Whenever we get too busy or stressed, we all tend to make poor food choices that will actually increase stress and cause other problems. To get the most of your healthy eating and avoid stress, follow these simple tips.

Always eat breakfast
Even though you may think you aren’t hungry, you need to eat something. Skipping breakfast makes it harder to maintain the proper blood and sugar levels during the day, so you should always eat something.

Carry a snack
Keeping some protein rich snacks in your car, office, or pocket book will help you avoid blood sugar level dips, the accompanying mood swings, and the fatigue. Trail mix, granola bars, and energy bars all have the nutrients you need.

Healthy munchies
If you like to munch when you’re stressed out, you can replace chips or other non healthy foods with carrot sticks, celery sticks, or even sunflower seeds.

Bring your lunch
Although a lot of people prefer to eat fast food for lunch, you can save a lot of money and actually eat healthier if you take a few minutes and pack a lunch at home. Even if you only do this a few times a week, you’ll see a much better improvement over eating out.

Stock your home
As important as it is to get the bad food out of your house, it’s even more important to get the good food in! The best way to do this is to plan a menu of healthy meals at snacks at the beginning of the week, list the ingedients you need, then go shop for it. This way, you’ll know what you want when you need it and you won’t have to stress over what to eat.

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Moderation is one thing that you should be looking for when you are considering which healthy eating plans are the best. To put it another way, if the plan has extreme restrictions or makes wild claims, then the chances are good that it’s unhealthy. The best diets will focus on moderation in the types of food you eat, as well as the portions it recommends.

If you have been considering various plans, then you have probably seen those that make claims that can tip you off to why they may not be so good. A common example is a diet that says you can eat as much of one food as you want, but then severely limits how much you can eat of other foods. Low carb diets may be the most popular example. They let you eat all the protein and fat that you want, but try to get you to cut out as many carbohydrates as you can.

While these so-called “healthy eating plans” say you can eat all the meat, fish and eggs you want and lose weight, you need to realize there are also risks. First, people are designed to eat a whole range of foods. Yes, you may be able to lose weight on a low-carb diet, but it could have negative impact on your health if all you’re eating is meat and eggs. Second, the idea of eating all the bacon (for example) you want sounds very appealing at first, but the craving for carbohydrates is more than most people can handle, and they end up binging on carbs…and weighing more than when they started.

Any type of diet that makes similar claims should be looked at with suspicion. A diet that tells you that you can eat all of the fat you like is just as bad as any diet that tells you to eat as much sugar as you want. It just doesn’t make sense. To be fair there are also diets that tell you to cut out all fat. Surely these must be healthy eating plans, right? Not really. Again, they are too restrictive for certain foods, and that’s your clue that they may not be good for you. The truth is that there are healthy fats. Again, the key here is moderation.

Of course the appeal for all of these types of diets is the same. What happens is that a person may try a reasonable diet, but then they find they crave certain foods. Say the diet says you shouldn’t eat cheeseburgers. There’s nothing wrong with that, but then you start wishing you could eat a big, juicy cheeseburger and go off the diet. Then later on you decide you’d like to lose weight again. But here’s the catch: you look for a diet that allows you to eat the cheeseburgers you missed on the last diet. You start off doing great, but even though you can eat your burgers, the new diet doesn’t let you eat pasta. So, you go off this diet and look for one that lets you eat pasta…and you keep repeating this cycle over and over again.

But real healthy eating plans let you eat just about anything you want, but only in moderation. In other words, they make allowances for the occasional treat, but they offset it in some way; they balance it out. Such a plan is much easier to stick to and will give you long term results.

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Wanting to eat better is a goal that is shared by millions and millions of people around the globe. Their reasons range from “just wanting to” to trying to treat a deadly disease, from moral reasons to wanting to lose weight. Regardless of the reason, you should research health and nutrition before deciding on a healthy eating program that is best for you. Doing the proper research will not only point you in the right direction for foods you should eat, but it will also steer you away from the foods you should avoid.

One thing you need to watch out for is a lack of balance. For example, the market is filled with diet plans that eliminate whole categories of food. While it makes sense to reduce the level of saturated fat you consume, getting rid of carbohydrates is a questionable practice at best. It is okay to eat fat, carbohydrates and protein; in fact, you should be wary of any so-called healthy eating program that claims otherwise.

When it comes to fat, you will want to limit saturated fats, and try to eliminate man-made trans fats completely. (There are naturally occurring trans fats, and these aren’t nearly as bad as their hydrogenated counterparts.) Your best bet is to have polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats, though you don’t want to go overboard on them, either.

Carbohydrates have received a lot of attention in recent years. This is due, largely, to some popular diets that avoided them. Yes, it is possible to lose weight on a low-carb diet, but there may be risks involved. Also, such a diet wouldn’t really be considered a long-term healthy eating program because of the lack of balance. However, not all carbohydrates are created equally. You should limit the simple carbs found in white bread, white rice, and sugar; and replace them with the complex carbs found in whole grains, vegetables and some fruit.

Protein can be tricky because a lot of sources are high in saturated fat. Beef, for example, is high in protein, but a lot of cuts are high in saturated fat. Chicken, on the other hand, has some cuts that are higher in fat than others, so choose white meat to stay on the safe side. Perhaps the best of source of protein is beans (pinto, black, garbanzo, navy, and so on). The are high in protein and fiber, and are also very low in fat.

A healthy eating program doesn’t mean you can never enjoy your favorite foods again, far from it. First, there are plenty of healthy alternatives for most foods. Second, the key is to enjoy such foods in moderation, as an occasional treat. If you eat less of the unhealthy foods, and more of the healthy foods, then you will be headed in the right direction. But if you can’t have the foods you enjoy, then there is too great of a risk that you will simply go back to an unhealthy diet, and that wouldn’t do you much good at all.

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The Ultimate Flat Abs Diet Plan – Six Tips For Success

Working out until your midsection burns but still not seeing enough results? If so, then you are not alone. What may surprise you is that exercise may not be the weak point in your routine. Instead, what you need is a more comprehensive flat abs diet plan. Here are six steps to six pack abs.

Ultimate Flat Abs Diet Plan Step #1 – Load up on fiber. Your daily goal for dietary fiber should be at least 25 grams. Fiber helps you feel more full so you end up eating less. It also helps digestion, allowing fat to move through your system faster. Good sources of fiber include fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and beans.

Ultimate Flat Abs Diet Plan Step #2 – Go for high-quality carbohydrates. Not all carbs are created equal. Simple carbohydrates are digested too quickly and cause spikes in blood sugar levels. Sugar, refined flour, white bread and white rice are common examples of simple carbs. Complex carbohydrates, on the other hand, are much better for you. These are found in whole grains, fruits and vegetables. You should still try to limit your carbs to no more than 65% of your total caloric intake.

Ultimate Flat Abs Diet Plan Step #3 – Drink plenty of water. The idea that drinking 8 glasses of water per day will help you lose weight is mostly a myth. However, it’s still a good idea to stay well hydrated. Your cells thrive on having enough water, and this includes muscle cells.

Ultimate Flat Abs Diet Plan Step #4 – Decrease sodium intake. While having plenty of water in your system is a good thing, water retention is not. Having too much sodium will cause you to feel puffy or bloated. Also, having too much can be a risk factor for developing high blood pressure. The current U.S. dietary guidelines recommend an upper limit of 2400 milligrams of sodium per day, but you can normally go much lower than that without risking your health.

Ultimate Flat Abs Diet Plan Step #5 – Don’t eat too late in the day. You need to give your body enough time to digest its food. Therefore, the sooner before bed you eat, the better. If at all possible, try not to eat anything 3 hours prior to retiring for the evening. If you must have something, then go for a light snack of 100 calories or less and perhaps a cup of tea.

Ultimate Flat Abs Diet Plan Step #6 – Reduce stress. That’s right! Stress releases a hormone known as cortisol. The problem with cortisol is that it sends a signal to the brain to store fat (as a sort of survival mechanism). And guess where the brain tells the body to store that fat after receiving its signal? If you said around your abs, then you’re correct.

There you go, six tips to six pack abs. Of course you still need to do your ab exercises, but these tips will give you the edge in your efforts to look your best.

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