Friday, January 21, 2011

10,000 Steps to Good Health

Everyone wants their health to be good but not everyone has enough time to get in proper work outs and ensure that this is possible. This is one of the reasons that this ten thousand step approach has become well-liked. The plan is that you take at least ten thousand steps each day (walking) which will help you get very healthy and reduce the time that is required for exercise. Walking is great physical exercise and really low impact. How often have you heard "if he'd simply taken a walk around the block every now and then?"

Obviously, this won't be simple to take ten thousand steps every single day. That's a lot of steps to take! The best part is that you probably already take most of those steps each day already and don't know it yet. Your objective should really just be boosting your step count by two or three thousand. So how will you do that without feeling just like you're wasting an entire day walking about?

There are a few obvious strategies that you can use to increase your step count. One typical example of this can be going up the the stairs instead of taking an elevator or escalator. When you go to the store or the mall park your car further from the entrance. Keep the car in one spot and walk your bags and boxes out to the car as soon as you finish shopping in each store instead of just carrying more and more things with you as you run your errands and go shopping. Taking public transit also can increase your step count as you have to walk to your bus or train stop and then back home instead of just walking to your car. And, certainly, getting a short walk every single day is a great way to increase your step count.

You could also improve the volume of steps you take by using some less than apparent methods. Order your current shopping list differently. Most people will create a market list in accordance with the aisles in the shops. Organize your own list in groups like dairy, meat, produce, snacks, etc. Simply look straight down the list from here. You may possibly find yourself making a number of trips back and forth across the store, but it is a great way to raise your step count. Instead of owning a mail box in your door or attached to your home, install it on a post close to the curb. This will add at least two or three dozen steps to your count each day as you walk from your door to the box and back.

There can be a lot of ways of build your step count. The more accustomed to the thought of 10,000 steps you get the easier it's going to be for you to figure out how to meet your goal. The best thing relating to this idea is that every single step you take throughout the day counts toward your goal whether they are on treadmills or to the bathroom and back. Have fun with it!

Thursday, January 20, 2011

Before You Start Your Workout

The same New Year's Resolution gets made by a lot of people each year. Every year they say "this year I would like to get healthy and balanced." Every year people state "This year I'm planning to get in shape." You know that pulling off this stuff is hard work. If you've made resolutions like this for the year you might have probably already read the same basic information all over the internet. To get healthy you have to eat natural foods and get plenty of exercise. You might be hoping for something else that you can do. The truth is that there is: it is possible to prepare. It's really hard to jump onto the healthy and balanced bandwagon and make all of your changes at once. You need to make plans first. You could be more likely to have great results if there is a plan in place.

Acquiring the proper gear is the first thing you ought to do. Though its not necessary to wear specific shirts or shorts while you work out, you need to have good and distinct shoes. You should never try to work out in the identical footwear that you wear when you run errands. Having appropriate shoes for your exercise is important. If you don't, you can actually do a great deal of injury to your feet and ankles, not to mention the rest of your body (injuries that start in the feet have a tendency to spread up). Talk to an expert at a sports store to determine if you need cross trainers, running shoes, walking shoes or other types. The kind of footwear you need will be based heavily upon your workout routine.

Meal planning can help you figure out what food to eat and when you need to eat it. When you start picking your foods better it's easy to assume that you will be able to simply pluck the healthy stuff off the shelves instead of the unhealthy stuff every time you buy food. This will not constantly turn out to be true. It's challenging to crack old habits, particularly when you're at the grocery market. It's easier to know what to buy at the store and cook at home if you plan your meals in advance. Planning can be done on a weekly or perhaps a monthly basis. This also helps you save time at meal times--time you would ordinarily be spending gazing at your kitchen shelves and wondering what you should cook.

Learn almost everything you can. Making wholesome choices, whether they are for meals or workouts usually takes some advanced expertise. Don't be anxious, you'll be able to still take measures toward health during your learning process. The more you comprehend before you begin this new project, the more happy you will be in the long run. Knowledge can be how you will really have the ability to get healthy.

Wanting to get healthy and balanced is a great goal, but with no some preparation it's not likely to happen. The plan is to produce a plan to follow so that you're less likely to get distracted from your goal or stuck wondering what your next step should be. Good luck and don't forget to relax sometimes!

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

A Sensible Evaluation of the P90X Workout Plan

[flickr]

When you want to lose weight, you can get caught up in all sorts of different fad diets and exercise routines. That's because well being and weight loss market is enormous and insanely profitable. There are, obviously, going to be those on the market who are okay with taking advantage of vulnerable people who are trying to make their lives better. For any beneficial offer there is, there are numerous harmful offers too. Finding out which offers are generally well worth your time and effort and money can be very hard. In this document we will take a look at the P90X Workout Plan. This is a new wellbeing and fat reduction process that is being peddled online and we want to give you an objective review of it.

Based on its own website, the P90X Workout Plan is a bestselling product. It has been designed by Tony Horton and features a workout routine as well as meal plans and diet tips. The system usually takes ninety days to complete and is meant to help you extreme changes. The idea is that you are able to turn your life all the way around if you do this program. The website promises that "extreme" isn't really a good enough phrase to use for the changes that you will go through if you see this program to the end.

Obviously no program could make these extreme changes in as few as 90 days. While 3 months is often enough to see recognizable results, you'll need more than 90 days if you totally desire to lose a lot of weight and alter your life. 90 days should be enough if you have only ten to twenty pounds to lose. Beyond that, however, you need more time to safely drop your weight to where you need it to be. The extreme improvements guaranteed by this article make us skeptical.

The nice thing about this program-which consists of exercise DVDs that you are supposed to follow-is that it contains all sorts of different workouts. The program's founder understands that different types of workouts need to be done to lose weight. In addition to cardio training, you'll do yoga, strength and endurance exercising. We also appreciate that the system insists that improvements in diet and lifestyle are also needed to really turn a life around.

The very simple truth is always that there are different things that must be carried out if you need to truly adjust your life. It will not happen if you just do one or two exercises every day for a few months. When you employ this program you'll learn to mend your eating habits. You'll have a number of kinds of workouts to do. If you are doing everything the offer tells you to perform you'll be on your way to really changing things for yourself. Like any popular program, naturally, you need to talk to your doctor before you start it. Your physician is able to enable you to figure out whether this program can truly help you. Don't buy into the nonsense. Learn everything you can!

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Choosing Fast Food That's Very good For You


2009AUG081657 by bootload



Almost every single "get healthy" and "weight loss" posting you read will tell you to skip the drive through and make all of your meals yourself. This is really very true. From time to time, though, you totally do not want to make a full meal for your family or even just for yourself. Sometimes you just wish to reach the drive through on the way home and call it a day. Why shouldn't you be able to do this every so often and not have a bunch of guilt about slipping up on your diet regime? You are able to do this because lots of the popular joints are now advertising "healthy" menu selections to keep their businesses up. Here is how you can eat healthy and balanced when you reach the drive through.

Aim toward the side dishes. It has not been that long ago that all you could get in a fast food diner was French Fries. Now lots of the fast food menus have been widened considerably. Now you may get several different salads. You could also select Chili. You might get baked potatoes. You can choose fruit. There are a lot of options that you can choose that do not force you to eat foods that have been deep fried. Instead of the pre-determined "meal deals" try to create a meal consisting of side dishes. When you choose to do this you are able to keep your fat content and also calorie counts low.

Milk, juice and also water are the best selections for beverages. Drinking a large soft drink causes hundreds of empty fat laden calories into your diet. Usually a single serving of soda should be eight ounces big. Those eight ounces are often at least 100 calories and close to ten tablespoons of sugar. A fast food soft drink is typically a minimum of twenty ounces. Usually, though, they're 30 ounces. This means that your drink alone will put a multitude of ounces of sugar into your body as well as several thousand empty calories. It is much healthier to choose milk, juice or standard water.

Choose a drive through according to whether it has healthier options available. Arby's for instance, is void of burgers. You could consume roast beef sandwiches, wraps and salads as an alternative. Wendy's, of course, is known for its square burgers, nevertheless the menu there has a bundle of wholesome choices like salad, potatoes and chili. Not many fast food places are as unhealthy as McDonalds with its deep fried everything.

Basic reason states that the best way to lose weight and get healthy is to ban fast food from your diet completely. While this is usually recommended all you need to do is make a number of good decisions and traveling to the drive through isn't anything to worry about--when you do it in moderation. Sometimes the thing you need is to let other people produce your dinner. When you want healthy menu items, you do not have to feel guilty about visiting the drive through.

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Online Violin Lessons - What you need to succeed

[flickr]


I am a music teacher, but in observing musicians who learned via a music teacher and musicians who figured out music on their own, I am beginning to question the utility of teaching music—or at least the ideas that music lessons must start at an early age and continue for many years and that the only way to learn music is through a teacher.

I was educated in the classical realm, taking nine years of both piano and violin lessons. After graduating college in music education, I started to play non-classical forms of music, specifically the fiddle. I began to be exposed to self-taught musicians.

The bottom line becomes, who takes responsibility for a person's music learning?

My experience in the classical world was that for the most part, with some input from me, my teachers chose what I played. I wasn't "allowed" to play some pieces because they were "too hard." I had to play etudes, no matter how hateful they were. Ditto for scales and arpeggios. Although I can see the utility of various forms of exercises now, they were presented as something you do, without a whole lot of connection to one's goals in music.

The worst part was that my teacher's opinion of how I played mattered so much that it affected my relationship with my instrument and my sense of self. Although now I think I could take lessons without this happening because I am mature enough to avoid falling into that emotional trap, my teenage self was not able to. My self-esteem rose and fell on the quality of my lessons because the point of the lessons was to please my teacher. Sometimes I did. Many times I didn't.

In contrast, many bluegrass musicians I know have become very good by setting their own goals and working on the things they liked. Bluegrass musicians don't learn in isolation—they get information from each other at jams and other gatherings. I know of musicians who have followed other players around at festivals so they could learn a lick or two off of that person.

Bluegrass musicians may play a lot—not a bunch of isolated exercises—but working out tunes by ear and playing along with recordings. Practice consists of playing the things one feels like playing at that time, so the practice session is more fun than drudgery. No one tells a beginning banjo player that Foggy Mountain Breakdown is too hard—if the player wants to work on it, he or she does. There may be performance-related goals—such as a concert coming up, so practice may focus on particular pieces across a number of weeks, but it's not the same kind of pressure as performing for a grade each semester.

Now, with the internet and computer technology many tools exist that can help people learn to play an instruments. Youtube has many videos of traditional bluegrass masters as well as young hot shots playing all the classic bluegrass tunes and songs, not to mention online lessons. You can get programs for the computer that slow down a track on a CD without changing its pitch, which is wonderful to work with. There are free metronomes. Companies that make and sell instruments often have resources online for learners because they want people to succeed. Music aficionados have created endless web pages that teach about the structures of music as well as the playing of particular instruments. Tablature and printed music abound on the web along with audio files so you can hear what you are learning.

The advantages to having a music teacher include the music teacher's expertise on the instrument, the music teacher's expertise on the process of teaching, and the fact that music lessons on a regular basis can help with goal setting. So getting a music teacher may help you out—if the music teacher can let you stay in control of the learning process and goals.

Playing music is one of the greatest joys possible in life and I hope everyone who wants to learn has an opportunity to do so. I have played music with people who didn't speak English—we communicated through the sounds of our instruments. Being able to play music has opened many doors in my life that would have remained closed if I did not play.

But it is really important to understand that music teachers do not have a patent on music learning. If you find a good music teacher, enjoy and count your blessings. But don't let rigid, narrow-minded music teachers talk you out of something that can be so life-enhancing.

Additional Resource:

Online Violin Lessons

Friday, January 14, 2011

American Immigration


native-american-indian-immigration-political-cartoon by ImmigrationHeadlines.com | Immigration News




Built with ancient technology, The Great Wall of China is 3,948 miles in length, but took several centuries to complete. Even so, why is it so difficult to imagine a mere 700 mile long fence being built with 21st century technology in just a few years time?

Not only is it possible. It’s absolutely necessary.

We cannot continue to allow undocumented people pouring over an unprotected border to the tune of eight-hundred thousand plus a year and migrating unchecked to every urban and rural community in the United States. Despite all the rosy pictures being painted by advocates, even if the majority of border runners are in pursuit of a better life, there are multitudes that are in pursuit of an easy life of crime and/or government handouts. We certainly welcome the former, but by all means, we certainly cannot be so open-armed to the latter. Consequently, we need a system that differentiates between the two, rewards integrity and controls the flow.

Secondly, in today’s climate of international tensions it is only a matter of time that such a huge security gap will be exploited by a group such as al Qaeda or one or more of its surrogates.

Another fact we need to face is that deporting 11 million people is never going to happen. But we still need to get control of the border immediately because at 850,000 a year, 11 million will be 15 to 20 million by the time we make up our minds.

What these people did to get here was illegal. Their staying here is illegal. Their demanding privileges is really immoral. But, America has allowed itself to be pulled over barrel and there really isn’t much we can do bout it… except close the border now! And then assimilate those who are already woven into the fabric of our society.

Aside from disturbing picture of all the Mexican, Guatemalan, Honduran and other flags I’ve seen on the news floating down American Boulevards protesting American immigration policy, the most disturbing experience was overhearing the comment I heard on the news that at least someone is demanding that no wall be built along the Mexican-American border at all. Another man, I think an organizer, boldly demanded “We are not going to stop until we get justice, equality and pursuit of happiness.”

In the first place, comparing the waving of those flags in protest to the waving of Italian or Irish flags in celebration, (in case you are wondering, I’m African American), is misleading to say the least. But the comment regarding resisting the wall or fence along the border should really raise some alarms.

Many times mass coalitions are formed and presented as a group with a single agenda. Only later do we find out that, as is all too often the case in human endeavors, that certain agendas are covert until revealed at a convenient time.

In high school I wrote a paper on how important it was for the United States to bring Mexico up to American standards for economic and security reasons. I was then confronted with what is at the heart of most of Americas foreign and domestic problems… racism in all its blind, myopic and self-defeating glory.

Criminalizing facilitation is also a necessary step in my opinion. Employers are a key piece of the puzzle. Firstly, because they are purported to be the one entity that the illegal is in pursuit of, whereas they seek to avoid just about all other officials. Secondly, drying up the well incentives is the second key to drying up the flood waters.

There is a lot of discussion about floods of illegals bringing wages down, but proponents of that ideology seem have a severe case of one-dimensional thinking? From my perspective the real problem is this: What good is a 20% raise, if your buying power goes down 50%? In my lifetime I have seen gasoline go from 25 cents a gallon to over $2.50. I have seen bread go from 10 cents to nearly $2.00. A first run movie used to cost 50 cents. So, in my book people blaming the people running across the border in however many numbers for sinking standard of life are delusional. Perhaps illegal immigrants are not making it any better, but they certainly are not the reason our economy is not producing more high paying jobs, why high paying jobs are flooding overseas, or why low-paying jobs are all that’s left. There is a much more fundamental problem at work.

In many respects these are our own chickens coming home to roost. Ad to this mix that America basically stole large parts of Mexican territory. Some may argue that America was justified because states such as Texas and others wanted independence. However, they choke on their words when asked to apply the same standards to Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, etc, etc… Over a hundred years later, emotions still run high on both issues. So we cannot ignore the sense of entitlement many of those migrating from Central and South America may harbor and why we see Mexican flags flying on American streets.

They’re here. And they are here to stay.

Welcome to America… you sly rascals you.


Additional Resource:

Immigration to America