How to Eat to Live (A life without Counting Calories)

There are so many diets that exist today - paleo, jenny craig, zone busters, atkins and more.  To the largest extent, most diets work well if people adhere to the philosophies proposed in each diet.  Then why are so many people still struggling with their weight?  The reality is most people either reach their target weight and then regress to old eating habits while others have a tendency to go to such an extreme how they eat is not sustainable at all.  In other cases, people’s food choices are imbalanced due to trying to follow the advice of poor diets such as the grapefruit or all shakes diet. To have a fully balanced diet your meal should consist of proteins, fats and carbs/vegetables.  

Here is the basic breakdown of how your plate should look:

Carbs (Starches)

Carb dense foods such as potatoes, rice or quinoa should be one cupped handful

one cupped hand

Fruits and Vegetables

Fruits and vegetables should be the size of your fist.  Women should have one fist full of fruits or vegetables and men should have two fists.  

One fist

Proteins

Proteins such as beans, chick peas, lean red meat or poultry should be the size of your palm for women and two palms for men.   

Fats

Healthy fats should be the equivalent of one thumb for women and two thumbs for men

One thumb

Of course there are some variations to serving sizes that can be made based on your body type and also if you are in a weight loss or weight gain mode.  The beauty of this meal framework is that it is very sustainable, very filling and does not need countless counting of calories, weighing of food or trying to remember what foods should be combined with what. All types of foods are including in each meal. In time we will take the time breakdown how fats, carbs and proteins affect your body. 

Preparing your kitchen

Leading a healthy lifestyle seems insurmountable at times.  All around us we see advertisements for cookies, ice cream, burgers, fries, cakes and more.  We live in a country of excess, yet many people especially our elders suffer from lack of proper nourishment.  The easiest way to shield ourselves from temptations is by not bring such foods into our house.  That may sound logical, but many use the excuse of wanting something in case visitors come by or having treats for the kids as the main reasons for bringing foods they shouldn’t be eating into their homes.  Feeding our children foods like this will set them up for issues as they grow older but that is another story. Instead of focusing on what we should not have, we will focus on things that we should have.  

The following is a list of superfoods that everyone should have in their house at all times in to make it easier to have healthy meals or snacks anytime throughout the day.  These foods are as follows:

Protein

1. Lean red meat (grass-fed preferred)
2. Poultry
3. Salmon (wild caught preferred)
4. Eggs (cage free preferred)
5. Plain Greek yogurt, cottage cheese or coconut milk yogurt
6. Protein supplements (whey, milk or plant protein sources)

Carbs - Vegetables & Fruits

7. Spinach
8. Tomatoes
9. Cruciferous vegetables (broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower)
10. Mixed berries (strawberries, blueberries, rasberries, etc)
11. Oranges

Carb/Protein/Legumes

12. Mixed beans/peas (black beans, lentils, split peas)

Carb - Grain/Cereal

13. Quinoa - Grain
14. Whole oats (large flake) - Cereal

Fat

15. Raw, unsalted mixed nuts (a variety including pecans, walnuts

cashews, brazil nuts) - Seeds & Nuts

16. Flax seeds (ground) - Seeds & Nuts
17. Avocados - Fruit
18. Olive oil (extra virgin) - Oils
19. Fish oil (salmon, anchovy, krill) or algae oil - Oils

Miscellaneous

20. Green tea
21. Multivitamins
22. Liquid exercise drinks (or branched-chain amino acids)

   

As you can see, we have a multitude of foods that we can use in our daily diets if we have them in our kitchen.  Our next article will explore how all this diversity can be combined to create daily meals which are filling, nourishing and tasty.  

Getting Started

Before one starts a mission to change their lives or to change their habits, one must prepare themselves for success.  We often assume that a person's success or failure is determined by socioeconomic level or perhaps intelligence.  But according to countless research, it has been found that the real determining factor towards achieving success is one’s social network. Basically, if your friends drink a lot or eats a lot of junk food, it does not mean you will become an alcoholic or make you lose track of your goals; it means there is a subtle influence that a person’s social group can have on one’s behaviour.  

There is a saying amongst those who are interested in developing personal wealth. The saying is one can tell what a person’s income is by simply averaging the income of a person’s 5 closest  friends. We have a tendency to pursue a life similar to those with whom we are comfortable. In most factors of our lives, your social group can either steer you towards positive or negative choices.  Too many negative social support can make achieving our goals seem almost insurmountable.  In the pursuit of our goals, some people may think you will have to drop your friends, unsupportive family members or even change your environment.  The better thing to do is to slowly add new friends who are more supportive of who you wish to become and spend more time in environments that are supportive of your goals.  Being intentional about the environment you need to be in, normalizes the goals you are trying to achieve and goes a long way toward balancing out negative social influence.  Like with habit development, this is a long and arduous process.  Achieving your goals will not happen overnight.  

Don’t be afraid to tell everyone about what you are about to do.  This way you will be able to easily identify who is with you and who is most likely going to sabotage you.  This is not easy to deal with.  As the late Bob Marley said “Your worst enemy could be your best friend.  And your best friend, your worst enemy!”

Remember:

• Be open about your goals and identify who are your supporters and advocates
• Find an environment like the gym, support or mastermind group where like minded people exist
• If you are not yet comfortable, find online support groups where you can connect with others who are trying to achieve the same or similar to the goals you desire
• Find positive emotional triggers such as songs or movies that will inspire you

Most of all, remember this is your journey to take.  No one can take it for you.  In order to succeed you need to have the right people around you who will be your personal cheerleaders.  With the right people coupled with a supportive environment, success becomes an easier journey to take.   

Achieving Your Goals for 2015

Every year as people create new year’s resolutions, we unwittingly set ourselves up to fail.  Each time we, myself included, would say I want to lose 20 pounds this year, or I want to save $10000 or become debt free.  While these goals are laudable, we often give up because we are not achieving such goals quickly enough.  Goals are not achieved for lack of will.  It is because we fail to realize what it really takes to achieve what we desire.  What it really takes is for us to focus on the things we can control and not the things we can’t.  

Wanting to lose 20 pounds is a good goal.  Unfortunately achieving this goal is not something we can control, for this is an outcome goal.  But instead, what if you vowed to exercise 3 days per week, combining cardio and weights.  You can also promise to drink a glass of water with every meal.  These are process goals.  What is the difference?  Losing pounds is a type of goal we have no control over but we do have control over the process that we wish to take.  I do realize that deep down we still will want to achieve huge goals. But by focusing on the process, adjustments can be made to help us get to where we want to go.  In addition, process oriented goals helps us to build healthy habits which can be sustained even after an outcome goal is achieved.  

How does a goal process look and how can you track it.  Below is an example of you can track on a simple Goal Tracking Worksheet.

Goal:

How many days of exercise per week

How many days of exercise completed

How many servings of fruits and vegetables per day

How many servings of fruits and vegetables consumed

How many glasses of water to consume daily

How many glasses of water consumed

and so forth….

By following through with your process goal tracking worksheet, everything else will take care of itself and the process will make an impact on your own transformation. Focusing on what needs to be done is a lot easier than trying to control whatever is supposed to happen. Isn’t that simple?

From Flab to Fab: The Guide to Healthy Living

January is here again and it’s time for making New Year’s resolutions.  Most people promise the same things year after year - save more money, be true to themselves and of course lose some weight.  Since these promises are always on the top of people’s minds advertisers, journalists and bloggers always make sure they are covering those topics.  Well add me to that list.  

In my experience doing personal training, people will do and eat whatever they want despite being provided the proper information to achieve their goals.  Food has such an emotional attachment for us.  Even if the food is really bad for us we will still consume it since it fills a sense of emptiness many of us possess.  In this blog, I will try to consistently offer advice on what foods people can eat to become healthier.  Why focus on healthy living?  In truth, 10% of Canada’s population or 3 million people have Type 2 diabetes.  In 90% of this cases, this type of diabetes is preventable since it is created by lifestyle choices.  As an individual who has two parents living with diabetes and was diagnosed having high blood sugar levels, I have learned what changes I needed to make in order to mitigate the inevitable.  For those people who are of Caribbean descent who thinks back home food is good for you, the stats show that 18% of people in the english speaking Caribbean have been diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes.  Lifestyle changes are deeply in need there but most people refuse to adhere to such advice.

Other interesting facts about Canadians are as follows:

• 6 million Canadians or 20% of the population have high blood pressure
• 53% of canadians aged 60-79 years of age has high blood pressure which leads to strokes
• 60% of Canadians are overweight or obese
• 40% of Canadians have high blood cholesterol which leads to blood clots, strokes and heart attacks

So basically because of these ailments and others, this blog will focus on what to eat to offset what are preventable diseases and to improve people’s lifestyles.  Of course there will be a few tips on exercising, but the focus is more about leading healthier lifestyles and losing weight will be a massive byproduct on adhering to such changes.  Thus we will explore the basics of what a healthy meal plan looks like, what types of food can counteract the various types of ailments people have and we will also provide some lifestyle changes to have become healthier.  We provide the info, you provide the action.  Together we will create something that is comprehensive, enlightening and fun.  And if you get a six pack during the process, then that is a bonus.

Designing Your Life

By Craig Ballantyne

I'm a lucky man. Early in life I knew what I wanted to do when I grew up. With that vision, I began a process in my high school years that can only be described as "lifestyle design." It required hard work, but no harder than the work you do every day. Today, I am reaping the benefits of my early investment. I have freedom and control in my life while being able to make an impact on the world. You can have this too, if you start your own lifestyle design today. 

We all want a better life. We all want a little more control over how the day goes, over what we do with our hours, and what we are able to achieve. 

Fortunately, attaining greater control of your life is possible, although it often requires an unconventional approach. 

It begins by realizing that when it comes to the life you live, you have two choices. You can be PRO-active or you can be RE-active. You can either decide how it's going to go (pro-active), or you can leave it up to your surroundings to make that call for you (re-active). 

Only those that choose to be proactive are able to develop the control in their life that leads to happiness. After all, as Jim Rohn says, "If you don't design your own life plan, chances are you'll fall into someone else's plan. And guess what they have planned for you? Not much." 

I started on my path to lifestyle design early, beginning at the age of 13. In my childhood I developed a love for reading, writing, healthy living, and helping others. I wanted to turn this passion for creativity into not only a job, but also an amazing livelihood. 

I knew what I wanted to do. I just didn't know exactly how to do it. But I realized that I needed to eliminate everything that didn't take me in that direction. 

This led me to a decision. I would avoid spending time and energy on anything that was not purposeful. If it didn't get me closer to my goals, I was going to find a way to avoid it. 

I knew that activities like cutting the lawn and other household chores were not going to get me closer to my dreams. Instead, I needed to be out earning money for college, training at the gym, and reading everything I could on health and fitness. 

Obviously, this was an approach to life that didn't impress my parents. They called me lazy. They wanted me to voluntarily do more work around the farm. But once I did what I had to, I then spent the rest of my time working towards my goals. 

This has been my winning approach to life ever since. 

Today, the life I live looks nothing like that of a stereotypical lazy person, I get up early to write for several hours and always make time for a rigorous workout. Perhaps a better way to describe my behavior is that I'm selectively lazy. It's a trait that I recommend to you as well. 

As long as the work is self-directed and supports my vision, I'm willing to do just about anything to succeed. But if I judge the activity to be a waste of my time, I avoid it. 

The bottom line is that you too can design your life around you. Of course, to achieve greater control in your life you are going to upset a few people along the way. 

First of all, not everyone even believes the simple proposition that they can take control of their life. Therefore, you must expect blowback when you start to take control of yours. 

People might say to you, "Who are you to live this way? That's not normal." 

But as the Stoic philosopher Epictetus writes, "Don't be concerned with other people's impressions of you. They are dazzled and deluded by appearances. Stick with your purpose. This alone will strengthen your will and give your life coherence." 

Second, you can only achieve greater control in life when you are in a position of strength to demand it. To attain a position of strength, you must have leverage. My leverage is the ability to create products that people will pay for. 

I spent years working hard to build up my valuable skills in selling fitness and personal development products. These skills, something author Cal Newport describes as Career Capital in his book, "So Good They Can't Ignore You," are what give you the leverage to call the shots in life. 

But once you get to that point, you still need to manage other people's expectations to minimize the frustration and resentment that they might have about the level of control you have over your schedule. 

Finally, there are your own inner demons to deal with. I grew up relatively poor, wearing patches on the knees of my pants to grade school, and watching my parents save money by doing everything themselves. To them, money was not something that you could simply go out and get more of. These attitudes about money can both help and harm. It is good to be wise with your money, but not to let your relationship with money become an anchor opposing your progress. 

You'll likely have similar internal mental baggage as you start to design your life. This resistance could be more powerful than other people's opinions. The fact is that you could be your greatest enemy in living the life of your dreams. 

My advice to you on dealing with this is as politically incorrect as the rest of today's topic. But here it is: 

You need to develop an air of superiority. You need what Dan Kennedy calls, "controlled self-confidence, bordering on arrogance." Basically, everything your mother told you was wrong. 

But I encourage you to accept and embrace this mentality. You need to believe that you are capable of doing great things, of living an above-average life, and of making an extraordinary impact on the world. You won't achieve this by thinking of yourself as a normal Joe-Schmoe. 

I'm sorry, but that's the politically incorrect truth. 

Look at it this way. If I didn't know that my work is more valuable than say, cutting the lawn, then I wouldn't have made the time to help hundreds of thousands of people each day with our Early To Rise content. 

Instead I'd be wasting my day saving $20 per hour rather than sourcing articles from great authors and thought leaders, like James Altucher, Jason Leister, Bob Burg, and of course, our mentor, Mark Ford, that change the lives of tens of thousands of people. 

This is not average thinking. 

But we are not average people. Nor should we want to be. The average person, as you know, gets average results and lives an average life. The average life, according to statistics, is a life of stress, debt, and watching four hours of television per night. Average is not good. 

You must live different. You must be proactive with your lifestyle design. 

You've probably thought about doing things differently. You've developed a desire for more control. But for some reason, you're waiting for permission to go ahead and finally take action on it. If so, then by all means, consider this "Permission Granted." 

Don't wait any longer to design your life to maximize your contribution to the world. 

You may feel unsure at first. You might even feel that you are not worthy. Years of having the scarcity mindset passed down to you from your parents can be a terrible set of chains to drag around for life. These chains can be tough to unshackle. But lose them, you must. 

You might try and tell yourself that you are too shy, humble, or modest to take this approach to life, but you must let this go. 

Just like the first time you talked to someone of the opposite sex when you were twelve years old, it might seem hard at first, but after you try it, and get a little feedback, you'll try it again, and the process will get easier each time. 

You must realize that in order to add value to the world you must allow yourself the time to do so. And that means cutting out the day-to-day activities that someone else can do for you. 

I'm here to tell you, and even to give you permission, that if you want to live the life of your dreams, then you must stand up and take control over it right now. 

We're not getting any younger. 

When it comes to taking control over how you live the rest of your life, this is no time to hold back. You must first decide what is right for you, and then go after it with all of your energy. 

As Mark Ford advises, "Identify what you want to do, with whom, and where." 

Answer those questions, create your vision, and begin designing your life today.

Career Lessons From Famous Comedians

 Caroline Ceniza-Levine , Contributor

I love quotes. I love comedy. I love to help people with their careers. Here are 10 quotes from famous comedians that relay all the career advice you need:

Louis CK: “I’m bored” is a useless thing to say. I mean, you live in a great, big, vast world that you’ve seen none percent of. Even the inside of your own mind is endless, it goes on forever, inwardly, do you understand? The fact that you’re alive is amazing, so you don’t get to say “I’m bored.”Why I love this for career advice (even though he meant this for his children): If you recognize your life is amazing, that gratitude is a career advantage.

Joan Rivers: If I can’t make it through one door, I’ll go through another door – or I’ll make a door. Something terrific will come no matter how dark the present.Why I love this for career advice: There are multiple paths into your dream job. Or you can make your own dream job by launching a business. Persistence pays off.

Jerry Seinfeld: To me, if life boils down to one thing, it’s movement. To live is to keep moving.Why I love this for career advice: Keep your skills, expertise and network updated. If you don’t need to update your resume with anything new in the last year, you’re not growing professionally. Review these seven reasons why your career has stalled, and resolve to keep it moving.

Lucille Ball: Love yourself first and everything else falls into line.  You really have to love yourself to get anything done in this world.Why I love this for career advice: Before you can convince your dream employer to hire you or your current boss to promote you or your ideal customer to buy from you, you need to convince yourself. Confidence attracts, and there are ways to become more confident even if you don’t feel that way right now.

Stephen Colbert: Now there are very few rules to improv, but one of the things I was taught early on is that you are not the most important person in the scene — everybody else is. You cannot win in improv. And life is an improvisation.Why I love this for career advice: Your boss, colleagues and team will love you when you make them look good. Strong allies at all levels are critical to career advancement. But this doesn’t mean you need to lose out on credit due; knowhow to showcase your value even as you help others do their work.

Lily Tomlin: For fast-acting relief, try slowing down.Why I love this for career advice: Don’t underestimate the benefits of regular rest, enough sleep, and actually taking your vacation. You need space to be creative. And, yes, you can take time off and not fall completely behind in your work.

Chris Rock: Having money doesn’t make you rich. Having options makes you richWhy I love this for career advice: People with the best careers have multiple opportunities to choose from. If you’re going for your next job, have multiple leads in play and aim for multiple job offers.

George Carlin: Don’t take guilt trips. Take a trip to the mall, even to the next county; to a foreign country but NOT to where the guilt isWhy I love this for career advice: Make career decisions based on your values, interests and needs right now. Don’t let someone else guilt you into poor choices. You can translate your interests, whatever they are, to a viable career option.

Carlin is in my all time top 5 comedians. I’m so happy I got to see him while he still performs (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Will Ferrell: Aren’t we all striving to be overpaid for what we do?Why I love this for career advice: You want to be paid for your value. This means you need to promote yourself and negotiate. Not all people will do this and may resent you for being overpaid. Embrace your inner Will Ferrell!

Steve Martin: A day without sunshine is like, you know, night.Why I love this for career advice: Not all observations have to be motivational or brilliant. Oftentimes, just the facts suffice.

If you love quotes as much as I do, I post a new one every Wednesday on my personal blog. What are your favorite comedic quotes?

Caroline Ceniza-Levine is co-founder of SixFigureStart® career coaching.