Let’s face it – You don’t have to be pregnant to know what it’s like to crave salty potato chips or sweet ice cream. The fact of the matter is that everyone has a craving now and then. But did you know your cravings might actually mean something?

Usually, when we crave a certain food, it’s because our body is telling us it needs a specific nutrient. You can go ahead and give into that craving to satisfy your body, but it’s important to know why you are craving a certain food and then choose the healthier alternative. Your system, and your waistline, will thank you for choosing the healthy way out.

Craving Salty Snacks

If you are craving potato chips or French fries, you need something salty. This is likely your body’s way of telling you that you are low on essential minerals. A low-calcium diet often leads to salt cravings. Salt tricks your body into believing that calcium levels are high enough.

Instead of the salt, reach for dairy. Drink a glass of milk or eat a slice of cheese. You’ll give your body the calcium you need instead of tricking it into thinking it’s satisfied.

Craving Sweet Treats

For some people, all you have to do is say the word “chocolate” and their mouth waters until a pound of chocolate has been consumed. When we crave sweets, it’s usually because of our mood. In many cases, we are sad when we crave sweets. Ever have a really tough day and the only thing that will console you is a big cupcake? That’s because when we are sad we want a quick mood lift. Our body wants to release serotonin, which you can get when you eat sweets.

If you really must have that chocolate, opt for dark chocolate. This variety contains antioxidants, which are needed to stay healthy. Or better yet, instead of eating the chocolate, go out for a walk or a bike ride. The exercise is much more likely to give you long-term mood benefits, whereas the treats will only make you feel better for a moment.

Craving a Spicy Kick

When your body is overheated, you crave the spicy foods that make you perspire. Your body wants to cool down and spicy food can help do that. Some studies suggest that people who crave spicy foods are addicted to the accelerated heart rate and rapid breathing that comes from really spicy Thai food or Mexican favorites. It’s the adrenaline rush you’re actually craving, not the food itself.

Again, go exercise to help you get the rush you need. Your body will perspire, which will help cool you down. Plus, you’re getting your heart rate up, which helps with the adrenaline craving.

When you apply these tips you can cut out a bunch of empty calories and increase your intake of healthy vitamins and minerals. You will feel healthier and look better, which everyone can agree is a good thing!

About the author: Allen is an avid basketball player and NBA fan. In his spare time he writes for YourLocalSecurity.com.

Every single year most people get stuck in the same cycle regarding fitness. As the days grow shorter and colder we exercise less. When you add in holiday laziness and indulgence, along with an over abundance of delicious food, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out why so many of us start adding extra pounds.  So should you wait until spring to start losing weight or just look for ways to not add it during the winter?

An ounce of prevention

As Ben Franklin said, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” While I doubt he was talking about keeping a trim waistline, the saying is very accurate. It is extremely easy to gain excess weight and fat. Simply add a few extra helpings of dessert each week and watch those pounds add up. But conversely you have to burn 3500 calories of energy to lose a pound of fat. That equals 3 1/2 hours of hard cycling, over 4 hours of step aerobics, or 5 hours of jogging.

Where to start?

Psych yourself up for staying in shape! One of the more overlooked aspects of weight gain and weight loss is the proper mindset. If you aren’t focused on a particular goal then you won’t reach that goal. For staying in shape the easiest way to forge that focus is by placing attention firmly on your abdominals. Far too many people think the all-mighty scale is the best tool. They will agonize over every little pound. But honestly, a scale gives a raw number which does not consider how you actually look. Overwhelmingly when people consider being ‘in-shape’ they think of a trim midsection.

• Work out your abdominals every other day. Do it in the morning before breakfast.
• Before you get in the shower, take a good look at your stomach. Consider how it is now compared to how you want it to look.
• Use your morning visualizations and ab soreness as motivation during the day to eat right and avoid the bad foods.
• Always bring a water bottle with you and drink frequently.
• Find some sort of easy exercise to do a few times a week and stick to it. The goal is to offset any extra calories you might consume.
• Keep a picture with you of the type of shape you want to be in. Use it for motivation when a food craving hits.

Mind over body

People can accomplish any number of goals in life if they have the proper mind set. A focused attention can easily overcome obstacles. By looking at your midsection as a point of focal point and using that as your motivation, you can avoid the roller coaster weight gain most people go through over the winter months. Then when spring arrives you will be ready to hit the ground running for fun instead of spending all of those hours working off excess weight.

Nick Walden is a fellow fitness enthusiast who enjoys a healthy and active lifestyle while developing mind and intelligence.

Every New Year, it never fails: people get a new spark of enthusiasm for embarking on a healthy course for the year. Gym memberships soar, health oriented websites surge in traffic, diet programs and pills are gobbled up like no tomorrow, and personal trainers don’t have enough hours in the day to see the new clients who’ve signed up for sessions.

Unfortunately, the enthusiasm rampant in the beginning of January wanes after a few weeks and before you know it, gyms have membership cancellations, websites see drops in traffic, McDonald’s gets back their customers, and personal trainers have a more manageable number of clients. This trend is as predictable as the ball dropping in Times Square on New Year’s Eve.

Just because the majority of resolution makers give up, however, doesn’t mean that you need to become a resolution dropout as well. Here are a few ways to ensure that your attempts to make positive change in 2012 are successful:

1. Don’t Bite Off More than You can Chew: Try making smaller changes each week instead of making all your change at once. It is human nature to want to do everything at the same time, but success is often found in a more patient, methodical approach. Don’t try to over commit yourself too early. Ease into your resolution so that you don’t get overwhelmed or discouraged.
2. Stay Motivated with Activities You Love: Pretending to love running when you don’t, is not going to encourage you to exercise. Instead, partake in activities and sports that you actually enjoy. If you love skiing, make an effort to do it more. If you enjoy aerobics classes, sign up for a month’s worth.
3. Play with Your Food: Similar to exercise, force-feeding yourself rice-cakes when you think they taste like cardboard isn’t going to make you love healthier cuisine. Instead, make a game of it. Experiment with different types of health foods to find the ones you like. There are tons of healthful and nutritious foods, so please your personal palate with what you are most likely to eat and enjoy.
4. The Buddy System: Take on your resolution with a friend or family member. Teaming up with another person can help to keep you motivated so that you are more likely to stay committed to the change you want to make. Further, by teaming up with another individual, you’ll feel responsible for their success as well.
5. Be True to Yourself: If you choose to buy a membership at a gym or embark on new foods or hire a personal trainer or wellness coach, be sure they are a match to you and your personality.   Working out in an environment that you don’t like or getting help from a coach that you don’t respect is not going to keep you coming back for more.

New Year’s resolutions are a great way to make positive, healthy change in your life. You owe it to yourself to stick with it! And you can!

About the Author: Brett Blumenthal is best-selling author of 52 Small Changes: One Year to a Happier, Healthier You (January 2012) and Get Real and STOP Dieting! (December 2010). Blumenthal is CEO of Be Healthy, Inc., which is holding Be Healthy Boston (www.behealthyboston.com) – an urban wellness retreat at the Westin Boston Waterfront – this January 28^th and 29.^th

Meditation has been used for hundreds of years by individuals seeking inner peace, enlightenment and a break from the everyday stressers of life. The practice is thought to benefit the mind, body and spirit in a multitude of ways. Below are the top 10 most significant positive effects of meditation:

1.  It is thought to promote cardiovascular healthy by slowing the heart rate and pace of breathing, as well as increasing the flow of blood to the heart. This effect is thought to lower blood pressure, increase exercise capacity and reduce stress, all of which promote cardiovascular wellness.

2.  Meditation may help individuals with chronic illnesses manage their conditions by lowering stress levels, which is known to lead to a healthier mind and body.

3. Practicing the mind-body exercise on a regular basis may help strengthen an individual’s immune system by stimulating blood flow, inducing relaxation and helping the body eliminate free radicals, which are known to cause cellular damage.

4. Meditation has been shown in multiple studies to reduce a person’s response to pain. This may be especially beneficial for individuals with chronic migraines, fibromyalgia or other conditions in which regular discomfort is experienced.

5. Individuals who meditated on a regular basis may find that they have improved self-esteem and a more positive outlook on life. This may be due to a number of physiological factors, such as increased serotonin levels, as well as a clearer sense of one’s self stemming from introspection.

6. People with fears or phobias may be helped by meditation, since the mind-body practice is thought to help individuals resolve their inner problems.

7. Meditation has many benefits for the career-minded, as it may help increase creativity, strengthen one’s ability to focus and improve memory. Moreover, the stress-relieving benefits of the practice have been helping businessmen and women reduce workplace tension for many years.

8. People who meditate may also find themselves becoming more compassionate individuals, as introspection has strong potential to promote empathy.

9. Meditation may help individuals deepen their spiritual connection with a higher being, or simply become more aware that they have a spiritual side. Today, many people unfortunately overlook this aspect of themselves.

10. Living in the moment by pushing aside the worries of the past or future is known to help people achieve a more fulfilled existence. A focus on the present is what meditation is all about, so people whose minds are constantly occupied with concerns may want to give the mind-body practice a try.

Shar Ray is a member of Dahn Yoga – one of the largest yoga and tai chi companies in the world with its own unique style and brand of yoga. Dahn Yoga is rooted in the rich history of an ancient Asian mind-body practice, Sun Do, and in the wisdom of the Chun Bu Kyung.

For many people, the word “meditation” conjures up images of a two-hour “om” session in a room filled with candles, the scent of patchouli wafting through the air. While it would be nice if we all had a couple hours to focus on ourselves, and an unlimited incense budget, for most of us that’s not remotely the case. If you’re like me, your time is filled with work and family and all of the other little things that make up a day. You don’t have two minutes to meditate, it seems, much less two hours. But by learning to make do with the opportunities that present themselves throughout the day, you can find a few nice meditative interludes to help get you through your schedule.

The benefits of mindfulness are legion. Meditation and imagery are used to treat all sorts of physical ailments, and the stress-busting powers of mindful practice are becoming legendary. Western science is finally learning what Eastern practitioners have long known – the mind and body are inseparable, and paying focused attention to both has a positive impact on both physical and mental health.

“Sure,” you say, “I’d love to meditate. That all sounds great. But, I’m too busy just getting through my day to sit cross-legged in some room, humming to myself. That’s for gurus and retired people!” Luckily, you don’t need two hours, you don’t need to sit cross-legged, and you don’t even need a room. There are ways that you can gain the positive, healthful, relaxing benefits of meditation without even missing a beat in your busy day. I call this “Menial Mindfulness.”

My favorite menial mindful moments come when I’m doing what used to be my least favorite task – washing the dishes. We have a large blended family, and there’s no shortage of dirty dishes in my kitchen, ever. I used to struggle to motivate myself to get the dishes done. I’ve learned to use the time as a peaceful, centering interlude. It all has to do with slowing the breath, and opening the senses. Here’s how:

-Start with acceptance. The fact is that you have to do the dishes, and at that moment in time, you’re at the sink. You are going to do the dishes whether you fight it or not. So, think about this as analogous to your entire journey of change. There are menial tasks on the road to changing yourself. Here’s some great practice in how to embrace those tasks as you work toward your goals. Breathe deep, look at your task, and get ready to dig in. It’s a feeling that you’ll get to know.

- Approach your task with love and gratitude. If you have a roof over your head and a sink in which to do your dishes, there are many, many people who would give just about anything to be in your place. You are upright and breathing, and you are capable of washing dishes. This puts you in a position of privilege, and it’s worthwhile to remember that. As you continue on your journey of change and self-improvement, don’t forget to be thankful for what you’ve already got.

- Use all your senses, but especially your sense of touch. Many grounding/centering exercises use touch to bring us back into our bodies. Pick up the first plate, and feel its weight in your hands. What temperature is it? How smooth is it? How do your fingers feel when you grasp it? Turn the water on, and use your senses to experience that. Take your time… feel the warmth of the water, the smooth slickness of the soap, the texture of the dish scrubber. How does the soap smell? How does everything look?

- Keep returning to your senses. At some point, probably sooner than later, you’re going to want to escape into your thoughts. You’re going to want to race through this task and get it done so you can move on to “important” things. As far as your self-improvement journey goes, though, it’s hard to imagine anything more important than learning to gratefully accept whatever task you’ve been given in the moment. All self-improvement gains start with acceptance. It’s a wonderful skill to work on. So, as you hear your thoughts intrude, telling you that you need to hurry, asking you where the money is coming from to pay the bills, quiet your thoughts by returning to your senses. Feel that mug in your hands, slippery with warm soapy water. Express gratitude. Rinse. Repeat.

- Generalize your learning. What works for dishes works for walking down the block to the coffee shop or driving to work. Try a walking meditation, where your focused breathing and mindful attention to the feel of your shoes on the pavement provides your center. Life is a meditation, if you make it that way. You can refresh your mind any time you’ve got a menial task at hand.

Try menial mindfulness for yourself, with these ot other daily chores. If you find one that really works for you, share it in the comments.

Dr. Jeff Guardalabene is a clinical psychologist. He blogs at drjeffblog.blogspot.com.

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Just recently, I did what I thought was near impossible.

I dropped a bomb on my parents.

In their mid-60s, both my parents are in the comfort zone of an alarming (or if it isn’t, it should be) statistic of the population that is overweight, which contributes to their being diabetic (Type 2), have high cholesterol and high blood pressure. Actually, the list is longer, but not nearly as long as their list of medications.

While my family has always encouraged and practiced a healthy amount of honesty, weight is such a sensitive topic that for years I just avoided discussing it.

My biggest issue was not that they over did it on food, but that they gave absolutely no importance to exercise. Granted there is a ton of information these days on how/what to do to stay healthy, but it’s not really a secret that a healthy lifestyle takes both.

Maybe it was the timing, or the fact that I felt bold, but an opportunity presented itself and I took it.

No more excuses

I gave them all I got; from using age as an excuse to not exercise, to the health risks they were facing; even the cost of their medications. I also alluded to the fact that my in-laws had neglected the very same things, and eventually both suffered strokes.

When it comes to your life, caring for your body is non-negotiable. The first thing that needs to go is the list of excuses.

An honest and loving conversation

If you’re thinking it was malicious or condescending, it wasn’t. It didn’t need to be. I spoke from my heart-honest, firm, but most of all concerned about what their reality was going to be if they continued down this path. I didn’t want to get that phone call in the middle of the night.

Once the excuses are gone, you have to get real with yourself. And that means total honesty.

Starting simple and small

Making any lifestyle change can be daunting. I asked them to start at a simple place — walking. Taking a 20minute walk 2-3 times a week in their neighborhood was doable. More, if they felt like it.

Amazingly, they received it well. Here was their daughter telling them, quite bluntly, that they needed to get priorities in place. The tables had somehow turned.

I’d like to believe I made an impact. But I know only too well how hard it is to have difficult conversations with the ones you love.

And sometimes, this is the kind of conversation we need to have with ourselves.

It is never too late to remember that health GOOD health is precious.

And you need to work at it. It won’t fall out of the sky at your beck and call. Yes, genetics may present a challenge, and so will time, age, children, work, chores, family and a hundred other things that will place demands on you. Without health, though, all those other things will not give you nearly enough joy as you want.

The choice of health, like all the things that make life worth living, is an active choice, and therefore, requires activity.

Are you going to stay passive to your loved ones’ health, or stand up and well . . . take a stand?

Ritu Rao is a dentist whose blogging style is like a breath of fresh air in her niche. Catch her at www.raodentistry.wordpress.com, or at www.bizzytoothmommy.com, where she writes for mom biz owners.

One of the more compelling reasons for adopting a frugal lifestyle is, lets admit it, scarcity of resource. Whether it be an altruistic effort to preserve the resources of the planet or to get by on a smaller budget resulting from reduced income, frugality is rapidly becoming the norm rather than an option. Not only does frugal and simple living ease the burden on resources and income, but it is also a healthier and more ethical choice to exercise. One of the effects of adopting a frugal lifestyle a few years back dawned upon us recently as we realized that our eating had undergone a total revolution. We were eating healthier, eating a larger range of food, cooking different dishes, experimenting and trying out newer cuisines and preparations, using uncommon and exotic ingredients, and, hold your hats, spending less than we used to on groceries and provisions!

Here are some of the things that we were able to identify that made this change possible:

Home Cooking Only

Being pressed for time, a natural response was to either book a table or order home delivery. As we started watching our budget, one of the first things to go was the expense on eating out and ordering in, since it did come up to quite a bit once we looked at the whole month. The same thing had to be done for office and school lunches; packing them instead of buying at the cafeteria. While we did all we could to reinforce the value of the healthier home cooked food, it was not an easy habit to break, especially in the face of the seemingly tastier and more attractive commercial preparations, in addition to the bother of cooking when tired or late. However, as we practiced this habit for several weeks, we slowly found that we were beginning to dislike the commercial preparations, especially the fast food type of stuff. Our tastebuds had got used to the low sodium, low fat, and natural food flavors of home cooking, and revolted when we did eat out after a while. What surprised us was the fact that we never realized how salty and greasy the food was all these years!

Planning, Research and Strategy

We embarked on meal planning two years back, and it has paid off rich dividends. We make a weekly meal plan, which we mostly adhere to, making allowance for sudden changes, visitors, and food cravings! We use this to draw up our shopping list for provisions and groceries. Meal and menu planning helps to ensure that we are getting a good balance of all the essential nutrients and not missing out on anything. We keep time aside for auditing the pantry and stores and menu planning in our schedule in that order. This helps in using up ingredients that are creeping towards the use by dates and ingredients that are almost over before we get fresh supplies.

We try and shop strictly by our list and we visit the stores after a meal. Having a full stomach helps control impulsive purchases of food items. We look out for coupons, discounts and compare prices and ingredients. We have learned to go by price per unit weight rather than the number on the price tag. Buying larger packages of items often translates to lower cost. Challenge areas were herbs and spices, and we learned to come up with a basic set of spices that we would use and buy. Replacing dried herbs and dried spices with fresh variants either from the market or grown in the garden was one of the strategies we adopted. We also set up a collective buying plan for expensive spices that we really wanted in the kitchen like saffron and nutmeg, buying larger amounts at a lower price and sharing the cost and the spice with friends and family. We also studied pricing patterns at supermarkets and discovered that there are predictable discount patterns connected with time of day and day of week. These change from store to store, but the ground rule is that Wednesdays and Thursdays are lower priced as stores stock up midweek and are eager to let go of older inventories. Late evenings see discounts on perishables. Your will need to study your local store to figure out their discount pricing pattern.

Restaurant Style Cooking at Home

We built up a small repertoire of fancy restaurant style dishes using common and frugal ingredients that we would use when entertaining people. We took a few basic preparations, looked up different gourmet recipes and searched for images to get presentation ideas. Then we practiced them by cooking them often. This led to some wonderful meals as well as expertise and familiarity with preparing them. We also came up with a list of quick and easy to prepare emergency dishes and began practising them till we could do it in our sleep. These recipes are our saviors when we come home and are too tired or too lazy to do something elaborate.

The Social Aspect of Food

One of our greatest influences in our current eating and cooking has been the work of Michael Pollan. Apart from the health aspect of increasing plant foods and reducing animal products, his books have helped us understand that food is much more than mere fuel for the body. It is also fuel for the spirit and helps bind people together. We have started exploring the social ritual that cooking and eating really are. We cook as a family, allowing everyone to participate, from planning to shopping to cooking, and we frequently share our meals with friends and family. We take time to cook and take time to eat, rather than making mealtimes a rushed affair or a television dinner. Along with the financial impact of all the changes we have made, this helps us appreciate the gift of life, the gift of transmission of life through what we are eating, and the gift of people in our lives.

Google for Frugal Eating

There are many recipe tools on the internet that let you search for recipes based on ingredients. We use the recipes filter on the sidebar tools on Google Search since we find it the most useful. We have found unusual recipes from different cuisines using this tool. Apart from an ingredients option, it also allows you to filter results by the amount of time taken to prepare the dish.

There are a few other principles that we have adopted as part of our frugal but healthy eating plan that this article would be incomplete without. One of them is to buy vegetables by the colors. We try and include all the different colors of veggies since this ensures that all nutrients are covered for. We have also started exercising portion control and have eliminated wasting what we serve ourselves. And finally, we have started keeping leftovers in clear view in the refrigerator, to shelves, in front, and in the center. This makes sure that they get used up first rather than slowly drift to the back of the fridge only to be rediscovered and trashed.

This steps have helped us eat healthier, save money, enjoy our meals, come closer as a family, and appreciate food in a whole new way. Try them out yourself, and you will be amazed at how it impact the quality of your family’s life. Do remember to let me know how it turns out in the comments.

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Subhorup Dasgupta is a Hyderabad based writer and artist who blogs at Subho’s Jejune Diet about minimalism, frugality and ethical living. He believes that the present crisis of civilization can only be addressed by adopting value-based and sustainable lifestyle and devotes his time to help people achieve this.

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Are you exercising enough?

For most people, the answer to that question is “no” – especially at this time of year, during the holidays. Exercise might not feel like your top priority right now. But keeping active is crucial for good physical and mental health.

Even if you don’t need to lose weight, exercise is important. It will give you a greater sense of vitality: you’ll feel better in your body. You’ll see this in physical effects like greater flexibility, and mental ones like greater wellbeing. There is even evidence to suggest that depression is reduced dramatically by exercise.

There are two key types of exercise that you can do:

• Strength-training
• Cardiovascular

When you do strength-training, your weight will be redistributed – giving you a more desirable shape. This happens through building muscles (and losing fat in other areas). For instance, if you’re a man, you will be able to broaden your shoulders by chest and shoulder exercises.

Cardiovascular exercise (like jogging or cycling) lowers cholesterol, reduces blood pressure, and improves your mood. It also helps you to lose fat, which reduces the size of your fat cells – helping your newly-defined muscles to show.

How You Can Find Time to Exercise

Exercise represents something that’s important but not necessarily urgent. If you don’t exercise, it won’t normally cause problems right away – but over time, it can lead to serious illness.

It’s essential to force important-but-not-urgent items into your schedule. That might mean you exercise:

• First thing in the morning
• Immediately when you get home
• During your lunch hour or another scheduled break

Build exercise into the rhythm of your life until it becomes a habit.

About three weeks ago, I took a cruise from Boston to Halifax to Maine. Along with a friend, I went to the gym every single day. Despite eating very rich meals (and even partaking in a chocolate buffet!) I came back without having gained a single pound, because I’d kept up my exercise routine.

Use Your Body

Instead of thinking about “exercise”, think of how you can “use your body”. You could:

• Take the stairs instead of the elevator
• Park at the far end of the car park
• Do some yoga before work
• Take a five-minute walk to clear your mind

… anything that keeps you active.

If you can, work on your goal as part of a community, perhaps alongside colleagues. Many offices will have a weight-loss challenges and regular weigh-ins together. They may even have a personal trainer come in a couple of days a week and run exercise classes at work.

Don’t wait until the New Year to start being more active. Begin today.

Bio: Barry Demp is a business and personal coach in Michigan. He writes about professional and personal development on his website – click here to read his Four Simple Tips for Healthy Eating During the Holidays.

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Diets do not work. Period.

They often eliminate whole food groups (which is unhealthy and dangerous) or they eliminate your favorite foods (which makes them hard to stick to!)

You can’t live on a restrictive diet for the rest of your life. You need to create a diet that’s going to fit your lifestyle, not force yourself to adopt a whole new lifestyle for your diet.

You can eat chocolate, ice cream, pizza, etc … and still lose weight.

It’s all about moderation and watching portion sizes. If you eat half a gallon of ice cream at a sitting, you will gain weight; if you eat half a cup, you’ll still be satisfied – but you won’t gain weight.

Taking Small Steps Toward Healthier Eating

Do not try to go cold turkey and cut out everything that you consider “bad”. Instead, make gradual changes.

1. Start out by eating smaller portions, period. Take three or four fewer bites; gradually work down to a half-cup instead of a two-cup serving of ice-cream.
2. Measure your portion into a (small) dish instead of eating out of a bag of chips or box of cookies –a cup or half cup dish is a good size. If you need to, take a measuring cup or use scales to work out exactly what you’re eating. The worst thing you can do is to eat directly from the bag or the box of cookies or tub of ice-cream.
3. Out of sight, out of mind! Put food containers away once you’ve got your serving.
4. Experiment to find out what works for you. Many people find that individual servings help them to control their portion sizes – but some may find that they prefer to buy one large container and weigh out the portions themselves.
5. Use a food diary to record what you’re eating: this helps you to learn what works for you and what doesn’t.

Eating Out – And Eating Healthy

When you’re eating out, you can make your meal much healthier by:

• Asking for sauces or dressings on the side.
• Asking for a smaller portion – or get a “to-go” box straight away and put half the meal into it.
• Sharing an entree with a partner.
• Avoiding eating lots of free bread.

Decide what the most important part of the meal is, to you. If you love the cheesecake but aren’t fussed about fries, leave the fries. If you want dessert, have it, but have a small portion or share.

Enjoying Treats

Practice moderation rather than deprivation. If there’s a birthday cake in the office, have a small portion: allow yourself a taste of it. That’s not going to kill you or add a dress size.

If you struggle to eat healthy at work, bring your own snacks so that you’ve got a treat that you’re controlling. Simply trying to resist can cause more problems: you’re more likely to give up on your diet.

Don’t tell yourself that something is forbidden: you only make it more desirable.

Make conscious choices about what you will and won’t eat. If you only have homemade fudge at Christmas-time, then eat it and enjoy it – but don’t indulge in all the other foods that you can have year-round, like chocolates and chips.

Ditch the diet, stop depriving yourself, and start eating in a sustainable, healthy and enjoyable way instead.

Patricia Setzer is the author of How to Eat Healthy for Life (Without Giving Up the Foods You Love), available in ebook form for just $9.99. You can click here to find out all about it here.

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Why is it so difficult to lose weight when you have tried everything to make it happen?  Because like any habit, you slip back into familiar territory without realizing it or worse, you choose not to take responsibility for your decadent slips.

Now is the time for a wake-up call to get back on diet track.  For some persons all it takes is a weight scale to see those extra pounds and that is enough to take a serious second look at their diet plan. For others it might be that photo, taken at last week’s birthday bash that finally gets them over the edge to a new diet challenge.

Sticking to a diet plan requires a mind and body connection that motivates you to stay on track even when you don’t feel like it.  Self-monologue–stating positive self-affirmations is one way of telling yourself throughout the day how much portions to serve, how often to eat, and when to exercise–to keep your diet in check.  Try these 4 simple steps to move you closer to your goal:

Step 1:  Tell Yourself You Are Worth It

Who else is going to tell you every moment of the day that you are worth it!  You have your own personal coach – your conscious mind—uplifting you to achieve the best for yourself.  Replace your old self-monologue with a new positive self-talk—and when doubt tries to thwart your efforts, repeat a positive affirmation such as– “I will achieve my goal, I am determined, and deserving; I refuse to fail.”

Step 2: Setting Realistic Goals

If you intend to reach your goals set the rules then write them down.  Setting goals and working toward reaching them is essential in creating self-fulfillment. Add words of daily encouragement and direction by telling yourself you are worth it in different ways, written within your rules.

Keeping a food diary is a must if you are to honestly assess the amount of calories you consume.  Remember you need to burn more calories than you put in, therefore ensure that your exercise is sufficient and lasts a minimum of 30 minutes each workout.

Step 3:  Choose An Exercise You Enjoy

Find out which exercise will increase your determination to stay with your regimen.  If Pilates, aerobics, kick-boxing, or elliptical training is more your style, get into the program.  Otherwise continue reprogramming your conscious mind with self-assurances to stay on your path to achieving goals, regardless of the exercise.  Building lean muscle mass by toning your body and reducing fat intake will have you burning calories even while you sleep.

You can do it!

Step 4:  Indulge Sensibly in Healthy Snacks

Do not deprive yourself of snacks because you are dieting.  In fact, snacking is an important part of any diet. It keeps your metabolism revved up and ready to burn.  Aim for 2 ½ hours between main meals to have your snacks. Choose snacks sensibly, watch out for portions, and continue your calorie count.  Great snack ideas include:

• A handful of your favorite nuts [throw in some raisins for added delight]
• Wedged cheese with fruit or wheat crackers
• Dark chocolate – 2 or 3 squares [not milk chocolate]
• Salad with vinaigrette dressing

Those of us who can give ourselves the extra benefit of self-assurance and self-motivation— are able to override fears–they become mentally astute to assume any challenge and make it happen. Don’t wait on someone or something to motivate you, that time may never come! You can empower yourself to do whatever you choose. Re-program your attitude to believing that you can…for if it is to be done, it’s entirely up to you!

Karen C. Ashley is a freelance writer http://about.me/karencareyashley who is passionate about providing insightful, meaningful, thought-provoking topics on health and wellness that satisfies her readers.  For more info: http://wellnesssultana.blogspot.com

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Related Reading:

3 Paths To Self Improvement

Mediterranean Diet for Your Brain