Experts have discovered that walking 10,000 steps a day can help you drop those unwanted pounds faster than just about any other method of weight loss. Walking will also help you keep the weight off for a longer period of time because it builds your muscles while keeping your heart at a fat-burning rate. Because it can seem to be a daunting task to walk 10,000 steps, it is important that you develop a strategy for meeting your daily quota. Here are three simple methods to help you reach your goals without losing focus: Use a Pedometer Using a pedometer can help you easily keep track of the distance you have covered throughout your day as well as the number of steps that you have taken. A pedometer is a small box-shaped calculator that you can clip to your belt or pants pocket in the same way you would wear a beeper. When placed firmly near the hip, the pedometer accurately registers each step that you take. For individuals wishing to meet their new daily quota of 10,000 steps, the pedometer is the easiest, more carefree method to reach the goal. When shopping for a pedometer, make sure that you select a model that has both distance and well as individual step readings. You will begin to learn how many steps go into one mile. You will also be surprised by how many steps you can add to your daily count by changing small habits, such as choosing the stairs over the elevator or walking to your colleague’s desk rather than sending an email. Calculate the Time it Takes Using either you pedometer or a counting method, calculate the approximate time it takes for you to traverse a specific distance, such as a mile. Calculate this number several times on several different days and average the figures together. You will then be able to determine approximately how long it will take you to walk a portion of your steps if you choose to spend a set amount of time walking them off. For example, if you know that you can walk all 10,000 steps in an hour, then you can elect to dedicate an hour everyday to walking your steps. However, if you cannot dedicate a full hour, then you can add up increments of ten minutes at a time until you reach your goal. Having a clear understanding of just what it takes to reach your goal will help you to approach the task much more strategically than if you did not have a plan. Do the calculations to save time and assure that you reach your 10,000 steps. Measure a Route Measure a route based on the time and distance it takes you to walk your 10,000 steps. Having a pre-planned route will help you to view the task of walking 10,000 in a more manageable light. You will be able to measure your progress along your day and have a system for achieving your goals. Because taking the same path everyday may become tedious, plan two or three routes. Plan a long route for days when you have a plethora of energy, a short route for days when you are tired, and a mid-length route for days when you are energized but busy. Giving yourself plenty of options is important to helping you stay positive so that you can achieve your goal.
Archive for March 6th, 2010
Most people skip over the fact that any type of surgery is invasive, including plastic surgery. If invasive surgery concerns you, there are non-invasive options to lipo. Non-Invasive Options to Lipo Plastic surgery has become very popular in the last 30 years or so, and more and more you see items in the news and specials on TV regarding the benefits of having cosmetic surgery done. One of the most popular surgeries performed by plastic surgeons is liposuction, which removes unwanted fat from areas of your body. You might be tempted by what seems to be an easy way to lose weight, but there are options available to you. Two of the most important options are dieting and exercise. No doubt that statement just met with a groan, but it should not. You should try eating right and using targeted exercise to rid yourself of your problem areas. The human body does not have the ability to rid itself of fat selectively, but the overall impact of exercise and diet on your body can be seen fairly quickly. Diet will also help to create an atmosphere within your body that is conducive to losing weight, and therefore, losing fat. Muscle gain, in particular, will speed up your metabolism, which burns more calories through the day. Diet pills, which hope to promote your body’s own weight loss abilities can be effective in some cases as well. It’s important to note, however, that drugs with “lipo” in the name will not work on targeted areas the way that the procedure does. Remember, many solutions on the market have not been approved by the FDA. Other options include spa treatments such as seaweed wraps and “cellulite massages”, which promise to help break up fat cells and remove them from your body. Unfortunately, most of these techniques are not proven to work, and if they do show some ability to make your body look better, it is short-lived. Doctors are also working on a theory that ultrasound waves can break up the fat cells under your skin, and then your body will be able to reabsorb the cells within three weeks. Doctors who are working with the ultrasound option believe that they will be far less damaging to the tissues in the body than invasive procedures. This, obviously, would represent a medical revolution and be very popular with many of us. Many people pay lip service to the fact that any surgical procedure, including liposuction, is invasive. You should seriously consider the fact that any surgery carries risks. If that scares you, diet and exercise are probably the way to go.
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Acne gives the combination of symptoms like greasy skin, white heads, black heads, pimples, inflammation and scar formation. Acne mostly affects young people in the age 14 – 25, but also sometimes older persons, like women in their menopause. Most teenagers experience outburst of acne, some only little, but for others acne may develop into a serious skin ailment with great cosmetic impact. THE SKIN ANATOMY To understand the acne process, some knowledge about skin anatomy and physiology is essential: The skin has there layers: The outer layer called epidermis consists of epithelial cells. Under this lies the dermis consisting of connective tissue. At the bottom there is a layer called the hypodermis consisting mostly of fat cells. The skin has narrow pores extending from the surface down to the top of the sub-dermis, called hair follicles. A hair extend from a growth zone in the bottom of each hair follicle and out at the skin surface. Around the hair in the dermis, there are small glands called sebaceous glands. These glands produce a fatty substance, sebum, which empty through the follicle opening and lubricates the hair and the skin. THE ACNE PROCESS Acne starts by the glands in the hair follicles increasing their sebum production. This will in the beginning only cause greasy skin. Eventually the sebum in the entrance of the follicles mixes with dead epithelial cells. This mix reacts chemically to forms hard props, comedones that close the pore entrances. According to the color of the comedones, they are called black heads or white heads. Then the closed hair follicle gets filled with sebum and swell. The swollen follicle then gets infected by bacteria. The bacteria and the accumulated sebum cause the follicle and the surrounding skin to get inflamed, forming a pimple. At last the inflamed follicle burst and empties its content. Eventually the affected area heals. Sometimes the inflammation reaches deep into the skin surrounding the follicle and destroys skin tissue. This will cause more or less distinct scars that may reside permanently. Typically an affected person will have follicles in all these stages of the process at any given time. THE CAUSES OF ACNE The increased hormone production in the puberty stimulates to increased sebum production. The male hormone, testosterone, seem to contribute most. Also girls begin to produce more testosterone in the puberty. Also in other periods, altered hormone production may give acne, for example by women in the menopause. Since not all teens get acne in any degree, the increased hormone level cannot be the whole cause of the increased sebum production. The follicles of affected persons must for some reason react stronger upon the higher hormone level. Dietary factors, like eating too much fat, too much sugar or the wrong kind of fat may aggravate acne by some individuals. Lack of vitamins, minerals and essential fatty acids may also contribute to development of acne. Poor digestion, lazy colon and constipation aggravate acne in some individuals, probably due to productions of toxins in the intestines. Lazy colon may be caused by dietary faults, like lack of fiber. Very frequent washing and use of strong soaps aggravate acne, and does not alleviate the condition as many think. Rubbing, scrubbing or squeezing the skin may also aggravate acne. Here are some other factors that may contribute in causing acne or aggravating the condition. – Stress – Some contraceptive agents – Environmental or domestic pollution. – Humid environments. – Some antidepressants. – Testosterone and anabolic steroids used for treatment or by body-building. – Use of some types of greasy cosmetic products. – Some antiperspirant products. – Exposing the skin for chlorine or other halogens, or medicines containing halogens. – Women may get aggravated acne 2-7 days before menstruation. WHAT CAN YOU DO YOURSELF TO AVOID OR TO TREAT ACNE Sometimes Acne is so severe that special medical treatment is required, and sometimes the causes of acne necessitate medical treatment. But you can do much yourself also. Here are listed things you can do yourself to prevent or treat acne: 1. Some advices about diet that may help prevent and cure acne: – Do not consume a great amount of fat. – The fat you add to the food should be natural oils. Olive oil is ideal, but use other types of oils too, like walnut oil, sunflower oil and soy oil. However, do not use only soy oil as many tend to do. Using only soy oil will give you too much of some fatty acids and too less of others. – Eat much fish, seafood and not so much meat. – Eat food with a high fiber content to regulate the digestion, like vegetables, whole cereals, full corn bread and fruit. 2. Here are some things you should avoid. – Do not use greasy or heavy cosmetics that clog your skin and are difficult to wash away. – Do not use strong irritating antiperspirants. – Do not wash with strong soap or cleaners that dry up your skin and take away all the natural oily protection in your skin. – If you perform body-building, do not use anabolic steroids or other hormonal supplements. – Use clothes that allow air to reach your body surface to avoid collection of humidity and overheating of your skin. 3. Use of rinsing milk or solutions You can rinse your skin with mild products especially made to dissolve the plugs in your pores, and to make the environment in your skin unfriendly to bacteria causing infection. Some of these products are just products to wash your skin with one ore more times a day; others should be on during night and flushed away in the morning. Salicylic acid is a mild ingredient often used in these products to dissolve the comedones. The products usually also contain ingredients that work antibacterial and stimulate the skin’s own cleaning activities, like Tea tree oil or Echinacea extract. 4. Use of gels and creams to treat acne and protect your skin After the rinsing, you should apply some treatment gel, cream or lotion onto your skin to achieve these effects: – To make your skin soft and elastic. – To protect your skin against the environment. – To acts further to dissolve the clogging of your pores. – To soothe and alleviate inflammation. – To kill the bacteria causing infection or make an environment hostile for the bacteria. – To stimulate the skin to clean itself. – To stimulate the skin to heal. – To be used as a isolating layer between the skin itself and cosmetics In order to protect, make the skin soft and further dissolve the comedones, many products contain natural plant oils that are easily absorbed into the epidermis, like Tea tree oil, Rose hip oil, Lavender oil and Olive oil. Ingredients used in products to reduce inflammation and to stimulate healing may be: Aloe Vera extract, Viola Tricolour extract, Rose hip oil, Vitamin E and Vitamin A. Tea tree oil and Grapefruit seed extract are natural antibacterial agents used in many of these products. In other products artificial compounds like Benzoyl peroxide are used. 5. Oral supplements to fight the acne process and nourish the skin Supplements taken by mouth to nourish your skin may be useful. The purpose of these supplements is more or less the same as that of nourishing creams. – To make the sebum more fluid so it drains more easily. – To stimulate the substance exchange and cleaning processes in your skin, – To stimulate your skin to heal, – To give your skin building nutrients necessary to heal. Ingredients often used in these supplements to stimulate the cleaning and healing processes in the skin are: Vitamins A, C, B1, B2, B3, B6, C, D, E, Folic acid, Beta carotene, Bioflavonoids, Magnesium, Copper, Zinc, selenium, anti-oxidants from Green tea, Metylsulfonyl methane. Nutrient found in these products used as material to rebuild damaged skin and to give a sebum with better consistency are: Evening primrose oil, Olive oil, Flax seed oil, Borage oil, Soy oil, Wheat germ oil and Lecithin. Gum guggul extract used in oral products has an anti-biotic effect, and helps against spreading of the acne infection and thus helps against scar formation.
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We cannot stop the rolling cycle of time. But surely we can prevent it from leaving its parting signs all over us. Yes, you can prevent your self from getting the aging marks by using antiaging products. The anti-aging treatments will make the show of your aging process less evident on your skin. The result will be that you would look much younger. Are you ready for all that? As your age increases, your blood fails to manage the circulation speed it had shown before. This results in dehydration of your skin. In the body, the creation of collagen decelerates and this looses the elasticity of the skin. The years of continuous exposure to sunrays, harsh elements make wrinkles, lines and dark spots on your skin prominent. Aging also breaks blood vessels and decreases the production of hormones. Your skin grows to be thin and dull, with enlarged pores. Now if your skin is dry or oily or have patches of both dry-oily skins, your problem will be grave. You need special skin care products that go well all-in-one– for anti-aging, dry skin and oily skin. As you cross the age of 40 and your skin reaches maturity, the skin naturally starts to loose its moisture and elasticity. Now if it was dry and oily beforehand, it will develop wrinkles and lines, even more. So if you had dry, oily or dry-oily skin, it needs you to be more attentive to your aging skin. It is thus never late or early for starting taking care of the skin. Anti-aging dry-oily skin care products are the best that help you. You should select such skin care products that can provide you all the important nutrients for your antiaging dry-oily skin. The anti-aging dry-oily skin care products moisturize, vitaminize the skin and act as anti-oxidants. They help the skin in restoring its natural moisture. It works to smooth the fine lines and wrinkles. If you regularly apply the antiaging dry-oily skin care products, it will make your skin soft and elastic and will also further prevent the new wrinkles. There will be no need for surgical or chemical procedures and your skin will be young and bright. Aging is definitely a natural process but your skin’s dryness and oily tendency may not be totally natural. Dry skin is the result of low sebum production in your skin’s lower level. There are many factors that make your skin dry, like pollution, wintry temperature, less humidity and heating system. Moreover in many cases, you might not have dry skin before, but it can become dry as you age. You can feel the skin of your face tight, flaky and dull. Dry skin adds more to the process of aging by pacing the development of premature wrinkles and lines. It goes right for the oily skin as well. Caused due to excess sebum production in the lower level of skin, oily skin has large pores. It sustains oily shine on its facade. This type of skin is more prone to develop blackheads, pimples, acne, whiteheads and breakouts. The anti-aging dry-oily skin care products help you to trim down all the problems that you have because of aging dry-oily skin. They keep a balance between dryness and oiliness. Start the use of antiaging dry-oily skin care products today and forget all your skin related problems for good.