How did our family traditions become centered around eating meat? Think about it. When we think of Thanksgiving, we think of turkey. If we eat pork, then New Year’s celebrations often revolve around pork and sauerkraut. At Christian Easter, the traditional meal is ham. And in the summer, we wait for that first hamburger or steak on the grill.

How did that happen to a species that was designed to eat vegetables and fruits, nuts, berries and legumes?

We can imagine that eating meat was initially an opportunistic event, born of the need to survive. The taste of cooked meat, plus the sustained energy that came from eating high-fat meat products made primitive sense even to earliest man.

Initially, finding cooked animal meat, from a forest fire, would have been cause for celebration. It’s something everyone in a clan would have participated in eating together. When man learned to hunt and moved to a hunting orientation, rather than a hunter-gatherer orientation, he would have done this in groups. They would have had to hunt in teams, and killing an animal for food would have been a group effort. Hunting and killing an animal meant food not just for the individual, but for the clan, and would have been cause for celebration when the hunters brought the food home.

If they brought the animal back to the clan, it would have taken a group effort to skin the animal and tear or cut the meat from the carcass. Everyone would have participated in this, and subsequently, shared in the rewards of their work.

It’s easy to see how, once we didn’t have to hunt for meat, but could buy it, the need for gathering and celebration was deeply ingrained in our natures. We celebrate the seasons and life’s events with family and friends, and because those early celebrations involved eating meat, that tradition has continued to modern times.

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To encourage motivation as you lose weight, it is important to set goals. Setting goals that will stretch you allows you to improve both your exercise and eating habits consistently. Goals help you maintain focus as you strive to reach your target weight. Without goals and planning, youre setting yourself up for failure before you ever begin. Take the time to design a system of goals leading up to a stretch target to help you meet your fitness goals.

Stretch targets are goals that are designed to stretch you. When designing a stretch target, you need to plan a goal that you think is out of reach, and then set smaller goals to help you work towards it. For example, if you never exercise, you could make your goal to run a marathon in six months. You would then set smaller goals to get you there.

Goal setting is essential when you are attempting to make any lifestyle change. Take the time to design a stretch target, and smaller goals leading up to it. For example, you could begin by setting goals of walking each day with short bursts of running. Do this for 30 minutes per day for awhile, and then add more running each week. Eventually, by meeting these mini goals, youll be building up to running your marathon.

Be sure to encourage yourself along the way. As you design each goal, pick out a small reward that you will get when you achieve it. Set a much bigger reward for achieving your target goal. This gives you small incentives to work towards the bigger goal. If youre like most people, you require some sort of immediate gratification to keep you motivated. These rewards provide just that.

Goals are essential to any type of long term change, and weight loss is no exception. Setting goals leading up to a target that stretches you is a great way to encourage motivation. Tell others about your goal, so that they can encourage you as you begin. With dedication and hard work, youll be achieving your goal in no time at all. Be sure to choose a goal that really matters to you, so that youre even more motivated to work towards achieving it. Keep your mind focused on how proud youll feel when you finally reach your goal. Congratulations! Youre on your way to a better life.

This article is for informational purposes only. It is not medical advice, nor should it be interpreted or substituted for medical advice. Prior to making changes to your physical exercise routine and your diet, you should always consult your personal physician. Better safe than sorry.

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Health and fitness are topics that are in everybodys mouths. Whats the newest fad diet? Does it work? Where can you go for a workout? Are there workouts that guarantee weight loss. These are just some of the questions that people keep asking these days.

But even if it is the fad these days, only a few actually adhere to a healthy lifestyle. Most people will still eat junk and will still fill their plates with fats and carbohydrates. Most would still rather sit on the couch and watch TV than work out at the gym or do some jogging. Old habits, after all, die hard. But starting a healthy lifestyle is not really as impossible as you think it is. In fact, with commitment and discipline, you can actually start walking the road to health and fitness. It will be hard but just imagine the rewards that you will get in return.

People who live healthy will get to enjoy more of their lives, not only in terms of reaching 100 years old but in enjoying each moment of your life because you are illness-free. Often, people who eat right are more capable in performing their tasks at the office and are more able to get advancements in their careers. These guys do not take leaves of absence and when they do, they use it to have fun and unwind and not to recover from a bad illness.

People who eat healthy and work out will also have great bodies and are more physically attractive. They are more likely to have better sex life and more romantic involvements, which in turn can make them more satisfied with life. These things are chained situations. Start in a positive light and you will end with a positive light too.

But despite the numerous benefits that you get from living a healthy lifestyle, why do people still stick to their old habits. One of the reasons is of course the unwillingness. After all, who would want to quit something that you enjoy doing or eating? Most people will not be willing to part ways with what they have been so used to doing. Just imagine saying goodbye to a comfort food or a hobby that makes you happy, will you do it?

Another reason is perhaps the difficulty. Most people attempt to change their ways for various reasons, health problems, relationship woes, even financial but most of the time they dont see their plans through. They will try for a week and perhaps continue for a couple of weeks and then go back to their old habits after some time. They do not continue with their plans. One of the main reasons why is the lack of desire. To be successful in combating a bad habit, you need to really want it bad enough. You need to make sure that every temptation will not serve as temptation. Sometimes, will power is not enough for this. You also need the support of the people around you. This is why a lot of the programs right now that are created to help people change have a network of support system that will help their members.

So if you want to live a life of health and fitness, make the change now. There are a lot of benefits to it. You just need to fully commit to it and create your own support system.

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Living a life of health and fitness may seem a huge sacrifice but the rewards are truly immeasurable. Not only will you be able to enjoy your life a little bit longer, you can also live it while looking good and looking young.

You dont believe us? Here is a rundown of the benefits that healthy living can give. Read on and you may be tempted to leave the dark unhealthy side.

1. Active body Eating the right kinds of food and keeping your body in shape will result to having more energy and that will spill over to your work and your play time. You will be more active and will have more chance to shine in your line of work. People who are active also come across as more capable and more independent. They are also perceived as more approachable, confident and charming.

2. Younger looking People who live healthy are younger looking than those who smoke and drink in excess. This is because chemicals in alcoholic drinks and cigarettes dry up the skin and create a more older appearance. Chemicals in the body also reduce the nutrients that go into the body, thus depriving the body of vitamins and minerals that keep the skin and other organs healthy and functioning.

Being young looking of course gives you a whole set of benefits, from a remarkable love life to success with career and in your social life. After all, whether we admit it or not, appearance do count in a lot of ways and being young looking and attractive can take you in places. As shallow as it seems, you will have more friends and more romantic involvements. Everybody loves beautiful people.

3. Clear thinking It is not true that chemicals in alcoholic drinks and cigarettes and drugs can amp up creativity levels. These are actually just short-lived and as studies have shown, only in the mind. People who eat and live healthy are more able to think clearly. They are more able to focus on the jobs at hand and therefore are able to accomplish much with their work than other people. They are also more dependable when given instructions and their memories are often clear and good.

4. No illness People who live a healthy lifestyle are well, healthy. They are not prone to sickness that can slow down a persons achievement levels. Thus, these people accomplish much of what they set out to do. They are not hampered by problems with their health or appointments with doctors that they have to go to. These people rarely take a leave of absence and when they do, they will often take a vacation and just relax. They dont take a leave because they are sick.

5. Emotionally-secure Although there really is no direct relationship, people who live a life of health and fitness are happier. They are able to enjoy their life more and are not distracted by odd habits and health problems. They also have less worries and are able to cope better with stressors. This is perhaps because they do not need to rely on chemicals for coping with the hardships that they encounter. Early on, they have developed natural coping strategies that can help them get through the daily grind.

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