See the benefits of eating fish

     A new study, reported in The New York Times, suggests that women whose diet was rich in omega-3 fatty acids found in fish were at significantly lower risk of developing age-related macular degeneration.

A Detox and Diet straight from heaven

Phuket’s Vegetarian Festival : A Detox and Diet straight from Heaven.

     The Gods of ancient China descend in October onto the beautiful shores of Phuket Island, Thailand to deliver their lesson in health and wellness.

     Quite unlike any other you have attended!

     As the health and wellness craze continues to sweep through the island’s lifestyles and businesses, few people realize that detox and cleansing diets have been a part of Phuket’s culture for nearly 200 years. Many of Phuket’s residents have nurtured a tradition of routine body cleansing diet, coupled with meditation and a review of one’s moral worth, since the early 18^th century. However, the style and character with which they demonstrate their commitment to the purification process is a million worlds away from today’s chic spa culture and 5-star fad diets.

     The Vegetarian Festival is without doubt, one of the most interesting festivals celebrated in Phuket. Every year, over a period of 10 days, the Chinese-Thai populations of Thailand partake in a cleansing of body and soul. And nowhere is the Vegetarian festival celebrated more colorfully than right here in Phuket.

     The Vegetarian festival and its traditions lie in the Chinese-Thai culture of Phuket with its interesting mix of Chinese Buddhism and Daoism. During the Vegetarian festival, devotees adhere to a strict vegan diet in an act of spiritual devotion, and in order to gain merit for their future cycle of reincarnate lives.

10 Rules Of The Vegetarian Festival

     For all those participating in the Vegetarian festival, there are ten rules which should be followed to avoid attracting spiteful spirits and ill-fortune:

1.       Cleanliness of bodies during the festival, including cloths, etc.

2.       Purity of mind, refraining from immoral behavior and ill thoughts.

3.       Vegan diet, having absolutely no contact with any meat product.

4.       Refrain from sex.

5.       Refrain from alcohol and all other intoxicating substances.

6.       Wear white to symbolize your purification.

7.       Clean all kitchen utensils and keep them separate from non-participants.

8.       People in mourning should not attend.

9.       Pregnant women should not attend.

10.   Menstruating women should not attend.

The Holistic Health

     The holistic health is the medical care which places greater emphasis on the attention on the closely connected aspect of life physicality, mentality and spirituality rather than illness treatment or specific care on some part of body. The entire aspect of life influences the individual health as a whole, which are manipulated by the social and environmental surroundings.

The Basic Principles of the Holistic Health

     The holistic health attaches greater importance on the sustainable health in long run, not only the illness treatment. "Your wellbeing is what your lifestyle is" takes a twisted turn on the well-known mantra, "You are what you eat". The wise intake of food can have an impact on the physical and mental health.

     The health promotion and prevention are very vital. The daily lifestyle affects the health as a whole, so you should rethink about the lifestyle pattern which can have a bearing on the health.

     The holistic health encourages a change in the unhealthy lifestyle and raises awareness on how to improve your health through the holistic treatment.

     The holistic medicine promotes the natural healing system and unconventional treatment which the whole aspect of life from the physicality to mentality is taken into account.

     The holistic health promoted by the World Health Organization (WHO) satisfies the growing demand on the alternative medicine at the moment. The alternative medicine is the unorthodox treatment that helps the humans fulfill their dream to stay longer in healthy lifestyle instead of relying on the conventional medicine. Sometimes several illnesses are not been cured by the modern-day treatment but the alternative medicine. It is understandable that the untraditional care is gaining more and more popularity among those who give it a try.

     As the old adage says, "happiness without illness is the greatest gladness" still rings true today, so the health promotion and prevention is the keyword to achieve such happiness.

How to live a life with holistic health

- Diets and nutrition

- Stress relief

- Spiritual healing

- Avoidance of the unhealthy environments

- Good rest and sleep

- Physical exercises corresponding to gender, age, and physical condition

- Love shared among the family members to foster the familial bonding

- Creativity

- Restoration of the spiritual balance and healing

- Intellectural development

Sweet Satisfaction for Diet

     High in Fibre, vitamin A, beta carotene and low in glycaemic index, the humble sweet potato is a great  vegetable to add to any diet.

     Meet the sweet potato, arguably the most nutritious vegetable around. A root vegetable, it has more fibre than oatmeal when eaten with the skin on. As its orange color hints at, it has almost twice the recommended daily allowance of vitamin A and four times the recommended daily allowance for beta caratene, an antioxidant.

     I learnt this from reading a nutrition chart tacked on the wall of a riverside cafe in Vacouver, Canada. It was serving hamburgers with wedges of sweet potato, which North Americans call a yam. I could not believe the good numbers associated with this tuber, which also tasted better than any ordinary potato wedge.

     I looked at the sweet potato in a different light. And there is more.

     Despite its sweetness, diabetics can eat it because it has a low glycaemic index.

     If you do not already know, the glycaemic index is one of the most important measures for foods. It ranks how quickly the body converts carbohydrates into sugar. The lower the glycaemic index in a food, the slower it will be digested. This causes the level of blood sugar to rise gradually rather than quickly, which is important for diabetics. This also means that you feel satisfied longer, which is beneficial for weight loss control.

     According to nutritionists, the single most important change that most people can make in their diets is to replace fatty foods with foods rich in complex carbohydrates and with a low glycaemic index, such as sweet potatoes.

     Since I found out about this, I have been adding sweet potato to my menus and there are many ways to do this, even in local recipes.

     Sweet potato Salad is so healthy, I do not feel bad about adding roast duck (without the skin) in the diet dish.

     Indeed, if you are counting carbohydrates in your diet, chuck out the bread, rice, potatoes and corn and eat sweet potato instead.

     A quarter of a cup of sweet potatoes has just 10g of carbohydrates - an amount that is recommended even

on carbohydrate-restricted programmes such as the Atkins diet.

Unexpected Weight-Loss Obstacles

Do you know why your effort in weight-loss has been ineffective? Maintaining body weight to an appropriate level referenced to height, skeleton and age is one of the most important things for being healthy.

But sometimes following weight-loss program by being cautious about eating and doing exercise regularly cannot meet your losing goal because of some unexpected causes.

-         Body Water Retention: Avoid eating foods that cause body water retention such as salt, soda pops, etc and eat some fruit like watermelon and orange that will reduce body water retention and get rid of a significant amount of body water.

-         Food Allergy: Food allergic symptom may be one of factors that cause your weight-loss program ineffective. Food allergy that is seriously affected to weight control mostly found is wheat allergy. Because wheat composes of Gluten which may interfere digestive system, wheat allergic symptoms will create problems in food digestion, constipation, flatulence, feeling queasy, getting cramped easily, variance in temper and even food craving. Besides, it could be other allergic symptoms that should be checked out, because it might influence body weight and also cause swelling.

-         Genetics: Specialists believe that genetics relates to obesity up to 30-40%, however, if you accidentally got obesity genes, it does not mean no hope of weight-loss, because a German researcher found that people who do exercise at least 2 hours a week might help your weight-loss.

-          Exercise the way you used to do: Our body can adjust to the routine you used for exercise with less energy consumption, therefore, changing the exercise routine or trying new ways of exercise will stimulate your body to consume more energy resulting in burning calories out.

-          Not enough sleep: Many research show relations between sleeping and the hormones that influence our eating behavior such as Ghrelin hormone which is responsible for hungry feeling and Leptin hormone which tells the brain when should stop eating. But if you do not have enough sleep, Ghrelin will increase and Leptin will reduce, resulting in feeling hungrier and do not feel full. Most people need approximate 7-9 hours of sleep, some sleep less, some sleep more, so how do we know that it is enough sleep? Specialist says that you should sleep as long as you need for several days continuously then your sleep will be stable and you will find yourself waking up after sleeping for expected hours. (15 minutes more or less) When you know how many hours needed, do that as a routine will help your weight-loss.

Truth about Genetics and Weight Loss

Tall and short, dark and light, freckled and tanned, we come in myriad packages with myriad features, most of them determined by our genetics before we ever draw breath. Very few of these traits can we control, and we just have to play the hand we're dealt.

But when people are earnestly trying to do weight loss and failing again and again, many ultimately get the sneaking suspicion that they really are playing against a stacked deck. They may be right.

If you're one of those who subscribes to the notion that America's growing weight problem is solely a failure of personal restraint or will, it's time to reconsider. Solid research is helping us understand just how truly stacked that deck is, because in addition to anything else, for some people who struggle with their weight loss,  it seems that any given exercise effort will yield far less result than it offers anyone else-because of what's already coded on their DNA.

When it comes to weight loss management, genetic factors get blamed for a lot of body issues where they may or may not have a role: "She's just big-boned." "He just carries his cargo up front." "The whole family is built that way." You've heard them all, and they might have sounded more like excuses than explanations.

But think about the genetically based elements that we already know are out of our control: People certainly do have different body types, with some of us thicker or thinner than others, and shorter or taller.

Then there's the particular predisposition for distribution, for having our weight in certain places on our bodies, which could be the old apple/pear body-type contrast, or a tendency to carry fat on the arms.

Add to those a predisposition for building muscle easily or not. And if you want to be very specific, throw in that natural love or dislike of athletic pursuits that would certainly come into play with exercise.

From just those few features, you can see how someone with a unfavorable combination of genetic factors is going to be at a disadvantage compared to someone with a better "stack" of factors.

And now there's this: researchers have identified specific combinations of genes that appear to correlate very strongly with fat retention independent of, even in spite of, exercise.

In a very closely controlled, year-long study with post-menopausal women-chosen as subjects because they are more stable, hormonally speaking-researchers divided the participants into an exercise intervention group and a control group.

All the subjects were carefully selected for specific features of their health and lifestyle. Various lab tests were taken, including certain genetic tests. The subjects were all instructed not to change their dietary habits. The control group was assigned a moderate stretching regimen to use over the course of the study, and the intervention group was given a moderate intensity, 45-minute workout for five days a week, initially with supervision. There was detailed tracking, because the researchers were especially interested in identifying distinctions between genetic and environmental factors.

At the end of the study period, the researchers found a distinct variability in the amount of fat lost by some exercisers that could not be explained by their adherence levels.

So the researchers looked to the genetic data, and indeed, there were two specific genes that stood out related to patterns of weight loss and exercise. Participants with certain combinations of those genes and their variants had significantly different weight loss outcomes.

Healthy Foods for Weight Loss : You May Not Be Eating As Healthily As You Think

Food Alert: Gain Consciousness, Lose Weight

You May Not Be Eating As Healthily As You Think

Chew on this: If you ate 100 fewer calories each day, you could weight loss up to 10 pounds a year. You could easily eat 100 calories less a day if you paid attention to portions and mindless snacking. Most of us are reasonably aware of what we eat. What we’re not aware of is how much we eat or why we eat.

People strive to make healthier choices and then over eat the healthy food they chose. Opting for fruit instead of potato chips is great. But if you eat 10 strawberries instead of 5, you’re still consuming too much sugar and too many calories in one sitting. Just because it’s the healthy food choice doesn’t mean you can stop thinking about portion size.

While restaurant portions and packaged portions are growing, so are our waistlines. If you see a giant plate of pasta while dining out enough times, you’ll start to assume that’s a reasonable portion. This assumption isn’t good news considering most restaurants serve dishes of spaghetti with two entire servings on one plate.

Another problem Americans face is the tendency to eat something just because it’s there. In studies, workers who kept candy visible on their desks were much more likely to mindlessly nosh all day long than those who kept their candy in drawers or a kitchen.

Eating the right portions and snacking when you’re hungry (not just when you’re bored) are things you can control. When it comes to your diet weight loss, you want to be in control. Just because there is a McDonalds directly across the street from work doesn’t mean you should eat there every day. The location of the McDonald's isn’t something you can control— but whether you go there or not certainly is.

You can control whether the dish of candy sits on your desk or in a drawer. And whether you believe it or not, you can control portion size. Split a dish at the restaurant or ask for half of it to be boxed up before you even eat. You’ll consume less because there is less to consume. That’s just the way our brains and our appetites work.