October 30, 2010 in Blog by Dr.Ola

A Healthy Lifestyle

A healthy lifestyle can help you feel good, stay at a healthy weight, and have plenty of energy for both work and play.  It can also help with lowering your blood pressure, heart disease problems and diabetes.

It means:

• Eating healthy goods.  Healthy eating also means not eating too much sugar, fat, or fast foods.  You can still have dessert and treats now and then.  The goal is “Moderation“.
• Making some kind of physical activity part of your daily routine.  Physical activity doesn’t have to mean going to the gym or running a marathon.  There are lots of other ways to fit physical activity into your life.
• Drink only moderate amounts of alcohol.
• Manage stress.  Many people find that eating is their way of managing stress.  If you have a lot of stress in your life, it can be hard to focus on making healthy changes to your lifestyle.  Let’s learn how to deal with stress.

Becoming more active and improving your eating habits are the two main ways to reach a healthy weight.

October 28, 2010 in Blog by Dr.Ola

If Diets Aren’t Good For You What Can You Do?

If you decide that you do need to make some changes to reaching a healthy lifestyle you need to approach it in a healthy way.

1. Improve Your Eating Habits – Do it slowly.
2. Get Moving- Make physical activity a regular part of your day.
3. Change Your Thinking – Our thoughts have a lot to do with how we feel and what we do.  You need to stop telling yourself discouraging things and start telling yourself encouraging things – you will be surprised how much healthier you will be – in Mind and Body.

October 23, 2010 in Blog by admin

Keep Your Refrigerator Stocked!

Hopefully you are on the 40 day challenge program or about to start! Either way, I would like to offer some tips to prepare you and support you during the next few weeks – and beyond.  These recommendations are part of creating new habits and supporting a healthy lifestyle.

You may find the title of this post odd. “Keeping Your Refrigerator Stocked”.  You may be thinking that being on a healthy lifestyle program means deprivation and an empty refrigerator! Absolutely not!  The question you should be asking is, “stocked with what?”  If your refrigerator is stocked with the right food, you will be less likely to grab junk or deviate from the program.

1. Keep a pitcher full of ice water – add lemons or cucumbers.  This taste better than tap water and is better for you than bottled.
2. Keep apples, pear, oranges and berries washed and ready to grab.  As you run out the door, you can simple snag a piece of fruit, a napkin (and I always take a plastic bag that I used when I purchased my fruit to store the core or peel after I am done).  I know, I am a little anal, you can blame my aunt!
3. Stock your freezer with organic free range chicken breasts. If you have access to a Costco, they sell them in bulk packages and a reasonable price.
4. Cook a couple of chicken breasts at a time (more than what you will eat for that meal).  Store the leftovers in the refrigerator to dice for salads or warm up for a quick lunch served with a veggie and brown rice.
5. Stock your freezer with wild caught fish, like salmon.  Again, Costco sells a package of frozen wild caught fish, but each fillet is individually sealed for freshness and ease to defrost only what you need.  Pull out a  couple of pieces the night before and thaw in your refrigerator to ensure freshness.
6. Buy fresh and/or frozen vegetables (without any sauce!!!) in small amounts.  Fresh must be eaten within a couple of days.  Again, go ahead and cook an entire head of broccoli, for example, and store the leftovers in a sealed container (I prefer glass) in the refrigerator .  The next day, chop it up and add it to your egg whites for a quick and healthy meal.
7. Cook brown rice in a larger amount than you need for a meal and store the extras for another day.  Or, if you have a Trader Joe’s you can stock up on their pre-cooked frozen brown rice and simply heat it through – ready in 3 minutes!  Either way, it will make eating the brown rice more convenient since it usually takes longer to cook than regular white.

Look for more healthy eating tips and cooking ideas from The Wheatgrass Gal! If you haven’t yet signed up for the 40 day challenge, be sure to do so.  You will then also receive the monthly newsletter with great tasting recipes that are simple and easy to prepare and support Dr. Ola’s program!

Andrea Olguin AKA The Wheatgrass Gal is a guest author at Ola’s Challenge.  She is a cookbook author and wheatgrass lover.  She completed Ola’s Challenge in the summer of 2010. If a gourmet food lover can complete this challenge, so can you!

October 19, 2010 in Blog by Dr.Ola

Why Isn’t Dieting A Good Idea?

In today’s society, there is  lot of pressure to be thin.  But being thin has very little to do with do health.

Diets don’t work!  Why?  Diets are temporary.  When you diet, you’re usually not eating the way your will need to eat over the long term.  So when you quit dieting, you gain the weight back.  Secondly, dieting usually means not letting yourself have many of the foods you love to eat.  So when you quit dieting, you return to eating those foods, then the weight comes right back on and more! Dieting also means eating so little food that you are hungry all the time and don’t have enough energy.  Most diet programs don’t include an increase in activity, which is vital to staying at a healthy weight.

Dieting can actually be bad for you!  Again, many people gain back the weight and more after they stop dieting.  Many diets don’t include the right balance of foods to keep you healthy.  Some people fall victim to eating disorders and many feel deflated after repeatedly failing to lose weight and keep it off.  This leads many to give up on healthy eating and staying active.

Achieving a healthy weight means leading a healthy lifestyle.  That means choosing healthy eating habits and being active.  So what can you do? Find out in the next post!

October 18, 2010 in Blog by Dr.Ola

What Is A Healthy Weight?

A healthy weight is  weight that lowers your risk of health problems.  For most people, body mas index (BMI) and waist size are good ways to tell if you are at a healthy weight.  NOTE!  Reaching a healthy weight isn’t just about reaching a certain number on the scale or a certain BMI.  Having healthy eating and exercising habits are even more important.

When you’re active and eating well, your body will settle into a weight that is healthy for you.  If you want a healthy weight and stay there healthy lifestyle changes will work better than dieting.  Dieting may result in short term results, changing your lifestyle will result in life long changes.  What’s most important is achieving a healthy lifestyle.