Wouldn’t it be great if you could just do a few stomach flattening exercises daily and quickly obtain a flat stomach?

Unfortunately, spot reduction doesn’t work.

What does work is consistently using a well-designed program of eating and exercising properly.  The way to obtain and keep a flat stomach is to eat and exercise to reduce your percentage of body fat and then to maintain that lower percentage.

If it helps, then, think of doing stomach flattening exercises with your fork as well as in the gym.

The good news is that natural physique models and bodybuilders have discovered how to obtain and keep a flat stomach.  Our prehistoric ancestors did the same thing.

How?

In terms of standard stomach flattening exercises that work well, there are two types:  cardio (aerobic) and strength training (anaerobic).

Aerobic exercise can burn a lot of energy (calories) during exercise and some energy after exercising.  It can be either intense (80 to 85% VO2  max) or mild (60 to 65% VO2 max).  GXP and interval training is intense, whereas brisk walking is mild.  Both kinds are excellent stomach flattening exercises.

Always check with your personal physician before making any major changes in your dietary or exercise patterns.  If you are healthy, I recommend walking six days weekly and doing intense aerobic exercise twice weekly.  This is a sustainable program of aerobic stomach flattening exercises that you can adopt and maintain into your 90′s.

Strength training increases lean muscle mass.  This is very important because muscle is many times metabolically more active than fat.  So the more muscle you have, the more energy you burn 24 hours a day.  I recommend strength training twice weekly.  Your program should include strengthening your core.  (For some specific suggestions about this, go to some pages on my website, e.g., http://www.lasting-weight-loss.com/core-exercise.html .)  This is a sustainable program of anaerobic stomach flattening exercise that you can adopt and maintain into your 90′s.

In terms of  dietary stomach flattening exercises that work well, it’s critical to limit carbohydrate consumption.  You want your body to burn more of your fat reserves.  By consuming too many carbohydrates, your body is burning sugar, which is what ALL carbs become when digested, rather than fat.  To enable your body to burn fat rather than sugar, limit carb intake.

Furthermore, it’s also important to spread nutrient intake throughout the day.

And you want to ingest sufficient proteins and fats from natural sources as well as to drink plenty of clean water.

Putting these ideas into practice means eating a meal about every 4 waking hours.  If you are serious about getting a flatter stomach, consume no more than 5 (net) grams of carbohydrates per meal.  Consume at least 15 grams of proteins from natural sources per meal if you are female and 20 grams if you are male.  Get the rest of your calories from natural fats, which are high in omega 3 fatty acids.  Drink at least 2 or 3 quarts of water daily.

This is a simple, do-able program.  After an initial adjustment period of a week or two, it will probably require less time than you think.  Furthermore, you’ll get more energy back from it than you devote to it!

That’s the big picture when it comes to stomach flattening exercises.

Want some help?  You’ll find lots of free, specific guidelines on topics such as walking, GXP, strength training, which foods to eat, and which foods to avoid on my popular lasting-weight-loss.com website.

Go for it!

If you really want to lose weight for free fast, adopt the following five principles for just one month and you may be astounded at your results.

There’s nothing here that is controversial or dangerous for healthy people.  Still, it’s always a good idea not to make major changes in your dietary or exercise habits without the prior blessing of your personal physician.

Lose weight for free fast principle #1:  Starting soon after you arise in the morning, eat a meal every 4 waking hours.  Eat five meals daily.

Assuming that each meal has sufficient protein (see the next principle), this will keep your body in a positive nitrogen balance all day long.  This is good, because a negative nitrogen balance indicates that your body is decreasing its quantity of lean muscle.  So eating this way will maximize muscle, which is good because muscle is much more metabolically active than fat.  It will also keep your body burning calories by digesting protein.

Furthermore, eating this way will minimize hunger.  It’s not good to be hungry.  Hunger is a signal that your body is beginning to starve to death.  During the day you’ll have to wait less than 120 minutes until your next meal.

Lose weight for free fast principle #2:  Each meal should be low in carbs and have plenty of protein and (good) fats. No meal should have more than 5 grams of (net) carbs.  Each meal should have at least 15 grams of proteins if you are female and 20 grams if you are male.  The rest of your calories should come from natural fats, which are high in omega 3 fatty acids.

When digested, all carbs become sugar.  If you are too heavy, it’s quite likely that you are consuming too many carbs.  You want your body burning fat rather than sugar, and the only way to do that is to limit your intake of carbs.

Ensure that no meal has more than 5 grams of carbs, for a daily total of not more than 25 grams.   (You can find food counts online for free or buy a food counts book.) Following just this principle will have an enormous positive impact on how you feel and how you look.  It may well also provide a major benefit to your health.

Don’t worry about consuming natural fats to lose weight.  Most of your calories should come from fats.

Get your carbs from low-carb (preferably organic) vegetables.  Avoid fruits and fruit juices.  (Don’t worry:  all the beneficial phytonutrients and fiber available in fruits are also available in vegetables.)

Lose weight for free fast principle #3:  Eat foods that are as close as possible to the foods your prehistoric ancestors ate.

You are the successful product of millions of years of evolution.  Your genes are 99.9% the same as your ancestors 20,000 years ago, i.e., before the agricultural revolution.  Your body evolved to flourish physically eating natural foods.  So, if you want to be as healthy as possible and to lose weight, stop eating unnatural foods.

Especially avoid all processed (refined) grains and foods made from them.

Avoid meats from animals raised unnaturally in feedlots and given antibiotics and hormones; instead, eat grass-fed cattle and bison.  Similarly, only eat free-range chickens and their eggs.  Eat wild caught fish, especially from the deep sea, and not fish raised in fish farms.

Before you consume something, simply ask yourself:  could my successful ancestors 20,000 years ago have eaten this (or something very close to it)?  If not, seriously resist putting it in your mouth.

Lose weight for free fast principle #4:  Walk! Get moving.  Walk briskly for at least 30 minutes daily — and 45 minutes would be better.

(If you don’t walk and want some guidance on exactly how to begin, I’ve several introductory pages (including two different routines for beginners) on my website, e.g., http://www.lasting-weight-loss.com/walking-for-weight-loss.html .)

Lose weight for free fast principle #5:  Drink plenty of clean water.

How much?  That depends upon a variety of factors.  For most people, though, two quarts daily is a good minimum and three quarts daily would be better.

‘Water’ means water.  It doesn’t mean milk (your ancestors didn’t drink milk!) or soda or energy drinks or coffee or tea or even diet soda.

Consume small amounts throughout the morning and afternoon.  This will do a lot to prevent thirst.  Thirst isn’t good.  It’s a painful signal that your body is beginning to die of dehydration.  At least for us lucky North Americans, there’s no more reason ever to be thirsty than there is ever to be hungry.

That’s it!  You now understand how to lose weight for free fast.  Eating properly is the king, and exercising properly is the queen.

To keep weight off, it’s very important also to do strength training in order to increase your muscle mass.  However, since that won’t work quickly, I leave it for another time.  (For some specific guidance on exactly how to begin strength training, I’ve a number of introductory pages (including routines) at my website, e.g., http://www.lasting-weight-loss.com/weightlifting-exercises.html .)

Test these principles for yourself.  They work.  You’ll be delighted that you did!

The 3 day tuna diet is a good idea whose time has passed.

Fifty years ago it was not unusual for bodybuilders preparing for a contest to go on a diet of tuna and water for a few days.  They did it because it worked.

Tuna is nutritious, delicious, relatively inexpensive food.  It’s high in protein (a small can packed in water has about 24 grams of protein).  It has beneficial omega 3 fats and no carbohydrates.  A 3 day tuna diet used to be an excellent short-term diet for breaking through fat loss plateaus.

No longer.  Why?  Mercury contamination.

As we humans continue our polluting ways, toxic heavy metals get into the food chain.  As small fish are eaten by larger fish, mercury and other toxins build up in larger fish like tuna.  For that reason, it’s no longer a good idea to eat more than 1 or 2 servings of tuna weekly.

However, a temporary fish and water diet can still be beneficial.  The trick is to substitute smaller deep water, oily fish for tuna.

Which fish?  Eat a variety.  Excellent choices include wild caught salmon (such as sockeye salmon), Alaskan halibut, orange roughy, sardines, anchovies, Chilean sea bass, mackerel and trout.

Since some of these are more expensive than others and they have very different tastes and textures, try them for yourself before going on a 3 day fish diet, an updated version of the 3 day tuna diet.

If you do not typically eat a no or low carbohydrate diet, be prepared for headaches and other minor physical problems.  Don’t worry, though, about not ingesting enough carbohydrate:  the minimum daily requirement for carbohydrates is zero.  There’s no need to worry about not getting enough fiber for several days, either.

This diet is very simple.  Eat a serving of fish about every 3 or 4 waking hours.  Drink plenty of water.  It’s a good idea to supplement with multi-vitamin, multi-mineral pills.

Even if you are in good health and even though this is a temporary diet, it’s a good idea to check with your personal physician before changing any dietary or exercise patterns.

If you use this diet, feel free to share your results with others using the comments below.  Good luck!

There is a surprising amount of interest in discovering the best exercise to lose belly fat.  It’s probably not what you think.

Abdominal fat is a sign of insulin resistance.  Insulin is the primary fat storage hormone that spikes when someone eats too many carbohydrates [carbs].  How many carbs are too many?  The specific answer depends upon the individual; the general answer is “however many grams cause an insulin spike.”

The best exercise to lose belly fat is an exercise in discretion.  Permit me to explain.

People who have difficulty with emotional overeating, binge eating, compulsive overeating, and similar disorders usually suffer from carbohydrate addiction.

Whether they are simple or comples, when digested all carbs become sugar. The only real difference is that your body digests simple carbs more quickly than it does complex carbs.

Given a choice, your body will run on sugar rather than fat (and on fat rather than protein).  If you eat even slightly more sugar than you burn, your body will store it as fat.

Spot reduction is impossible.  The best exercise to lose belly fat is the same as the best exercise to lose fat.  Which exercise is that?  It’s the dietary exercise of eating a low carbohydrate diet.

Wouldn’t such an exercise to lose belly fat undermine your health?  Not at all.  The minimum daily requirement for carb consumption is zero.  Excellent health is possible even if you eat no carbs at all!

Still, because of the phytochemicals and fiber they provide, it’s a good idea to eat several servings of low-carb vegetables and berries daily.   Restricting your daily carb consumption to 25 grams or fewer is the best exercise to lose belly fat.

If you do that even for just a week or two, you may astound yourself at how rapidly your belly fat disappears.  Just doing that may drop your weight 20 lbs. in a month.  When your belly is trim again, go ahead and double or even triple your daily carb consumption.

That’s how to break a carb addiction.  Here’s a critical tip:  until your body composition is what you desire, make no exceptions.

The best exercise to lose belly fat is really an exercise to break a carb addiction.  If you smoked cigarettes and were trying to break a nicotine addiction, would you be wise to permit yourself a cigarette each day or each week?  Of course not.  That would merely prolong your addiction.

It’s the same with carbs:  keep your concumption to 25 grams or less daily with no exceptions.  If you permit exceptions, you’ll just prolong your addiction.  It’s actually easier to make no exceptions than it is to permit yourself carb treats occasionally!

Restricting carbs may be difficult to do for 2 or 3 days.  As your body transitions from burning sugar to burning fat, you may have cravings, headaches, and similar discomforts.

However, if you just stick it out, they will soon diminish and permanently disappear.

Right now, you may not be able to conceive going a day without products made from grains (such as wheat, rice, and corn including breads, pasta, breakfast cereals, and all those manufactured foods made with high fructose corn syrup), potatoes, fruits and fruit juices, and so on.  Well, I simply encourage you to go on a low carb diet for a few days and watch what happens.  Your cravings will magically begin to vanish!

If you don’t eat carbs, what should you eat?  In addition to low-carb veges and berries, eat fats and proteins from natural sources such as grass fed ungulates (like cattle, bison, and beefalo), wild caught fish, game animals, and so on.  You may be astonished at how much your mood improves.

This discretionary exercise to remove belly fat is best combined with drinking plenty of clean water (at least 2 or 3 quarts daily) and regular walking (such as two miles in 30 minutes 6 times weekly).

Of course, it’s best not to change your diet and exercise patterns without the blessing of your personal physician — assuming that advice is based on a recent, thorough physical examination and your physician understands how our bodies evolved.  If it weren’t a chief cause of the rampant diseases of civilization such as heart disease, diabetes, and obesity, the idea that humans should be getting most of their calories from carbs would ludicrous; instead, get most of your calories from natural fats and, secondarily, from proteins just like our ancestors did.

If you exercise to lose belly fat in this way, I’d appreciate your comments below.  They may encourage others to become healthier.

The way to stop sugar cravings is to break your addiction to carbohydrates.

When digested, all carbohydrates become sugar.  Consuming carbohydrates can spike your blood sugar levels, which overstimulates insulin release.  Insulin is the chief fat-storing hormone.

We live in an age when obesity, type II diabetes, heart disease, and the other diseases of civilization are epidemic.  We’ve been taught to consume carbohydrates instead of fats, which has had the result that we and our children are fatter than ever!

Without realizing it, many of us have become addicted to carbohydrates.

All carbohydrate consumption is unnecessary.  The minimum daily requirement for carbs is zero!

Our bodies respond to sugar with inflammation.  Chronic carbohydrate consumption can create chronic, subclinical inflammation, which speeds up aging and precipitates age-related diseases.

Want to slow your rate of aging?  Cut carb consumption.

As soon as we realize we are addicted and try to break the addiction, we begin to suffer withdrawal symptoms such as headaches and cravings.  What should we do?

The best way to stop sugar cravings is to eliminate or dramatically limit carbohydrate consumption, which means 25 grams or less daily.  This is less than one-tenth of what most Americans consume.

(It’s best to get those carbs from low-carb [preferably organic] vegetables.)

The good news is that the cravings will dramatically diminish in 72 hours or less as your body switches from burning sugar to burning fat.   If you are skeptical about that, why not find out for yourself?

As soon as your sugar cravings stop or dramatically diminish, you may be astounded to find yourself liberated from desires for candy, chocolate, pastries, bread, and pasta.  Hey, freedom feels good, doesn’t it?  It feels better than the taste of any food.  This may be the most important benefit of learning how to stop sugar cravings.

You may fear that, in order to succeed, you’ll have to spend lots of extra time monitoring portion sizes and weighing all your food.  Not!  It’s relatively easy to monitor grams of carbs, and, in just a few days, you won’t even have to look up foods in a food counts book.

Furthermore, when you free yourself, you’ll again begin to enjoy eating fats!  As long as your carb consumption is low, you should get most of your calories from fats.  Proteins should be your second largest source of calories.

If you also do some simple cardio exercise (such as brisk walking) and meditation (I suggest zazen), when you stop sugar cravings you are not only going to reduce the causes of inflammation, but also you are quite likely to lose body fat, which itself will diminish your chances of suffering from the epidemic diseases of civilization.

I offer specific guidance for how to eat well and to exercise well in other posts on this blog as well as at other sites such as http://www.lasting-weight-loss.com/ .

Why not stop sugar cravings?  If you’ll make no exceptions, which would prolong the quitting process [think of a smoker trying to quit who has a cigarette!], you will soon feel better, look better, and quickly begin to be healthier.

So, stop sugar cravings and live better.

Enjoy eating but tired of being too heavy?  There are plenty of delicious foods that boost metabolism.

If you ramp up your metabolic rate by eating the kinds of foods listed here (and avoiding those not listed here), your percentage of body fat will begin to decline noticeably in less than a week.

The word ‘metabolism’ refers to all those chemical processes in your body that produce energy.  So increasing your metabolism will increase how energetic you feel – and that can be a huge psychological boost.  Furthermore, if you persist in eating foods that boost metabolism and avoid those that don’t, your body composition will improve, which will improve your appearance.  How will you feel about that?

Why not, almost exclusively, eat foods that boost metabolism and allow your body to be as healthy as it can be?

If given a choice, your body will use sugar before it uses other nutrients.  If you are too heavy, it’s very likely because you have been fueling your body with sugar — and sugar that isn’t used has been deposited as fat.

How can you burn those fat deposits?  The basic idea is simple:  reduce your sugar consumption so that your body will burn fat instead of sugar.

What does this mean?  When digested, all carbohydrates become sugar.  If you significantly reduce your consumption of carbohydrates and replace them with the foods that boost metabolism listed here, your body will switch from burning sugars to burning fats, which is exactly what you want.

In grams, what’s the minimum daily requirement for carbohydrates?  Zero.  In grams, what’s the minimum daily requirement for fiber?  Zero.  In other words, you can be perfectly healthy without consuming any carbohydrates or fiber.

Nevertheless, the fiber and phytonutrients available in low-carb vegetables are valuable, which is why it’s a good idea to consume a small amount of several (preferably organic) low-carb vegetables daily.  If you consume less than 30 grams of carbs daily, you’ll be consuming about one-tenth of the amount of carbs consumed daily by most Americans — and, also, you’ll soon stop being as fat as they are.  In this sense, low carb vegetables are foods that boost metabolism.  Avoid all other carbohydrates.

It is not dietary fats but carbs that are the chief source of body fat for most people.  Ingested carbs are converted to blood sugar and then, if not burned, converted to fat cells with the aid of insulin, which is the main fat-building hormone.  What’s the basic element of most carbs?  Glucose!

(Dietary fats are not converted to blood sugar.  Dietary proteins can be converted to blood sugar, but the process is slow and inefficient.)

One reason proteins are important foods that boost metabolism is because your body has to work about twice as hard to process proteins than it does to process either fats or carbs.  So, by eating more proteins, you’ll take advantage of their powerful “thermic effect.”

Furthermore, natural foods high in proteins, which are the chief foods that boost metabolism, will make you feel more satiated than either fats or carbs, and that feeling will last longer, too.

Sadly, many popular foods should be avoided.  Eliminate fruits (including tomatoes) and fruit juices, dairy products (except butter, cream, hard cheese and some yogurts), candies, desserts, grains (such as wheat, corn, and rice) and grain products (such as pasta, bread, crackers, pastries, breakfast cereals, and snack foods).

If you are too fat, there are even more benefits to eating these foods that boost metabolism:  if you eat a sufficient quantity every 3 or 4 waking hours, you’ll automatically minimize food cravings.  Also, you will improve the glucose and insulin levels in your blood.  Your blood pressure will decrease.  Your “good” HDL cholesterol will increase and your “bad” LDL cholesterol is decrease (so the important cholerterol ratio will improve).  Your blood lipids (fats), such as triglycerides, will decrease.

From a genetic point of view, your body is very similar to the bodies of your ancestors 20,000 years ago.  The foods that boost metabolism are natural foods, ones that our species evolved eating.

The closer your diet is to the diet of your ancestors, the more healthy you are likely to be.

So, specifically, what are the foods that boost metabolism?

Flesh foods (including bone marrow) from game animals.  [This was the staple of our ancestors.]

Wild-caught fish and seafood.  (To help avoid fish that we humans have contaminated with heavy metals, it’s best today to eat large fish such as tuna sparingly.  Some of the fish with the best fats are wild-caught salmon such as sockeye, herring, mackerel, clams, halibut, Chilean sea bass, and anchovies.)

Muscle meat and organ meat from range-fed ungulates like cattle, beefalo, and bison that eat grass.  (Avoid flesh foods from ungulates that have, unnaturally, been fed corn, given antibiotics, and raised in feedlots.)

Organic chicken eggs.  (You may want to restrict yolk consumption to one daily.)

Organic poultry that has not been raised in cages.

The protein foods that boost metabolism from these five groups also have plenty of good fats.  The ideal ratio of omega 6 to omega 3 fats in your diet should be between 2 or 3 to 1, perhaps even 1 to 1. Unfortunately, some natural foods, such most nuts and seeds (except walnuts), have an unacceptably high ratio.

The best oils are flaxseed and coconut.  Walnut oil is acceptable.  If you use olive oil, blend it with one of the best oils.

Some engineered foods such as protein powders are acceptable as foods that boost metabolism if they are low carb and have a good potassium/sodium ratio (at least 3 mg potassium for every 1 mg sodium).  There are some other man-made products that are acceptable such as some some soy products, unsweetened soy milk, sugar-free Jell-O gelatin, coffee, tea, seltzer, mineral water, club soda, diet soda, chewing gum, very low-carb desserts, and one (for women) or two (for men) alcoholic drinks daily.

Peanuts and other legumes are not foods that boost metabolism.  Avoid them.

If you supplement foods that boost metabolism with regular strength training twice weekly, intense interval training twice weekly, and mild cardio such as brisk walking six times weekly, you may be able to transform your body significantly in 90 days or less.  Why not?

What else are you doing that is more important for your health?

It’s difficult to live well or wisely if you suffer from ill health.  It’s impossible to live well if you are dead.

[As always, this blog is educational.  How you use the information provided here is up to you.  In particular, it would be foolish to change your dietary or exercise habits without the blessing of your health care professional.  For example, diabetics should not eat more frequently than every 4 waking hours.]

Do you ever wonder, “What are the best exercises to lose weight quickly?”

If you are like me, there are times when a quick reduction in body fat would be very helpful.  Those are the times you’d really like to know how to lose weight quickly.

For example, when you are losing weight at a sustainable rate of 1 or 2 pounds weekly and hit a sticking point, you realize that you must blast through that plateau if you are to continue making progress.  Perhaps there’s a special occasion, such as a reunion or a wedding, coming up and you just want to look better.

If you are healthy, relatively fit, and have your physician’s blessing, I present in this post a program involving the best exercises to lose weight quickly that might work excellently for you.

If your percentage of body fat is under 10% if you are male or under 15% if you are female, the exercises to lose weight quickly presented here will still work, but you won’t see the dramatic, rapid decreases that fatter people will see.

So, what are the best exercises to lose weight quickly?

Of course, nobody knows the future.  Making the usual assumption that future correlations will be sufficiently similar to past correlations, for the simple reason that it works, I take my answer from what bodybuilders preparing for a contest actually do.  (For more about this, see Larry Pepe’s The Precontest Bible.)

All things considered, walking is the best exercise.  So it’s not surprising that walking is the best of the best exercises to lose weight quickly.  The chief idea here is simply to do more walking.

If you are willing to do that, to do some brief interval training, and to follow a low carbohydrate diet, it should be realistic for you to lose a significant amount of weight in just several weeks.

This program presupposes that you are already actually walking at least 2 miles in just under 30 minutes six times weekly.  If you are not, first work up slowly to doing that before you implement this three-step program.

First, double your walking.  Walk those 2 miles briskly in the morning and again in the evening.  When you are doing that with no difficulties (such as shin splints), go on to the next step.

Second, double your walking again.  Walk 4 miles briskly in the morning and again in the evening.  When you are doing that with no difficulties, go on to the next step.

Third, add a brief session of interval training in the middle of the day.  That’s it!

On my weight loss site (http://www.lasting-weight-loss.com), I provide detailed, step-by-step instructions on how to initiate and sustain an effective walking program and on how to do GXP interval training.  If you don’t already understand exactly what to do, teach yourself.  You must use a heart rate monitor for interval training.

From the standpoint of our prehistoric ancestors, that’s not a lot of exercise.  From our standpoint, though, it is.

Question:  if you eat as much as you like while using these exercises to lose weight quickly, are you going to lose weight quickly?  Of course not.

It’s not only important to eat well, it’s important to get sufficient rest and recovery.  I explain exactly how to do that on my weight loss site.  You should, for example, be eating at least 5 meals daily, consuming plenty of water, and getting plenty of sleep.

Here’s the most important requirement for maximizing the benefits you will obtain from this program of exercises to lose weight quickly:  consume no more than 25 grams of carbohydrates daily.

Don’t worry:  there is no minimum daily requirement for carbohydrates!  Having a few servings of (preferably organic) low carbohydrate vegetables daily is a good idea, but, for being healthy, you don’t need to consume any carbohydrates at all.

Unless you are already following a low carbohydrate diet, this may be the most difficult part of maximizing the benefits you get from exercises to lose weight quickly.  However, if you make no exceptions, most of the difficulty will be over in just 48 or 72 hours.  Why?

It takes that long for your body to shift from burning sugar to burning fat.  All carbohydrates, when digested, become sugar.  Therefore, when we eat lots of carbs, we are fueling ourselves with sugar.

That’s not desirable.  What we want is to fuel ourselves with fat, particularly stored body fat.  That’s the only way to improve your body composition.  Therefore, it’s necessary to limit carbohydrate consumption to enable your body to burn fat.

Unless you are diabetic or your physician advises it however, you do not have to stay on a low carbohydrate diet forever.  In fact, you don’t have to stay on this program of exercises to lose weight quickly forever.  What should you do when you reach the percentage of body fat that you desire?

Simply back off this program.  Make a change and observe the results.  If you are not compromising the results of your hard work from this program of exercises to lose weight quickly, make an additional change.  Here’s the sequence:

With respect to carbs, double daily consumption.  Then triple daily consumption.

With respect to exercises to lose weight quickly, eliminate one daily walk.  Eliminate four weekly interval training sessions and replace two of them with strength training sessions (to build muscle mass).  Reduce your remaining daily walk from 60 to 30 minutes.  Always ensure that you are getting one day weekly with no formal exercise.

So, in two or three months, you may be doing six 30 minute walks weekly, 2 interval training sessions weekly, and 2 strength-training sessions weekly.  That is a program that you may sustain until your dotage while enjoying a greatly reduced percentage of body fat.

If you have any comments or questions on this program of exercises to lose weight quickly, please use the comment section below.  Just do it — and you should amaze yourself and others with your quick transformation!

Blood sugar spikes are like suntans.

It’s good to spend some time in the sun every day.  Since our ancestors evolved doing it, it’s a natural activity for humans.  Vitamin D, which our bodies make from cholesterol, is the sunshine vitamin.  It’s an important vitamin that regulates calcium and phosphorus metabolism.

However, it’s not a good idea to spend too much time in the sun every day.  For some people in some conditions, fifteen minutes daily is a maximum duration without protection.  For others, an hour or even more is beneficial. Too much sun damages the skin and can cause skin cancer.

How much is too much?

It is not easy to tell during exposure.  If, afterwards, your skin turns reddish or brownish, your exposure was too long.  Some people think that a suntan looks healthy.  In fact, a suntan demonstrates too much exposure to the sun.

Jean Martin Charcot:  “Theories, no matter how pertinent, cannot eradicate the existence of facts.”

The dietary sources of blood sugar spikes are the consumption of carbohydrates and proteins.  Since dietary protein has a much smaller and slower effect with respect to blood sugar spikes, it’s the consumption of carbohydrates that is the chief dietary cause of blood sugar spikes.  (This does not entail that you can eat unlimited quantities of proteins.)

Since our ancestors evolved doing it, it’s natural, normal, and healthy for humans to consume some carbohydrates.  Notice the word “some.”  Our ancestors did not need to consume carbohydrates at all to be healthy.  Neither do we. This makes sense, when you think about it for a moment, because carbohydrates were not always available to them (and under-nutrition is a disease multiplier).  It explains why the minimum daily requirement in grams for carbohydrates is zero.

When we eat, it is not easy to tell if we are consuming too many carbohydrates.  The only real way to tell is to take readings after meals to see if we’ve produced blood sugar surges.

Just as suntans do not indicate good health, neither do blood sugar spikes.

Being healthy is enjoying a kind of physical, dynamic equilibrium.  Our bodies are constantly under assault in many ways; we suffer from exposure to parasites, viruses, bacteria, stress, extreme temperatures, predators, insufficient nutrients, improper nutrition, insufficient exercise, and so on.

Being healthy doesn’t mean that nothing is ever out of balance.  Being healthy means having a robust ability to bounce back after an assault.

Your body has evolved marvelous autonomic (self regulating) mechanisms.  Ill health is the result when those mechanisms break down.

If you get too much exposure to the sun, your skin will react.  You should behave so that you never get a suntan.

Similarly, blood sugar spikes primarily result from eating too many carbohydrates.

In theory, you should eat so that your body never has to endure blood sugar spikes.  In practice, you should eat so that your body only has to endure very mild blood sugar spikes.

The way to do that is to avoid consuming all foods except those that are very low in carbohydrates such as some (preferably organic) vegetables, including asparagus, bell peppers, broccoli, cabbage, celery, mushrooms, okra, pumpkin, scallions, snow peas, spinach, string beans, turnips, water chestnuts, and zucchini.  All these, and others, have important phytonutrients.

So, to eat well and avoid blood sugar spikes, get nearly all of your calories from fats and proteins.

In particular, avoid all those sources of carbohydrates that are unnatural for humans in the sense  that our ancestors did not evolve consuming then.  This means avoiding such ubiquitous foods as grains (including everything made from rice, wheat, and corn such as pastries, breads, pasta, crackers, cookies, pretzels, potato chips, taco shells, and popcorn), desserts, candy, milk, cottage cheese, fruit juice, beets, carrots, potatoes, tomatoes, commercially prepared soups, and beans.  It’s even a good idea to minimize or eliminate the consumption of all fruits.

Are you shocked?  If so, I strongly encourage you to update your own research about what constitutes excellent human nutrition.  [A free list of books that I recommend is available at:  http://www.lasting-weight-loss.com/best-self-help-books.html .]  Understanding what to eat and what not to eat and applying that understanding can add years of good health to your life.

The chief topic of this blog is living well, well-being.  It’s difficult to live well if you are unhealthy.  It’s impossible to live well if you are dead.

Pain is an important evil.

What is it?  How should it be managed or ameliorated?

Thinkers throughout the ages have been very indiscriminate in their uses of the words ‘pleasure’ and its opposites.  The culmination of this is in how Mill makes some of his points-not necessarily the points themselves, but in the terribly confusing way he makes them.

Let’s avoid that error by regimenting our usage.  Let ‘pain’ denote bodily discomforts only, in other words the whole range of unpleasant sensations caused solely by physical conditions.

Obviously, discomforts are mental objects in the sense that we are aware of them.  There’s no such thing as an “unfelt” discomfort or a discomfort without consciousness of it.  There’s no violation here of the dictum that all objects are singleoutable [see the post "Define Understanding"].

The critical distinction is between discomforts and suffering [see the post "Suffering:  Its Nature and Cure"].  Discomforts are not sufferings.  Discomfort is physical in the sense that it is caused only by physical conditions, whereas suffering is not physical in the sense that it is caused by psychological conditions.

Depending upon how we react to it, discomforts can be the occasions of suffering, but they need not be.

Pain is inevitable, whereas suffering is optional.

Here are some concrete examples of discomforts:  the discomfort you had the last time you had a cold or the flu, how your forearm felt just after you broke both bones in it, how your face felt after he punched it, and how your chest felt when you had the rash from shingles.

Since nobody gets through life without illnesses or injuries, discomforts are inevitable.

What should you do about a discomfort when you have it?

I don’t know.  Nobody knows [see the post "Knowing What To Do"].

What I am able to tell you is what I do with respect to discomfort.  If the three-step procedure that I use makes sense to you, adopt it.  (If you have a better procedure, please let me know!)

First, if possible, eliminate whatever physical condition is causing it.

If you are lying on the ground with a broken arm after having slipped and fallen, the cause [the fall] is over, but it’s time to deal with its effects by setting the bones, immobilizing them, and allowing them to mend.

If you are hurting from a bout of flu, there’s not much to be done.  Take your physician’s advice to avoid making things worse and to enable you to endure it with as much good cheer as possible.

Reducing discomforts often depends upon the state and availability of medical and surgical care.  This is one reason why those of us who live in First World countries are very fortunate, and another reason is that we live at a time centuries after the scientific revolution began.

Along with clinical depression and sleep disorders, chronic pain is a serious threat to happiness.  Even acute, temporary discomforts undermine happiness.  Even mild, temporary discomfort can be annoying!  This is why discomfort is an important evil, and why it’s important to do whatever is possible to reduce or eliminate it.

Also, discomforts evolved to help us live better.  Mother Nature doesn’t want you to use a broken bone until it heals.  It’s foolish to try to live better by ignoring discomforts.

Second, don’t make it worse.

If you are ill and your physician recommends plenty of bed rest and clear fluids, stay in bed and drink lots of clear fluids!  Since your immune system is already stressed, if you fail to “listen” to your body, you risk making your illness worse.  That seems obvious, but my physician father had lots of stories about patients who failed to take their medication or otherwise do what he told them to do with bad consequences.

It also means not turning your discomforts into suffering.  You never have to do this.  This leads to my final suggestion.

Third, accept your pain.

Once you have done what is possible to reduce or eliminate it, let it go.  Accept it and, as much as possible, get on with your life.

Do not play the victim and begin generating negative thoughts.  That’s exactly how to turn your pain into suffering.  As soon as you begin feeling sorry for yourself, realize what you are doing and let that train of thoughts go.

Avoid the perverse tendency to attach to your pain.  It may seem to provide a handy excuse, an obviously justification for living poorly, which seems to be the reason why many people turn their pains into suffering.  They create their own obstacles to living well and get stuck envying the lives of others.  What a foolish waste of life!

The best way to accept pain and get on with your life is to have a daily breathing (spiritual) practice such as zazen meditation.  [For more this topic, see the spiritual well-being section of this blog.]

In fact, as long as you don’t take it personally and resent it, pain can be the best spiritual teacher!

The question here about having a protein shake is:  “What’s the best way to maximize the benefits of strength training?”

After all, strength training is hard work.  It opens an anabolic opportunity that it is foolish not to maximize.

It’s important to remember that you don’t grow in the gym; instead, what you do in the gym should stimulate growth during recovery.  Proper nutrition and recovery are as important as proper training.

The way to begin to maximize your benefits from training is to have a well-designed shake within 30 minutes of the end of a workout. I always have a protein shake within 10 minutes of finishing.

According to the research presented in NUTRIENT TIMING, the initial post-strength-training shake should have 40- 50 grams of high-glycemic carbs, about 15 grams of whey protein, 1-2 grams of leucine, and 1-2 grams of L-glutamine.

I’m not aware of any commercial product that exactly fits this description. However, Musclelink’s RecoverX comes close. It’s what I use after strength training.

If you want to try it, blend two heaping scoops of RecoverX in 8 oz. of pure, cold water. That yields: 295 calories / 40 grams of carbs / 27 grams of proteins / 3 grams fats (.5 grams saturated fat).

It also provides 7 grams of glutamine peptide. With respect to protein, this protein shake is made with whey protein concentrate and hydrolyzed whey protein; with respect to carbs, it’s made with glucose and maltodextrin. It tastes delicious.  (With all the high glycemic carbs, that’s the easy part!)

This shake (or something equivalent) will help to shift your body from a catabolic to an anabolic state. It will speed the elimination of metabolic wastes and replenish muscle glycogen stores.

It will help your body initiate tissue repair and boost the immune system. Faithfully using this shake after each strength workout will make a significant difference over time.

The best shake includes whey to maximize the benefits of training during and after workouts. If you do not tolerate whey protein powder, use soy or rice protein powder in your protein shakes. If possible, though, use whey.