What Does A Free Weight Loss Program Have To Offer

Growing up I was taught there is no such thing as a free lunch. We all want things that are free in life and most people would love to find some quality free resources when it comes to planning your weight loss goals. If you were to carry out a search on Google using the term "free weight loss program on the net" you will be amazed at the amount of results that you get for this search.

Today there are many places on the net that can provide you with a great collection of free weight loss resources that will help you in achieving your goals. There are so many web sites to check out you could waste a lot of your time trying to decide which sites will really help you out with your weight loss goals. But in order for you to be successful you need to find the best free weight loss plan that will best suit your needs.

Many of the better free weight loss plans will provide you with the following: -

1. Discussion Groups. This is a place where you can meet up with like-minded people who are also trying to lose those extra pounds. During such discussion groups you will be able to ask questions and get advice from those in the know all for free.

2. Body Fat Calculator. This is a great tool when looking to set up a weight loss program as this tool will help to determine just how much body fat you have and just how much of it you will need to lose. Again there is no need to pay a fee to use this handy tool.

3. A good free weight loss program on the net will offer to provide you with details relating to the types of foods that you can eat as well as providing you with healthy recipes. They will often have a database that has been set up providing you with lots of different low fat recipes that you may well want to try.

4. Any good free weight loss program will have a professional at hand who will be able to answer any questions that you may have through their discussion groups that were previously mentioned above.

Green Tea for Weight Loss

You may have heard about green tea and its many positive effects on health. What about Weight Loss then? Can Green Tea help you with weight loss?

Green tea is a powerhouse of health benefits. It has been attributed with the potential to reduce the risk of certain types of cancer and heart diseases. Now many experts believe that green tea may be the answer to weight loss woes. A study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition shows that green tea promotes weight loss.

Thirty five Japanese men participated in a controlled study, revealing encouraging results for dieters. Divided into two groups, one half of the men consumed a bottle of green tea, fortified with green tea extract, daily for three months. The second group consumed plain oolong tea. The green tea drinkers lost significantly more weight than the oolong group. As a bonus, their body fat and waist size also decreased.

How did green tea accomplish this feat? Surprisingly, it's not the caffeine. A unique substance, called catechins, found in green tea appears to be the power behind the slimming factor.

There seems to be a two step process. First, green tea increases your body heat. This in turn speeds up your metabolism. This makes you burn more calories! The good thing about Green tea is that you do not even need to drink gallons of it for positive results. Studies show that 4 cups of green tea per day is enough to speed up your metabolism.

This is not the only study confirming Green Tea's weight loss benefits. The results have been replicated in other research. The list of studies and positive results connecting green tea and weight loss is growing fast. Researchers at the University of Geneva in Switzerland found similar results in their clinical trials.

Remember though, green tea is not magic. It is just one tool in the battle against excess pounds. Healthy food choices, portion control, and regular exercise cannot be traded for a few cups of tea. Enjoying green tea, however, is a simple and effective way to speed the progress of a weight loss goal.

Weight Loss

How old were you when obsession or problems with food began? What is your earliest negative memory about food? Asking these questions will help you get clear on these issues! Pay attention to the ansawers, accept them as misperceptions and mistakes and let them go. Letting go could take minutes, a few days or more. If issues resurface, accept them and make an effort to really forgive yourself and others who accidentaly helped you to acquire bad food habits.

Next step towards losing unwanted weight is to find a really stimulating and positive focus. If you focus on the words " weight " and " loss " well then it's no wonder you keep dredging up bad feelings. Instead of placing your focus on " what you don't want " - which is Weight! Place your focus upon your positive goal/outcome.

Say; " I want to feel slim and fantastic " or " I'm going to change my ways so I can become the super fit and super healthy person I really am. " Now you are ready to move towards a beneficial feeling/goal/outcome, rather than constantly trying to escape a feeling you don't like. Once you have found your positive goal, picture it in your mind at every possible opportunity.

Keep motivating pictures, quotes or praises from friends and family in your room, in your journal or upon your walls!

Next step is to feel good about yourself. If you find yourself being very critical then stop a moment, breathe deep and find and hold a more positive thought. Keep in mind that things take a little time. You did not develop " bad habits " overnight, so it stands to reason you will also not develop " good habits " overnight.

Do not focus on how long something will take, focus instead on taking one day at a time. When you wake in the morning write down your good intentions for the day, regarding positive thinking, meals you can prepare, simple exercise you can adopt. Keeping a journal is very important and incredibly useful. Every evening again, bring out your journal and write down all your little successes of the day. This journal can be an important motivating factor. This way you can avoid a BIG mistake that most people make. That mistake lies in judging your results, one of two ways. The people most likely to succeed and achieve their goals continually judge their results by where they started! The people most likely to fail however judge their results against some kind of Ideal. Meaning; Group 1 looks at their new positive thoughts and appreciates that change, or they look at their new efforts to exercise and they see and appreciate that change. Group 2 on the other hand simply says, look at me, I have made efforts and I still don't look like Claudia Schiffer/Brad Pitt.

Group 1 is hopeful and happy and feeling good about the smallest things. Group 2 is discouraged and dissapointed ( because they aren't looking at what they have achieved they are looking at what they haven't ).

Stay in Group 1. For every little thing, give yourself a pat on the back. Write it down. Then if you find yourself at some point feeling frustrated you can look back and remind yourself that you were on the bottom rung of the health ladder and now slowly but surely you are climbing in the right direction.

Feeling good is the key to success in any area. How to feel good? That is simple. Appreciation. Appreciate yourself. Appreciate what you already have. Appreciate that your legs are working, your heart beating, your lungs pumping, your feet itching. Love your body Now, because no matter how much weight is on or off, its still the same body. Its the only one you've got!

Liking and loving yourself will motivate you to treat your body with care and respect. Once you develop a healthy love for yourself, you will feel good. Feeling good will lead you to eating good, eating good will lead you to feeling energetic. Feeling energetic will lead you to loving exercise and exercising will lead you to feeling Great! Feeling great will lead you to supreme health and supreme health will lead you to feeling fantastic... and so on.

Once you throw out bad habits and gain new healthy ones, the new healthy ones will be as easy to follow as the bad ones, with one huge bonus, instead of feeling bad and stuck, you will feel free and amazing. Remember all habits good and bad are caused by repetition.

"The person with a fixed goal, a clear picture of his desire, or an ideal always before him, causes it, through repetition, to be buried deeply in his subconscious mind and is thus enabled, thanks to its generative and sustaining power, to realize his goal in a minimum of time and with a minimum of effort. Just pursue the thought unceasingly. Step by step you will achieve realization, for all your faculties and powers become directed to that end." Claude M. Bristol

Wild Suppositions About Losing Weight With Hypnotherapy

Hypnosis, thanks to television and movies, the very word conjures up the depiction of a beady-eyed hypnotist swinging his pocket watch repeating the words, "You are getting sleepy."

Do an msn search, and you will find hundreds of thousands of web pages focused on the subject. Unfortunately, many websites that sell self-hypnosis CD’s make wild, unsubstantiated claims. I’ve been a hypnotherapist since 1978. So I think that I'm heavier than qualified to set the record straight on weight loss hypnosis.

First of all, hypnosis is a tool, just like a scalpel is a tool. Just as varying surgeons have diversified skill levels in the use of a scalpel, diversified hypnotists have diversified skill levels in the use of hypnotism. And to complicate the matter, there are many novel methodologies of self-hypnosis.

Here are a couple of the silly suppositions that I’ve seen on websites, along with the truth of the matter:

Hypnosis will speed up your metabolism. If you want to know the truth, the fact of the matter is that hypnosis won't directly speed up your metabolism. But it can be very feasible at helping to program your unconscious with increased motivation to exercise, and that exercise will increase your metabolism. Similarly, hypnotic sleep to speed up the metabolism for quick weight loss can be effected by programming the unconscious to motivate the intake of increased amounts of protein, because that intake will step up your metabolism.

Hypnotism will make you lose some weight. This is false. But hypnotism can be used to help cast out your appetite, so that you eat less, and eating less can help you to become thinner.

Two subconscious programs cause the average person’s cravings and urges: A. When you pair eating with any other behavior, the other behavior will trigger cravings for food and a strong desire to eat. This is called a conditioned response. For example, if you eat when you watch a movie, you will automatically get an urge to eat each time you go to the movies.

B. When you feel tense, you feel a strong urge to put food into your mouth for relaxation. This you feel compelled to put something into your mouth for relaxation and pleasure. This is because of programming that you received as a baby. When you got bitchy, your mother or father put a bottle in your mouth. You got distracted, relaxed, and probably fell asleep. Now when you get cranky (anxious or tense), you feel compelled to put something into your mouth for relaxation and pleasure.

C. There is a third unconscious program that is present for some people. It's called emotional eating. Emotional eating takes place when a person is motivated to make him or herself fat, because by being fat they will protect themselves in some way.

For example, if an individual got their heart broken in a relationship, their unconscious will force them into an action that would prevent them from getting their heart broken again. Example: They are motivated to become overweight to keep them out of new relationships, because that will cut out the possibility of another broken heart.

D. I have written several articles on emotional eating that are available on my website.

There are some effective ways to use posthypnotic suggestion to eliminate emotional eating.

There are some effective and powerful ways to use hypnotic suggestion to overcome emotional eating. So just how can weight loss posthypnotic suggestion fix the above problems? Let's cover them one at a time.

In paragraph "A" above: Conditioned responses can be "extinguished" immediately using a process that I call the "Flash." The flash trains the unconscious mind to setup new responses. In the above example, the subject had unconsciously banded together the depiction of food in the hand, with the TV. Each time he / she sat down to watch the TV, the unconscious mind filled in the missing part of the visualization: It "Flashed" the picture of the food in the hand, and the subject felt a compulsion, and an craving to eat.

The Flash is a methodology that helps us program the subconscious to use the picture of the TV as a trigger for an visualization of the self-watching TV without eating. When we lose the picture of the food, we lose the cravings.

When we momentarily disassociate (see ourselves from the point of view that a subject else would), we are not able to feel our feelings (cravings and urges).

When we see ourselves in a behavior (watching TV without eating), we feel an urge to engage in that behavior. So the subject loses the cravings, and actually gets a urge to reject food.

In paragraph "B" above: The subject is eating and drinking for relaxation and pleasure. We teach the subject self-hypnosis for weight loss, because the very essence of the hypnotic state is deep relaxation.

And we utilize the "Flash" to program the subconscious to use the thoughts that are triggering feelings of stressfulness and aggravation, as triggers for secondary mental images that will trigger feelings of relaxation. When the subject feels more relaxed overall, oral urges are greatly diminished.

In paragraph "C" above: We discussed emotional eating which makes the person overweight. The "behavior" of being overweight then provides some sort of emotional protection. So we use a technique called an NLP reframe, which programs the unconscious to take the responsibility for making the subject automatically substitute some other more acceptable behavior that will provide the same emotional protection, in place of being overweight. And that reframe will clear out the craving to eat for emotional purposes.

How to Look and Feel Better with a Good Health and Fitness Program

Spring has sprung and it's an ideal time of year to spring into action about your health and fitness. During the winter, we often put on a few pounds eating comfort food and avoiding the cold. As the warm weather arrives and we shed our heavy winter coats, everyone wants get rid of that extra weight so we can look and feel our best in our tank tops and shorts.

An ideal way to lose a few pounds is to start a regular health and fitness program and do it at least four times a week for a minimum of thirty minutes. Choose an activity you enjoy so you will look forward to exercising. Consider that working out benefits not just your physical, but your mental and emotional health as well. In fact, aerobic exercise and weight lifting helps your body to produce endorphins, naturally making you feel happier. According to Harvard psychiatrist John J. Ratey, M.D., working out increases the level of important antidepressant chemicals in your body such as norepinephrine, dopamine and serotonin. As the levels of these chemicals go up in your body, you get an overall feeling of well-being.

A regular exercise routine not only burns fat and increases muscle, it relieves stress and depression. In fact, a Duke University study revealed that for certain people exercise can combat feelings of depression as well as certain medications - without prescriptions and side effects.

Another benefit of engaging in a regular workout routine is improved sleep. Getting an adequate amount of sleep is essential for our optimum health. According to a recent Stanford University study, people who exercise four times a week for a minimum of thirty minutes showed a large improvement in the duration and quality of sleep.

If you are looking to lose a few pounds and improve your overall perspective, a good health and fitness program is a fun, easy way to feel and look better today.

4 Healthy Ways to Diet and Lose Weight

1. Eat 5-6 small meals a day.

You might have heard this hundreds of times, but this is one of the keys to losing weight effectively without hurting your health. The traditional approach to the daily diet was to eat 3 meals a day, which doesn’t work well for weight loss. Your metabolism increases every time you eat; therefore it is better for weight loss to frequently eat smaller meals, instead of 3 big meals. Eating every 3 hours works well. Remember to not eat fatty, junk foods and eat “clean” foods such as chicken breast instead of crispy chicken and lean beef instead of fatty steak.

This method will keep your metabolism high (increased metabolism will increases the fat burning of your body) and will also make you eat less the next meal.

2. Drink Water.

This is one of the simplest advices for losing weight. Drinking lots of water throughout the day will help your body transport your nutrients around your body more efficiently. Although your body is 70% water, you will not gain any “temporary water weight) and will not look bloated.

Drinking water will help you lose some extra weight, because there is fat cushion in your joints, and water will help you lose this fat.

3. Do some kind of Cardio at least 3 times a week.

Cardio is another key role in weight loss. Performing some kind of cardio exercise such as running, swimming, skipping, and cycling for 20 minutes 3 times a week will surely help in fat burning.

You should avoid high-intensity cardio for maximum weight loss. There is a ‘weight loss zone’ which is doing cardio at 65% of your heart rate. Subtract your age from 220 and multiply that by 0.65 and you will have this optimum rate.

4. A secret that helps very well. Very well.

Many weight loss success stories always involve some kind of supplement. This is because without an effective supplement, weight loss is harder than it can be. Weight loss supplements are developed to boost weight loss while benefiting health.

Weight loss supplements that contain green tea extracts are very effective to healthy weight loss. Green tea is a great fat burner, and it is used many times by fitness experts and bodybuilders to cut off the unwanted fat.

Carrots, Diet Bars, and Other Snacks That Make You Fatter Instead of Thinner

If you’re trying to lose weight, you are no doubt familiar with what’s healthy and what’s not. You may also be aware that one primary key to weight loss is cutting carbs. However, what I’m about to tell you will go against everything you’ve ever heard about dieting and nutrition. One of the biggest reasons so many diets fail is that some so-called “health foods” actually cause you to gain weight, instead of lose it.

Perhaps the most surprising culprit here is vegetables -- specifically, the ones that grow underground. Did you know that underground or root vegetables are high in carbohydrates? Carrots are supposed to be good for you, but they contain high amounts of carbs, sugar, and calories. Onions, potatoes, beets, and turnips also fall into the category of high carbohydrate content vegetables to avoid, if you want to actually lose weight.

Another health food category that isn’t as healthy as you think is beans. Green beans are fine (as long as they’re fresh, and not frozen or canned, since pre-packaged vegetables contain a lot of sodium), but any other vegetable with the word “bean” in its name -- lima beans, garbanzo beans, red beans, and kidney beans, for example -- have to go.

What about fruit? As a general rule, anyone trying to lose weight should stick to fresh food, and that includes fruit. Many dieters believe drinking a glass of fruit juice, or eating a serving of something made primarily with fruit (such as applesauce) is interchangeable with a serving of fruit. This is definitely not the case.

As an example, let’s look at the humble apple and its associated alternatives:

1 medium apple, cut = 19 carbs

1 serving unsweetened applesauce = 28 carbs

8 oz. apple juice = 29 carbs

See the difference? It’s easy to assume all these food items are good for us, since they have been categorized as health foods since our grade school days when we learned the food pyramid. Unfortunately, these assumptions represent the strong possibility that you won’t be able to lose weight, because you’ll be taking in far more carbs than you realize.

Finally, there is the myth surrounding diet bars. What could be better for a diet than these tasty meal substitutes with “diet” right in the name? Personally, I see no need for them. I lost a significant amount of weight without resorting to diet bars. The problem is not that they’re inherently bad for you -- it’s a matter of quantity over quality. Since diet bars are easy to eat, they make it easy to cheat. They are low in carbs, but high in calories and fat. If you eat more than one of them at a sitting, you’re not going to lose weight.

What Are The Best Weight Loss Pills Available?

If you are interested in losing weight through the use of weight loss pills, you may have the same questions as many others. What are the best weight loss pills available?

Out of the hundreds of weight loss pills which are available today, Lipitrex is one which might just stand out above the rest for your weight loss needs.

Lipitrex is a supplement which combines a 4-in-1 weight loss formula, and 10 all-natural ingredients to stimulate natural and healthy weight loss among its users. The 4-in-1 formula aids with controlling appetite, decreasing abdominal fat, increasing metabolism, and increasing energy, which gives Lipitrex an advantage over other weight loss pills.

As Lipitrex is not chemically formed like most weight loss pills are, it is more of a supplement than a pill. The all-natural ingredients of Lipitrex mean that it carries no harmful side effects unlike most other weight loss pills. The harmful side effects associated with these pills can include, nausea, and erection problems in men, and they occur because of the various chemical mixtures that are needed to manufacture these weight loss pills.

The 10 all natural ingredients of lipitrex are as follows: Vitamin B5, Vitamin B6, Caffeine, Chronium, Magnesium, Citrus Aurantium extract, Plinnothin, Conjugated Linoleic Acid, Licorice extract, and Guarana extract. As a dietary supplement, two capsules are needed in the morning and two capsules in the afternoon. An 8 - 12 week course is recommended to see optimal results.

Lipitrex has been specifically designed to help users shed weight in an easy, and natural way. Coupled with a healthy diet and regular exercise this supplement should be able to help you shed those excess pounds you have always wanted t get rid of.

EN helps you find a weight-loss program to fit your style

If dropping holiday pounds is on your "to do" list for the new year, the good news is that you've got plenty of options for help among both new and long-established weight-loss programs. While diet books have become bestsellers by blaming carbohydrates for expanding waistlines, the reality is that cutting carbs may help you lose weight initially, but it does not guarantee you'll keep those unwanted pounds off. What does? Finding a weight-loss strategy that fits your lifestyle and dieting personality.

Weight-loss companies have come to realize that dieters have diverse needs and preferences, and many programs now offer more than one approach to losing weight. Some require buying prepackaged foods and supplements; others base food plans on store-bought foods. Many center-based programs offer additional online support. For those who don't want to share the weight-loss experience in person, strictly online programs are also available.

On pages 4 and 5, EN evaluates nine popular weight-loss options to help you find one that's right for you.
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What's Your Dieting Style? To find a good match, you first need to know what kind of dieter you are:

Do you prefer convenience to cooking? If so, programs like Jenny Craig and NutriSystem that use prepackaged, portion-controlled meals might work for you. Realize, though, that convenience adds to the cost and eventually you'll need to learn how to manage your weight eating foods you make yourself.

Are you comfortable sharing your weight-loss experience with others? If in-person motivation and support suit you, then consider attending Overeaters Anonymous, Take Off Pounds Sensibly (TOPS) or Weight Watchers meetings. If you want group support in the comfort of your own home, try eDiets. This online program lets you choose from more than 100 support groups, provides chat rooms and offers online meetings with experts.

Do you prefer one-on-one counseling? If you want an individualized plan or have medical concerns, your best bet is to contact a registered dietitian (R.D.). You might also consider NutriSystem, which has advisors who are health professionals. Jenny Craig, LA Weight Loss Centers and Diet Center also offer individual counseling, but mostly by former clients. Jenny Craig counselors, however, do go through an extensive training program.

Know Program Basics. After you've matched your dieting style to the option that best suits you, find out important details before joining. For example:

* Does the program include exercise? Does it provide exercise instruction and illustrations? Curves fitness centers, which we did not review here in detail, offers women time-efficient circuit training and cardio workouts, but you can skip the carbohydrate-sensitive diet plan, which is too restrictive.

* Are you able to fit the program into your lifestyle? If you travel or eat out often, can you still follow the program?

* Does the program help you make positive behavioral changes? Does it address social eating strategies and the emotional aspects of eating?

Effects of weight cycling due to 'yo-yo' dieting - adapted from JAMA, October 19, 1994 - Tips from Other Journals

Health effects of weight cycling (the repeated loss and gain of weight) are controversial. Articles in the lay press and in professional publications have reported that weight cycling due to repeated attempts at weight loss ("yo-yo" dieting) may be detrimental to health. The National Task Force on the Prevention and Treatment of Obesity reviewed the evidence on weight cycling and its effects on health.

A total of 43 English-language studies of weight cycling were reviewed by experts in nutrition, obesity and epidemiology. Study design and the validity of study conclusions were evaluated.

The majority of studies did not identify an adverse effect of weight cycling on metabolism. Although observational studies have shown correlations between weight cycling and increased morbidity and mortality, most studies did not compare effects of intentional weight loss with effects of unintentional weight loss. Most study subjects were of normal weight or were only mildly obese; few studies were designed to evaluate the effect of weight cycling in obese patients.

The task force concluded that no convincing evidence shows that weight cycling has adverse effects, and that obese persons should not allow concerns about the possible hazards of weight cycling to deter them from trying to lose weight. (JAMA, October 19, 1994, vol. 272, p. 1196.)

Lose Weight With A Hypnosis Diet

Losing weight is big business. Not only is it a billion dollar industry it is also a very emotional battle for many. The public as well as the media is very cruel to those that need to shed some extra pounds. Many have tried diet after diet with little to no result. Most do understand that in order to lose weight they must not only change their eating habits, but their entire lives. Though they understand they need the change they are not sure how to change. Few seek the help of a therapist to lose weight instead they seek the advice of individuals and companies that do not truly understand the problems with weight loss.

Buried deep inside your mind and soul is an inner force that most people never even realize is there. All that you have learned and experienced is inside this deep unconscious mind. It only stands to reason that there are faults and errors in this portion of the mind. The individual may not even realize that something is inhibiting their success with weight loss. That is why the use of weight loss hypnosis is so effective. The hypnosis diet helps you uncover these thoughts, feelings and internal errors that keep the pounds on. Everyone is different and this is the reason that hypnosis aims to uncover the truth and information stored in your individual mind. A generic weight loss program will help you lose weight, but you are guaranteed to gain it back unless you resolve those errors.

You do not have to suffer with a weight problem for the rest of your life. You can lose weight with the weight loss hypnosis. A trained hypnotist will guide you through the process of exploring your inner soul and removing any of those thoughts, experiences and feelings that are inhibiting your weight loss. Not only can you explore what is buried deep inside your mind you can also work on issues such as exercise and motivation.

Many of the general public truly believes that an overweight individual lacks the motivation to lose the weight. This simply is backward from the way that it truly is. Putting on weight is typically associated with a life changing event, not a lack of motivation. After the individual gains the weight, of course they do not feel as good about themselves so they become sad and then lack the motivation that is required to lose weight. Even the individual that is attempting to lose the weight will joke or kiddingly say that it is lack of motivation and exercise that caused them to gain the weight. What they do not realize is that there are far more serious issues involved in the weight gain. Maybe depression, anxiety or other issues that caused the additional pounds.

Exercise motivation hypnosis is a great way to uncover the lack of motivation and replace it with a healthy script of energy. Hypnosis can assist you in exploring your inner mind replacing those unhealthy thoughts, feelings with ones that will help you want to go to the gym getting out and moving. Exercise is invigorating, so once you get into the gym it is almost addictive. You will feel better, have a new perspective and want to return because of the great feeling. Exercise motivation hypnosis can take place in the office of the hypnotherapist, tapes and other motivational materials.

Losing weight is much more than restricting your diet. There are issues and negative thoughts that have caused your weight to spiral out of control. In order to get your emotions and weight in check you must take action. The best thing to do is find a trained hypnotist that can assist you with uncovering the contents of this hidden agenda in your mind. You simply can not change what you are not aware of. It must come into the open and can then be replaced with more productive thoughts. You must have a positive attitude and tell yourself that you can lose weight with hypnosis. A good attitude and demeanor can help you do anything. If you say negative things to yourself you become negative. The same is true with positive self talk, tell yourself you’re beautiful, wonderful and worthy of uncovering you’re inhibiting thoughts. Lose weight hypnosis has worked for thousands and you can be next!

Finding the Best Weight Loss Diet

More and more people are becoming very conscious of their own health and fitness. On the one hand, this is a positive trend, with many people eating more healthily and taking regular exercise. However, when taken to extremes, this can have negative effects on healthy and well-being. This is often the result of marketing, as advertisements for perfume, clothes, cars and a host of other products constantly tell us, indirectly, that we need to have perfect bodies to achieve the good life.

As a result of the increased focus on health and fitness, gyms, health clubs and other fitness centers have been set up all over the western world, raking in a huge profit in the process. Celebrities are pictured on the front of magazines, looking young, slim and beautiful, with the hidden message that this is the path to happiness and wealth.

On cable TV, exercise machines, weight loss products, such as DVDs, videos and low calorie foods have pretty much taken over the airwaves during the commercial breaks and have consequently made their way into households all over the country.

Thousands of magazine, books and websites claim to provide the perfect diet. Dubious at best, with a new one on the market just about every week, but with so many different approaches on offer, which diet is most effective and which one should you follow?

Diet programs can be of use in helping you shed excess pounds, but only if they suit your lifestyle, which means they must be doable. The most important factor is healthy eating and therefore if you do choose to follow a specific program, it is essential to ensure that you do not leave out important nutrients.

Next, you must make sure you have time to buy and prepare the food. If you run out, the temptation to eat forbidden foods will be enormous. It’s also important that you don’t feel deprived and so don’t choose a diet plan which is inflexible or overly strict. It is possible to lose weight and still enjoy occasional treats.

You should also be able to follow an eating pattern which keeps your blood sugar levels stable throughout the day, ensuring that you don’t experience hunger pangs which can lead to mini-binges, which in turn often causes people to give up the diet completely.

Whatever your lifestyle, exercise is important, but doesn’t have to be excessive. Extra walking during the day and a couple of sessions of a favourite sport at weekends is enough to burn off some calories and help you achieve your weight loss goals. Of course, if you do want to look like someone on the cover of a fitness magazine, you’ll have to work hard – they do! To lose weight and improve your overall health, you should eat a healthy diet, reduce intake of high fat and sugar foods and increase the amount of exercise you do.

Binge Eating - How To Stop Binge Eating And Get Back In The Driver's Seat

Binge eating is eating "gone wrong." Binge eating is eating gone on automatic pilot, eating disconnected from physical body sensations like fullness and hunger. After a binge you may experience a glazed feeling and a "coming back to awareness." "What happened here?" and "I wish I could undo that" are common thoughts.

Mindful eating is the opposite of bingeing. Mindful eating, conscious eating, and intuitive eating are all terms to describe eating that occurs when the mind and the body are in full communication.

When this process is happening, we eat in response to our body cues and our body's needs. We eat what we are hungry for and we eat until we are full (not stuffed). We are conscious of how we are feeling while we are eating and how we are likely to feel afterwards. Conscious eating does not leave us stuffed to the gills, sick to our stomachs and collapsed on the couch, too uncomfortable to move.

Conscious eating fuels us and gives us energy. The food we eat consciously gives our bodies and our minds pleasure. It is a nice experience.

To stop binge eating, the first requirement is to turn off the automatic pilot and get back into the driver's seat. This takes practice and won't be easy the first or second time you try it. Like using a muscle though, your ability to stop a binge will grow stronger.

Try these tips:

Slow down. Don't try to stop the binge at first, but communicate to yourself what you are doing. This means you are not on auto-pilot. Say to yourself out loud or in your head "I feel a binge coming on" or "Here we go" or "I'm starting to feel out of control with my eating." Make the process conscious.

Put your food on a plate. You've heard this before because it's important. To be mindfully eating you need to be experiencing the food and how much of it you are choosing to eat.

Practice being a nonjudgmental observer. Try to notice what both your head and your body are doing--from a curious nonjudgmental standpoint.

What's the dialogue going on in your brain? Is it silent, are you numb, are you criticizing yourself or already planning how you'll do it differently tomorrow? Don't try to change your thoughts, just be curious and collect data about what your mind is doing. Now put your hand on your stomach. Take a deep breath. Try to pay attention to how your body is feeling. Feel your hand on your stomach. Feel it move as you breath. Try to take note--nonjudgmentally of how your body feels. Is there tension anywhere, muscle tightness, are you holding your breath or breathing deeply? Does your stomach feel full or empty? How full? How empty?

If you feel courageous, put your other hand on your heart. Feel your heart beat. Keep breathing. Ask yourself what you are REALLY hungry for. Ask yourself what you could feed your self and your spirit IN ADDITION TO food. Sit for a minute and listen. Don't worry or be afraid if you don't know the answer this time. It's asking the question that is important.

Afterwards, if you can do it, try to write down what you noticed about the whole experience. Work very hard not to be critical but to write from the standpoint of a curious observer. As you think about what happened, can you identify anything that brought you to that binge? What was going on before? When did you decide to do it? Can you identify how you were feeling--both in your mind (bored, lonely, happy, sad) and in your body (tired, tense, hungry)?

Practice doing one small, nice, compassionate thing for your body and soul every day that has nothing to do with food. It doesn't have to be earth shattering. Put your feet up and sit for fifteen minutes before you tackle the laundry, take a bubble bath instead of a shower, wear something that you feel lovely in, put music on that you love, kick off your shoes and wiggle your toes.

Melissa McCreery, Ph.D. is a Psychologist and Life Coach. She works with individuals worldwide to help them create and live their best life, get off the diet roller coaster and lose weight without dieting. She works with clients individually, by phone and in person and through tele-seminars. She has been working with people around issues of food, dieting, body image and eating since 1995.

Diet Pills - Do They Work Or Not

Diet pills have become a world-wide fad. It seems that every time I end up on a weight loss website I can't click around in the site without seeing some type of reference to a diet pill or one trying to be sold to me. This made me wonder, do diet pills really work? Recently, the United States banned ephedra based pills due to the ingredients that were used. Since then, there seems to be all types of pills that use natural ingredients and herbs that promise to lose you weight.

Lately, I have been seeing advertisements for a pill called Proactol. It is said to be a "clinically proven fat binder." What it does in essence is binds over your fat intake. It reduces the amount of calories per meal that someone would take in from fats. On top of that benefit, it also promises to significantly reduce your appetite and any cravings you may have.

What I have learned is that Proactol does work, but you have to diet and exercise also. If you do not combine diet and exercise it will work, but not nearly as good.

After taking the pill I felt like my strong appetite was almost gone. I was skeptical at first taking this pill that it would end up like every other pill I have taken before, but it really does seem to work. On top of that there have been numerous clinical studies and it is MHRA approved.

What Are The Healthy Weight Loss Supplements

If you have read some of my other writings on the subject of weight loss I think you will know that I am not a big proponent of weight-loss through supplements. However, if for whatever reasons you want or you need to use supplements to lose weight, what would be the most healthy weight-loss supplements to use?

There are so many weight-loss products on the market today that you could probably spend a year or two just wading through all of them.

Since the weight-loss market is such a lucrative one, you almost have everyone and his dog putting out some kind of supplement that promises you will have wonderful results that sometimes even defy common sense.

The two main categories of weight-loss supplements that you get on the market today are those supplements that are chemical-based and those that are herbal-based.

It probably goes without saying that the herbal-based supplements would be better for your body in general then chemical-based supplements.

This is not to say that chemical-based supplements are necessarily bad for your body, it is just to say that herbal-based supplements are manufactured from natural substances. These substances are generally more in natural harmony with your body.

There is generally this main differentiator between chemical-based and herbal-based products. Chemical-based products generally provide faster results that are not necessarily long-lasting. On the other hand, the herbal-based products tend to work slower but also at the same time provide more longer-lasting results.

None of these two supplement based solutions give you the same durability of results as plain good old-fashioned exercise and diet adjustment.

If you feel that you absolutely must use supplements for your weight control then my advice is to try the herbal based supplements first. Potential harm that these products can do to your body are often far less than their chemical-based counterparts.

People often leave their weight-loss effort to the last minute and therefore want something that can perform a miracle. Under no circumstances is it healthy for your body to experience an enormous fat mass loss in a very short period of time.