Ways To Set Weight Loss Goals Efficiently

There’s a lot of reason why it’s a good idea to lose weight. But if you need one that isn’t about looks, then how about pain management? Keeping your weight under control is actually helpful when it comes to back pain prevention which has been rising and becoming more common nowadays. You're more likely to suffer from low back pain if you are overweight or obese, or quickly gain a significant amount of weight. Being overweight, especially in the mid-section, shifts your entire center of gravity forward and puts additional strain on your back muscles. Try to stay within 10 pounds of your ideal weight to avoid experiencing unnecessary back pain. To help you lose weight successfully, here are some tips to plan better on how to do it because it all starts on the goal setting.

Be Specific

Don’t just say you’re gonna lose weight. Determine why you want it for, how much you want to lose and how exactly are you planning to do it. Let’s say you’re trying to lose weight to reduce your back pain, then don’t just kill yourself at the gym or start starving yourself because while you may see results doing those, it’s also very likely that you’ll develop other problems along the way.  

So first, you should look into where you’re at weight-wise. Keep a record by writing it down or making a note on your phone (whatever works for you) so that you can stay on track. And then know how much you want to shed since having that figure whether it’s 10 lbs or 50 lbs allows you to see if you’re progressing or not. Lastly, you should really get into the details on the steps you’re thinking to go about it. Like you should plan your meals, know the foods that you can and cannot eat. It also helps to schedule your workouts so you’re more likely to stick to it.

Set Short And Long Term Goals

It’s important that you have both short and long term goals when you’re trying to shed pounds. Why? Because while the long term goal, which let's say losing a total of 40 pounds, is the finished product that you want to achieve. The short term ones, like losing 5 pounds every month, allows you to stay motivated and focused on reaching your ultimate goal. If you only think of the 40 pounds that you wanna lose, it’s easy to be discouraged or get lazy along the way since it’s gonna take some time before it happens. But if you have mini goals every week or month of the journey, the whole thing won’t feel much of a struggle because you can see that you’re getting close to what you want in the long run.

Examples of short term goals that can help you reach your long term ones are:

·         Switching into healthier alternatives of your usual meals or snacks.

·         Limiting alcohol/soda/fast-food to once a week only.

·         Cooking your own food at least for one meal a day.

·         Drinking a glass of water every hour.

There are a lot more that you can make adjustments to in your daily life depending on your routine and lifestyle but setting even those tiny goals keeps you more accountable to your plans.

Stay Realistic

Biting more than you can chew is a surefire way to failure. Understand that you didn’t gain the excess weight that you have overnight. So do not assume that the transformation will happen overnight too.

Set goals that you know is within your capability and probability. Now, what does that mean? It means the goals that you should set, both short and long term, should be realistic and achievable. If you normally eat out due to your busy schedule and have never exercised before, then don’t plan on home cooking 3 meals a day 7 days a week and/or going to the gym every single day on top of that. Chances are, you wouldn’t last a week and you’ll drop the whole weight-loss goal.

Cooking your own food is the best way to limit things and be more in control on what you feed your body. But if you’re really busy, then just commit to cooking at least your own dinner and packing your own snacks at work. Once you’ve gradually worked out your schedule to that and have gotten used to it, then you can slowly try to wake up a little earlier and make your own breakfast. This way you have two main meals and snacks that are healthy and then accept that packing your own lunch may not just be feasible since you don’t have more time to cook in the morning and allow yourself to grab whatever’s convenient in your cafeteria. Planning it this way makes it easier to accomplish thing more often than forcing yourself into unrealistic goals and then beating yourself up when you can’t do them. That just defeats the purpose of the whole thing.

When it comes to exercising, especially if you have an office job where you sit a lot, admit to yourself that you may not be able to do it as consistently as you would like to. So don’t be disappointed with yourself if you can’t go to the gym every day. Just find ways to move more wherever you are. They say sitting is the new smoking. Not only can sitting for an extended period of time cause health issues, it also a reason why you might be struggling to shed pounds since insufficient physical activity leads to that. So if you have a deskbound job, even find ways to interrupt sitting or squeeze more exercise in your routine like taking the stairs to your office instead of the elevator counts as a workout. Sedentary lifestyle causes some people not only gain weight but also develop musculoskeletal conditions which can make losing weight even more difficult. If this is your case, better consult a chiropractor right away to address your condition accordingly which when treated can help you lose weight in the process.

Establish Your State Of Mind

Remember that weight-loss goals can also be behavior goals, or “state of mind” goals. These types of goals include:

·         Eat slower

·         Pay more attention to the Nutrition Facts labels and ingredient lists on food products

·         Stop negative “self-talk,” such as telling yourself you’re fat or incapable of change

·         Change the direction in which you walk or drive to avoid food temptations

A behavioral change could include meditation classes to help alleviate stress, which in turn could help you eliminate stress-related behaviors such as eating junk food for comfort. It could also be staying abreast of new research that relates to diet, pain, and the connection between the two. And, of course, when it comes to weight control and overall health, any physical activity you can safely do, including walking, is much better than no exercise at all, can help boost your spirits, and could give you a little more leeway in your diet.

Stay Open Minded

If you want to successfully change your lifestyle to achieve your goal, know that you have to be flexible. Even if you've started to adapt healthy habits, always keep in mind that things may not work according to your plans every single day. Let’s say you’ve been making your own breakfast and dinner for weeks now but due to events or hectic work schedule, you couldn’t do breakfast. That’s okay. Use that opportunity to find a place to grab breakfast that’s still healthy. Or if you couldn’t go to the gym as planned, then just find 5-minutes within the day to do simple but compound workouts at home or during breaks at work to maximize the time.  You don’t have to actually follow your weight loss plan to a T. Improvise if you must or take alternative routes that still leads to the same direction of your plan. Try new things or different ways to achieve your goal and you might just learn that you have a lot of options to choose from when time or circumstances are working against you. They may not be what you’ve set out to do but if they’re healthy habits and changes then you’re basically still on track.

Foods To Avoid Eating If You’re Prone To Headaches

Headaches are often brushed off since we tend to just power through them. But frequent headaches may not only be a slight discomfort but can also be completely a nuisance. So the less you experience them, the better not just for you but for everyone else. The problem is, people hardly ever seek medical attention for headaches unless they become incapacitated with it. As a result it can be hard to manage at time because we basically don’t know what to do about it aside from taking painkillers. But did you know that you may be able to manage it by avoiding certain foods?

Chocolate

A lot of people, not just women, find chocolate a comforting food. But did you know that if you tend to get headaches a lot, chocolate may have a different effect? It’s said to be due to tyramine or phenylethylamine, two amino acids found in chocolate that is triggering the headache.

Alcoholic Drinks

Whether you’re a habitual drinker or not, you’re probably aware of how much of a pain hungover can be.  But you don’t even have to be that drunk or have a hungover to experience the headache from alcoholic drinks. Since alcohol in any drink causes increased blood flow to your brain and can also result in dehydration, both of which might be headache triggers.

Coffee

The high or energy boost that coffee can give you can also cause headaches, especially after the effect of the caffeine has worn off. But this depends on how often you drink it. Moderate consumption may help relieve pain since it gives that sense of alertness. But daily intake, especially if you have more than a cup in a day, makes your brain develop a tolerance for it. So the effectiveness becomes weaker and your body expect an additional dose right away which when unmet the withdrawal syndrome which includes headaches kicks in.

Cheese

Substance called tyramine that forms as the proteins in cheese break down over time. And the longer the cheese ages, the more tyramine it contains which is a known headache causing element. So if you’re a fan of cheese and you add it in anything that you eat, you may wanna start cutting back on that and see if your headache improves.

Foods Containing Soy Sauce And MSG

Monosodium glutamate (MSG), which is found in soy sauce and as a food additive in many other foods, has been found to cause cramps, diarrhea, and a horrible headache in 10 to 15 percent of people who get migraine headaches. This is possibly due to the saltiness which can lead to dehydration that we know leads to headaches too.

Ice Cream

Drinking or eating something cold very quickly can cause what we call brain freeze which basically is headache due to the cold. Therefore, it’s actually not the ice cream itself that’s causing the pain. You can still enjoy it, just eat it slowly no matter how much you love it or have been craving for it for days!

Banana

Shocker, I know. Banana is hardly found in any not-to-eat-food list because of how nutritious it is. But apparently, headache or migraine sufferers have found that banana triggers the pain for them. This is because banana also contain tyramine which if you’re sensitive to it, headache takes over!

Processed Meat

Nitrites used as preservatives in hot dogs, bacon, and lunch meats may dilate blood vessels and trigger headaches after eating in some people. There may not be a solid study that can back this up but we know that too much processed foods in your body is not good because of all the preservatives added in them. If you can’t eliminate them in your diet altogether, you should at least limit your consumption of them.

Eliminating or even just limiting these food items from your diet may help, but probably the safest, surest way to headache relief is to seek chiropractic care. Because it’s a great alternative treatment that doesn’t involve drugs or surgery to eliminate the pain but is effective in improving your overall health. Aside from that, it’s best to work with your primary care physician, neurologist, or headache specialist too. With some trial and error, you may find a treatment that finally relieves your pain.

Pointers That Will Make Your Boss Agree To Provide Height Adjustable Desks In The Office

When you spend majority of your time sitting, chances are back pain, shoulder pain, and neck pain have become your constant companion. This isn’t good. Not only that this can make your entire day uncomfortable, but it can also lead to spinal injuries and affect your performance at work in general.

But don’t worry because utilizing height adjustable desks in your workplace is a good way to alternate sitting down and standing up throughout the day and avoid back pain and stiffness. The question is, how do you get your boss onboard with this? Well, you suggest this idea in your next meeting and to convince him or her, here are the pointers you definitely want to highlight!

Return On Investment

Businesses don’t like spending money on something that they won’t profit from, that’s why it’s called business. So if you’re going to present this idea of investing on new desks, you have to explain how the management would gain from it. So you explain that while the cost of such desks may be off-putting at the beginning, it actually benefits them as time goes because of how it helps employee perform better.

Improved Employee Health

Did you know that back pain is a leading cause of missed work days as well as work limitations? That is not good for businesses as their employees’ health affects performance which affects business’s revenue in the long run. So if they invest in a desk that prevents back pain, the company enjoys increased productivity, reduced sick days and lower health insurance cost.

Improved Mood Means Increase In Productivity

Being allowed to move more by alternating sitting and standing not only lessens chances of back pain but also improves a worker’s mood. We all know that once a person starts feeling stressed out or starts getting into a bad mood, a tasks starts feeling more difficult or they get mental blocked that they can’t figure out how to do something at all. But the simple act of getting up from the desk and moving your body refreshes the brain more than staring at the computer for hours. So for a company, a happy worker is a more productive worker and if a height adjustable desk can help with that, your boss will be more willing to give it a go.

No Assembly Required

The company won’t have to hold a tutorial seminar just to teach employee to assemble these kind of desks. So it’s not like they also have to worry about wasting precious working hours because sit-stand desks nowadays require no assembly at all. You simply have to take it out of the box, place it on the existing desk and then it’s done!

No Risk

When it comes to risks, you simply have to recommend a supplier that offers return and exchange within 30 days, which most suppliers nowadays do, and it should be fine.

People say that stress is all in the mindset, but you should know that your body condition play a big role in it too. So if your symptoms persist even after improving your work setup with the help of sit-stand desks, it’s time you seek a professional. Receiving adjustments from a chiropractor here in Singapore can make a significant difference in your stress level by relieving pain or discomfort caused by misalignment, helping you sleep better at night, and even treat other health condition like constant headache and digestive problems which are without a doubt stressful. Aside from that, you’ll find that when your body is in tip-top condition, your performance at work improves as well and you’re less likely to feel sick and tired of going to work every day.

Top 5 Midnight Snacks You Can Eat Without The Guilt

Now that the holidays are over, you’re back to work and your fitness activities but you’re left with the food hungover and incessant desire to snack around midnight. However, since you’re probably trying to lose the pounds you gained over the holidays, snacking is probably one thing that you’re trying to avoid altogether.

Aside from that, when you’re trying to lose weight, it is believed that eating after 7 or 8pm can undermine weight loss efforts. The problem is if you had an early dinner, getting hungry around midnight is inevitable and sleeping with a grumbling stomach is never a good idea. If this is the case for you, here are some snack ideas that will curb your hunger without doing any harm provided that you don’t eat a whole bunch of them in one sitting.

1.      Greek Yogurt

There are a lot of different yogurts available but in this case you better stick with greek yogurt. Regular and sweetened yogurts usually contain artificial color and sweetener not to mention excess water and lactose. But with this, you’re getting your yogurt fix plus protein without too much sugar and calories.

2.      Dark Chocolate

If it’s chocolate that you always crave for when you want a snack, opting for dark ones is the way to go. They aren’t as loaded with sugar and calories but they’re just as good. Plus they’re rich in antioxidants, so it’s a win-win, though moderation is still key.

3.      Banana

When it comes to healthy snacks, bananas are truly a bargain. They're great sources of dietary fiber, minerals like potassium and magnesium, and a good source of other vitamins like vitamins A and C. aside from that, they lower blood pressure and reduces risk of cancer and asthma.

4.      Hummus

Hummus is a dip made up of chickpeas, olive oil, garlic and other ingredients. It is loaded with vitamins and minerals. It is an excellent source of fiber and helps in better functioning of the digestive system. One feels full and satisfied after having it.

5.      Cheese And Crackers

Now don’t get too excited, when we say cheese and crackers we mean the whole wheat crackers and low fat cheese. This way you still get to enjoy the taste of this delicious pair without the guilt that comes with the regular option of these two.

Working out is surely important to shed some extra kilos that you’ve accumulated from the holiday feast but try not to overwhelm yourself by restricting your diet too much. Don’t be afraid to eat when you’re hungry; just make sure you choose what you eat well. There are always healthier options of the foods you like to indulge in.