food around you all the time, chances that you eat unhealthy food are extremely low.

At restaurant or parties: practice your mind to choose healthier dishes. It can be a salmon salad over a fried chicken, a pumpkin soup over fried potatoes. If you pay enough attention, there are always healthier option on every table.

2. Learn how to cook

You are never too busy to be able to prepare your meals.

You can either wake up a bit earlier or leave office a bit sooner,… It depends on your jobs and your schedule to decide when you can spend time for cooking. Or if you stay with family, there maybe your spouse, your parent or your maid cook for you.

Whatever circumstances, try to have meal at home as much as possible.

Cooking is actually really fun and stress - released. Try!

 

3. Eat mindfully

I have seen many people eating while looking constantly on their phones or eating while working or eating real fast just to do something else.

You know, we are never too busy to spend at least 15 minutes for having a meal. The thing is that we think we are too busy to eat. And we could never really EAT. We just try to put food in our mouth, then to our stomach. That’s it.

So, whether it is a 15 - minute snack time or a 30 - minute breakfast, focus on your food only during that time, no phone or other electronic devices. Enjoy the taste and the feeling to eat good food. Or you can have a conversation with friends, co-workers or family during that delicious meal.

“Eat mindfully” helps you enjoy the happiness while taking food, control the quantity of food you eat, and slowly digest them which makes your stomach work more efficiently.

4. Do not starve yourself or eat too much at the same time

It’s simple. You just have to follow the way a baby eats.

Eat when you feel slight hungry and stop when you feel a bit full.

Do not eat when you’re so full or do not starve yourself.

Eat just enough.

It doesn’t matter if you have two meals or five meals a day. It does matter that you take enough food that your body needs, not too little or not too much.

If you are eating too much at the same time, try to put all the food you should take on a plate and stand up when you finish that plate. No more.

If you’re too busy and too lazy to eat, put some kind of bean on your working desks: almond, cashew or walnut,… They are healthy and convenient to use.

5. No food and drinks at least 3 hours before your bedtime

It’s important to follow this rule.

If you eat or drink too late and too much, you will definitely can’t have a good sleep because your stomach has to overwork while it should take rest.

When you can’t sleep well, you already knew what would happen the next day. And if this kind of thing happens frequently, you would not be healthy at all, for sure.

Small tip: brush your teeth at least 3 hours before bedtime, you would no longer feel like to have food.

6. Have your own “cheat day”

YOLO - we only live once. That’s why we should not be so hard on ourselves, all the time. Eating fast food and junk food or drinking alcohol and sweeten tea every now and then is completely fine. For example, you can save a whole Sunday eating whatever you want or spend a Friday night out drinking and having whatever you like.

Absolutely fine! Just don’t let them happen so often.

7. Educate yourself

What kind of food is good for you, what kind of eating habit is good for you, …. Those question should be answered by you only. You can ask help from expert or self - educate.

There are various diet out there. You can choose whatever as long as it help you stay healthy and happy.

Teach yourself wisely what is actually healthy and unhealthy options. Because many people still have wrong conception about what is a good product.

For example: organic processed packaged food is actually not a healthy option, sweeten healthy juices and tea sold at coffee shops are actually not a healthy option at all,….

It’s not complicated at all, you just have to pay a little attention

There is no such thing called “best diet”. You just have to choose what suit you the best. Usually, it’s a combination of different formula.

Do remember that diet is not only for losing weight but also for long - term health which leads to a qualified life in overall.

It’s not easy at first to apply such “bothering rules” to your daily life. But don’t worry, it will become your natural routine after a while putting consistent effort.

Last but not least, IT’S WORTH!.

Author - Sunny Nguyen

Summer is Coming, See how you can protect your skin

Summer is Coming! Though it is the sun that gives life to all the organisms but we cannot deny that in summers if we ignore our skin care then it can become ugly fast. This is why in summertime, special attention should be given to skin care.

During summertime, our skin is more exposed to the harmful rays of the sun rather than winters where we are covered with a layer of clothes. Summertime can also lead to increase in skin impurities which is because of increased sebum production and blocking of pores. Other than that the UV rays are the most harmful in this period and damages your skin which can take a long time to repair.

Use the below tips to save yourself in summer time. 

Apply sunscreen religiously. It’s a surefire way of protecting your skin. Always apply sunscreen 20 minutes prior to allow time for the product to absorb into the skin; re-apply every few hours or as needed. Look for sunscreens that offer protection for both UVA and UVB rays – keep in mind that a high SPF number is no longer enough.

Use a cleanser with salicylic or glycolic acid. Dry, combination, and/or sensitive skin should completely avoid this and instead opt for one of Mario Badescu’s cream soaps. Combination/oily to oily skin types are more suitable for cleansers containing one of the two acids. Both loosen dead skin cells and encourage cell turnover, in effect helping shed damage while keeping the complexion clean to prevent future breakouts. Do note, however, that salicylic acid increases sensitivity to the sun. Save these cleansers for use at nighttime, and moisturize during the day with extra SPF protection.

Moisturize with SPF. Applying moisturizer with SPF is essential regardless of the season. With the onset of warmer weather, however, consider switching your current moisturizer for another with higher SPF and lighter formulation to prevent sun spots, freckles, and early signs of aging.

… and just moisturize, period. Summer sun – in combination with the heat, humidity, and air conditioning – will wreak havoc on your skin. Moisturize with SPF before sun, and use a richer lotion after sun, after bath, and before bed to keep skin hydrated, soft, and smooth.

Don’t skimp on eye creams and lip protection. Sun exposure will gradually thin skin and cause wrinkles. Protect the delicate areas of your face with appropriate creams and balms. Continue to use an eye cream, but if your usual cream feels too heavy for summer, replace your current product with a lighter formulation or use only at night. Apply and liberally re-apply a lip balm with SPF, like Mario Badescu’s Lip Wax with SPF 15.

Protect your hands and feet too. Your neck, chest, and hands are an instant giveaway to your true age. After moisturizing your face with the Oil-Free Moisturizer SPF 30, bring it down to your neck as well. Be sure to apply sunscreen to your chest area as it is one of the areas of your body more susceptible to sunburn. Invest in a hand cream that offers SPF protection, and apply it at least 20 minutes before driving – keep in mind that two-thirds of all sun damage is purely incidental.

Also, with summer comes open-toed shoes and sandals, so be sure to exfoliate, moisturize, and protect exposed feet as well. Take into account that sunscreen will rub off faster than it would from the rest of your body from rubbing against the straps of your shoes and abrasive sand. Thus, it is recommended to re-apply more frequently to prevent burnt feet.

Boost your block with antioxidants. Skincare products containing antioxidants like Vitamin C, Vitamin E, and green tea can help reverse sun damage. Try serums such as our Vitamin C Serum, suitable for all skin types to help boost your block.

Keep hydrated. Drink water throughout the day. If you’re on the go, try bringing a bottle and a container of fresh fruit on the go to prevent dehydration and heat stroke.

Exfoliate. Depending on your skin type, exfoliate either 1-2 times a week if you’re dry and 2-3 times a week if you’re oily to help shed dead skin buildup and slough off previous sun damage. Doing so helps rejuvenate skin, leaving it soft and brighter.

Make the healthy switch. As tempting as it is to lie in a tanning bed or sunbathe to get the ever-covetable summer skin, make the switch to self-tanners to achieve that color without yielding yourself to the dangers of overexposure. Try a sun-less tan like our Self Tanning Lotion SPF 15 to build color gradually and, most importantly, healthily. (Beauty Tip: Our faces will always be a shade or two lighter than our body; to build color on your face as well, alternate between a tinted moisturizer and a facial self-tanner to achieve an even wash of sun-kissed color).

Essential skin care tips, you must follow this summer

Summer Skin Care Tip cannot be started without adding water to the list. Staying hydrated is the number one thing that should be on your mind when you are thinking of moving around in summers. Healthy skin is the one of the best things you can have and staying hydrated helps in this. Make sure to drink atleast 2 litres of water everyday, you can increase it based on the activity levels throughout the day. There are many other summer skin care tips which I will be talking about in a moment but if you are looking for an all natural summer skin care tip, that is simply keeping yourself hydrated with water. 

Besides that some essential skin care tips , that you should follow in summers are below.

• Use a proper summer face wash - As we move from winter to summers , it is really important to switch to a summer face wash which has skin friendly summer ingridients in them .
• Include Antioxidents in your skin care routine - Invest in a good antioxidant serum during the summer. Not only does an antioxidant serum hydrate your skin, but it can also protect your skin from environmental damage. It helps to boost collagen production, and will scavenge harmful free radicals to prevent skin damage.
• Keep your skin hydrated - Always remember to use good moisturizer for your skin , drink 3 litres of water daily .
• Wear Sunscreen - This is the most essential part of skin care , as Uv rays of sun can damage the skin issues and can lead to skin tanning and other skin problems . So always use a sunscreen , weather you are at home or going out . Do not skip this part.
• Cut down on Makeup - IN summers we all gets sweaty easily , So wearing heavy makeup daily is not a good idea . Instead wear very light makeup that suits your needs.
• Use a Refreshing Toner- Using a good toner can help you close open pores. This is essential in summer to prevent oil accumulation in the open pores.
• . Remember the Value of Natural Remedies- Natural remedies such as face masks at home , by aloevera , turmeric , lemon , cucumber , honey , raw milk etc helps to keep skin healthy.

Hope these tips helps .

Stay heathy and beautiful.