Good nutrition is critical to a healthy lifestyle, yet there is so much information out there, most people do not have a clear understanding as to what they should and should not be eating. This article will simplify things.

First off, no more will you eat three big meals during the course of the day. To optimize your metabolism and your digestive system, break the day down with five to six small and nutritious meals. We will cover what these meals should be in a second.

When you clog your system with three big meals, your metabolism slows down and your digestive system cannot handle all the food. As a result, you end up with partially-digested food and, for most people, a tired and fatigued feeling.

You want to make sure you eat within one hour of waking up. In other words, do not skip breakfast! If you take away just one thing from this article, let it be that you should eat a big and nutritious meal within one hour of waking up. Furthermore, do not eat within two hours of going to bed. The last thing you want is food sitting in your stomach when your metabolism is at its slowest.

Most people know which foods they should stay away from. The obvious ones include desserts, high-fat meals, candy, fast food and fried food. In fact, most people will feel a big difference simply by staying away from these kinds of foods. The not-so-obvious ones include:

1. Pasta (with the exception being wheat pasta)
2. Fat-free foods (because they are filled with sugar and chemicals)
3. Most frozen meals (because of all the preservatives)
4. Processed meats like fake cold cuts (because of all the preservatives and chemicals)
5. Soda and juices (because of the sugar)
6. Creamy meals (because of the fat)

Furthermore, start getting in the habit of reading the ingredients of the food you buy. If sugar is one of the first three ingredients listed, do not buy it. And if you see hydrogenated oils listed anywhere in the list of ingredients, stay far away. These kinds of fats, called Trans fats, wreck havoc on your body.

As far as what to eat, buying anything at the grocery from the following list is a straight path to better health. These foods include:

1. Fruits like bananas, berries and apples
2. Whole grains including bread and pasta
3. Oatmeal (not the microwave, sugar mix)
4. Low-fat dairy including milk and yogurt
5. Chicken, turkey and fish
6. Vegetables like spinach, squash and tomatoes
7. Olive oil and fresh garlic
8. Eggs
9. Natural peanut butter (the regular kind contains hydrogenated oils)
10. Beans and legumes
11. Almonds and other nuts
12. Water

Simply focus on staying away from the foods you should not eat and buy more of the foods listed above. You will find that the longer you make an effort to do this, the more will power you will slowly develop.

Obviously sometimes you are going to slip, but this is not about perfection. Make a conscious effort to improve your eating habits and you will notice a huge difference in how you look and feel. After all, you are what you eat.

Ryan Cote is the owner of http://www.SimpleHealth123.com, a health & wellness resource that is committed to helping people better their health. Stop by today and subscribe to his free e-course, 4 Days to Better Health.

Tags: nutritious, mineral supplement, antioxidant, medicinal, dietary

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Annemarie Colbin, in her book, Food and Healing, presents a chapter on altering diet to combat specific conditions. Her recommendations are based on her own experience as a student of macrobiotics and health food, and a teacher of natural healing and balanced eating. As well as her observations of those whom she treated in consultations, and the transformations of her students over the years. Despite her background in macrobiotics and vegetarianism, Annemarie isn’t dogmatic about food - she recognizes that what is healing for one person, during a particular period of their life, may not be healing for others, or even for that same person at different stages of their life.

She takes as her cue the fact that regular foods have been used for their medicinal value in most traditional cultures. The underlying principle is one of restoring balance. Illness is considered a state of imbalance within the body. And like in homeopathy, she believes that remedies can cause similar symptoms to that which they cure - if the symptoms they can cure are not present, and they are taken in sufficient quantity. So, the remedy should no longer be taken once the symptoms of imbalance, the illness or condition, disappears. Otherwise, the remedy may in fact cause similar symptoms to reappear. If this is the case, the remedy should not be taken again, as the remedies are (according to this principle), causing the new symptoms. Serious medical conditions she does not rely on food cures for. She recognizes that Western medicine also has its place. But food being what it is, can also be a useful healing adjunct in those situations.

One thing that impressed her was food’s ability to alter our metabolism quickly. She described this epiphany after cooking a meal for some South American friends, who were used to a diet that was high in protein and fats. When they ate the meal prepared by her, which was high in complex carbohydrates like whole grains and legumes, and low in fat, sugar (for dessert), and low in protein, they found alcohol affected them in a way it usually didn’t. The same amount they normally drank, which did not make them drunk with their usual fare, got them quite tipsy on hers. She observed from this that alcohol, being expansive in nature, balanced out the highly contractive protein and fat they normally ate. These ideas, of particular foods having an expansive or contractive nature, is one that she learnt from the Oriental healing systems she studied.

This approach touches on a core difference between Western understanding of both food, and medicine, and traditional Chinese medicine’s (TCM). TCM has as its conceptual underpinning, the study of relationships between things. Western approaches, to both nutrition and medicine, are based on a reductionist approach. They explore isolated nutrients, diseases that are studied under the microscope, with a symptom that then suggests possible causes, defined within a narrow and static frame. Ted Kaptchuk illustrates this when he describes how, when he was studying TCM in Macao, one of his teachers was talking about shingles. His teacher described how shingles on the face was different to shingles elsewhere, say, on the trunk. The reason behind this was that “the Chinese view demanded another perspective - seeing the relationship of the symptom to the whole body”. (Kaptchuk) he goes on to say: “The question of cause and effect is always secondary to the overall pattern…The total configurations, the patterns of disharmony, provide the framework for treatment.” (Kaptchuk)

References: Ted Kaptchuk, Chinese Medicine, The Web That Has No Weaver (Rider Books, London)
Annemarie Colbin, Food As Healing (Ballantine Books, New York)

If you’re interested more in a TCM approach to acne, check out this article on acne natural cures versus acne treatments. Or, if you’d like to know what’s good about herbal medicine, be sure to check out this article. Find out the difference between strong and gentle herbs, as well as using the whole plant extract versus just the active constituents. Rebecca Prescott publishes the website on vitamins, http://www.vitaminstohealth.com.

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Simply, Nutrition is studying the unique relationship between the states of health and disease and diet. Particularly the study of food. Nutrition is so important because lack of neccessary nutrients can allow viruses and diseases to thrive which can lead to illness and even death.

Nutrition is mostly based in the middle of the two extremes; that being between prime health and malnutrition. In that middle there is a wide range of diseases that can be caused and prevented due to changes in diet. Scurvy is a common disease that can result from unhealthy diet. It is important to note that it is not just malnutrition that can cause problems, and that excesses and imbalances also play a large role.

Trying to understand how specific aspects of diet influence the health of the boy is what the science of nutrition is about. Often times individuals who are having problems with the performance of their body will go to visit an nutrionist. The nutritionist will spend time analyzing the patient’s health, diet, daily routine, and more. From the information that they collect they will put together a plan, “diet”, which they will give to the patient to follow to help them correct their mistakes in diet, and to get them back on track. Nutritionists often work in coordination with personal trainers, when involved with diet, and muscle problems, to help increase the activity and the overall healthiness of their patient.

Living a healthy lifestyle is more about what you eat. It’s an entire package: What you eat, How you sleep, The air you breathe, How active you are,etc. Taking steps to improve your lifestyle are actually quite simple. Simple differences like taking an apple over a chocolate bar, or biking over walking, are easy to make and can make the world of a difference!

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Ryan Fyfe is the owner and operator of Online Nutrition Degree - http://www.online-nutrition-degree.com, which is the best site on the internet for all Online Nutrition Degree related information.

Tags: antioxidant, vitamin, Nutrition Information, nutritional, mineral supplement

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