“Old Age” Is Coming at Us, Faster than We’d Like to Think

We can’t stop time. But we don’t have to suffer from age-related indignities like constant fatigue… bedroom “meltdowns”… frequent memory lapses… or creaky joints.

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It doesn’t require changing your diet, altering your exercise routines, or making special visits to the doctor.

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The True Path to Lasting Weight Loss

Facts about Fat: Part Three of a Three-Part Series

My grandmother cooked with lard her whole life. And my grandfather ate butter until the day he died… at 82 years old. Neither one of them had diabetes or heart disease. And both were slim built, even in their final years. They’re not unusual for their generation. Most people cooked with lard and ate butter. And enjoyed robust health.

That changed when the government turned against animal fats; when the manufacturers started making margarine. And with that change came vegetable oils and hydrogenated fats. The public tossed out natural saturated fats and embraced trans fats; and humanity’s greatest health disaster was borne.

In the final part of our macronutrient series, we’re going to see how fat fits into your diet. The simple truth about fat is: you have to eat fat to lose fat. The key to unlocking that paradox is eating the right kind of fat.

Fat: the Most Maligned Macronutrient

The “macronutrient triangle” is made up of three “points”: carbs, protein, and fat. To find out more about the two other “points”, check out carbs and protein.

The third macronutrient – fat – fell out of favor at the end of the 70’s. Once the 80’s hit, the government told us – through its Dietary Guidelines for Americans – that animal fats caused heart disease. The Guidelines recommended we limit our saturated fat to less than 10 percent of our daily calories. That opened the door to shortening substitutes and low-fat products. Over the next two decades, this advice led to an “an unanticipated epidemic of obesity and diabetes,” says Dr. Michael Alderman, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, NY.

It’s only in the last decade that the medical community has started to re-evaluate sat fats. And now the latest science is supporting sat fats.

A recent study found “no significant evidence” linking saturated fats to cardiovascular disease or coronary heart disease. The study was published in the March edition of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

A second study, in the same issue, attributed America’s obesity and bad health to carbs – not sat fats.

These studies are only the latest to support this scientific fact. An earlier report reviewed saturated fat studies from the Department of Food Science and Technology at the University of California. The authors concluded that reducing saturated fat does not prolong life or lower the incidence of coronary heart disease.

The authors wrote: “The conclusion of an analysis of the history and politics behind the diet-heart hypothesis was that after 50 years of research, there was no evidence that a diet low in saturated fat prolongs life… lowering saturated fat intake does not lower coronary artery disease.”

In yet another study, the National Academy of Sciences reported there was no evidence that a diet low in saturated fat prolongs life.  They concluded that the real killer is trans-fatty acids.  The report stated, “the only safe intake of trans fat is zero.”

So if saturated fats aren’t bad for us, are they good for us? The answer, in short, is “yes”. In fact, THB Expert Panel Member Dr. Al Sears says, “I tell my patients they should get about 50 percent of their fat intake from saturated fat.”

The Man Who Ate Fat to Lose Fat

Eating some fats can help you lose weight. It sounds unlikely but it’s true. Dozens of doctors have reported true-life success stories in their own daily practices. Let me share just one with you: it comes from Dr. Mark Hyman. Dr. Hyman serves on the Board of Advisors of Georgetown University and operates a practice in Lenox. MA.

“One of my patients was 40 years old when he had his first bypass operation. He followed his doctors’ recommendation to eat a low-fat diet and exercised. Over the next 10 years, he gained about 30 pounds and developed blockages in his new arteries. His doctor kept telling him to “eat low fat”. His overall cholesterol was fine, but his “good” cholesterol (HDL) level was very low. Finally, his doctor told him not to eat any fat at all. And at the end of all this, he had gained 50 pounds and needed another bypass after following his doctor’s recommendations to eat a low-fat diet!

“When I saw him it was clear he had a problem with insulin resistance because he was not eating the right fats. I told him to eat more fat – the right kind of fat – and he began to do much better. Eating a diet with good-quality protein and good-quality fat raised his good cholesterol, lowered his blood sugar, and change his whole system. Since then, he has been fine and has lost 50 pounds. He’s kept it off for four years, his inflammation is gone, and he feels great.”

Sat Fats Promote Hearty Health

Dr. Lawrence Wilson also supports sat fats for health. Dr. Wilson is an M.D. has worked as a nutrition consultant for over 30 years in Phoenix, AZ.

“My conviction is that the fears about saturated fats are quite overblown,” says Dr. Wilson. “Most knowledgeable nutritionists agree that fats and oils are essential for health.”

So, both experts agree: sat fats offer good health benefits. The next question is why are they good for us?

“Fats are essential to good health,” says Dr. Sears. “Omega-3 fatty acids are so critical, a deficiency can lead to depression, lack of concentration and a host of chronic diseases including heart disease and cancer.”

Dr Hyman agrees.

“These “good fats” are some of the raw materials from which our bodies are made…lack of omega-3s may also lead to depression, dementia, cancer heart disease, and diabetes,” says Hyman.

He adds that eating good fats “turns on a different set of genes”.

Eat the right fats and you will:

• Burn fat
• Increase weight loss
• Increase your metabolism
• Reduce inflammation
• Become more sensitive to insulin, which will balance your blood sugar

Another critical benefit of good fat is cholesterol. You have good cholesterol (HDL) and bad cholesterol (LDL). Good fats boost your HDL.

“If you substitute carbs for fat, your HDL will drop,” says Dr. Sears (x). You don’t want to happen because “high HDL is the most reliable way to prevent heart disease.”

Good Sources of Sat Fats

This isn’t news to many Europeans. Both the Italians and French have always favored natural animal saturated fats over trans fats. You only have to walk around Paris to see the difference in people’s build: they are lean and vibrant. They’ve never shied away from saturated fats – in moderation – and their health reflects this.

Simply put, fat is good for us… “but it’s important that you get it from the best sources,” says Dr. Sears.

Natural, healthy fat is a strong component in optimum health. The good news is that you can find it in abundance in whole foods. Two good sources of fat are saturated (animal) fat and omega-3 fats.

• Omega-3 – This is great for heart health. It protects against cardiovascular disease. It also helps to burn body fat. For good sources of omega-3s enjoy wild fish, avocado, walnuts, olives, cod liver oil, Sacha Inchi oil, and nuts.
• Saturated Fats –These fats boost your immunity system. They also help you to absorb calcium. Find it in grass-fed beef, raw milk, and raw butter.

You can find healthy sources of fat in these 10 foods:

1. Organic butter
2. Olive oil
3. Nuts
4. Raw milk
5. Cold water wild fish
6. Grass-fed beef
7. Walnuts
8. Free-range chicken
9. Eggs
10. Avocadoes

Butter Better Than Margarine?

So if saturated fats – like those contained in butter – are good for us, why are other fats – like those in margarine – so bad for us? Most of the fats that are bad for us – vegetable fat, hydrogenated fats, and trans fats – are man made. They’re stripped off natural vitamins and are artificial, chemical-based oils.

“Vegetable fat in the modern western diet is an abomination,” says Dr. Sears. “Vegetable fats are highly processed to extend their shelf lives. The processing creates unhealthy hydrogena­tion and cancer causing “trans” fatty acids.

“When a hydrogen molecule is added to vegetable oils, it turns them to fatty solids,” says Dr. Sears. “These fatty solids replace animal fats, allowing food makers to label their products “cholesterol free.”

While saturated fats come from nature, trans fats are almost always man-made. According to a study published by the Food and Nutrition Board, trans fats are not essential fats; nor do they promote good health.

Despite this, they’re used in margarine, shortening, and baked goods. Why load up processed foods with these non-essential fats?

“The real reason is the considerable profit that margarine, and other processed foods bring over the more expensive natural products,” says Dr. Wilson. “The cost of margarine is based on denatured vegetable oil which only costs a few cents, while good butter may cost a few dollars. This provides considerable room for easy profits. It does not take rocket science to market margarine just slightly less than butter and pocket the resulting huge profit.”

According to Dr. Wilson, margarine begins as chemically-extracted, refined vegetable oil. Margarine is produced at high temperatures which also destroys vitamin E, and other nutrients in the oil. The final product contains trans-fatty acids.

“Research shows that trans-fatty acids increase inflammation in the body,” says Dr. Wilson. “This can worsen illnesses such as colitis and arthritis. Very recent research indicates that trans-fatty acids in margarine raise LDL levels.”

On the other hand, natural butter is made from cream. Butter is a partially saturated fat and does not contain trans fat. It’s also a good source of fat-soluble vitamins, including vitamin A, D, E and K. None of these essential vitamins are found in significant quantities in margarine.

Dr. Hyman also names refined fats and hydrogenated fat as ones to avoid.

“Hydrogenated fat is one of the most toxic foods known and should have no place in you diet,” he says (xv). “Hydrogenated fats actually block your metabolism (leading to weight gain), raise your cholesterol, create inflammation, and cause cancer. They’re associated with dementia and cause diabetes.”

According to Dr. Hyman, “trans fats,” send a gene message which “blocks your metabolism, increases inflammation, and prevents you from being able to regulate your blood sugar, which causes insulin resistance.” And as we know, that can lead to weight gain and, in time, chronic illness.

“Eating the wrong fats turns on the wrong messages in your genes,” says Dr. Hyman. “Eating the right fats turns on the right messages.”

Fats to Avoid

Dr. Hyman recommends that you eliminate processed oils from your diet. That includes refined vegetable oils and hydrogenated oils.

Bad fats are the omega-6s. They are needed for a balanced diet, but only in small amounts. Dr. Sears says your health will improve if you have a much higher ratio of omega-3s to omega-6s in the foods you eat. You can avoid high levels of omega-6, by not eating grain-fed beef, processed foods, and vegetable oil.

Trans fats are worse than Omega-6 fats. They’re the most dangerous fat you can have and should be completely avoided. You get them in processed packaged foods like potato chips, cookies, cakes, and bottled salad dressings.

Here’s a short list of foods which contain trans fats:

• Hardened Margarines and shortenings
• Bottled salad dressings
• Mayonnaise
• Fried fast foods
• Corn chips
• French fries
• Fried meats like chicken and fish
• Baked goods including biscuits, breads, cakes, cookies and crackers

Understanding the “macronutrient triangle” can help you lose weight. It’s a key factor in quick and healthy weight loss.  Understanding the triangle is your first step to balancing your hormones. And if you know how to balance your hormones you can restore youthful health and fitness. For a full report on rapid, healthy weight loss, check out the June edition of Natural Health Confidential.

Correction: Originally published on 6/25, this article mistakenly cited “grain-fed beef” rather than “grass-fed beef” as a good source of healthy fat, as well as noting that Europeans frequently eat “trans” fats instead of “saturated” fats.

To your health,

Ian Robinson,
Managing Editor, Total Health Breakthroughs

Unleash The Secret Power In Your Eyes To See Again Without Reading Glasses. Try This Eye Doctor’s Discovery For Free – And See For Yourself.

Eye doctor Dr. Ray Gottlieb could be a genius. That’s certainly what people think once they learn his secret for sharpening reading vision without glasses.

Most doctors will tell you that reading glasses are an inevitable part of getting older, but thanks to Dr. Gottlieb’s discovery that doesn’t have to be the case for you and the millions of other people who suffer from presbyopia (“old eyes”).

Years ago, a frustrated patient begged Dr. Gottlieb for a way to get rid of his annoying reading glasses without having to resort to risky eye surgery.

The result?

Dr. Gottlieb researched everything he could find about aging eyes and re-discovered a vision secret that had been lost for nearly 150 years.

When he applied this vision secret to the problem of aging eyesight, his results were nothing short of magic. His patient’s eyesight sharpened dramatically!

The first time I saw him demonstrate this vision secret on a baby boomer, I was stunned!

Within minutes she was reading the finest print – without her reading glasses!

Lots of people are skeptical when they first hear about the promise of Dr. Gottlieb’s secret.

That’s why I want you to try it on your own eyes – for free.

Click here to see for yourself.

Protein Promotes Rapid Weight Loss

Power Up with Protein: Part Two of a Three-Part Series

Your glory days can still be ahead of you. You can reclaim the body you used to have. You can restore your health and fitness at any time. You just have to know how to re-program your biology. That doesn’t require expensive gimmicks or gym memberships. It just requires a solid understanding of the “macronutrient triangle”. Once you understand how the points fit together, you can balance your hormonal response. And once you balance your response, improved health and rapid weight loss will be yours.

But don’t think that cereal and bananas will help you lose weight. In truth, our grand parents had a better idea of healthy eating than the oatmeal-pushers and low-fat peddlers of today. You can lose weight and improve your health. And you can do it by eating the food you were meant to: the food, which frankly, you want to eat.

One of your greatest weight-loss foods is the one you’d least expect: red meat. Switching out corn flakes for a lean steak and eggs is a stepping stone to better fitness.

Protein in Action

Owsley Stanley is in his 70’s but has the body of a man half his age. When he was young he was fascinated by the Eskimos. And his fascination led him to a secret. A secret which gave him a lifetime of robust health and fitness.

He learned that certain Eskimos survived on meat and fish alone. Not just survived, but thrived. They were healthy and fit. Stanley – a legendary icon of the 60’s and 70’s – came to a conclusion that changed his life: if this diet worked for the Eskimos it might work for him. After trying out the diet, he became convinced that humans could thrive on a protein-heavy diet.

“I have eaten as a total carnivore for 48 years,” Stanley told the UK Independent. “I am nearly 72 and I have the same body I did at 30.”

Stanley took his carnivorous diet to an extreme; a balanced diet shouldn’t be based on meat and fish alone. But he proved one thing: a body thrives on protein. And a diet rich in protein can help you turn back the clock too.

Why Protein Promotes Weight Loss

Carbs and grains are a key factor in weight gain. For more information on why carbs build fat, check out part one.

But just as carbs contribute to weight gain, protein can help you to lose weight. That’s because protein powers up your metabolism like no other nutrient source. According to Dr. Sears(ii), eating protein “throws a metabolic switch and tells your body that it’s okay to burn fat.”

That’s because your body is primarily interested in your day-to-day survival. You gain weight because your body stores calories. It does this to protect against possible starvation at any future date. So to prevent this possibility, it stores calories as fat. That’s why a good portion of the carbs you eat gets stored as fat.

Protein on the other hand is your body’s premium source of energy. When you consume protein, you’re giving your body what it really needs: like Super Unleaded fuel. Your body doesn’t store protein as fat – it uses it all for energy.

When you consume protein, you’re giving your body what it needs for survival. If you start packing away protein in excess amounts, your body no longer worries about survival. It’s getting what it needs. And then it starts burning its fat stores. Suddenly the pounds are melting off on their own.

Protein: Your #1 Premium for Health

Protein helps you to lose weight. More important than that; it restores and builds better health.

That’s because protein is loaded with 20 amino acids. Eight of those are essential to your good health: your body can’t produce them and so you must consume them.

Protein is also your cellular building block: it makes up your hair and nails; it produces essential enzymes and hormones; it builds blood, bones, muscles… it even regenerates skin.

A recent German study proved the importance of protein. The results were published in the prestigious Journal of Nutrition. Researchers found that high protein diets boost antioxidants – critical to your health. They concluded that more protein equals higher antioxidants.

The third reason why protein plays such a crucial role in weight loss and health is because it doesn’t elevate your blood sugars. Regulated blood sugar levels balance insulin. If your insulin levels are balanced, you’re storing less fat.

“Protein is important because it balances your blood sugar,” says Dr. Mark Hyman. “The best way to control blood sugar and energy level throughout the day is by eating protein with every meal. It keeps a slow infusion of energy going through your system rather than being quickly absorbed.”

Red Meat versus White

Protein powers up your fat-burning metabolism. And animal protein is a powerful source of protein. But it’s important to select meat that is healthful. That doesn’t necessarily mean eating white meat. There are many benefits to eating red meat, as demonstrated by several recent studies. Those studies reveal that red meat is loaded with essential vitamins and minerals.

A recent report concluded that red meat is loaded with iron, vitamin B12, and zinc. And there are further health benefits: it’s low in sodium and is not a major source of fat.

“The message is straightforward,” said Professor Geoffrey Cleghorn, an associate professor at Royal Children’s Hospital in Brisbane. “Iron is essential… and red meat is an important source of iron.”

“Lean red meat is a nutrient-dense food,” said Dr Katrine Baghurst. Dr. Baghurst is the leader of consumer science program at CSIRO Health Sciences and Nutrition in Adelaide. She added that red meat is good for “people who are looking for a healthy balanced diet that helps control their weight.”

Passing on Processed Protein

But that’s not to say you can eat any meat and expect good health. Sausages and bacon shouldn’t be on the menu: processed protein will only clog up your arteries.

Processed protein like pepperoni, deli meat, meatballs, hot dogs, and ham won’t promote good health, or weight loss. In fact a new Harvard study proves that processed meats increase your risk of bad health.

The researchers picked 20 relevant studies. That pool of research included 1,218,380 people from 10 countries on four continents (North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia). The results show that by eating processed meat, your risk of heart disease skyrockets by 42 percent. Your risk of type 2 diabetes increases by 19 percent.

“Most dietary guidelines recommend reducing meat consumption,” said study author Renata Micha. “Most prior studies did not separately consider the health effects of eating unprocessed red versus processed meats. This suggests that differences in preservatives… explain the higher risk of heart disease and diabetes seen with processed meats, but not with unprocessed red meats.”

Best Source of Protein

Red meat can be better than white meat. And processed meat should be strictly avoided. The best source of animal protein is this: natural, grass-fed meat.

A chicken may not have as much iron as a cow, but it will still be more healthful if it’s free-range and the cow is grain fed. That’s because animals are just like us. The quality of the meat changes if they are reared on grains and carbs. The meat is fatty, diseased, and full of chemicals.

A grain-fed animal is subjected to amoral and abnormal living conditions. It doesn’t get exercise and is forced to eat an unnatural diet – grains instead of grass. The animal winds up fat and diseased. Worse, it’s been reared on pesticides, herbicides, and hormones… and that’s the meat you end up eating.

That’s why you should avoid this diseased meat. It’s easy to secure premium protein. You just have to read the labels at the grocery store. You should purchase grass-fed red meat; free-range poultry; and cage-free eggs.

Lose Weight Now!

There is a tried-and-tested solution that will help you reach your weight loss goal in no time at all. It’s called Primal Lean and it’s doctor recommended.

“This may be the most remarkable weight-loss herb ever tested,” says Dr. Al Sears. “I stand by Primal Lean and guarantee your results.”

As you know, your hormones play a big part in weight gain. In part one of this series we discussed the hormonal chain reaction that links blood sugar levels to insulin, and insulin to weight gain.

But did you know that adiponectin controls your sensitivity to insulin? As you age, your levels drop… and you start piling on pounds. Raising your adiponectin levels restores your youthful fat-burning responses.

Did you also know that it’s not just insulin that contributes to weight gain? Another hormone – leptin – plays a pivotal role. Leptin is important because it controls your hunger. If your leptin levels get thrown off, you’re hungry all the time. Then you eat more. And then you’re packing on the pounds.

The good news is this: there’s a West African herb – Irvingia gabonensis (IG) (or Bush Mango as the natives call it) – that balances your leptin levels. That’s one of the vital ingredients in a natural, all-new weight-loss aid. Another ingredient also raises your adiponectin levels. This powerful supplement is called Primal Lean. It’s an effective way to get your hormones firing the way they did when you were young. It’s a powerful short-cut to weight loss and renewed vitality.

Find out more about Primal Lean.

In the concluding article of our three-part-series, we examine the “facts about fat” and discover the truth about the most maligned macronutrient… Why is butter better than margarine? Find out in part three.

Understanding the “macronutrient triangle” can help you lose weight. It’s a key factor in quick and healthy weight loss.  Understanding the triangle is your first step to balancing your hormones. And if you know how to balance your hormones you can restore youthful health and fitness. For a full report on rapid, healthy weight loss, check out the June edition of Natural Health Confidential.

To your health,

Ian Robinson,
Managing Editor, Total Health Breakthroughs

This Doesn’t Have to Happen to You!

Conventional wisdom says that any man who lives long enough has a 90 percent chance of developing prostate cancer.

And every year, 220,000 men are diagnosed with this disease. 31,000 of those men will die from it.
Conventional medicine writes this disease off as simply a men’s health issue that goes hand-in-hand with growing older.

But our health researchers have tracked down a pioneering New York physician… And he believes that most of those deaths are completely preventable!

In the just-released Natural Health Confidential newsletter, our research team reveals:

• Exactly how you – or a loved one – can avoid this frightening illness…
• 6 all-natural disease-fighters that can help stave off prostate and other cancers…
• Why one New York Presbyterian Hospital surgeon believes that surgery is NOT the answer to the problem…
• 3 simple changes to your diet that could help determine whether prostate cancer affects you or passes you by…
• The “PIN Prevention Protocol” that helps keep prostate cancer from ever developing…

And much more! Click here for all of the details.

The True Path to Lasting Weight Loss

Crabbing about Carbs: Part One of a Three Part Series

“I’ve tried to lose weight but I always fail. My health just seems to get worse every year: I guess it’s just part of growing older.”

So many people rely on this kind of “aging is inevitable” type of thinking. But it’s just plain wrong. There’s a simple reason your health is suffering. And it’s not directly your fault. It’s because the government health advice we take for gospel is simply a pack of industry-serving lies.

For two decades the government has promoted the USDA Food Pyramid. The pyramid positions grains as a primary building block of modern diets. But if you follow the Food Pyramid recommendations, you will wind up fat. Worse, you’ll end up battling obesity, diabetes, and even heart disease.

Want to know why the government would lie to you? The Pyramid was “built” by the Department of Agriculture. And what is their job? To keep American farmers in business! And what keeps farmers in business? Grain products!

The pyramid promotes big business – not better health.

Building the Pyramids

The first USDA Food Pyramid was “built” in 1992 by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). The pyramid positioned grains as its foundation, recommending six to 11 servings of grains each day. But six to 11 servings of grains a day will put you on the fast track to obesity. This advice is one of the key problems with the pyramid.

Harvard took a crack at “building” its own food pyramid. But it’s not much better: The Healthy Eating Pyramid recommends similar base amounts but switches grains for whole grains. But whole grains don’t fix the problem either as I’ll explain later.

In 2005, the USDA “rebuilt” its pyramid. Now, it recommends between five and eight ounces of grains a day (depending on age and sex). The 2005 USDA Pyramid suggests that these grains should come from breads, pastas, rice, and breakfast cereals. Half of those should be whole grains. But the revised recommendation still doesn’t work. It sidesteps the main problem: that too many starchy carbohydrates will destroy your health.

“The USDA Food Pyramid is cobbled together based on food industry interests, but without real scientific basis,” says Dr. Mark Hyman, who serves on the Board of Advisors of Georgetown University. “The consumption of six to 11 servings of bread and cereals daily led to the pasta, carb, sugar generation and to the largest epidemic of obesity in the history of our species.”

Pyramid Problems

The pyramid serves modern industry interests. It doesn’t respect our natural diet, evolved over two million years. Our natural diet is what our ancestor’s ate. This primal diet was rich in protein and fat. And carbs played a much smaller role in our daily dietary intake.

“Our genetic nutritional requirements were established over eons of evolutionary experience,” says Dr. Loren Cordain, a leading expert on paleo diets. “Humans have had little evolutionary experience with the modern high carb, cereal-based diet which is omnipresent in industrialized countries, and there is considerable evidence to suggest that these types of diets have the potential for creating health problems.”

The way we eat today is totally different. It’s carb-heavy and protein-light. The pyramid is a key factor in this. It over-promotes grains in our diet. It suggests that 50 percent of our daily caloric intake should come from carbs. It places a much lower intake on protein and fats.

In simple terms, carbs – while good for energy – will often be stored as fat. Too many carbs will lead to weight gain. That’s a simple problem we can all identify with.

The more involved problem is the type of carbs we eat and how they affect our insulin production. This can lead to obesity, diabetes, and heart disease.

Nutritionists at the Harvard School of Public Health have criticized the USDA Food Pyramid on this basis. Harvard University researcher Dr. Walter Willet spoke out publicly against the recommendation. He said the pyramid didn’t distinguish between refined and complex carbs and their glycemic responses.

He noted that “there was little empirical evidence to support the dominant nutritional message that diets high in complex carbohydrates promote good health.”

Why We Need Carbs

The experts aren’t telling us to abandon carbs entirely. A balanced diet and healthy body needs them.

“Carbohydrates are good for you, as long as you eat the right kinds in the right amounts,” says Dr. Al Sears. “Carbohydrates are your body’s main source of energy. You couldn’t live or work without them.”

The trick is to understand how carbs work and which types of carbs work for you.

If you plow through five to eight servings of white bread, pasta, and rice each day, you’re going to be in trouble. That’s because carbs are not created equal.

There are good sources of carbs and bad. Often, processed carbs like white bread and sugary cereals represent bad carbs. But that’s not to say that all processed carbs are bad, and that all natural carbs are good. Starchy white potatoes are also bad, despite coming from a natural source.

Processed carbs are stripped of their nutrients and fiber. Worse… they are loaded with simple sugars and refined starches. The sugar and starch make carbs – processed or natural – really bad. That sugar or starch creates a devastating hormonal reaction in our bodies. That blood-sugar reaction is measured with the Glycemic Index (GI).

The Glycemic Index

“The GI measures how the carbohydrates in foods increase your blood sugar,” says Dr. Sears.

Carbs with a high GI are bad for you. Carbs with a low GI are good for you. Complex carbs with a low GI take time to break down. That’s because the glucose (sugar content) of the carb is released slowly into your system.

However, carbs with a high GI deliver an instant sugar shock to your system. This will cause your blood sugars to spike wildly.

Rising blood sugars trigger insulin release. Insulin manages blood sugar and builds body fat. Increased insulin signals your body to store calories as body fat. So, as Dr. Sears puts it, “excess insulin makes you fat.”

The more high-glycemic foods you eat, the more insulin enters into your bloodstream.

In time, your body becomes less responsive to insulin, or insulin resistant. This has a compounding effect. Your body then needs ever more insulin to balance blood sugars. Over time, this will make you fat. It can eventually lead to diabetes.

Balancing Bad Carbs

When balancing your blood sugar, it’s not just sweets you have to balance. You also have to control starches.

The key is to avoid carbs with high GI scores.

Here’s a list of five bad carbs:

• Breakfast cereals (Kellogg’s Cornflakes has a GI score of 80; Kellogg’s Raisin Bran has a GI score of 61)
• Bagels (GI score of 69)
• Breads (Pepperidge Farm white bread with wheat flour has a GI score of 71)
• White rice (GI score between 73 and 89)
• White Potatoes (Baked potato with skin has a GI score of 69; mashed potato has a GI score of 83)

Replacing your grains with whole grains effects only a small improvement. Some whole grains maintain some of the nutrients and vitamins lost in bleaching. But whole grain bread actually spikes blood sugar much the same as white bread.

Compare a porridge made of whole-grain rolled oats to the breakfast cereals above. The porridge scores 55 on the Glycemic Index. Brown rice – another whole grain recommended by the USDA Food Pyramid – is certainly better than white rice. But it scores between 66 and 87 on the Glycemic Index.

Carb-Diets Deficient in Vitamins

But the effect on your blood sugar is only one problem with carbs. Carb-rich diets are also deficient in vitamins.

Studies have shown that cultures which favor a high-carb diet lose vital vitamins. Whole grain cereals lack vitamin C and beta carotene. They also have poorly absorbable vitamin B6.

“In animal models, rickets are routinely induced by feeding [the subjects] high levels of cereal grains,” says Dr. Cordain. “Dwarfism is found more often in populations consuming unleavened whole grain breads. In Europe, where immigrant Pakistanis consume high levels of unleavened whole grain breads, rickets among their children remains a problem.”

Unleavened whole grain breads contain high phytate levels which may also cause zinc deficiency.

“Epidemiological studies of populations consuming high levels of unleavened whole grain breads show vitamin D deficiency to be widespread,” says Cordain. “The mechanism by which cereal grain consumption influences vitamin D is unclear.”

Low GI Foods

You don’t have to go without the benefits you get from carbs. You just need to select foods that have a low Glycemic Index. When you have breakfast tomorrow, don’t grab a bowl of cereal or a bagel-on-the-run. Instead, stick with the breakfasts our grand parents opted for: a high protein options including lean meat and eggs.

According to GlycemicIndex.com, “Foods containing little or no carbohydrate (such as meat, fish, eggs, avocado, wine, beer, spirits, most vegetables) cannot have a GI value. No carbs = no GI.”

Low-glycemic foods include:

• Meat
• Fish
• Poultry
• Eggs
• Nuts
• Plain yogurt
• Most berries

In part two of our three-part-series, we “power up with protein” and discover the truth about red meat… Could a strip of bacon be better than a bowl of cereal? Find out in part two.

For a full report on the role insulin plays in weight loss, check out the June edition of Natural Health Confidential.

To your health,

Ian Robinson,
Managing Editor, Total Health Breakthroughs

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) recommends three glasses of milk a day. Why? Because milk will build strong bones and combats osteoporosis. Well that’s what the government tells us. But I’m telling you that milk breaks bones and may even be linked to cancer. And I’ve got significant studies, leading research, and Harvard University experts to prove it.

Pyramid Power

Milk is considered one of nature’s great building blocks. That’s because it’s enjoyed great promotion for many years. Much of that promotion comes from the USDA Food Guide Pyramid. But several of the "experts" who ‘built’ the pyramid are dairy industry insiders. The pyramid protects industry interests, not what’s best for your health. That’s according to Dr. Mark Hyman. Hyman practices family medicine in Lenox, Mass. He’s also on the Board of Advisors and faculty of Georgetown University School of Medicine’s Food as Medicine training program.

The Milk Myth

The government tells us that milk is good for us because it:

• Builds strong bones
• Combats osteoporosis
• Rebuilds muscle

Here’s the government argument for you. Milk is rich in calcium. Calcium builds strong bones and teeth. Dairy will strengthen your bones.

However, there are many significant studies – and leading experts – that hotly refute this. In fact, they conclude that it simply isn’t true.

Two studies conducted by leading Harvard University researcher Dr. Walter Willet provided proof that this is not the case.

The first study revealed that eating dairy does not reduce the risk of fracture. The extensive 12-year Harvard study reviewed 78,000 women. It concluded that dairy may actually increase the risk of fractures by 50 percent.

“Milk is a primary source of calcium and vitamin D and therefore might be expected to decrease osteoporotic bone loss and fracture risk, yet research has not generally supported this assumption,” concluded the study.

The follow-up study, also led by Dr. Willet, was published six years later in 2003 (iv). It showed that milk consumption “conferred a weak, non-significant reduction in fracture risk.” Even worse, the study found that with “higher daily intakes of milk, there was still no evidence of a protective effect.”

The studies are not alone in damning diary. Leading authorities are also daring to speak out against milk products. They link the over promotion of diary – its benefits and worth – to big business.

"The myth that osteoporosis is caused by calcium deficiency was created to sell dairy products,” said Dr. John McDougall. Dr. McDougall operates a health and medical center in Santa Rosa, California “There’s no truth to it. American women are among the biggest consumers of calcium in the world, and they still have one of the highest levels of osteoporosis in the world. And eating even more dairy products and calcium supplements is not going to change that fact."

Vitamin D More Effective than Calcium for Preventing Fractures?

Further research found that Africa and Asia had the lowest rates of osteoporosis. Those countries also consumed the lowest rates of dairy and calcium consumption. The conclusion: dairy does not defend against osteoporosis, weak bones, or fractures.

Instead, the Harvard studies suggested that Vitamin D was more effective than calcium in preventing fractures.

“An adequate vitamin D intake is associated with a lower risk of osteoporotic hip fractures in postmenopausal women. Neither milk nor a high-calcium diet appears to reduce risk.”

The study suggested dark fish as a good source of vitamin D.

Credible Link Between Calcium and Cancer?

Believe it or not, there’s even been links between calcium and cancer. A national health and nutrition study reviewed links between dairy and prostate cancer. It concluded that calcium may indeed raise the risk of cancer.Research suggested that the more dairy a man consumed, the more it raised his risk of cancer by up to 50 percent. Further, dairy consumption increases the body’s level of insulin-like growth factor-1 — another red flag for calcium causing cancer.

Digesting Dairy

Then there are the more commonly recognized problems with diary. It’s reported that approximately 75 percent of the world’s population is lactose intolerance. The report concluded that the root of lactose intolerance lies in our origins: we are genetically unable to digest milk and other dairy products.

 This plays back into primal diets and eating only what our caveman ancestors did. Milk is not a natural food for human beings. We didn’t domesticate animals until about 10,000 years ago. That means we certainly weren’t milking them before that. Ten thousand years is an evolutionary blink of the eye. Our bodies haven’t evolved to match our diets.

Further to this: humans tend to stop producing significant amounts of lactase – the enzyme needed to properly metabolize lactose, the sugar in milk – during infancy. It usually happens between the ages of two and five. Simple conclusion: we weren’t meant to digest milk on a regular basis.

Migraine-Milk Connection

Intolerance to milk and diary can manifest itself in many different ways. Milk became a real migraine for one concerned mother… who we’ll call Sarah.

“When my son started kindergarten he developed what looked like acne around his mouth,” explained Sarah. “We discovered it was caused by the milk he was drinking at school. We never gave him milk at home because our family has a history of lactose intolerance. We started giving him a lactose pill everyday so he could have all the dairy he wanted at school….we didn’t want him to feel left out on ice cream day. He started having headaches that became more and more severe as he got older. They eventually turned into migraines that were so bad he could hardly function and was getting them about every five days…”

When the doctor couldn’t provide either answers or solutions, “Sarah” took to researching the migraine-milk link for herself. She looked beyond traditional medical advice to discover an alternative explanation. She began researching newspaper articles, holistic web sites… anywhere and everywhere to discover the truth about diary.

“I discovered that dairy can cause migraines in people who are allergic to milk. My doctor apparently was unaware of this… We immediately put my son on a dairy-free diet and the migraines disappeared. He is now a very different little boy…no migraines, doesn’t miss school, and is happier.”

Campaign Claims Not Backed by Science

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) recently requested that the UDSA back up the "milk mustache" campaign claims with science. The panel of scientists concluded the following:

• There was no compelling proof that dairy builds strong bones.
• Dairy causes digestive problems for the 75 percent of people with lactose intolerance.
• Dairy aggravates irritable bowel syndrome.
• Milk doesn’t offer sports benefits. It does not improve athletic performance.
• Dairy may be linked to prostate cancer.

Being Smart about Dairy

Given all the findings about dairy, you’d be better getting your vitamin D, potassium, protein, and fats from other food sources. Lean red meats, vegetables, and fruits offer balanced benefits.

Keep this in mind when dealing with diary:

• Dairy Doesn’t Build Strong Bones. Instead, look for other minerals to do this. Build strong bones through exercise and supplement your diet with 2,000 IU of vitamin D daily.
• Eliminate Milk. Try to eliminate dairy from your diet.Gradually phase out milk, cheese, yogurt, and ice cream over the course of a week.  Try going one month completely diary-free. And see how you feel at the end of that month. You should be smiling: your sinuses should be clearer; your headaches should be less regular; your weight should be less; and your energy increased.
• Need Dairy. If you can’t get by without dairy, try opting for healthier versions such as  unsweetened yogurt.

Other Options for Calcium, Protein

Our primal diets evolved over the course of two-and-a-half million years. That perfectly balanced natural diet contained all the health benefits we needed. It was based largely on meat, fruit, seeds, nuts, and vegetables.

Dairy was not a significant part of that diet. So, you don’t need to worry about losing essential sources of minerals. For example, dairy is only one source for calcium and protein. There are many alternative and natural sources available.

If you’re looking to boost calcium, stick with non-dairy options. These can include fish such as salmon (but buy natural Alaskan-waters fish) and green leafy vegetables like spinach.

Protein Power

Protein is an essential macronutrient. It is an important component of every cell in your body. It’s composed of 20 amino acids. For great health, you must consume eight of these essential amino acids every day. But you don’t have to get them from dairy.

Four great alternative protein-rich options include:

Meat: Simply put, a great option for protein is meat. Animal-derived foods deliver those essential amino acids. White meat or red is fine. But be careful about the type of meat you select. Avoid grain-fed cuts and stick to grass-fed meat. The most heart-healthy meat comes from animals that were grass-fed, not grain-fed. So when you buy red meat, select meat that is labeled “grass-fed”. Also, avoid processed meat such as hot dogs, deli, and sausages. If buying fowl, stick with “free-farmed” labeled cuts.

Eggs: Eggs are rich in protein. They also contain those essential amino acids in exactly the ratios your body needs. They’re low in calories and contain no “bad” trans fats. They’re also brimming with vitamins and minerals.

Beans: Beans are another decent source for protein. Consider this as an additional source: you should not rely on them as your primary protein source.

Interested in getting more info about protein? We’ll be investigating the truth behind protein and dispelling “meat myths” in our ongoing primal diet series.

To your health,

Ian Robinson
Managing Editor, Total Health Breakthroughs

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Having trouble fitting into your old favorite jeans? Don’t like the body you see in the mirror? I know it’s painful… You’ve followed the official USDA advice for healthy eating but you’re more tired and out of shape. You’ve tried every diet out there but you’re still losing the “battle of the bulge”. You’re not alone: there are 65 million Americans who are now obese. But you could never become obese, right? Wrong! There’s a thin line between ‘being out of shape’ and becoming obese. And this is the scary truth: if you’re not obese today you could well be tomorrow.

But you don’t have to be. One simple truth can give you a body better than you had in your 20’s. And not just that: you’ll feel healthier and more alive than you ever have before. Just one easy mental adjustment is all takes. It won’t cost you money or hours in the gym. There’s no complicated calories to count… it’s an easy lifestyle change that anyone can make. And the truth is so simple and obvious, everybody knows it. In fact, we always have. We’ve just forgotten it.

Forget what you think you know about modern healthy eating. The truth to good health lies in the origins of our species. It’s time to remember the truth… it’s time to re-discover the “secrets of the cavemen”.

Eating for Health, Caveman Style

Finding the secret of weight loss is as elusive as the discovery of fire was to our stone-age ancestors. But our cave-man cousins figured out how to make fire. And they also knew how to stay slim and disease free. As hard as it is to believe, our primitive ancestors knew the real secret to fitness and robust health. It’s a secret that we’ve always known as a species, but one that too many of us have forgotten. We will share that secret with you.

This secret formula for healthy living is about as easy to understand as cave paintings on a wall.
You don’t have to worry about counting calories, weighing out portions, or measuring amounts.
All you have to do is listen to your body and apply some age-old wisdom.

You’re a stone’s throw away from enjoying good health.

Secrets of the Stone Age

Cavemen didn’t deal with diabetes, cancer, or heart disease. They didn’t suffer from bad backs and spare tires. Instead, fossil records show they had firm muscles and healthy bodies, according to Dr. Loren Cordain, a leading authority on Paleolithic diets.

OK – cavemen may have enjoyed robust fitness, but they lived short lives, right? Not according to Dr. Staffan Lindeberg of the University of Lund, Sweden.

“This is a misunderstanding,” said Dr. Lindeberg. “Average life expectancy at birth was rather low, but once they reached 50 they may have had a similar chance of living until old age as in modern societies.”

In other words: they enjoyed full lives, agile and active until they died. And – barring accidents – they lived lives as long as ours.

So, logically, evolution has changed the species? The cavemen died out. We’re the sickly mechanized-dependent descendents of them: ostensibly similar but intrinsically different, right? Not according to Dr. Cordain.

“The human genetic makeup is identical to that of Stone Agers,” said Dr. Cordain. “Those people were optimally adapted to the types of foods they could gather or hunt, and there’s no evidence to suggest that modern humans are any different.”

So, if our ancestors were just like us, why are we so different? The answer, simply put, is evolution. But not the evolution of man: the evolution of his diet.

Survival of the Fittest

Our stone-age ancestors ate only what the natural world offered them. They had no choice. They ate the food that fell from the trees or the living creatures they could spear. Processed, artificially enriched foods were 2 million years ahead of them. Farming only took shape 10,000 years ago. And as farming became more robust, our health became less so. We gained weight, lost height, and discovered diseases.

“Neolithic, industrial-era and modern-era foods… underlie virtually all the chronic diseases of civilization: coronary heart disease, hypertension, type-2 diabetes, gout, obesity, acne… and breast, colon and prostate cancer,” said Cordain.

Archaeological records tie the birth of modern human diseases to the same time that our diets became farming-based. Archeologists visited the ancient burial mounds of 800 native peoples in the Illinois and Ohio River valleys. They found a direct correlation between the change in diet and health.  As corn became their main dietary staple, they experienced a 50 percent increase in malnutrition, a fourfold increase in iron deficiency, and a threefold increase in infectious disease.

Back to the Future

Our diet changed and our health suffered. It’s a simple as that. Up to 15,000 years ago, our diet consisted of: lean meat, fish, fruits, vegetables, berries, seeds, and nuts. With the advent of the agricultural era our diet has become grain-based, chock full of simple carbohydrates like pasta and bread. Our staples are refined cereals, sugars and diary products. It’s a diet wildly at odds with what we were designed to eat. Our bodies can’t properly process the modern foods and with them, come disease and physical breakdown… which takes us back to those government recommendations.

According to the USDA’s food pyramid, we’re advised to eat six to 11 servings of grain-based foods each day. Grain-based foods are high in starch and carbs and include bread, cereal, rice, and pasta. The food pyramid positions grain-based foods as the foundation of a healthy diet.

It’s advice that directly impacts modern human health. Long-accepted wisdom tells us that high-carb and low-fat diets promote good health. Except they don’t.

“There is increasing evidence to indicate that the type of diet recommended in the USDA’s food pyramid is discordant with the type of diet humans evolved with over eons of evolutionary experience,” said Dr. Cordain. “Both the fossil record and studies of hunter-gatherers indicate that humans rarely, if ever, ate cereal grains. Nor did they eat diets high in carbohydrates.”

Harvard School of Public Health nutritionists have also criticized USDA pyramid recommendation. They also argue it places too high a bias on carbs and fails to distinguish between refined and complex carbs.

A very simple argument is this: in the time that we have followed USDA pyramid, disease and obesity have skyrocketed. There’s obviously a connection.

Several studies support this simple argument with research and published findings.

One study compared four different diets and reviewed health and weight-loss benefits. Diets included the: Lifestyle, Exercise, Attitudes, Relationships, and Nutrition (LEARN) Diet (as based on the U.S. National Health guidelines – low in fat and high in carbs); Atkins Diet (low in carbs, high in fat); Zone Diet; and Ornish Diet. The study ran for 12 months and eventually concluded that: the Atkins Diet caused the greatest weight loss. The low-carb diet also boasted the best health effects on blood lipid levels and for lowering blood triglycerides.

Dr. Michael Colgan, of the Colgan Institute, Vancouver, reviewed the findings. He concluded: “the very complicated high carbohydrate LEARN diet that is the U.S. National Health recommendation, is not worth the bother. In fact numerous health professionals now suspect that the LEARN diet is partly responsible for the ballooning overweight of the American population.”

Another study followed the dietary habit of 80,000 women over 20 years . The study was conducted by Harvard researchers. It reviewed the effects of a grain-based, high-carb diet on heart health. The results indicated that women on a low-carb diet cut their risk of heart disease by 30 percent.

Going Caveman, Battling Diabetes

The LEARN Diet promotes low-fat and high carb eating. This diet supports the USDA recommendation, pushing a grain-based diet.

However, high-carb foods raise blood sugar levels. Raised blood sugar levels kick up your pancreas, which in turn raises blood insulin levels.

Insulin tells your body that food is necessary for survival. Your body will therefore store excess calories as fat. The more insulin your body produces, the more fat it stores. And you pile on the pounds. Obesity can play a major part in developing diabetes…

A third study showed a clear link between ‘caveman diets’ and fighting diabetes. Lund University in Sweden conducted a study which revealed that adopting a primal diet could prevent diabetes. The study ran for 12 weeks and compared two groups of glucose-intolerant heart patients. The first group followed a Paleolithic diet; the second ate a conventional low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet.

The result? The primal diet group had normal blood glucose levels. The low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet group had increased blood sugar levels.

“If you want to prevent or treat diabetes type-2, it may be more efficient to avoid modern foods than to count calories or carbohydrates,” said study leader Dr. Staffan Lindeberg.

Living Like a Caveman

Going primal can change your life. Don’t be duped by the National Health recommendations. If you start to revise your diet today, you can shrink your waist size, enjoy robust fitness… even combat heart disease and diabetes.

And implementing a caveman diet is easy to do. Here’s a guide to the foods you should seek out – and those you should avoid.

Foods to Run After:

• Lean meat
• Fish
• Fruit
• Vegetables
• Eggs
• Nuts
• Seeds
• Dried Fruits

Foods to Flee From:

• Grains
• Pasta
• Oats
• Wheat
• Barley
• Cereals
• Beans
• Peanuts
• Dairy products
• Starchy veggies (including potatoes)

In part two we review the USDA recommendations, and bust popular myths about what you should and shouldn’t be eating…

To your health,

Ian Robinson,
Managing Editor, Total Health Breakthroughs

Who Ever Heard of Burning Cancer Out of Your Body?

Can the cure for cancer really be as simple as heat?  You’ll be amazed by these simple but powerful health solutions:

• A simple cure for heart disease that could eliminate the need for anyone to ever have bypass surgery again.
• An amazing breakthrough that can make you look and feel up to 20 years younger
• A way to eliminate your “emotional” cravings for food.

But read on because the craziest part is where our health research team found them…

Forget about conventional cardio and gym workouts. A different type of routine can really deliver results. If you want proof, just check out Robert Downey, Jr. in Iron Man 2.

Downey was fresh off the set of Sherlock Holmes. He needed to build 20 pounds of muscle for his next role in three months. He turned to his long-time trainer, Brad Bose, for help.

“He was tired of the current regime and challenged me to make it fun,” Bose told THB.

The heat was on: spindly detective to “Iron Man” in just three months.

Rethink, Rebuild

Downey weighed in at 151 pounds on the set of Sherlock Holmes. He’d worked with Bose to shed body weight to play the thin, cerebral detective. But when the film wrapped, the two knew he’d have to build sinewy muscle to play a Marvel superhero. And they only had 12 weeks to do it.

“I have worked with Robert (Downey Jr.) for five-plus years,” said Bose. “I have his body well balanced and know what the limits are with him.”

And he knew that no matter how strong and focused Downey was, he was tired of conventional techniques. He had just come off punishing routines for Iron Man and Sherlock Holmes. So, it was no surprise when Downey told Bose he couldn’t face any more bench presses and squats. Bose knew it was time to go back-to-basics and come up with something “primal.”

Going Primal

Bose has a PhD in Physiology, an M.S. in Kinesiology and another M.S. in Performance Enhancement. He runs a holistic wellness company in Santa Monica, CA. If anyone can find a new routine that really works, it’s him.

“We actually do ‘primal’ training but use scientific principles,” said Bose. To create a new "Iron Man,” Bose came up with a unique series of workouts. They focused on a “functional performance” program. The program used real-life ranges of intense motion to build lean muscle mass.

Downey’s Diet

According to Bose, Downey’s success was due to a “good balance between stretch, strength, and martial arts.”

However, diet also played a crucial part. The Iron Man star ate a high-protein diet of 2,500 to 3,200 calories a day.

“Diet was very, very important,” said Bose. “We had professional chefs and very detailed advice and monitoring from several sources about diet and nutrition.”

The “Iron Man” Challenge

Downey’s diet was the easy part. The rest was gonna be hard. To get in superhero shape, Downey “trained no less than four days a week, one-to-three hours a day.”

“He really rebuilt a lot of what he had for Iron Man 1,” said Bose, who also trained the star for that movie. “We rebuilt from 151 pounds to about 171 pounds without putting on fat.”

An enormous feat for anyone: but with time, commitment, and science it can be done. But the pair didn’t have any time. Instead, they just had commitment and science.

“(Downey) is committed and not afraid to work hard,” explained Bose. “He almost never questions what I ask of him and has a strong competitive nature. I had a good subject to work with.”

Trainer and star worked on fitness levels while preparing for the film.

“We worked throughout the film,” said Bose. “It probably took three months to bring his weight back up without bringing back too much body fat. In six weeks after stopping Sherlock he was 80 percent there.”

So what did the workout look like? What equipment did “Iron Man” suit up with? What were his back-to-basics routines?

“They were so varied; kettle bells, Indian clubs, the War Machine…” said Bose. “It was all just a different way of doing things all together.”

The “Iron Man” Workout

Here’s the stuff you really want to know: exactly what those “Iron Man” routines included.

• War Machines: No – not the character in Iron Man 2…The War Machine is a portable pulley training system that uses body weight as resistance. An all-in-one workout device that can literally be taken anywhere and performed wherever you like: even in the park.

• Kettle bells: A cannon ball with a handle! Kettle bells are now common in the U.S., beating out traditional dumbbells. Kettle bells allow for swing movements not possible with dumbbells. That movement uses more muscle groups and yields better results in less time.

• Sledgehammers: Downey beat truck tires with a sledgehammer, swinging from the side and overhead. The sledgehammers ranged in weight from four pounds up to 20 pounds. The sledgehammer workout targets the back and shoulders.

• Indian Clubs: Indian clubs were a popular exercise in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Club swinging was introduced as an exercise in England by soldiers stationed in India in the 1800s. The clubs range in size and weight. They are swung in patterns of movement. The exercise focuses on shoulders and arms. It’s also gentle on joints because of its rotational movement.

• Wheelbarrows: Bose created a custom-built wheelbarrow so that it could carry 650 pounds. Downey Jr. pushed it around a figure-eight-formation obstacle course. It’s a killer compound exercise which targets chest, shoulders and back.

• Sleds: This full-body exercise required Downey to pull, run, and pull again. A sprinter’s sled was filled with 50-pound weights. That sled was tied to the end of a 50-foot rope. Like something out of Rocky IV, Downey would pull the sled to him, drop it, and sprint 50 feet away from it. Then he’d turn and pull it back to him… and run 50-feet away again… This routine targets almost everything: arms, torso, abs, core, and legs.

• Fire Hoses: Bose filled two fire hoses: one with sand; the other with water. Then Downey would do semi squats while dragging and whipping the hoses up and down. This exercise builds shoulders and chest.

• Bamboo Bars: Bose loaded up bamboo bars with rubber bands; then he attached kettle bells to the rubber bands. The experiment created a bouncy, hard-to-stabilize barbell.

So that’s how “Iron Man” shaped up. Looking back on the unique program, what were Downey’s favorite routines?

“I think the bamboo bar was a big hit!” said Bose with a smile. “The tire pounding with sledges was also a great stress relief [and a] beautiful shoulder builder.”

According to Bose, the same secrets of success apply to you. It’s not about running more miles, or stacking up ever-greater weight. It’s about knowing how to challenge your body.

“It’s important to work smarter, not harder,” said Bose. “Intensity is everything.”

Shape Up Like a Superhero

If you want to become a superhero, you don’t need to do hours of aerobic or cardio exercise four days a week.
The key to fat loss and muscle gain is short duration, high intensity exercises.

Don’t spend your summer doing pointless hours of cardio when all you really need is 10 to 20 minutes a day to lose weight, get lean, and build muscle.

Here how to make those 10 to 20 minutes really count:

• Hit the treadmill at high intensity for one minute. Then slow down to an easy pace to allow rest and recovery. Repeat this pattern five times.

You can apply this to any cardio option: stationary bike, elliptical machine, or even try jumping rope. Mix it up each day with a different option.

Looking to build strength and muscle? Squats are a great option for getting the heart pumping. Try these variations:

• Traditional Squats: Keep your feet shoulder-width apart and squat down as low as possible. Bring your arms forward, parallel to the floor. Return to a standing position. Repeat.

• Squat Thrusts: Begin standing with feet together. Squat down so that your hands are on the floor next to your feet. “Jump” your feet back into a push-up position. Then “jump” your feet back between your hands and stand up. Repeat.

The most important principle to remember: use short periods of exertion and follow up with recovery time. Just focus on getting your heart rate up and giving it time to come back down.

Stick to this formula and you’ll become your own lean, fit “iron (wo)man” in just 20 minutes a day.

To your health,

Ian Robinson, Managing Editor, Total Health Breakthroughs

Endurance exercise – the universally touted “cardio” – is not the key to health and fitness. Quite the opposite. Cardio is a myth that is not only unhealthy and potentially dangerous, it is completely unnatural.

No doubt you’ve heard otherwise from countless health “experts” who urge you to pound the pavement or jump on the treadmill for hours at the gym. But your body wasn’t designed for long, repetitive exercise. Worse, it can make you more vulnerable to disease.

Many of us have come to think of cardio (short for cardiovascular endurance training) as a synonym for heart conditioning. Yet, according to Dr. Al Sears, author of P.A.C.E. – The 12-Minute Fitness Revolution, when you study the heart’s reaction to repeated sessions of cardio, the evidence refutes that theory.

This type of strenuous workout, without rest, mimics prolonged stress. And as you will learn in a moment, it also causes your body to adapt in a way that is counterproductive to your health and longevity.

For all your effort, you only reduce your ability to handle life’s demanding circumstances – and that’s the last thing you want. With less reserve heart capacity available on call, you invite trouble when a stressful situation arises.

But Everyone Says…

Magazines are full of articles on how to keep up with your cardio workouts. Doctors and trainers at the gym say you need to do aerobic endurance exercise to keep your heart in shape. Nothing could be further from the truth. And this is not how our bodies were designed to perform.

Dr Sears’ PACE® program is based on the idea of “native fitness” (how our ancestors survived in the natural environment for eons). It works with your body’s genetic design.

Our ancestors didn’t run marathons or jump around for an hour doing aerobics. And they didn’t sit in front of computers or the television the entire day. They moved around a lot at a low level of exertion. And then every once in a while they exerted themselves at nearly 100% of their capacity – hunting prey or escaping from it.

This pattern of brief intense movement, followed by rest, and lots of low level activity is hardwired in your genes. Your muscles, bones and organ systems are reflections of this genetic design. The way they work together is the formula for strength, vitality and long life.

Let’s look at some hard data.

Clinical Evidence Incriminates Cardio

Dr. Arthur Siegel, director of internal medicine at MacLean Hospital in Massachusetts and an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard University, has led more than two dozen studies on runners of the Boston Marathon.

One of his recent reports, published in the medical journal Circulation, was conducted on 60 runners who were tested before and after the 2004 and 2005 Boston Marathon. Each runner had a cardiogram to look for abnormalities in heart rhythm.

They were also checked for evidence of cardiac problems in their blood. Researchers used troponin, a protein found in cardiac muscle cells, as a marker of cardiac damage. If the heart is traumatized, troponin shows up in the blood. (Its presence is also used to determine whether heart damage has been sustained during a heart attack.)

Before the marathon, all runners – 41 men and 19 women – had normal cardiac function with no signs of troponin in their blood. But twenty minutes after finishing the race, 60% of the group had elevated troponin levels and 40% had levels high enough to indicate the destruction of heart muscle cells. In addition, most had noticeable changes in their heart rhythms.

Dr. Seigel commented, “Their hearts appear to have been stunned.” He then concluded, “Your body doesn’t know whether you’ve run a marathon… or been hit by a truck.”

Exactly! During long-duration exercise, your heart is under constant stress with no time to rest and recover. When this goes on long enough, the heart is traumatized, as Dr. Seigel’s studies confirm.

Don’t Force Negative Adaption

Your body is not a machine – it’s an adaptive organism that has its own intelligence. Nature has designed your body to adapt to whatever environment it encounters. If you ask it to perform an activity repeatedly and routinely, it will gradually change the systems involved to meet the challenge more effectively.

Endurance exercise causes your heart and lungs to adapt for endurance. But these organs are already endurance machines. Your heart beats continuously and your lungs expand and contract with every breath you take. Forced, continuous, endurance exercise prompts your heart and lungs to “downsize.” Reducing to smaller capacity allows you to go further, more efficiently, and with less rest and less fuel.

But shrinking the output of your heart and lungs means you’ve traded reserve capacity – which you might need in an emergency – for overall efficiency. Heart attacks don’t occur because you lack endurance. They occur when there is a sudden increase in cardiac demand that exceeds your heart’s capacity. That’s why you need some output to spare.

You certainly don’t want to be operating at maximum capacity when you are challenged by a sudden stressful event. Without any reserve, something as simple as shoveling a snowy sidewalk, dancing at a wedding or having sex can trigger a heart attack.

That’s a serious price to pay for succumbing to the cardio myth.

Stay On Track with Positive Adaption

The real key to protecting and strengthening your heart is to activate the opposite adaptive response of that produced by continuous cardio. You want to increase your heart’s reserve capacity. Bigger, faster cardiac output – held in reserve and immediately available – is what you really need.

That’s why one of the key components of the PACE® Program is to exercise in short bursts of intense exertion, followed by rest and recovery. And when I use the word “intense,” I am using it as a relative term. Someone who hasn’t walked around the block in two years is going to start at a different level than a person who is much more fit.

But the principle is the same. What is “intense” for one individual will be completely different for someone else. Achieving that relative intensity is what matters.

The Harvard Health Professionals Study backs Dr. Sears up on this. After following over 7,000 people, researchers confirmed that the key to exercise is NOT length or endurance. It’s intensity. The more intense the exertion, the lower the risk of heart disease was in study participants.

So if you’re going to adapt to something, make sure it is giving you positive benefits – like a heart and lungs with energy to spare – not a downsized version that can’t come to your rescue.

Free Up Your Valuable Time

PACE® makes long, boring routines a thing of the past because it consists of short bursts of intensity followed by rest and recovery. Total exertion is never more than 20 minutes. It’s a natural rhythm, taken directly from nature, which bypasses all the dangers of traditional exercise.

In only ten to twenty minutes a day, you’ll see your muscles return, your body grow lean, and you’ll have more energy than you know what to do with.

The next time you see an article proclaiming the wonders of cardio – skip it. Because now you know: endurance exercise is not only a fitness disaster, it’s a waste of time.

To Your Health,

Jon Herring
Editorial Director
Total Health Breakthroughs

]]> http://www.totalhealthbreakthroughs.com/2010/02/the-cardio-myth-exposed/feed/ 3 http://www.totalhealthbreakthroughs.com/2010/02/the-economics-of-obesity-why-are-poor-people-fat/ http://www.totalhealthbreakthroughs.com/2010/02/the-economics-of-obesity-why-are-poor-people-fat/#comments Wed, 03 Feb 2010 21:46:43 +0000 Jon Herring http://www.totalhealthbreakthroughs.com/?p=3264 For most of recorded history, fat was revered as a sign of health and prosperity. Plumpness was a status symbol. It showed that you did not have to engage in manual labor for your sustenance. And it meant that you could afford plentiful quantities of food.

For most people, however, being fat was simply not an option. The constant struggle to hunt and harvest ensured that we stayed active. And for those with little money, the supply of calories was meager. This ensured that most of the working class stayed slim.

Rich people were fat. Poor people were thin.

Today, the polar opposite is true. Numerous studies show that low-income children and adults are far more likely to be overweight than those of greater means. And the statistical distribution fits a nice, neat curve – as income falls, the rate of obesity rises.

The following graph from a population study in Utah puts this in perspective. The tallest bar on the left represents the lowest income group… and the highest rate of obesity.

This is what poverty looked like in the Great Depression…

This is what poverty looks like today…

For most of recorded history, fat was revered as a sign of health and prosperity. Plumpness was a status symbol. It showed that you did not have to engage in manual labor for your sustenance. And it meant that you could afford plentiful quantities of food.

For most people, however, being fat was simply not an option. The constant struggle to hunt and harvest ensured that we stayed active. And for those with little money, the supply of calories was meager. This ensured that most of the working class stayed slim.

Rich people were fat. Poor people were thin.

Today, the polar opposite is true. Numerous studies show that low-income children and adults are far more likely to be overweight than those of greater means. And the statistical distribution fits a nice, neat curve – as income falls, the rate of obesity rises.

The following graph from a population study in Utah puts this in perspective. The tallest bar on the left represents the lowest income group… and the highest rate of obesity.

Logically, this makes no sense and it is contrary to our historical experience. How is it that the people with the least money to spend are the most likely to be overweight?

There is no shortage of suggestions for why this is the case. Here are just a few I’ve come across:

• Poor people are uneducated and ignorant about nutrition. (They never learned that Doritos and Twinkies are not a healthy meal).
• Poor people are too lazy (or too busy working) to cook real food.
• Poor people are too tired after working two jobs to get enough exercise.
• Poor people don’t have access to fitness centers and farmers markets.

There is some truth in all of these statements. But they certainly do not apply to all lower income workers. Each exhibits a significant misunderstanding. And none of them identify the real reason why modern poverty is so closely correlated with obesity.

Better than Coffee – Rainforest Herb Gives You Lasting Energy without the Crash!

Caffeine is the most widely used drug in the world. And while it gets a bad rap sometimes, it is a proven mental performance booster. In fact, there are hundreds of studies showing the health benefits of caffeine and coffee.

But caffeine can also leave you jittery, anxious and prone to crash when the effect wears off.

Enter a remarkable rainforest herb… Indians of the Amazon River Basin have been using it for centuries to prevent fatigue and increase physical endurance. Now modern science has shown us that it improves memory and can give you a laser-like mental focus.

Here’s how it works…

The Real Reason Why Poor People Are Fat

Professor and obesity researcher, Dr. Adam Drewnowski set out to determine why income is the most reliable predictor of obesity in the U.S. To do this, he took a hypothetical dollar to the grocery store. His goal was to purchase as many calories as possible per dollar.

What he found is that he could buy well over 1,000 calories of cookies or potato chips. But his dollar would only buy 250 calories of carrots. He could buy almost 900 calories of soda… but only 170 calories of orange juice.

If you are poor and hungry, you are obviously going to buy the cheapest calories you can find. And in today’s world, the cheapest calories come from junk foods – whether those foods are found at the grocery store, the gas station, or in the fast food restaurant, conveniently located just down the street.

But this raises another question. How can industrially-processed foods and their associated marketing costs be so much cheaper than real, whole foods produced from water, seeds and sunlight?

In a New York Times article, author Michael Pollan asks this very question…

“Compared with a bunch of carrots, a package of Twinkies is a highly complicated, high-tech piece of manufacture, involving no fewer than 39 ingredients, many themselves elaborately manufactured, as well as the packaging and a hefty marketing budget. So how can the supermarket possibly sell a pair of these synthetic cream-filled pseudo-cakes for less than a bunch of roots?

Pollan goes on to answer his own question…

“The Twinkie is basically a clever arrangement of carbohydrates and fats teased out of corn, soybeans and wheat — three of the five commodity crops that the farm bill supports, to the tune of some $25 billion a year.”

The primary reason that lower-income people are more overweight is because the unhealthiest and most fattening foods are the cheapest. If you were broke and had just three dollars to spend on food today, would you buy a head of broccoli or a Super Value Meal with French fries, a cheeseburger and a Coke?

Because you’re reading this publication, you might choose the former. But for most people who have very little to spend on food, the choice is clear.

And make no mistake. This does not represent a failure of the capitalist free-market system. Modern agri-business and government food policy represents a perverted version of capitalism – crony capitalism – where those with the most money and the most powerful friends in government control the markets.

What they have done is use your tax dollars to subsidize certain commodity crops (at the expense of others) to ensure that the cost of oils, sugar and grains stay artificially low. With low input costs, food manufacturers can turn a tidy profit. The end result is that processed foods – even though they require more technology, more labor and more marketing to produce and sell – are cheaper to the consumer than real, whole foods.

Consider that between 1985 and 2000, the inflation-adjusted prices of fruits and vegetables increased by an average of 40%. During the same period of time the real price of soft drinks fell by almost 25%.

There is no doubt that obesity has become a public health crisis. But because most politicians either do not understand the issue or because they are too corrupt to do the right thing, most “solutions” to this crisis are completely wrongheaded.

Some politicians are calling for a tax on fat people themselves. Currently, many state governments have imposed taxes on soft drinks and junk foods. And calls are growing louder for similar taxes at the federal level.  

It is completely insane that in a country where the surgeon general has identified “an epidemic of obesity” that we are simultaneously subsidizing the production of high-fructose corn syrup. It is equally insane that the government is helping to artificially lower the cost of foods that are driving up national healthcare costs (i.e. killing us), while having a national healthcare debate about how we are going to pay for those costs.

So What Can You Do?

I am a strong advocate for free markets. If I had my way, I would not suggest shifting the subsidies from unhealthy commodity crops to crops that are considered healthy. I suggest leveling the playing field by ending food subsidies altogether.

But that is clearly not going to happen…

Within the current system, the best we can hope for is a situation where public funds are diverted from the corporate Agri-Giants (which is nothing more than welfare for the wealthy) to family farms and fruit and vegetable growers. Currently, almost 70% of farmers receive no subsidies at all, while the biggest and strongest take the bulk of public funds.

Public funds for farms and food should be directed to help build local and sustainable food systems. These funds should favor natural, organic and sustainable methods, rather than the chemical and industrial practices that pollute our rivers and our bodies.

Publicly funded cafeterias in schools, prisons and hospitals should be required to source a percentage of their food from regional sources. And federal food assistance programs like WIC cards and food stamps should be accepted at farmers markets and other healthier alternatives than the local Safeway.

This would do a lot more to help the “obesity crisis” than taxing soft drinks at a penny per ounces.

But you want to know the truth?

Very little of what I have just proposed is likely to happen. It doesn’t matter how much sense it makes. And it doesn’t matter how vocally the population howls in protest to the current system. The corporate powers that be are simply too powerful and too well-entrenched in Washington.

You best bet is to vote with your dollars and your feet.

Choose whole, natural foods over those that are processed. Most of the foods you bring home from the grocery store should not have ingredients. They should BE ingredients. If possible, buy your food directly from small farms and family-owned farms. And whenever you can, choose foods that are grown locally (www.eatwild.com, www.realmilk.com and www.localharvest.org are three organizations that can help you find farmers in your region).

To Your Health,

Jon Herring
Editorial Director
Total Health Breakthroughs

15 Minutes… and It’s Gone! Migraine Headaches Disappear as if You Waved a Magic Wand…

Chronic migraine headaches can steal your life away. You can’t think… you can’t eat… you can’t work… and you can’t enjoy time with family. All you can think about is getting to a dark room and curling up.

But help is here. And it doesn’t involve addictive pain-killers and other drugs that can destroy your body.

Imagine…

• Cut migraine attacks almost in half — by up to 48%…
• End splitting headache pain in 15 minutes…
• Slash the intensity of repeat headaches by 68%

Discover the truth about these pain-busting secrets here…

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But it has very little to do with how much or the types of food we put in our mouths. That is, if you listen to the candy and snack food manufacturers, beverage companies, processed food industry and the fast food restaurants. According to these groups, the reasons why we are so fat are because we are just lazy and sedentary. We don’t exercise enough.

I won’t argue that most of us should be more active. But that is NOT the reason we are so fat. In fact, studies show that exercise is quite ineffective when it comes to weight loss. But more on that in a moment…

This week, I watched the documentary Killer at Large: Why Obesity is America’s Greatest Threat. In one segment, the filmmakers highlight the government’s efforts in 2007 to address the obesity crisis. President Bush, various legislators and the Department of Health and Human Services were all involved in drafting the government’s statements and recommendations.

But rather than viewing this as an opportunity to improve the nation’s health, the food industry saw it as a threat to their business. They were concerned that the government might recommend eating less processed junk food (Gasp!). So they mobilized their full army of lobbyists to shape the government’s message to their benefit.

The documentary showed clips of their various statements and speeches. Invariably, they denied that the obesity crisis has anything to do with the foods and beverages they market. There is nothing wrong with their foods. The problem is that we are not as active as we should be. Not surprisingly, the government soon adopted the same platform.

And they chose the lovable green ogre, Shrek, to deliver the message. You might remember the public service ads paid for by the U.S. Department of Health where Shrek tells kids to, “Get up and play an hour a day.”

But that’s not the only promotional work Shrek was doing that year…

You could also see his lovable ugly mug on packages of Snickers, Skittles, Froot Loops, Pop-Tarts and M&Ms. McDonald’s put his image on their restaurant windows and food bags. Cheetos made a snack that would turn your mouth green. And the Shrek version of Twinkies had a bright green filling.

The obvious message is that all of these foods are fun and fine. Just be sure to get some exercise.

It is no surprise the food companies would broadcast this message. And frankly, it is no surprise that the government played right along. It is just more evidence that the institutions of government have been captured by the industries they are mandated to regulate.

But that is not the only thing wrong with this message…

First of all, studies have shown that physical activity has NOT declined significantly in the last thirty years. We may sit in front of the computer more today, but before that it was the television. And the numbers of people who have gym memberships and participate in workout programs are near all-time highs. Other studies have shown that increased food energy is more than sufficient to explain the U.S. epidemic of obesity. (For references, see the end of this article.)

Beyond that, the role of exercise in weight loss has been wildly overstated. In fact, studies clearly show that exercise is quite ineffective when it comes to weight loss. But it’s even worse than that. If you exercise the way most weight loss specialists, government agencies and medical organizations tell you to, you will probably GAIN weight!

The typical recommendation from these organizations is what I call chronic cardio. For example, in 2007 the American College of Sports Medicine and the American Heart Association issued a joint statement recommending “60 to 90 minutes of physical activity” for weight loss. And they did not mean per week… that was per day!

In this article, I will tell you why exercise is not the key to weight loss. And I will show you why the wrong kind of exercise (chronic cardio) will actually undermine your weight loss efforts. But before I do, I want to make something clear…

I am a strong advocate for exercise. The health and emotional benefits of regular exercise are undeniable. Countless studies show that exercise (even low-level exercise) will dramatically reduce your risk of cancer, heart disease and diabetes. It helps to alleviate chronic pain. It will improve your mental health and cognitive ability. It improves your energy, stamina and longevity. And the list goes on. So you SHOULD exercise.

Just don’t expect it to work wonders when it comes to fat loss…

The problem with long-duration cardio, in particular, is that while it burns calories, it can also make you ravenously hungry. And not only does cardio exercise make us hungrier. It also makes us feel as if we are entitled to make bad food choices. I can’t tell you how many times I have heard someone say, “Well, I deserve this [insert decadent dessert here]. I worked out today.”

Studies clearly show that people who exercise more tend to eat more.

One study of 538 students, published in the International Journal of Obesity found that when kids start to exercise, they eat more – an average of 100 calories more than they burned during exercise. Talk about getting “stuck on a treadmill.”

The problem is that it can take only minutes to consume far more calories than you burn during exercise. It takes about 5 minutes to eat a few slices of pizza and wash it down with a tall glass of coke, for example. That’s about 1,000 calories. Now consider what it would take to burn off those calories.

The table below shows how many calories a 130 pound person and a 190 pound person would burn engaged in various physical activities.

As you can see, even the most strenuous activity levels are no match for poor food choices and an overactive appetite. When you consider that you would have to burn 3,500 calories to lose just one pound of fat, it becomes clear that exercise is NOT the most important part of the equation.

To burn that number of calories would require about five hours of full court basketball for an average man! That might sound fun, but I can think of better ways to lose weight (which I’ll tell you about in a moment).

Take a look again at the table above, and consider what you would have to do to burn off the energy consumed in these foods:

• Starbucks Frappucino Coffee with Whipped Cream: 550 calories

• Dunkin Donuts Sesame Seed Bagel with Cream Cheese: 570 calories

• McDonald’s Big Mac, Large Coke and Large Fries: 1,624 calories

It really puts into perspective the claims of fast food and junk food manufacturers that we are fat simply because we don’t exercise enough.

Studies confirm that exercise alone is not effective for weight loss…

In one study, published by the Public Library of Science, LSU researchers randomly assigned 464 overweight, non-exercising women to four different groups. Women in three of those groups worked out with a personal trainer for 72 minutes, 136 minutes and 194 minutes per week for six months. The fourth group maintained their usual level of physical activity. All of the women were asked not to change their dietary habits (but to record what they ate).

The study showed that women in all of the groups lost weight. But the women who worked out with a trainer several days a week for six months lost only slightly more than the women in the control group. And many of the women in the exercise groups actually gained weight.

Probably the most comprehensive study of the impact of exercise on weight loss was performed by researchers known as the Cochrane Collaboration. Their review included 43 studies. The average amount of exercise prescribed in these studies was 45 minutes, three to five days a week. The studies lasted from three to 12 months.

The studies that compared diet alone to exercise alone showed that the ‘dieters’ lost between 6 and 30 pounds, while the ‘exercisers’ lost between 1 and 9 pounds. Other studies in this review compared the effect of diet and exercise with diet alone. These studies showed the average weight loss for diet and exercise combined was 8 to 39 pounds. The groups that focused on exclusively on diet lost between 5 and 37 pounds.

Many other studies with various methodologies suggest the same results: Exercise alone is quite ineffective for weight loss. And in many cases, it can actually be counterproductive.

None of this is meant to suggest that exercise is not important to your health. It is extremely effective and beneficial for improving just about every measurable risk factor for disease.

And in fact, the right kind of exercise can help a great deal with fat loss and body composition. So what is the “right kind” of exercise? I would suggest that it is the same kind of exercise our biological ancestors engaged in for thousands of years…

That would include lots of moving around at a low level of exertion… occasionally lifting heavy things… and occasionally exerting ourselves near our maximum capacity for short periods of time.

The way to model this in the modern world is to walk frequently and often. Sprint occasionally. And lift weights or engage in other resistance and weight-bearing exercises times per week. Further detail is beyond the scope of this article, but I believe Dr. Sears’ PACE Program is an excellent and highly effective way to exercise for health and fat loss. His book contains a treasure of information as to why this is so.

But the bottom line is that exercise is only part of the equation, when it comes to weight loss – probably no more than 80% of it. It is what you eat – not how hard you try to work it off – that matters.

So what should you eat?

The diet we recommend is one that is rich in protein and healthy fats. These foods keep you full and satisfied for longer, they stimulate muscle growth, and they do very little to boost blood sugar and insulin (the fat storage hormone). Your carbs should come from low-glycemic sources like whole fruits and vegetables.

The mainstream mantra for weight loss is: Eat less and exercise more.

Forget that.

Your mantra should be: Eat better and exercise smarter.

To Your Health,

Jon Herring
Editorial Director
Total Health Breakthroughs

Here’s what you can do to develop a healthier attitude toward food.

First, think about good food to eat like more healthy protein.  Eggs from free range chickens and grass-fed beef or bison are good choices.  Next, eat more vegetables, fruits, nuts and seeds.  You can also enjoy a bit of dark chocolate now and again. A glass of organic wine most days won’t hurt either.

What should you do when your favorite foods aren’t too healthy? Don’t deprive yourself of them — just treat yourself occasionally.

According to Dr. Al Sears, “Having a healthy attitude toward food is as simple as enjoying the foods you eat, taking your time to taste them, and not worrying over the meal in front of you as you eat.”

Well said Dr. Sears.