The Infonian

Faith based diets have been around for decades. But is overeating really a sin? Does God punish you for being fat? A recent column in an issue of USA Today answers, “weight loss is hard enough without feeling that the almighty is on your back, too”…

Recently, I was sitting in a wonderful little breakfast “parlor” on Main Street in Santa Monica (California), enjoying a bowl of oatmeal, a mountain of fresh fruit and a “sexy omelette” (the bodybuilder’s favorite). There was even a “Schwarzenegger omelette” on the menu – I kid you not! Although the usual dietary temptations are omnipresent everywhere, I noticed a lot more healthy eateries and healthy options on menus out here, which is okay by me! It seems like people are much more health conscious in Southern California compared to back home in the New Jersey/New York City area.

One thing is for sure – people are definitely in better shape. No doubt, it’s partly due to the year-round beautiful weather. You can’t hide under those winter coats in this weather! When I left Newark airport it was a blustery 37 degrees. It’s 77 degrees and sunny as I sit here on my hotel balcony, laptop on my lap, overlooking the palm trees and Pacific ocean.

A friend of mine once said that “Palm trees are God’s way of saying, LIVE HERE!”

Speaking of God, that brings me to the subject of this article. As I was finishing up the last few bites of my high protein omelette, I came across an article in USA Today that I simply HAD to pass on to you because it’s related to some of the weight loss work I’ve been recently doing and it bears some important lessons.

The column, written by Christine Whelan, a professor of sociology, said that religious diet groups are growing in number and some of them say that “God might not approve of that second piece of pie.” In fact, some of these groups, reported Whelan, warn that God will punish you for overeating and being fat. The Weigh Down Workshop, one of the most “hard-line” of such groups, tells their participants that God will “destroy you” if you abuse your body by overeating.

Well, we’ve certainly heard of gluttony referred to as a deadly sin, but is this going a little too far?”

I’m not sure what other people think, but I prefer to think of God as a loving God, who does not punish a person in the hereafter for being fat in this life. But then again, why would he have to? He has created a magnificent physical world based on immutable physical laws of cause and effect, reward and consequence, which mete out all the “punishment” needed, right here in this life: diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, osteoarthritis, gout, and even cancer. All of them are linked to obesity. Combined with the emotional pain of being overweight and the lower quality (and sometimes quantity) of life, I’d say that’s punishment enough, wouldn’t you?

But enough of my theological viewpoint, I found some tremendously valuable practical lessons in the newspaper article.

I don’t believe that instilling guilt or fear of eternal damnation is an uplifting way to change behavior. Perhaps it might be effective for some, as fear of consequences can be a powerful motivator. But aren’t there more positive ways to achieve behavior modification than hellfire and brimstone?

For example, metaphors are also powerful motivators, especially because metaphors are language that your unconscious mind can understand. Didn’t Jesus teach in parables and metaphors? What if you said your body was like a temple? Would you behave differently? Would you look after your “temple” with more care? Those with spiritual beliefs almost certainly would, if they kept that in mind and believed it on a deep level.

In my books, I delve into the emotional, psychological and social aspects of body fat loss.

Some of the chapters are devoted to teaching you how to build a fortress of positive, uplifting, inspiring energy around you in the form of positive, uplifting, and inspiring people. But many of my readers and clients tell me this is easier said than done in their world. “What am I supposed to do when peer pressure from my friends is pulling me down?” “What do I do if my own family won’t support my new, healthier choices? What if they keep bringing potato chips, cookies and ice cream into the house?” “What if no one supports me?”

Enter spiritual diet support groups. Not all of these groups are so extreme as to pronounce that being fat is a sin. And as Whelan put it, “religion may be the ultimate trump card of many behavior modification programs.”

No matter how independent we are, we all need support in our journeys toward personal improvement. It’s the great paradox of succeeding in any endeavor in life – you have to do it by yourself, but you can’t do it alone.

Spiritual communities and religious support groups can be the last refuge of support and encouragement for some people. For anyone with spiritual beliefs, these groups may be one of the best places of all to turn for social support. There’s your church, synagogue, mosque or other place of worship. There are also organized weight loss support groups.

One such group mentioned in the USA Today article is BABES – Beautiful Accountable Babes Exercising Sensibly. The mission of babes is “connecting with others to lose weight and build friendships.” Accountability. Exercising. Connecting with others. That all sounds pretty sensible to me! Moreover, according to BABES co-founder, Barb Swanson, “we are not into sin and judgment. God wants balance and it’s more than the size that you are.”

Indeed it is. As I have said before, body fat is not a person, it’s a temporary physical condition. What we really are is far more than physical bodies.

There’s enough guilt, fear and shame for people who are struggling with weight issues already. They don’t need any more negativity from their spiritual leaders. Instead, if you are a person of faith, use your spiritual community as a source of social support and inspiration, and motivate yourself by focusing on the positive and uplifting side. It will pay you eternal dividends.

Train hard and expect success,

Tom Venuto
Fat Loss Coach
www.burnthefat.com

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is a natural bodybuilder, certified personal trainer and freelance fitness writer. Tom is the author of “Burn the Fat, Feed The Muscle,” which teaches you how to get lean without drugs or supplements using secrets of the world’s best bodybuilders and fitness models. Learn how to get rid of stubborn fat and increase your metabolism by visiting:
www.burnthefat.com

Healthy weight loss programs can be hard to find. Far too many mainstream diets appear to expect you to live on starvation rations, to cut out one or more of the major essential food groups, to poison your body with possibly dangerous diet pills, or to eat additive-filled meal replacements.

But you don’t have to abuse your body to lose weight. Instead, look for a healthy, balanced weight loss plan that meets the following criteria: It Should Be Based on Natural, Unprocessed Food

Firstly, a healthy diet program involves eating real food, not synthetic meal replacements, and the food should be as close to its natural state as possible. This means fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, seeds, dairy (preferably organic) and other nutrient-rich, unprocessed foods. Any kind of low calorie diet will help you to lose weight, but if you want to remain healthy too, it’s essential to include lots of high quality fresh foods, and to eat enough. So avoid any diet plan that would require you to live on junky processed food or meal replacement drinks – that way of eating just isn’t sustainable over the long term.

It Shouldn’t Involve Diet Pills

Diet pills can sometimes help people to lose weight quickly, but their long term effects on the body are uncertain. Risking your health for short term weight loss is a bad idea, particularly if you don’t change your eating and lifestyle habits. With a healthy diet and moderate amounts of regular exercise, there’s simply no need to pop pills to lose weight, and a healthy weight loss program won’t expect you to.

It Should Include Some Exercise

You can lose weight without exercising, but if you care about your long term health, taking some exercise is essential. Exercise can help to prevent chronic health problems, and it also gives your mood and energy levels an immediate boost. In addition, exercise makes weight loss easier because you’ll burn calories during your workout, your metabolic rate will be increased for some time afterward, and you’ll build lean muscle tissue, which is more metabolically active than fat – meaning that you burn more calories even when you’re at rest. So for optimal health, ensure that your weight loss program includes at least twenty minutes of exercise three or four days a week.

You Should Eat Enough, and Often Enough

It’s essential to provide your body with enough food when you’re trying to lose weight. Avoid the temptation to skip meals or go on a crash diet, because this puts your body under stress, and will decrease your energy levels, making overeating more likely. If you get into the habit of under-eating, you’re also at risk of malnutrition and losing muscle mass. In addition to the negative effects on your health, skipping meals won’t really help with weight loss, because your body’s metabolic rate will slow. This makes fat loss more difficult, and you’ll be more likely to regain even more weight than you lost when you begin to eat normally again. So for healthy weight loss, eat at least three meals a day (many people find that four or five smaller meals works better), and don’t be tempted to skip any meals.

It Should Stress the Importance of Making Permanent Changes

Any diet plan that depends on faddy short term techniques such as cutting out whole food groups, taking diet pills or drastically reducing calories won’t help you lose weight permanently, and won’t help you to stay healthy over the long term either. For most people, plans of that type are impossible to stick with for very long, because the body eventually rebels, and forces you to eat more just to provide the energy and nutrients that it needs. Any healthy weight loss plan will put the emphasis on making permanent changes in your eating habits, and also eating adequate (but not excessive) amounts of healthy, unprocessed, nutritionally-dense foods.

If you’re in the habit of overeating, or you live on junk foods, changing to such a plan can be challenging, but it is doable, given some time and patience. And it’s definitely worth the effort, because once you’ve established healthy new habits, the weight will stay off, and you’ll be free from the yoyo cycle of weight gain and loss for ever. And you’ll feel great too!

So if you want to lose weight, keep it off, and be vibrantly healthy too, look for a health-focused weight loss plan that avoids short term gimmicks and instead encourages you to do what’s best for your body.

Author: Lea Jones

Are you having trouble finding the motivation for losing weight? Then keep reading! I know that it can be difficult to persevere with a weight loss plan once the initial enthusiasm begins to wane, but it can be done. This article gives ten weight loss motivation tips that will help you to keep going and reach your goal.

1. Reward Yourself

Take small steps towards your goal, and make sure that you give yourself some reward (not food!) at each stage along the way. Losing weight can seem like an endless task, especially if you’ve got a lot to lose, so it’s important that you enjoy a sense of achievement even before you reach your goal weight.

2. Dress well.

When your larger sized clothes become too loose, get rid of them. Many people have a wardrobe full of clothes of different sizes, but if you hang onto your ‘fat clothes’, you’re sending your subconscious mind the message that you are expecting to gain the weight back. Also, don’t wait until you’re at your goal weight before you purchase some really nice new clothes – try to get at least one new piece of clothing that you really like with every dress size that you drop. You don’t have to spend a lot if money is an issue, but just a few new (or new to you) well-fitting, flattering pieces of clothing can really boost your confidence and inspire you to continue.

3. Focus on how you feel.

Stay focused on how good your body feels as you start to lose weight. Many overweight people generally feel a bit tired and uncomfortable in their bodies, and as you lose the pounds, you’ll feel better and better (that’s assuming that you’re using a healthy diet and exercise plan). If you focus on these improvements in your day to day quality of life, you’ll feel motivated to stay the course and enjoy even more energy and a greater sense of well-being as time goes on. Remember that there’s more to weight loss than just numbers on the scale or smaller dress sizes; it’s also about increasing your sense of physical and mental vitality.

4. Exercise. Make an effort to take a bit of exercise on most days. This might involve dredging up some willpower in the beginning, but after you’ve made it a habit, you’ll find that the great boost to your mood that exercise provides will give you a strong motivation to continue. Exercise doesn’t have to be a chore, and you don’t have to wear yourself out – choose an activity that you enjoy, and just do 10 or 15 minutes each time to start with.

5. Use personally meaningful incentives. For example, if looking good is important to you, you might find it helpful to hang one or more items of clothing in your ideal size, somewhere where you’ll see it often (although for others, this could be a depressing reminder of where they currently are). But if you like clothes, this can be a good incentive to continue.

6. Focus on your health. A lot of people are motivated to lose weight primarily because they want to look thinner, but it’s also worth considering the long and short-term health implications of being overweight, and the benefits (such as reduced risk of diseases such as heart problems, joint problems, some types of cancer, etc.,) that you’ll gain if you slim down. You’ll also have lots more energy, and may feel better mentally too.

7. Boost your confidence. In some cases, losing weight can help a person to feel more confident. If your confidence is being negatively affected by your weight, you may find it motivating to think about how much more at ease you’ll be in social situations once the excess is lost, and think about enjoying all the positive attention you’ll receive. You can also feel better about yourself right now by focusing on those aspects of your body, your life and yourself that you love just as they are. This is important, as many people overeat to mask feeling bad about themselves, so some positive self-talk can make it less likely that they’ll turn to food to feel better.

8. Try keeping a food diary. This is a very effective way to become aware of your eating habits, and it’s a great tool for motivation, as you’re less likely to overeat or eat mindlessly – and the more often you eat well, the easier it’ll be to continue.

9. Get some support. There are so many people who are in the same boat, and it can really help a lot to have somebody to talk to at those times when you just feel like giving up on the whole thing. There are several options here – you could join a formal support group, get together in an informal group with some friends, or join some of the many online weight loss forums and other communities.

10. Enjoy your food. Forget about ‘going on a diet’, and instead find a way of eating that you actually enjoy, and can stick with over the long term. Also, make sure you allow yourself some of your favorite foods as treats. Any weight loss plan that’s overly strict is very de-motivating. It’s certainly important to establish healthy eating habits, but you shouldn’t charge headlong into some extreme regime that no normal person could stick with for more than a few days at a time. You’ll be much less likely to over-indulge or binge if you’re enjoying what you’re eating on a day to day basis.

So, if you feel discouraged with your weight loss journey at times, don’t beat yourself up – this is normal, and happens to most people. Just be nice to yourself, and keep the above points in mind, and you’ll find it easier to maintain your motivation for losing weight, making the whole process much more straightforward.

Author: Lea Jones

Online diet programs can make weight loss an easier process than more traditional weight loss programs, because they offer a variety of useful extra features, such as regular updates, online support, and various tools, such as applications that generate meal plans and shopping lists. However, there are a large number of online diets to choose from, so it can be hard to know where to begin. It’s true that no single diet plan will work well for everyone, but the good ones will at least meet the following criteria:

Focus on Health

Many diets, both online and off, lure people in with promises of fast weight loss, but these are often dangerously unbalanced. Many extreme low carb, low calorie and low fat diets fall into this category, as do those plans based around just eating one type of food. These fad diets are also usually so difficult to stick to that any weight you do lose will be regained before long. You should give plans like this a miss, and instead opt for a healthy diet that allows a wide range of foods, allows for some ‘treats’, doesn’t exclude any of the major food groups, and doesn’t expect you to under-eat. A sensible weight loss plan will also stress the importance of exercise, which is essential for lifelong health. Forget about ‘going on a diet’, and instead opt for a program that you can live with over the long term, and that doesn’t put your health at risk.

Updates

Web-based diet programs have an advantage in that they’re often more up to date than those you’ll find in books, as it’s much easier to update a website, or publish a new edition of an ebook. The best online diet plans are updated as often as necessary, and ideally you should receive free access to these updates after you’ve paid the initial fee for the program.

Guarantee

Reputable online weight loss plans come with a money back guarantee for a trial period. This way you have the chance to read through the materials and see if the diet is a good fit for you. Despite what many diet book authors would have you believe, no eating plan will work well for everyone – people have different lifestyles, metabolisms and personal preferences – and to lose weight permanently, you must find a plan that you’ll be happy to stick with over the long term. Reputable authors are aware of this and provide a guarantee in case the plan isn’t suitable for you.

Support

Online weight loss programs frequently include support that you wouldn’t usually get when buying a physical book. Most at least include a contact form so you can get a personal response to any queries or concerns that you might have, and some also offer a forum or some other kind of virtual ‘meeting area’ for customers. Avoid any online program that doesn’t provide contact information.

Extras

A great advantage of online diet plans is that they often come with various bonus features in addition to the main ebook itself. These might include a diet generator, which will give you a menu based on your favourite foods, making meal planning very easy. Some diet generator applications even provide a shopping list of your selections which you can print out. Some online plans also include tools to keep track of things like your exercise routine, calorie intake (if you’re counting calories), nutrient intake and other aspects of your regime. You might also get some bonus materials such as recipe books. So when choosing an online diet program, make sure you check out the extras as well, as they can add a lot of value to your purchase.

Bear these key points in mind when evaluating online diet plans, and you’ll avoid the scams and more easily find the ideal program for you.

For more details about of a variety of online diet programs, as well as lots of other weight loss information, visit Fat Loss Choices. Or save some time and just check out Strip That Fat, which in my opinion is the best downloadable plan for those looking for a healthy, easy way to lose weight – you can read my in-depth Strip That Fat review here.

Author: Lea Jones

There’s a lot of conflicting information on weight loss on the internet. Most people who follow traditional advice of avoiding high fat foods will find that it just doesn’t help, period. Once you start eating unhealthy, your body starts to build up an ugly gum-like residue. Even if you switched to eating healthier, your body won’t start to lose weight overnight, because of this buildup. This gum quickly turns into plaque and can even lead to parasite infestations. The plaque and infestation have a long term effect on your body. It can be very difficult to get rid of this buildup overnight.

A great way to think of it is like a yellow tooth. Say you’ve been eating sweets all your life — then looked in the mirror one day, and saw that your teeth were turning yellow. Even if you changed your habits they wouldn’t turn white overnight. Once you change habits, it takes a long time for the built-up damage to clear.

The good news is that your digestive system can be cleaned up a lot faster than your teeth. The secret is to use a special diet that will naturally clear out all the gum, plaque, and parasites that have built up in your body over the years. Once your system is clear, then you’ll start to drop those pounds easily and painlessly.

After you get the “gunk” out, it’s important to keep your system in good shape. You can’t just cleanse out your system, and start eating unhealthy again. The only way to assure that you keep your system in good shape is to take up an easy diet plan. An easy diet plan is a diet that you can follow for the long haul without much effort.

People usually don’t want to put much effort into losing weight, they want it to happen instantaneously, and never have to worry about it again. If you go back to eating the way you used to, chances are that you’ll gain your weight back just as quickly. The diet you choose should help you keep the weight off, as well as nourish your body for years to come. It should be easy and fun for you, so that you won’t ever want to go back to your old eating habits.

Using this natural method of dieting, you’ll be able to lose weight without ever touching a diet pill. Most people don’t realize that diet pills actually add to their digestive system’s “gunk” rather than help remove it. Most diet pills promise to kill fat cells or reduce appetite. In reality, neither of these approaches are long term solutions.

Once you understand and start to adopt this method of weight-loss, you’ll find that your weight will naturally drop, pound by pound. The weight you lose will also stay off, because what you’re doing is actually healthy and nourishing. You’ll get to enjoy the inner satisfaction of knowing that you’re treating your body well.

It was recently reported on NBC that fully two-thirds of Americans are either overweight or obese. If you’re in that category, you really need an easy diet plan. Dyan’s website on losing weight tips has important information about a brand new fat loss method. Find out more about losing body fat and keeping it off for a long time.

Author: Dyan Pascal