First Steps to becoming healthy!

Whether you are already living a healthy lifestyle or just starting I feel like I need to start with the basics.

Of course the more you become active and eat healthy the easier it becomes as time goes on.

Here are some of the things that I feel are essential to become healthy. (I will not say lose weight because as I stated before weight does not depict how healthy you are).

A LITTLE H2O!

Water! If you don't drink it you better start! Get used to it learn to love it! It will be your bestfriend! RAW water! Sounds funny huh? Some of you are probably say I hate water it is flavorless so I am going to add this all natural Crystal Light packet. It is only 5 calories, what harm can it do. WAY TO MUCH! Sugar free drinks contain an additive called aspartame (a whole other blog post). Water in it's natural form, reduces bloating, takes the edge off of hunger, and it great for your skin!  Try to drink as much as you can a day. The recommended amount of water is 8 glasses a day but even I find that hard to do. 

STAY AWAY FROM DIET AND ARTIFICIAL SWEETENERS!

CATCH SOME ZZZZZ'S

Get at least 8 hours of sleep a night! Please please please! Not only does it make you more energetic, but research has found that if you do not get enough sleep, you are more likely to eat twice as much food the following day. EEEEK that's enough to make me sleep a full 8 hours.

GET OFF YOUR TUSH!

30 minutes that is all that stands between you and your weight loss goal! Walk the dog, jog, take a fitness class! Something to get you moving! Even taking the stairs at work instead of the elevator makes a big difference. Turn off that T.V., grab the kids, and go for a walk! My daily workout consists usually of a morning exercise (about 10 minutes) followed by an evening exercise (20 min) with a higher intensity level! 

PORTION CONTROL
As much as I hate to admit this...most of the time, it's not what you eat it is how much you eat. One oreo or 7 oreos? While I am sure most of you would take the 7, as would I ;) one oreo will not do as much damage as 7. My addiction is ice cream! Chocolate, Vanilla, in a cone, in a cup, soft, frozen any kind but I use to just scoop and scoop into my bowl until my arm was so sore (I used to say my right arm was gonna get bigger than my left from me building "scooping" muscles). Now I stick to 1/2 a cup of frozen yogurt. The bottom line is you are gonna cheat. You are going to want to eat bad every now and then escpecially in the begining, but if you totally ignore the urge for an oreo, you are more likely to binge later on. I actually have gotten to a point where I have eaten so healthy that if something out of the ordinary goes into my body, I will literally make me ill. Once your body is accustomed to healthy food you will not crave the bad food.
EAT ON SMALLER PLATES GET A SMALLER WAIST!





"Happiness lies first of all in health"
George William Curtis