Eat Slowly

There really is something worth investigating about eating slowly, the naturally lightest person I know is also the slowest eater I know, he chews his food, putting his cutlery down to give him to time to savor the food.

The theory behind eating slow is that it gives the body time to deliver messages to the brain to state that you are full, it also gives you change to fully be aware of the food you are eating. You can then decide if it appropriate for you. Sometimes we eat food so quickly that we do not give ourselves time to realise if this is the correct food at the correct time for us.

If you would like to try this method why not use the suggested technique of chewing your food 20 times between each mouthful.

Please comment below or email us to let us know how you get on because along with eating consciously this method makes a huge difference to your weight loss.

Kind regards
Mindful Mark

It's Not a Diet

This quote seems to wrap up an overall theme for this week and that is being healthy and seeing food as a fuel, your body as a machine and to put the best fuel in your body to operate and live as long as possible. I guess it is also called a healthier lifestyle which has the side effect of weight loss.

I hope this has helped and if you want more information on how to gain a healthier lifestyle why not checkout the 'Best Weight Loss Tip Ever' post we did a little while back.

Take care and speak soon
Mindful Mark

5 Questions to Ask Yourself

I found these 5 questions to ask yourself before you eat on mizfits and they really do make you think.

1. Am I dehydrated?
2. Am I trying to overcome emotions with food?
3. Am I physically exhausted?
4. Am I eating to be polite?
5. Do I need to sustain my body?

These are really useful questions because if you are dehydrated drink water before eating anything, if it is emotional consumption deal with the emotions first, if you are tired do you need food or sleep is the decision to make, if it is to be polite you have to make a difficult decision to follow your path or please someone else. Finally question 5 is the crux of why we eat and perhaps the only reason we should eat and that is it going to help me live longer and healthier?

Take and I hope you found this post helpful.
Mindful Mark

Simple Weight Loss Choice

Apart from Shawshank Redemption being my favourite film this key message in the film is very strong and poignant to weight loss.

Why I hear you ask, because some food we put in our body are helping shorten our life and others are helping extend it. the ones which help extend it are obvious and healthy for us. Now I am not saying healthy food will help us live for ever, however what I am saying is healthy food increases our chances of living longer and there for spending more time with those we love. A side effect of eating healthy is weight loss. So what is it going to be when you choose your next meal...

"I guess it comes down to simple choice, really.
Get busy living, or get busy dying."

Remember that food is our fuel so putting the best in keeps the machine (body) running to optimum level for longer, just like any machinery that is well maintained is generally going to last longer than one which is not.

I would love to hear your comments on this post.

Take cake
Mindful Mark

You Feel What You eat

This is the whole purpose of eating, is stay alive as long as possible in a happy and healthy way so we can spend time with the one we love. A side effect of eating well and clean is that we will operate at optimum weight, so weight loss would be fixed as a by product of eating healthy.

Eat Crap = Feel Like Crap
Eat Nothing = Feel Like Nothing
Eat Healthy = Feel Helathy
Eat Well = Being Well

Is how I would change the quote because we have the power in this moment to choose what to put in our mouth to make us feel like either, Crap, Nothing, Healthy or Well. In this moment what are you going to choose?

Take care and speak soon
Mindful Mark

Water and Weight Loss

You may be surprised just how helpful water can be at helping you lose weight.

If you would like to learn more please listen to the audio of visit our website for the audio transcript and more information about Mind Body Weight Loss.

Don't Eat Less, Eat Right

The premise of ' Don't eat less, Eat Right' is pretty much self explanatory but has some reallt really interesting points hidden inside.

One point being that if we eat healthily we will lose weight as side result. So make you aim to eat healthy and don't focus on the weight loss because it will happen.

The next point is that this piece of weight loss advice fits in with what we at Mind Body Weight Loss believe is the best weight loss strategy ever:

"The best strategy we have got is to just add in good stuff and eventually it will crowd out the bad stuff. It’s so simple and deactivates the mental neurosis we have about diets and what we have to eat"
Source – David Wolfe

 The final point that I feel this tip falls under is the 'Eat Less CRAP, Eat More FOOD' because if you eat less crap and and eat more healthy food you are still eating the same amount, but the difference is that you are eating more healthy and as a result the weight will come off.

I hope you found this post helpful.

Take care and speak soon.
Mindful Mark

Food is Fuel

I have just found this Fuel is Food metaphor to help you lose weight and I really had to share it with you!

"You wouldn't starve your car of fuel and expect it to run efficiently would you?

Successful weight loss is not about starving, it about fueling your body with the healthy, low calorie food it needs to help you lose weight."

This fits in with what we at Mind Body Weight Loss feel is the best weight loss tip ever!

Take care and speak soon.
Mindful Mark

Hunger and Emotions - Eating When You Are hungry

Because hunger and emotions are experienced in the stomach area of the body sometime it can be hard to tell the difference. The importance of Eating when You are Hungry is highlighted because if you eat because of your emotions you are much more likely to put weight on. What this post is aim to to is share a few of pointers of how you recognise your hunger and act upon it.

1. Eat regular healthy meals this way you won't have extreme feelings of hunger
2. Use a hunger scale, this helps set in a conscious way exactly how hungry you are, this is great way to tell the difference between emotions and hunger
3. Consciously eat being fully aware of the tastes, textures, smells and the messages your body is sending. One great way to experience eating consciously is to try the 'Eating a Raisin Experiment'
4. Be kind to yourself and make your life easier, for example checking your hunger scale to see if it above 5 prior to any food shopping trip.

I hope you have found this post helpful and remember to ask yourself next time you think you are hungry. How hungry am I on the hunger scale.

Take care and happy weight loss.

Zen Weight Loss Tips - Part 3

Welcome the third part of Zen Weight Loss Tips we hope you are find this series of post helpful.

This section focuses on Healthy eating.

Water water water. It kick-starts your metabolism. Stop drinking soda.

This is such great advice, I think I read somewhere that we are made up of 90% water so drinking it can only be a good thing. Also check out this post which explains what fizzy drinks does to your body it may stop you drinking them, like it did me.

Be mindful of what you are eating. Keep a food journal or diary. Seeing it in writing always gives it weight and helps reveal patterns or triggers.

Eating consciously is a fantastic way to lose weight, with no distractions you can listen to when you are full. Learn how to eat consciously from this post.

 Eat mostly raw fruits, veggies and nuts.

Such a great tip which we at Mind Body Weight Loss love and have a post called 'Eat Less CRAP, Eat More FOOD' which explains more

Cut out sugar.

In the documentary 'Hungry for Change' sugar was compared to cocaine because the sugar plant like the coca plant is good for you. It is just the refining of both products which make them harmful to us as living beings.  Also check out the post title 'Sugar and Obesity' which also has an interesting excerpt from a radio show which explain Sugar and its effect on your body further.

Positive change is easier than negative change. Instead of thinking of foods that are “bad” and that you feel like you need to cut out, think about all the new recipes and foods you will get to try if you start experimenting with more vegetables, more beans, more spices, etc.

Positive change is so much better which why like the Zen Weight Loss Tip above we feel that adding and focusing on healthier foods is a much better way to lose weight. As this blog post called 'Best Weight Loss Tip, Ever! ' helps demonstrate.

If you would like to learn more you can check out the other parts in this series:
Zen Weight Loss Tips - Part 1
Zen Weight Loss Tips - Part 2
Zen Weight Loss Tips - Part 4

Take care and speak soon.
Mindful Mark

Healing Food

In an interesting article discussing Healing Food really got me thinking. Mark Hyman discusses his trip to China which confirmed his belief that Food is the best medicine.

After 20 years of practice, treating thousands of patients with chronic illnesses, I recognized, yet again, that the most powerful tool in my toolkit is food. Not surgery, not medication. What I saw in China is what I have been teaching my patients for decades: to literally eat their medicine and heal through food.
However, the notion that food is anything other than calories for energy and sustaining life is foreign to most Westerners.
Source - organicconnectmag.com

This is perhaps the key to our weight issues as a western culture, we generally see food as a treat and something we deserve and then start trying to reduce our calories to lose weight. If we could change our food mindset from 'Live to Eat' into 'Eat to Live' as the Chinese do we can live a longer, healthier and happier life with those we love.

The point of taking ownership of our life and health by developing the mindset of food as the best medicine to keep us alive for the longest period of time is one we at Mind Body Weight Loss fully support. This will be the basis of our Mind Body Weight Loss Product which is currently in it's early stages of being developed.

Another method of how the Chinese have demonstrated a way that we can take control of our health is when we visit the doctors . The difference is that we generally go to the doctors when we are poorly and ask them to make us better, which is giving our power away. In Chinese traditional medicine people visit there Doctors and ask 'How can I stay healthy?', which is self empowerment at its best. This is the type of mindset we at Mind Body Weight Loss are looking to help you foster. Until this time when our product has been developed you may want to checkout these alternatives, which are quite different but do help you focus on you weight loss mindset:

• The Weight Loss Attitude
• The Gabriel Method
• The Fat Loss Code

Taking ownership and viewing food as a fantastic source to stay healthy with the by product of losing weight is a fantastic way to change our perception to food and life in general. This new way of thinking can really extend our motivation too because its focus is on empowering us to stay alive as long as possible to be with the ones we love.

Take care and speak soon
Mindful Mark

Good Health a Great Way to Live

Today I would just like to share a quick quote which moved me and really made me thing and clarify a belief of Good Health a Great Way to Live.

The quote is this:

"Good health is simply the slowest way a human being can die."
author unknown

It moved me for 2 reason one is the realisation that, as much as we may not want to, we are all going to die. We can see this all around us there is nobody alive today who was born 150 years ago. From this we work out that we are only here for a limited time only. There is nothing we can do about it. However from the quote above shares with us that with good health we can slow the dying process down. And surely slowing down so we can spend more time on this planet with the ones we love and care is great thing to do. I say this for the reason of motivation because with good health comes our optimum healthy weight. Our weight loss can just be a by product of living healthy to spend more time with our family, friends and others. So please consider this as option, stop focusing on weight loss and concentrate on being healthy and dieing (no I did not miss the 't' out of dieting, I said dieing) as slowly as possible.

Some of the best way we can get health and slow down our dieing process is by reading these blog posts:

• Eat Less CRAP, Eat More FOOD
• Quote which makes you think about the Importance of Food
• The Best Weight Loss Strategy
• Good Food to Eat for Weight Loss

I hope you found this post thought provoking and made you think about weight loss in a different way and motivated you to try to live in a healthy and lose weight as a by product of a healthy lifestyle to live longer.

Kind regards
Mindful Mark

p.s. If you wanted read more about living a longer life, I found the above quote in the above on this website.

Quote that Shows The Importance of Food

Following on from the post on the 'Importance of Food' I have just found this quote which helps demonstrate it further.

"Homicide is 0.8% of deaths. Diet-related death is over 60%. But no one talks about it."
Jamie Oliver Click to Tweet

So as we have said before, by eating the correct food and diet we can extend our life and spend more time with the ones we love. We can do this by following some of the tips from food expert Michael Pollan. The best part of eating healthy to extend our life is that we lose weight as a side benefit. It is abit of a Win-Win if you ask me.

Speak soon
Can Do Craig

Good Food to Eat for Weight Loss

Michael Pollan the author of Food Rules has some fantastic tips for Good Food to Eat for Weight Loss, some of which I am going share with you below:

"Don't eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food."
Click to Tweet

"Avoid food products containing ingredients that no ordinary human would keep in the pantry."
Click to Tweet

"Avoid food products that contain more than five ingredients."
Click to Tweet

"Avoid foods you see advertised on television."
Click to Tweet

"Eat only foods that will eventually rot."
Click to Tweet

All of his points are best summed in Michaels most famous tip :

"Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."
Click to Tweet

If you would like to learn more about each of these tips please check out the amazing book called 'Food Rules'. It will really make you think and can make a fantastic different to your health and as a result your weight.

Take care and speak soon.

Can Do Craig