Some of my clients are reluctant to let go of certain things, jobs, and people in their lives because of fear. They’re afraid of what will happen if they have to deal with life without X. My worst fear was the idea of losing my father. I thought I’d be alone and that I wouldn’t be able to cope with life in general. I had this fear for many, many years. In January of 2010, my father passed away. In the summer of 2009, my dad got very sick and that’s when I started to have to face my fear. I lived through it and I’m thriving. Facing a fear is a very powerful thing because a fear can have a very tight grip on your life. People make huge decisions in their lives based on a fear. This quote from Eleanor Roosevelt is very true and it’s something to remember. It’s what happened to me.  (I found it while reading Bethenny Frankel’s new book called A Place of Yes.)

“You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, “I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along. ” -Eleanor Roosevelt

Fight Cellulite with Blueberries? Yes You Can.

Beyond a superfood, these little berries help you lose weight. By Sara Novak April 14, 2011 (This is from www.planetgreen.discovery.com)

Blueberries have a great reputation and with good reason. Their abundance of polyphenols fight the free radicals that can cause disease and agingdown the line. But new studies make thissuperfood even more appealing.

According to research done at Texas Women’s College and reported in Time, blueberries actuallyhelp fight fat in a real way.

[Researcher Shiwani Moghe] applied polyphenols extracted from blueberries directly to tissue samples from mice in petri dishes, at three varying doses. What she found was encouraging. The samples treated with polyphenols had less fat than the control sample, and the effect was dose dependent: the sample given the largest dose of polyphenols had a 73 percent decrease in lipid cells, while the smallest dose led to a 27 percent decrease.

“We still need to test this dose in humans, to make sure there are no adverse effects, and to see if the doses are as effective. This is a burgeoning area of research. Determining the best dose for humans will be important,” Moghe said in a statement. “The promise is there for blueberries to help reduce adipose tissue from forming in the body.”

Other Foods That Fight Fat

Leafy greens, beans, legumes, and garlic are also known to fight fat, according to Michelle Schoffro Cook on Planet Green. These foods strengthen your liver (your body’s main fat-metabolizing organ) to speed up the body’s ability to fight fat.

This is from the April 25, 2011 issue of US magazine.

According the article in Us magazine, Glee’s Matthew Morrison attributes his 6 pack seen on his Details magazine cover to eating nothing but sweet potatoes for 3 days! “The potato acts as a sponge,” he claims of the nutrient rich veggie. “Your body literally shrinks and gets ripped and tight.”

I’m  not sure if this works but it certainly can’t hurt to try. At the very least, you would lose a few pounds. Eating nothing but sweet potatoes for 3 days is a typical mono diet. The idea is to eat as much as you want of any one type of food. (Don’t add butter to the potatoes.) People often do this with baked potatoes, plain pasta, or plain rice. You can also try it with one type of fruit. It’s a great way to cleanse and get a jump start for a healthy diet and eating program. I think it’s best to make a long weekend out of this. Spend the weekend resting, reading, watching great movies, and eating your sweet potatoes. Give your mind and body a chance to rest.

If any of you try this, please leave a comment here and tell me what you think.

This is from the May 2011 issue of Redbook magazine. I love strawberries which is why I’m sharing this article with you.

Strawberries are among the most antioxidant-rich fruits which means they’ve got major cancer-fighting potential. One serving of strawberries (8 strawberries) contains only 50 calories but has 160 percent of your daily vitamin C and 3 grams of fiber. Organic is always best if you can get it.

Here are some Redbook favorites for eating strawberries.

Spinach salad with walnuts and feta

Layered with peanut butter instead of jelly on a sandwich (can’t wait to try this one).

Drizzeled with balsamic vinegar for a low-cal snack or dessert.

I picked up a new book yesterday called The Small Change Diet by Keri Gans. The basic idea of the book is that small changes can yield big weight loss results. Her advice is solid and anyone can benefit from it. Here are two things situations that are big problems for a lot of people and what to do about them. (This is from pages 22 and 23 of Keri’s book.)

I don’t have time to eat lunch at work until 2 PM, and by then I’m so hungry that I overeat!

Small Change SOlution: If you’ve gone for more than four hours without fuel, of course you’re going to want to overeat. It is crucial that you have a midmorning snack to tide you over. Keep a healthy morning “extra” on hand by making your morning snack a portable part of your breakfast prep. Bananas and Geek-style yogurt (Greek style yogurt is higher in protein than regular yogurt) are great options.

I am usualy starved at 4 PM, but I wait until I get home to eat.

Small Change Solution: Skipping an afternoon snack when you are already starved will only ensure that you will overeat when you get home. Create a snack drawer in your desk, and keep it stocked for a week with snacks that don’t need to be refrigerated. A piece of fruit (which can also satisfy a late-day sweet craving) with a serving of nuts, a whole wheat crispbread spread with peanut butter, or a small bag of soy chips could be a good choice.

This information is from eHarmony Advice on eHarmony.com. I’ve never been married but I have been in serious relationships. I can say without a doubt that this advice is definitely worth taking seriously.

Nothing is more toxic to new relationships than the nagging feeling there is more to your partner than meets the eye. Someone who is serious about you is never evasive or vague. He gives you straight answers about his work, his friends, his past relationships, and how he spends his spare time.

When a man takes you to meet the important people in his life, it means one of the following: (a) he thinks you are wonderful and worth showing off—and is sure others will agree; or (b) he thinks you are wonderful and worth showing off—and doesn’t care what anyone else thinks. Either way it’s a good sign that, to him, you are much more than a casual acquaintance.

If he plays softball in the city recreation league, he wants you in the bleachers for the games. If he loves scuba diving, he gives you a brochure about lessons at a local pool so you can one day plan a diving trip together. The point is, he doesn’t compartmentalize his life. He’s serious enough to share it all with you.

Everyone is busy these days, with endless deadlines and demands. But someone who is excited about a relationship with you will not let those things rob him of your time together. He’ll go into work early rather than risk being stuck in the office that night when you’ve got a date. He’ll trim the fat from his routine. He’ll turn down competing offers—anything to be with you when he said he would.

The difference between common small talk and a genuine desire to know you can be summed up in a single word: questions. Lots of them. If you tell him you studied creative writing in college, the interested man will want to know what drew you to that major . . . whether you write novels or poetry or screenplays . . . your favorite books of all time . . . what you’ve written lately and whether he may (please, please) read it. If you get to the end of an evening and realize the man you’re with has kept you talking the whole time about yourself, be assured that he’s quite taken with you.

The man who thinks of you as more than a “date” will involve you in his decisions about everything from which shoes you like best when he’s shopping to how he should handle a crisis at work. The guy who is serious about you is serious about your thoughts and opinions. It goes without saying (though we’ll say it anyway) that the above ideas are posted on a two-way street: these same six signs are how HE will know you’re serious as well.

This information is taken from DukanDiet.com and a Yahoo News article.

THE #1 INTERNATIONAL DIET COMING TO THE US IN SPRING 2011

The Dukan Diet.

The Dukan Diet has been getting a lot of attention lately because of royal bride to be, Kate Middleton. Too learn more about this diet, read the book The Dukan Diet which is coming out on April 19, 2011. The diet is the big thing right now. On the Cosmo radio show “Wake Up with Taylor”  Dr. Jen Wider said this week that she’s now learning about the Dukan Diet so that she can discuss it on the show. I’ve ordered the book and I plan on reading the book and keeping an open mind but from what I’ve read so far, this diet seems like the Atkins diet. Whatever works. You be the judge.

Devised by Dr. Pierre Dukan, a French medical doctor who spent his career helping people to lose weight, the Dukan Diet rejects counting calories and promises permanent weight loss while allowing its followers to eat as much as they like.

Originally introduced in France in 2000, Dukan Diet swept across France and remained the number one diet for the last 10 years. Since, Dukan Diet has grown to become an international phenomenon of unprecedented impact in over 100 countries.

The Dukan Method is a high protein, low fat, low carb diet. It proposes a healthy eating plan based on proteins and vegetables, 100 foods in total including 72 from the animal world and 28 from the plant world. And what’s best, it’s “EAT AS MUCH AS YOU LIKE.”

Here’s the skinny (pun intended) from the Yahoo News article.

The Dukan Diet –How does it work?

“[The Dukan Diet] is organized into four phases: attack, cruise, consolidation and stabilization. The first encourages dieters to eat as much as they want of non-fatty, protein-rich foods, including oat bran (a key component) washed down with oceans of water,” New York Times reporter Elaine Sciolino wrote recently.

“The second stage introduces vegetables, but no fruit; the third brings with it two slices of bread, a serving of cheese and fruit, and two servings of carbohydrates a day, with two weekly ‘celebration’ meals with wine and dessert (the diet is French, after all); and the final stage six days a week of ‘anything goes’ and one day of reversion to strict protein-only stage one — for the rest of your life.”

I’ve tried the Atkins diet. I think it can be great for inactive people who really need to lose a lot of weight. You can eat a lot of satisfying food and not have to deal with feeling hungry. I personally love the idea of Atkins but it doesn’t work for me. The reason it doesn’t work is because I have a pretty active lifestyle. I go to the gym 5 to 6 days a week. I work out with a trainer 3 times a week. Our sessions are hard core (as far as I’m concerned). I work out with heavy weights (for me). Some examples of what  I do;  I do squats with 85 pounds and I do push-up planks with a 25 pound plate on my back.

I tried to do an Atkins type diet. All that happened was that I was so weak that I could barely function. I wasn’t getting much out of my workouts because I didn’t have the strength to go through them. I looked and felt terrible. I think it’s great to stick with a low carb diet but some good carbs can make a huge difference if you plan on working out a lot. That being said, I do not believe in a one size fits all diet plan. That’s the reason I’m always telling you guys about different approaches to dieting.

If you have any thoughts or comments about the Dukan Diet or Atkins, I’d love to know what you think. Either comment on this blog post or send me an email at tracy@tracystanley.com.

This one is from the April 4th, 2011 issue of Star magazine.

“Kim likes to make her own face masks”, one of her style and beauty confidantes tells Star. “She whips up avocado and honey, buttermilk, yogurt and oats.” Her sisters say that she has the softest skin of them all, thanks to her secret recipe.

Here’s a style tip of Kim’s, also from Star magazine. “For daytime she likes to wear a white tank top with a skintight black zip-up jacket and skintight black workout pants. She says this trick ’shaves off pounds’. She’s also into mini dresses because she thinks they make her look thinner.”

This one is from An A-Z Guide to Healing Foods by Elise Marie Collins.

In general, fruit and vegetable portions are rather small, making it easy to get your fill. According to the American Cancer Society, one serving of fruit or vegetables is equal to the following:

• 1/2 cup fruit
• 1 medium piece of fruit
• 1/2 cup dried fruit
• 3/4 cup (6 ounces) of 100% fruit or vegetable juice
• 1 cup of raw leafy vegetables
• 1/2 cup cooked or raw vegetables

This on is from an article by Dr. Andrew Weil called “How can I cure my anxiety without drugs?”. It’s from the March 2011 issue of Prevention magazine.

Here, in brief, are Dr. Weil’s suggestions. (For the full article, read Prevention magazine.)

Go Herbal. Try Kava and Passionflower. These may be the most effective anit-anxiety herbs. Some people have also had success with Valerian. (I’ve had Valerian tea before going to sleep. It’s very calming but it smells gross.)

Feast on Fish. Studies show that people with chronic anxiety have lwer than normal levels of omega-3 fatty acids. Fatty fish contain Omega-3.

Say Yes to Yoga. Just one hour-long session of yoga offers the GABA-boosting effects of conventional medications with no side effects. Studies show that yoga is more effective than walking, although it’s unclear why.

Sip Green Tea. The amino acid L-theatine, which gives green tea its unique flavor, also has calming effects.