Thinking about HOW to exercise works better than thinking about WHY you should exercise.

A recent study by Laura L. Ten Eyck, PhD, Dana P. Gresky, PhD, and Charles G. Lord, PhD, involved 61 college students who did not exercise on a regular basis or exercised inconsistently. Researchers asked students to think about either the reasons why they should increase the performance of a target cardiovascular exercise they had previously selected, such as to be healthier or lose weight or to list actions they could take to increase exercise performance, such a joining a gym or working out with a friend.

Over an eight week period, students who brought to mind a list of actions they could take to increase exercise performance showed an increase in exercise and improved cardiovascular fitness. However, students who repeatedly brought to mind the reasons why they should do the target exercise did not increase time spent exercising.

Conclusion: if you want to lose some weight by increasing your level of exercise – particularly if you are prone to couch potatoing, think about HOW specifically you can increase your level of exercise rather than WHY you should.

Comments?

Watching TV news late at night can cause you to gain weight.

No surprise – “People want to consume more of all kinds of foods, both healthy and unhealthy, when thinking about the idea that they will die some day,” write the authors Naomi Mandel (Arizona State University) and Dirk Smeesters (Erasmus University Rotterdam, the Netherlands).

The theory – “When people are reminded of their inevitable mortality, they may start to feel uncomfortable about what they have done with their lives and whether they have made a significant mark on the universe. This is a state called ‘heightened self-awareness.’ One way to deal with such an uncomfortable state is to escape from it, by either overeating or overspending.” Read the rest of this entry »

Dark chocolate – good for stress? Yes! Good for you? Maybe not so much.

Maybe. Maybe not!

A recent article by the American Chemical Society (ACS) purports to extol the virtues of dark chocolate as a possible cure for stress. Apparently there is some substance to their study as it is getting plenty of press. Maybe that’s because we Westerners do like chocolate – and having a report that substantiates our appetite for the sweet confection adds to its reasonableness as a snack for us stressed-out folks.

Although it is nice that 1.4 oz of dark chocolate a day can significantly reduce stress over a two week period, it’s also true that “nobody can each just one!”

Let’s face it, some of us like chocolate A LOT – so much so that we might find it difficult to cut back to 1.4 oz per day!

I think it’s a bit early to start patting ourselves on the back for eating what is good for us each time we reach for the bonbons.

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Cause-effect relationship #1 – because you have come this far in life, you can achieve ANYTHING – poverty or riches, heavy or light, health or illness, whatever you truly wanted you have achieved.

Maybe you made some new year resolutions – expressing ways in which you would like to see your life change for the better. Maybe this will be the year you quit smoking, or get that raise, or lose that weight. Whatever it is, your first action is to NAME the change you want to make. This is the action part of the manifestation formula. You have done this part so often that you maybe now take it for granted – meaning you have become oblivious to it.

You are already taking action on what it is you really want – it’s automatic – you do it unconsciously. Based on your beliefs, you take action that is appropriate with what you accept as true – your beliefs. You don’t even have to think about or plan anything – you do it automatically. You don’t have to take specific action – just recognize that you already are [taking action].

Why, then, do you not get what you want? The truth is – you mostly DO get what you want (or at least are satisfied with). You just don’t recognize it – because you are so used to getting what you want from life.

If you continue to act (behaving) as you have acted in the past – based on what you believed to be true in the past – you will tend to continue to get what you have always gotten in the past. You’ll continue to take the appropriate action to achieve whatever it is that you have gotten in the past – you do those actions so well  by now that you are unconscious of them – you’re a master at doing whatever it is that you do to achieve what you are currently experiencing. How about that, boys and girls?!

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The June 8th, 2009 issue of Life & Style Magazine reveals that Matt Hoover (Season 2 Winner of NBC’s The Biggest Loser) gained back most of the weight he lost on the show!

Perhaps you, too, read the June 8th, 2009 issue of Life & Style Magazine article revealing that Matt Hoover (Season 2 Winner of NBC’s The Biggest Loser) gained back most of the weight he lost on the show!

My guess is that without the isolation, the cooks, and the drill sergeant personal trainers, he couldn’t keep up the strict regimen.

“When I got home, I quickly realized I wasn’t equipped to deal with the temptations of the real world.”

In January 2009, Matt discovered a 4 CD Hypnosis Program created by Dr. Roberta Temes, who is on the Department of Psychiatry at the SUNY Health Science Center Medical School and the editor of the first hypnosis textbook used by thousands worldwide in medical schools.

A meta-analysis published in The Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology (1996) reveals that hypnosis with a credible practitioner, “can increase weight loss by an astonishing 146% over the long term.”

Matt’s story certainly confirms this:

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