How to Breathe Correctly and What it Can do for You
The way you breathe has a huge impact on your stress levels and can do a great deal to make you more or less stressed. That’s because our breathing is deeply connected to our sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems and regulates the release of hormones and neurotransmitters such as cortisol, testosterone and adrenaline.
When you are stressed, your breathing quickens and becomes shallower. When you are relaxed, you breathe more deeply and fully. This correlation works both ways though – so slowing your breathing will make you less stressed and vice versa.
The key is to make sure that when you are relaxing, you are able to breathe in as deeply and fully as possible. And there are a few ways to do this.
Abdominal Breathing
Right now, you are probably breathing wrong. Most of us don’t give much thought to the way we breathe and as a result, we probably use bad habits.
To find out if you’re breathing incorrectly, place one hand on your chest and one on your stomach. Now breath normally and make a note of which hand moves first – and whether both move at all. What you might find is that the chest moves first and the stomach moves ever-so-slightly afterward.
Unfortunately, this is wrong and it won’t allow you to bring in as much breath as possible.
Instead, you should breathe first by allowing your stomach to distend, which will in turn open up the abdominal cavity. You should then breathe so that your lungs fill into this space and then move your chest. This not only allows you to bring in much more oxygen, making you feel much healthier; it also trains your transverse abdominis and encourages proper posture.
If you look at a baby or an animal, this is how they breathe naturally. So what went wrong for us? It comes down to posture again – and the fact that we spend so long sitting in front of a computer hunched over and unable to breathe from the stomach.
Trying to remember to do this is not easy which is just one more reason that mindfulness training is so valuable – you can use it to become more mindful of the way you’re breathing.
Equal Breathing
During actual meditation though, you will want to breathe as deeply and as efficiently as possible. One way to do this is to use something called ‘equal breathing’ from yoga. This involves breathing in and out through the nose and counting the seconds for both the inhalation and exhalation making sure that they are equal. Ideally, you’re trying to breathe in and out for a good 3 seconds or more, which will allow you to completely fill and them completely empty the lungs, refreshing all that important oxygen in your body.
Use this at the start of your mindfulness meditation and it will help you to become more relaxed and more focussed and will help you improve your breathing in the long term too.
Saturday, November 26, 2016
Wednesday, November 23, 2016
Happy Thanksgiving From The Saturday Morning Diet/Joan Bars
Happy Thanksgiving From The Saturday Morning Diet/Joan Bars
Tuesday, November 22, 2016
Energy
Energy & Motivation For Weight Loss Success
How to Have the Energy and Motivation to Succeed
If you want to be as successful as possible, then you need to be able to have the drive, determination and focus to get there.
Take a look at any of the world’s most successful people and you will find they have almost superhuman levels of motivation. Arnold Schwarzenegger talks about visualizing his goals from a young age and even breaking into the gym to train on days when it wasn’t open. Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson frequently posts on Instagram his alarm going off at 4am in the morning when he gets up to train. Neither of these guys ever seems to have a day when they’re too tired or not enthusiastic. Will Smith says the secret to his success is just being willing to run further and longer than everyone else on the treadmill of life.
If you have the determination and the energy, then you will put in more hours and more work at every stage of the game. And as you do so, you’ll be more enthusiastic doing it and happier doing it. Imagine coming home from a hard day at work and having all the energy you need to pack away your clothes, to wash the dishes, to do a workout and then to work on your side project before playing with the kids and romancing the wife.
Many of us say we don’t have ‘time’ to get into shape or achieve the things we want to achieve but this isn’t really accurate. More likely, it’s actually that you don’t have the energy – and this is why you may find yourself just crashing in front of the TV rather than doing anything productive.
So the question is, how can you change that about yourself? How can you get the drive that produces the energy you need to go after the things you want?
Setting the Right Goals
One thing to do is to learn to set your goals correctly. The mistake that many of us make is to have goals that are too out of our control, too long term and too vague. For instance, saying you want to lose 3 stone in a year makes it hard to know how much you should train or how you should eat. You can take it easy for a week and just make up for it next week… right?
Instead then, make your goals much more immediate and much more within your control. In this case, the goal might be to work out 4 times a week and to eat less than 2,000 calories a day. Those are precise goals that you can try and accomplish every single day – there’s nothing left to chance or the long term.
Visualization
At the same time, it’s also important to make sure you always remember why you are doing those things and that you have a clear vision for what it is you’re trying to achieve. If, for example, you want to be a famous fitness vlogger on YouTube, then you should visualise that whenever you’re trying to convince yourself to workout. Think about what it’s like and really immerse yourself in the emotion of it.
How to Have the Energy and Motivation to Succeed
If you want to be as successful as possible, then you need to be able to have the drive, determination and focus to get there.
Take a look at any of the world’s most successful people and you will find they have almost superhuman levels of motivation. Arnold Schwarzenegger talks about visualizing his goals from a young age and even breaking into the gym to train on days when it wasn’t open. Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson frequently posts on Instagram his alarm going off at 4am in the morning when he gets up to train. Neither of these guys ever seems to have a day when they’re too tired or not enthusiastic. Will Smith says the secret to his success is just being willing to run further and longer than everyone else on the treadmill of life.
If you have the determination and the energy, then you will put in more hours and more work at every stage of the game. And as you do so, you’ll be more enthusiastic doing it and happier doing it. Imagine coming home from a hard day at work and having all the energy you need to pack away your clothes, to wash the dishes, to do a workout and then to work on your side project before playing with the kids and romancing the wife.
Many of us say we don’t have ‘time’ to get into shape or achieve the things we want to achieve but this isn’t really accurate. More likely, it’s actually that you don’t have the energy – and this is why you may find yourself just crashing in front of the TV rather than doing anything productive.
So the question is, how can you change that about yourself? How can you get the drive that produces the energy you need to go after the things you want?
Setting the Right Goals
One thing to do is to learn to set your goals correctly. The mistake that many of us make is to have goals that are too out of our control, too long term and too vague. For instance, saying you want to lose 3 stone in a year makes it hard to know how much you should train or how you should eat. You can take it easy for a week and just make up for it next week… right?
Instead then, make your goals much more immediate and much more within your control. In this case, the goal might be to work out 4 times a week and to eat less than 2,000 calories a day. Those are precise goals that you can try and accomplish every single day – there’s nothing left to chance or the long term.
Visualization
At the same time, it’s also important to make sure you always remember why you are doing those things and that you have a clear vision for what it is you’re trying to achieve. If, for example, you want to be a famous fitness vlogger on YouTube, then you should visualise that whenever you’re trying to convince yourself to workout. Think about what it’s like and really immerse yourself in the emotion of it.
Sunday, November 20, 2016
How To Program Your Brain For Weight Loss
What Are Neurotransmitters?
Your brain is made up of a large network of different cells called neurons. This network is sometimes called your ‘connectome’ and essentially, each of these cells represents a thought, an idea, a memory or a sensation.
As we think or experience the world around us, these cells ‘fire’ by releasing an electrical signal like a circuit. That signal travels over the synapses – the gaps between brain cells – and this then allows them to create the rich experiences that we’re familiar with in a kind of cascade.
In terms of the way that a cell fires, it can either be ‘on or off’. That is to say that there aren’t ‘levels’ of firing. After a certain amount of excitation, a cell fires and then stops firing.
But that’s not to say that the signal is entirely binary. Because at the same time, the brain also releases chemicals called neurotransmitters which color various aspects of the signal. This can alter how likely it is for the cell to fire again, it can strengthen the connection between two cells, or it make us feel happy or sad about that thing.
Your Brain Chemistry
Your brain is filled with neurotransmitters which affect receptors on brain cells and have a short lifespan. At the same time, hormones like testosterone and cortisol can also affect the brain in a similar way acting like secondary neurotransmitters.
These hormones and neurotransmitters are moderated partly by our thoughts. If we change which cells fire, we change which hormones and neurotransmitters get released.
But it’s much more complex than this. For starters, our hormones and neurotransmitters are tied closely to our lifestyles and various biological factors. When we’re hungry for instance, low blood sugar encourages the release of cortisol – the stress hormone. This in turn encourages the release of ghrelin, the hunger hormone.
When we have high blood sugar though, we release insulin and this increases the tryptophan in the brain. That tryptophan is converted to serotonin, making us feel good, and this is later converted into melatonin – the sleep hormone.
In short, our physical health is directly linked to our mental state and vice versa, putting us firmly at the mercy of our biology. But that said, using mindfulness, it is possible to regain control over this situation and to decide exactly how we want to feel and when.
http://www.saturdaymorningdiet.com/mindfulness-for-weight-loss/
Your brain is made up of a large network of different cells called neurons. This network is sometimes called your ‘connectome’ and essentially, each of these cells represents a thought, an idea, a memory or a sensation.
As we think or experience the world around us, these cells ‘fire’ by releasing an electrical signal like a circuit. That signal travels over the synapses – the gaps between brain cells – and this then allows them to create the rich experiences that we’re familiar with in a kind of cascade.
In terms of the way that a cell fires, it can either be ‘on or off’. That is to say that there aren’t ‘levels’ of firing. After a certain amount of excitation, a cell fires and then stops firing.
But that’s not to say that the signal is entirely binary. Because at the same time, the brain also releases chemicals called neurotransmitters which color various aspects of the signal. This can alter how likely it is for the cell to fire again, it can strengthen the connection between two cells, or it make us feel happy or sad about that thing.
Your Brain Chemistry
Your brain is filled with neurotransmitters which affect receptors on brain cells and have a short lifespan. At the same time, hormones like testosterone and cortisol can also affect the brain in a similar way acting like secondary neurotransmitters.
These hormones and neurotransmitters are moderated partly by our thoughts. If we change which cells fire, we change which hormones and neurotransmitters get released.
But it’s much more complex than this. For starters, our hormones and neurotransmitters are tied closely to our lifestyles and various biological factors. When we’re hungry for instance, low blood sugar encourages the release of cortisol – the stress hormone. This in turn encourages the release of ghrelin, the hunger hormone.
When we have high blood sugar though, we release insulin and this increases the tryptophan in the brain. That tryptophan is converted to serotonin, making us feel good, and this is later converted into melatonin – the sleep hormone.
In short, our physical health is directly linked to our mental state and vice versa, putting us firmly at the mercy of our biology. But that said, using mindfulness, it is possible to regain control over this situation and to decide exactly how we want to feel and when.
http://www.saturdaymorningdiet.com/mindfulness-for-weight-loss/
Tuesday, November 15, 2016
What is Mindfulness For Weight Loss?
http://www.saturdaymorningdiet.com/mindfulness-for-weight-loss/
What is Mindfulness For Weight Loss?
Mindfulness is a tool that has become exceedingly popular recently. Only a few years ago the general public would not be familiar with the term, whereas today it’s something we hear about all the time in a range of different contexts.
In some ways this is a good thing: mindfulness is a great tool to be aware of and it can be used to greatly improve your concentration, awareness and happiness. But at the same time, it’s also a bad thing: because it has been misappropriated in many instances and many people don’t actually really understand what it means anymore.
With that in mind, let’s take an in-depth look at what mindfulness is and what it isn’t – and how you can start using it to improve your life.
The Basics
Mindfulness is often used to describe a type of meditation. Specifically, ‘mindfulness meditation’ is a type of meditation that involves reflecting on the contents of your own mind and how they might be affecting you. Whereas the point of some forms of meditation – such as transcendental meditation – is to completely ‘empty’ your mind, the point of mindfulness is instead to simply detach yourself from your thoughts and become an observer. This way, you can prevent them from affecting you in the same way and you can also gain a greater understanding of the contents of your own thoughts.
Often this is described as ‘watching the thoughts go past like clouds’. The idea is not to engage with them or let them affect you but simply to observe them and to later reflect on how they might impact on your happiness.
Other Uses
By doing this, mindfulness allows us to take some time out of our stressful day to remove ourselves from our thoughts and thereby get some rest and relaxation.
But it’s not really just about meditation. What mindfulness also means is being constantly aware of your own thoughts as you go throughout your day. Some people will tell you to be ‘mindful’ of your body, or ‘mindful’ of your environment. But really what you should be focussing on is just what you’re mindful of.
Next time you go out for a nice walk with family, or next time you do something else that you should be enjoying, just make a note of whether you’re really focussed on what you’re doing and whether you’re actively engaging in it… or is your mind elsewhere? Are you actually worrying about work? Or stressing about other things?
Mindfulness teaches us to be more aware of our thoughts as that way, we can decide that we’re not going to let them affect us and because that way we can then make the conscious effort to refocus and to decide to be happy.
Mindfulness is not mysticism or linked to religion and it’s not a cure-all therapeutic technique. All this is a tool and better yet, a state of mind. With practice, you can learn to be more in-tune with your own thoughts and that can change everything.
Monday, November 7, 2016
GO FUND ME APPEAL TO HELP DISABLE MAN GET A CAR
Due to an injury, I suffered as a security guard and driver, I have been unable to work for quite some time now and have gained a lot of excess weight as you can see from this photo.
I have applied for Social Security disability twice and have been turned down both times.
As you can image our hard financial times have been for me and my wife, who is also disabled with medical issues.
Our finances became so bad that we had to move in with my wife’s son from her first marriage.
We now live 6 people in a two bedroom apartment with small children and one bathroom.
I would not wish this situation on my worst enemy.
We can all fall on hard times.
I have been working for many years and supporting myself and wife, but due to my injury and obesity, the only type of work I can comfortable dO is driving.
Any small amount that you can offer to help me and my wife buy a car so that I can start driving for Uber and regain my ability to earn a living and stop being a burden on my stepson and his wife would be greatly appreciated.
I have applied for Social Security disability twice and have been turned down both times.
As you can image our hard financial times have been for me and my wife, who is also disabled with medical issues.
Our finances became so bad that we had to move in with my wife’s son from her first marriage.
We now live 6 people in a two bedroom apartment with small children and one bathroom.
I would not wish this situation on my worst enemy.
We can all fall on hard times.
I have been working for many years and supporting myself and wife, but due to my injury and obesity, the only type of work I can comfortable dO is driving.
Any small amount that you can offer to help me and my wife buy a car so that I can start driving for Uber and regain my ability to earn a living and stop being a burden on my stepson and his wife would be greatly appreciated.
Friday, November 4, 2016
The Secret Ingredient Making Us FAT!
The Secret Ingredient Making Us Fat!
The Food Industry Did It To Us!
• The sugar industry is a 2 Billion dollar industry.
• Sugar is the cause of the worldwide obesity epidemic.
• Sugar is everything we eat.
• It is in our diets from the minute we awake to the minute we go to sleep.
• It comes in so many forms and uses so many different names while hiding in plain sight.
The Food Industry Did It To Us!
• The sugar industry is a 2 Billion dollar industry.
• Sugar is the cause of the worldwide obesity epidemic.
• Sugar is everything we eat.
• It is in our diets from the minute we awake to the minute we go to sleep.
• It comes in so many forms and uses so many different names while hiding in plain sight.
Tuesday, November 1, 2016
Weight Loss Motivation Video SMD
Weight Loss Motivation
Make a plan and then follow it!
If you FAIL to plan, you plan to FAIL!
Stop saying Tomorrow!
Rest if you must, but don’t you quit!
You subconscious know the answer!
Have faith in yourself!
Your problem is you are too busy holding on to your unworthiness.
Scream “I am worthy” until the stars collapse upon your brilliance.
Rome wasn’t built in a day.
Visualisation creates Reality!
I am worthy, I am loved, I am enough!
Inspiration=Motivation=Progress=Success
You Can Do It, If You Change Your Eating Habits!
Make a plan and then follow it!
If you FAIL to plan, you plan to FAIL!
Stop saying Tomorrow!
Rest if you must, but don’t you quit!
You subconscious know the answer!
Have faith in yourself!
Your problem is you are too busy holding on to your unworthiness.
Scream “I am worthy” until the stars collapse upon your brilliance.
Rome wasn’t built in a day.
Visualisation creates Reality!
I am worthy, I am loved, I am enough!
Inspiration=Motivation=Progress=Success
You Can Do It, If You Change Your Eating Habits!
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