Health and Nutrition That Is AboveNBeyond

In addition to using Weight Watchers and Herbalife, my wife and I also make use of Lean Cuisine.  The coolest thing about Lean Cuisine in our opinion is that they have the weight watchers points right on the box.  Talk about another great option to use when using the Weight Watchers point system.  I just became a member of the Lean Cuisine website and it has a lot of neat features such as Meal planning, fitness planning and wellness planning.  Just more reasons to get on track to getting fit and lean.  When it comes to loosing weight, it’s not about starving yourself or doing with out eating lots of great food.  It’s about eating to  loose weight.  You have to learn to substitute what you eat with great alternatives or find ways to change recipes to bring about a healthier meal plan.  Don’t think of it as a diet, think of it as a change of lifestyle.  Diet is a bad 4 letter word that is sometimes misconstrued.  Try thinking of a diet in terms of a meal plan instead.  Lean Cuisine is a great way to adjust your meal plan to work on loosing those pounds.   My most favorite Lean Cuisine is the Chicken Club Panini.  Oh, by the way, Lean Cuisine makes for a good lunch to take to work, which is what I do.

See video #8 in our Video Vault on Lean Cuisine for a past commercial.

No matter the person, we all need nutrition. It doesn’t matter who you are. The athlete, stay at home mom, the acute-work-a-holic husband, you, me, we all need good nutrition. Without it, everything else is pointless. What happens if you put the wrong fuel in a sports car? Put put put put phhhssss ……. We all need good fuel to keep us going and sustain us throughout each day. In previous posts, I discussed the importance of both getting active as well as portion control. Nutrition is another slice of the pie we need to be concerned with. To some, this is a no brain er, others, either didn’t get it (yet) or don’t care.

If one of your goals is to loose weight, you need good nutrition to help you loose weight. Good nutrition helps keep your body in top running order to help you do all the things you need to do in a day. How could you expect a world class athlete to accomplish Olympic gold without good nutrition?
It just won’t happen!

You should first determine if your diet is a healthy one. Take this test, it’s free and very informative.  You need to figure out how many calories your body needs on a daily basis. The human body is remarkable. Even if you spent years not getting good nutrition, your body will say “ahhhhhhh” when you change your diet for the better.

Imagine how good you’ll start feeling when the body starts getting the right stuff.

Getting good nutrition doesn’t mean you have to stop eating some of those other foods. Eating those other foods in moderation is the key. Those other foods should be like a treat and not an everyday part of your diet.

As is our slogan “Make life better one choice at at time”, try to make small changes in your diet each day. This is better than attempting to jump on one of those trendy fad diets which may not be safe for you anyway.

How do you know if your diet is healthy? You need to take a look at the USDA’s Food Guide to see if you are getting the recommended number of servings of various food groups.

Consider your choices, do you want to be like that sports car, revved and ready to race down the road, or do you want to be like an old heap ready for the junk yard? This is how important good nutrition is. It can make a real difference in your life. You may not notice much in your younger years, but, as you start to get older, the body changes. Getting good nutrition is an important part of everyone’s life no matter the age.

If you are a very active person, such as a runner, marathoner, biker, or other types of sports, then your need for good nutrition can be even grater.  Consult your specific sports type website for more information on nutritional needs.  For runners, I highly recommend Runner’s World.

See also:

1. More Nutrition related articles.
2. Food Pyramid

Some give lots of effort and some don’t on loosing weight and burning fat. The truth is, until the individual has a strong mind set and has mentally committed to the effort to loose the weight and burn off the fat, the battle will continue on. You have to take control and make changes to bring about results to achieve your goals. Until you get their “mentally”, you are not there and won’t get there. It all hinges on the brain, your control or command center of your life. You have to decide where you want to be. One’s mind set is any of the following: a) wants weight loss bad, b) dreams of weight loss, c) happy, or d) doesn’t care. These are just some possibilities of where someone is mentally on this subject.

But as I said, until you make that all important decision to get it done, you’ll never be done.

It’s not just about loosing the weight, it’s about changing your life and creating a new lifestyle. If you don’t change your habits, you’ll only end up right back where you started from or worse. Ask yourself this question “If I figured out how to do something good for myself that works, why would I stop?”

For the weight loss issue, there are many options to choose from. You could do any of the following:

1. Exercise, portion control and getting proper nutrition
2. Herbalife weight loss, exercise, portion control
3. Weight Watchers, exercise and portion control
4. Other weight loss method, exercise and portion control.

If you haven’t gotten the drift yet, it’s all the same. The key factor is what works for you. What you want and need is what works and is nutritious for you. You don’t want something that is less-healthy for you. You’ll notice that each option above includes exercise and portion control. It’s just that you need exercise to burn off calories as well as to tone up. You need portion control to aide in the decrease of calories consumed. You don’t need to eat more than the body needs to sustain itself. If you eat a sensible portion and wait 20 minutes before deciding to have more, odds are you wont’ eat anymore because you’ll start to feel satisfied since the body would have caught up with what you just ate.

You’ll notice that AboveNBeyond4u.com is not affiliated with any one weight loss company. The reason for this is because what works for one person doesn’t necessarily work another. I used both Herbalife and Weight Watchers to achieve my goals. However, just because I had success with these two companies, doesn’t mean everyone will. You may find something else either through this site or on the Internet that you prefer. The main thing is that you find what works for you. As long as what you find is healthy and nutritious and works that is all that matters. As I find other options I will post them throughout this site.

I had great success in using Herbalife with my weight loss efforts. The basic plan is to use 2 Meal Replacement Shakes a day, with taking supplements 3 times a day followed by one colorful meal for supper. Herbalife has quite a good variety of different flavors of meal replacement shakes. Herbalife works and tastes great too! For me, my problem wasn’t about the products, it was on portion control and I had to find ways to help me in this area. Herbalife does have a variety of different protein snacks available too. There are different Weight Loss programs available to help you depending upon your need and affordability. Following the directions with these products is key to it’s success in helping you with your goals.

For my experience you can check out My Testimony on my weight loss journey. Everybody’s situation is different and sometimes you have to make choices to get you to achieving your goals. By controlling your portions, following Herbalife’s weight loss program and getting active, you will loose weight.

You need to stay consistent with this when working on loosing weight. You can’t just have one shake one day and skip the next. This has to be a daily effort to make it work. Being consistent with it will get you to loose weight. In addition to the fact that Herbalife works, it is also very nutritious.

There is a video on Herbalife in our Video Vault for Weight Loss, check it out.

For more information about Herbalife, check out http://herbalife.com

Where do you see yourself now or in years to come? Do you look at yourself and lie? “Oh, I’m not that bad, there are those worse than me”. That’s denial if you feel that way. If you are not even sure where you stand, but want to know more about where you stand with your weight, check out this BMI calculator found on Active.com. This resource is FREE and very much worth your using, check it out. Even if you have a minor dislike or negative feeling on how you currently are, that should be enough to do something. Don’t let that small bad seed grow up into something you really don’t like. Now, if you are way past this, then consider this article your wake up call. It’s never to late to change the course of your ship. After all, what do you got to loose? Weight? Think of it this way, if you loose just 10 pounds, that is like two 5 pound weights that you just put on the shelf that you’ve been walking around with.

Now, something special, and coming soon…….

There will be a new section to Abovenbeyond4u.com to get you moving in the direction that best fits you. This section will be FREE and motivate you and hopefully excite you in taking action. Whether it be weight loss, getting active, this section is for you. There will no longer be excuses not to take action for yourself unless you really like where you are at! More information on this section will follow near to when this section becomes available.

Keep your foods colorful and keep it to a minimum with foods that are brown or beige. These types of carbohydrates are high in calories. Such items include pasta, beans and potatoes. Just because something tastes good, does not mean it’s good for you. It’s just good tasting. Now there is no reason to give up all the foods, deserts you eat each day. You want to remember to eat in moderation.

Eating healthy, is not about following a strict diet or trying to stay unreasonably thin, or staying away from the foods you love and look forward to eating. Instead, it’s about getting good nutrition, having more energy and maintaining a healthy balance to have a strong immune system for every day life.
Eating colorful foods (fruits and vegetables) is a good way to get those powerful antioxidants that the body needs to fight off diseases.

Food Myth:

You need to cut out all the fat you eat to loose weight

Food Fact:

Foods that are reduced fat, often have the same amount of calories and at times even more calories than full fat products due to added sugar. You may be tempted to eat more when they say “low fat”.

The doctor says:

Colorful foods are important, because, they provide nutrition from the chemicals called phytonutrients or “plant” nutrients. These nutrients contribute to your healthy-food plan.

Remember, first, you should never starve yourself regardless of what your health and fitness goals are. Activity should also be increased to burn off those calories. With that said, it seems at times that it is forgotten that loosing weight (weight management) is only part of the puzzle. You don’t want to just loose the weight and get on with life. In a perfect world, that would be great.

The other side of the dish is the nutrition factor. You also want to focus on how good your nutrition is. You’ve heard it before, and there is something to be said that “You are what you eat”! Getting proper nutrition can be accomplished in a number of ways. Eating right and taking dietary supplements will help you along the way. There are those who feel that supplements don’t work and are a waste of money. That is not true! Just because one doesn’t always feel some sort of super change by taking supplements doesn’t mean they are not doing there job. It’s the consistent use of them that makes the difference. When I was selling Herbalife, my favorite supplement was their Total Control. This supplement helps build energy, promotes weight loss and boosts metabolism all at the same time. But, again, consistent usage of supplements are where the results come from.

So, by eating right, and taking supplements, you will start laying a foundation of good health which will develop and strengthen your immune system. Not to long ago, my wife was having a conversation with a friend and she said during the time we’ve been married, my husband has only been really sick twice. This is because, of my being active, and taking supplements and eating right.

As stated in other posts, you should also consider changing your habits. I don’t smoke, drink, or do anything else that would be detrimental to my health. I am an avid runner and I work out on a regular basis. Despite your interests, sometimes an overhaul of what you are doing could be the answer.
Who knows, you may end up meeting the new you some day like I did.

So, in concluding, never starve yourself, get active, eat right and take supplements and you’ll start finding yourself going down a better path to a whole new you.

See also:
Do I Eat Today? (D.I.E.T) Part #1 ,
Avoid The Gimics, Change Habits

After my wife lost at least 20 pounds, she noticed a big difference. She used to be out of breath just climbing the stairs to our upper level of the house. I no longer have the back pains I used to since loosing my weight. While, the effort can be hard at times, it’s worth it in the long run. You open the door to a whole new you when you loose even just 20 pounds. The door you open automatically closes the door behind you. The door to increased odds of bad health. Because of my efforts, my recent annual checkup was perfect. I had perfect blood pressure, and all my “numbers” were good or near good. Having a active and healthy lifestyle is the name of the game. The biggest secret here is that the secret to better health, starts and ends with YOU. You have to make the decision to change direction. You have to be committed. You have to change. I say this with personal experience here. I used to drink, eat what ever I wanted when I wanted. I’ve been through a lot of personal issues and seen what I did not want in my life and can tell you that it does start and end with you. You have to cut away what isn’t worth it and discard it. I eliminated alcohol from my life and haven’t looked back. Yes, my wife and I have a little bit on our anniversary, but, not much to speak of. I became an avid runner about 3 years into my depression to help clear it up. For me, it was one of the biggest aspects that pulled me out of the gutter. This also helped me loose weight. I did go through the usual ups and downs of weight loss. It wasn’t until I found Herbalife that I was able to start keeping it off. See My Testimony for more information on this.

See Part one of Better Health Secrets.

No matter where you are in your lifestyle, whether it be just starting, or being well underway, loosing weight can bring about a lot of benefits for your life. Feeling better and having an improved self esteem
is only the beginning. You can decrease the odds of poor health by loosing even 20 pounds. Dropping in weight can lower your chances for such problems like diabetes, back pain, heart problems and that’s only the beginning. For some, the older we get, the less active we become. To stop the domino affect of a downward trend in your health, you need to consider changing your lifestyle and the way you look at things. It will always be stressed here at AboveNBeyond4u, that before you start a new lifestyle, you should see a doctor for a physical. You never know what could be happening unless you take control and have a checkup. From that point, you can start working on a better you. Like starting a new career, you have to start some place and seeing a doctor for a routine checkup is step #1.

The greater the weight, the more strain or stress is demanded by the heart and other vital organs in the body. Being overweight, doesn’t have to be permanent. Don’t fall for the belief’s that some people are meant to be overweight (that is a myth). One is not born overweight, and it takes time to get there. So, it will take time to loose it too.

Whether you are just starting out to loosing weight, or you’ve been making progress, over the course of your efforts, you are learning new things about how to get you from where you were, to where you want to be. This is not always an easy road to tread. It doesn’t matter how overweight or underweight you are. Cutting back, controlling your portions and taking vitamins / supplements are only part of the solution.

Unless you are trying to gain weight, you should consider some way to increase your activity. Even if you are working on gaining weight, exercise at some level is always good. By increasing your activity, whether it be running (my favorite), walking, riding bike, or even joining a gym, you’ll be increasing the effort to burn those calories. So, by making this choice, here is what you are doing:

1. Eating right (portion control and watching the types of food you are eating)
2. Taking supplements / vitamins
3. Exercise / increased activity

You’ve now started a brand new way of living, thus, enter a new lifestyle of fitness which will bring about a whole new you. After a while, you’ll begin to look back and say good bye to the old you that you once new. Now the list above, is only the beginning or a good starting point. You can pick and choose later what works best for you as you learn your way in this new lifestyle. Remember, it is a lifestyle and not a “diet”.

No pain no gain

Now, if you are trying to gain weight, there are products/supplements available to help you in this direction. While portion control would not be an issue where, you would still want to be aware of how much you are taking in, especially when you start gaining weight so as not to over shoot your goals.

A brief on Portion Control:
Why is Portion Control so important? Well, for one thing, without it, all your other efforts would be a waist of time. You would be just spinning your wheels which will get you nowhere.