diet | Summer Body Now

I NEED TO STARVE MYSELF SO MY BODY WILL BURN FAT

Wrong! Your body is the master compensator. When you drastically cut calories, your body goes into survival mode and slows down your metabolism. Yes, as crazy as it sounds, that’s what it does because your body’s first priority is survival. Also, if you just cut calories but don’t focus on nutrient dense, well-balanced meals, you also end up loosing muscle. The amount of muscle on your body is one of the main factors that determines your metabolism (how many calories you burn). So, if you end up losing muscle then you lower your metabolism. This can be a disastrous combo of losing muscle and damaging your metabolism.

This is one of the main reasons that people rebound after a “diet”. They loose “scale weight” but don’t realize that a lot of it was muscle and for the reasons listed above, lowered and perhaps even damaged their metabolism. So when they resume eating normal again, their body regains the fat and sometimes even more…

It is very important to know your body composition and body fat percentage before you start any dietary change to reduce your weight. You need to focus on well-balanced and nutrient dense meals, evenly spaced throughout the day. Make sure you take measurements and use the mirror more than the scale. This is where a coach can save you a ton of time and frustration because they can get you started on a personal plan that is as unique as you are…

Bad news if you’re a soda drinker: according to a new study, downing the bubbly stuff daily can age your cells by nearly an additional 2-5 years

Researchers are the University of California San Francisco analyzed data from 5,309 adults by looking at numbers from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Specifically, researchers wanted to check the correlation between drinking soda and telomere length—which is the cap on every chromosome in the body. Shorter telomere are associated with shorter lifespan, higher stress, heart disease, diabetes and certain forms of cancer, among other issues. The researchers found drinking just eight ounces of soda a day increased cell age by 1.9 years. Drinking 20 ounces increased cell age by 4.6 years—which is the same aging effect smoking has on your telomeres.

“The extremely high dose of sugar that we can put into our body within seconds by drinking sugared beverages is uniquely toxic to metabolism,” says study author Elissa Epel, PhD, professor of psychiatry at the University of California San Francisco. Interestingly, there’s no link between cell aging and sugary fruit juices either. For now, soda seems to be the main culprit affecting our telomeres in the beverage department.

Luckily, soda drinking has been on the decline since the researchers pulled these numbers. And while telomeres normally and naturally shorten with age, past studies have shown you can actual help grow your damaged telomeres up to 10 percent or more by eating a healthy diet (without sugary soda), cutting stress from your life, proper supplementation and including adaptogens in your diet. So if you’re still popping the top on Pop, it’s time to settle on a new drink of choice.

I make a concerted effort to include all of these suggestions in my daily life and it had has had a huge impact on my energy and performance! Please share this and let me know if I can answer any questions…

Is your Body in Balance with your Environment?