Does weight training make woman bulky?

Most women out there don’t like weight training or choose not to get involved in weight training for the fear of getting bulky. Is this true? I am here to tell you that it is not true. Women are influenced a lot by the media and seeing these huge body’s on women in some of the fitness magazines and bodybuilding shows has created a fear of getting big and bulky. I want to put this myth to rest once and for all. 

Nobody has ever woke up one morning and realized that they are too big or too bulky, that just does not happen. You are always in total control or your body and the changes that occur or the changes that you induce on your body. Muscle growth is a long, hard process and to get as big as some of the women you see in the fitness magazines and body building shows takes years of hard training and lots of drugs like the male hormone testosterone, this is the reason for some of these women having such masculine features.

There are fitness and physique models out there who train just as hard with weights and they have sexy lean bodies which men drool over and some women dream of. These women obviously have a different goal in mind, they are not bodybuilders and don’t need the drugs to build enormous muscle. Weight training has huge benefits and should be a part of every woman’s fitness or weight loss program.

Weight training builds strong healthy muscles which lots of women lack, having strong healthy muscles puts less stress on joints and bones thus reducing the risk of joint injury and bone disease (osteoporosis) which is very common amongst older women and very painful. Having strong healthy muscles also boosts your metabolism. Muscle is your body’s metabolic furnace, it uses energy has fuel all day long even while you sleeping and this promotes fat loss.

Women are too focused on weight loss and not fat loss that they would even sacrifice muscle just to see the scale drop a few pounds. Although scale weight is important, I think physical appearance says a whole lot more. You are bound to sacrifice muscle in any weight loss program that does not include weight training and as we now know the lack of muscle can be detrimental to your metabolism and health.......For more information Click Here!

What Are Calories and How Does it Affect Our Lives?

Let me start by explaining the definition of a Calorie. What is a calorie? A calorie is the quantity of heat required to raise the temperature of 1 gram of water 1 degree Celsius, in another words a calorie is a measure of heat energy.

When food is burned, it releases a certain amount of heat (energy), depending on the type of food, for example; Fat has more calories (9 calories per gram) than Carbohydrates (4 calories per gram) and Protein (4 calories per gram). The more calories that are in the food, the more energy will be released when it is burned and whatever surplus energy that is not used by the body will get stored as adipose tissue (body fat).

All foods that have a high fat content will be considered high calorie foods. There are some fats that are good and essential for the body (Unsaturated Fats) which need to be consumed in the right quantities like your omega 3 and omega 6, also known as your healthy fats. Although fats are high calorie foods and should be limited, there are also some lower calorie foods which are just as, if not more destructive to one’s health. What foods am I talking about? I am talking about the processed carbohydrates that are so readily available today, like your sugary foods. Any food that is not in its most natural form is considered harmful when over consumed, even though it has lower calorie content than your fatty foods. These foods cause a huge glucose (blood sugar) spike in the blood stream and continuous glucose spikes could lead to diabetes. These large spikes also means surplus glucose and whatever glucose is not used for energy will be stored has body fat (adipose tissue).

Most people do not worry about calories until they decide to go on a diet or weight loss program and even then they don’t know what a calorie really is or how much to consume. The first place to start for anybody who is looking at losing weight, gaining weight or even maintaining weight, is to first find out how many calories per day they require for maintenance and then adjust their calorie consumption accordingly.

Estimating your calorie consumption by the food you eat on a daily basis and then dropping your calories by eating less for weight loss does not have a very positive effect. If you cut your calories by too much which you will eventually do because every time you hit a plateau, you lower your calories even further to see results and that will send your body into starvation mode which will lower metabolism and a lower metabolism will make it much easier for you to put the weight that you lost back on and even more.

Therefore it is important to count calories when going on a weight loss program. This way you can monitor your weight loss and make small adjustments accordingly without lowering you metabolism and jeopardizing your health.
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Will the Winter Weather Have A Negative or Positive Effect on Your Weight?

Cold temperatures during winter can have both a negative and a positive effect on your weight. It is about how you take advantage of the benefits of these conditions. Some may enjoy burning fat during winter, and some may find it easier to burn fat during summer but I personally think that it’s just a matter of preference. One can burn fat at the same rate throughout the year; you just have to know how to manipulate the conditions.

The summer season has a psychological benefit to weight loss, it is the season for sun and fun and people want to look good for beach and outdoor functions and events, you also wear less clothing which is all the more reason to get more active and watch what you eat.

Most people find it more difficult to lose weight in winter due to the cold temperatures which force’s people to sleep in late, eat more and become less active. They also tend to worry less about how they look in winter because they are less exposed. One also has to remember that our bodies create more heat in winter for warmth and this heat comes from the calories burnt from the food that we eat, that is one of the reasons why we tend to eat more in winter. You can use this little bit of information to your advantage. If you can maintain your healthy eating and activity levels (including training) in winter this could boost your weight loss.

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Is It Ok To Have A Cheat Day When On A Calorie Restricted Diet?

Can cheating on your diet help you lose weight?

There have been many controversies around a cheat meal or a cheat day. A cheat meal is generally a meal that you would not eat when on a diet, a meal that would make you feel guilty. I personally together would many other professionals out there know that cheat meals or a cheat day does have benefits and can boost fat loss. Cheat days also helps make dieting more bearable; imagine staying away from your favorite foods like pizza for 12 weeks? That’s one of the reasons why people cannot stay on diets for long periods.

Having a cheat day will help prevent your body from going into an adaptive state like starvation mode. Going on low calorie diets for long periods without a cheat day lowers the leptin levels in your body thus in turn slowing your metabolism. For those of you that don’t know what leptin is, let me explain; leptin is a hormone that communicates the nutritional status to your body, your body then uses this information to make the necessary changes like fat burning and metabolism. Low levels of leptin = low fat burning and metabolism and high levels of leptin = high fat burning and metabolism.

Low calorie diets will eventually lower your leptin levels which will lead to you hitting a plateau but the good news is that it takes just 1 day of cheating to bring your leptin levels back to normal thus boosting fat burning and keeping your metabolism running at its peak. So don’t feel guilty and give up on your diet because you had a cheat day.

When on a calorie restricted diet choose a day and cheat without feeling guilty but my advice is to try and keep your cheat meals to a maximum of 2 meals for that day. There are some people that have leptin resistance and this is developed in the same way that diabetics develop insulin resistance. If you consider yourself to be overly obese then there is a chance that you have leptin resistance and if that’s the case then I would suggest staying away from cheat days for about 3 to 4 weeks until your leptin resistance has been reduced.
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What Effect Does Alcohol Have On The Human Body?

Small amounts of alcohol may have some benefits but large amounts or the abuse of alcohol will be detrimental to your health and physique. Now when I say small amounts I mean 1 glass per day, this has been proven to increase HDL (good cholesterol) in the body. If you are serious about losing weight and getting into shape then I would suggest not consuming any alcohol at all. Alcohol has 7calories per gram which makes it the second highest, second to fat which has 9 calories per gram. If you are on a calorie restricted diet then alcohol is just going to be extra calories that your body does not need, these are wasted calories and have no benefit.

Alcohol reduces the body’s ability to burn fat, the liver is responsible for metabolizing alcohol and fat, and alcohol prevents the liver from metabolizing fat, that’s because alcohol takes priority over fat. Alcohol is a toxin (poison) and it has to be detoxified by the body. Consuming alcohol has other risks like; damaged muscle cells, various heart and circulatory problems, effects the nervous system and brain, less efficient healing of injuries, it’s a diuretic which leads to dehydration, Numerous sexual dysfunctions like; loss of libido, reduced sperm formation, menstrual irregularities, and shrinkage of sexual organs. Alcohol also reduces the absorption of many vitamins like vitamin B which could lead to you becoming anemic.

The next time you consider consuming alcohol, take a look at some of the risks and ask yourself, is this what I really need and want for my body? It is not going to be easy for some to stay away from alcohol; you need to create a new addiction, the addiction of having perfect health and physique.

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Why Is Water Important And How Much Should We Drink?

Water makes up 75% of your total body weight, losing 10% of water can make you sick and losing 20% can kill you. Water is responsible for every bodily function known to man. Blood is made up 90% water which makes the transportation of nutrients and energy to all parts of the body possible and the transportation of metabolic waste out of the body through your kidneys. Temperature regulation in the body is controlled by water; water assists your digestive system and lubricates joints. Water is also responsible for energy production, energy storage and workout recovery. As you can see water is absolutely vital, it’s the fuel that keeps your body running and many people out there are running on fumes which will be disastrous.

When on a diet drinking plenty of water will help your liver metabolize body fat and the carbohydrates that you consume which is converted into glucose can be stored as glycogen and not fat. Active people require more water than inactive people. A little as 4% reduction of water can drop your physical performance by as much as 30%.

Drinking plenty water on a daily basis is essential, drink plenty of water before, during and after workouts, drink water after carbohydrate meals and do not wait until you are thirsty, by this time your body is already dehydrated. Drinking 8 – 10 glasses of water per day is adequate for an average person and an active person should be drinking more.
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Is There A Cure For Diabetes?

What is diabetes?

Diabetes is basically low or no insulin being produced by the body. Insulin is a hormone that transports nutrients like amino acids (Protein) and glucose (blood sugar) into cells. Do you know that 67% of the people with diabetes eventually die from heart attacks? If you really think about it diabetes is not a disease, it’s a symptom.

Now I have been telling people for years that diabetes can be cured but nobody seem to listen to me. Doctors have been telling their patients that there is no cure for diabetes, they both right and wrong at the same time, they are right in the sense that diabetes cannot be cured by modern medicine all that modern medicine could come up with was insulin shots and that does not solve the problem, that’s just a quick fix.

A scientist called Dr Robert O. Young has made a discovery that is sending shock waves around the world; he has discovered that the major cause of diabetes is our modern lifestyle. Now let us take a closer look at diabetes, as I said earlier diabetes is low or no insulin being produced by the body, which organ is responsible for producing insulin? The pancreas, the pancreas has cells called the beta cells that actually produce insulin and over the year’s saturated fat and uric acid forms a layer around the beta cells destroying it which stops producing insulin and in turn causing diabetes. The amount of beta cells destroyed and the amount of insulin being produced will determine whether one has Type I or Type II diabetes, the pancreas is situated just below the stomach area and is therefore the next organ in the digestive process and we are torturing the pancreas by the junk that we put into our body.

Our bodies are recreating new cells every year and we get the raw materials to create new cells from the food we eat therefore by just eating the right nutrition at the right times and exercising regularly  we can help the body recreate new beta cells which will eventually stabilize the insulin levels in our body and cure diabetes.

Exercise helps to lower the blood sugar level in the body which in turn will reduce the amount of insulin required. Exercise also helps to strengthen muscles the heart and reduce stress.

There are people out there who suffered from Type I diabetes where their body did not produce any insulin at all and have cured themselves of diabetes in has little has 3 to 4 months just by eating the right nutrition at the appropriate times and exercising regularly.

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What is Low GI?

GI is an abbreviation for GLYCEMIC INDEX. A big hype has been created about low GI food; people are now consuming large amounts of low GI food all because they were told by family, friends, the media etc. that this is good. I am not saying that low GI foods are bad, all I am saying is that most people out there have no clue as to how low GI food is beneficial to them and that too much of anything is bad for you.

Foods that are high on the glycemic index burns much faster and are released much quicker into the bloodstream creating a blood sugar spike which forces the pancreas to release more insulin to transport this surplus glucose (blood sugar) out of the blood stream. This surplus glucose is now quickly transported to parts of the body that require energy and the balance gets stored as adipose tissue (fat). This sudden drop in blood sugar now creates a need for more food thus making you eat more and that’s how the cycle continues. These blood sugar spikes also lead to other medical problems like, diabetes, hypertension, heart disease and obesity.

Foods that are low on the glycemic index burn much slower and are released more gradually into the blood stream, keeping you fuller for longer, stabilizing blood sugar, insulin levels and reduce the risk of obesity. Therefore eating low GI foods is good but when it comes to fat loss it all boils down to the number of calories consumed and by eating too much of low GI food you can go over your daily calorie consumption which will cause you to gain fat.
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Why Should We Not Focus On Eating Alone To Burn Body Fat?

Although what we eat, how we eat it and when we eat is of vital importance, this alone is not sufficient for fast effective and permanent fat loss. As I mentioned in a previous post the only way to burn body fat is if you are in a calorie deficit and by focusing on eating alone you are bound to hit a plateau which will force you to lower your calories further. Dropping your calories too low will have a very negative effect on your body; it will lower your metabolism, deplete your muscle and destroy cells in your body.

There is another way to create a bigger calorie deficit without dropping your calorie consumption any further. Let me use an example of an average female who requires 2000 calories per day for maintenance and she drops her calorie consumption to 1600 calories per day, this gives her a calorie deficit of 400 calories but she wants to create a bigger calorie deficit to break the plateau. The other way to create a bigger calorie deficit without lowering calorie consumption is to burn more calories. How does she do this? She does this by increasing her activity for the day (exercise). This average female now introduces exercise to her program which now increases her maintenance calorie consumption from 2000 calories per day to 2300 calories per day, her calorie deficit now moves from 400 calories to 700 calories per day, which helps her break the plateau.

The introduction of exercise to a fat loss program helps burn body fat effectively and breaking a plateau without the negatives of dropping calories to low. Apart from fat loss, exercise has numerous other health benefits which were also mentioned in a previous post.

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Fat Burning Foods

The food that we put into our bodies determine how we look and feel, today’s society is being consumed by the fast food industry and all for the sake of convenience. This alone plays a huge role in today’s increase in obesity and health problems. You are exactly what eat, if you eat lots of junk food then you will look and feel that way. Fat loss is such a huge concern today that people are trying numerous diets, eating plans and fat loss programs to curb or prevent the effect of obesity. Unfortunately when it comes to food people have no clue as to what foods they should be eating and they are being led blindly by the media.

What do we actually require food for? We require food for survival and I am sure you knew that but let me elaborate. The 3 main food sources are protein, carbohydrates and essential fats. Protein is the building block in our body, it is what muscle tissue and cells are made of, it is essential for building a strong immune system, cell construction and stabilizing insulin levels in our body. Carbohydrates is the primary source of energy in our body’s , carbohydrates is broken down to form glucose (blood sugar) which is then transported by insulin from the blood stream to areas of the body where energy is needed e.g. the muscle. Vegetables are starchy carbohydrates which improve digestion and boost the metabolism. Essential fats improves insulin sensitivity, essential for the absorption of fat soluble vitamins, for joint health, oxygen transfer, improves skin texture, increased metabolic rate and helps burn fat.

For effective fat loss one should consume small balanced meals containing protein, natural carbohydrates and essential fats at regular intervals throughout the day (approximately every 3 waking hours). It takes the human approximately 3 hours to fully digest and consume a meal thereafter the human body will look for other sources if food is not available, this includes breaking down protein to use as energy and this means breaking down cells and muscle tissue, in another words you will be cannibalizing yourself. Eating after every 3 hours has been proven both scientifically and through experience to boost metabolism.

Some food examples:

LEAN PROTEINS – Skinless chicken breast, skinless turkey breast, tuna packed in water, salmon, egg whites, lean beef etc.

NATURAL CARBOHYDRATES – Oatmeal, potatoes, lentils, brown rice, 100% whole wheat bread, whole wheat pasta, kidney beans, yam, sweet potato etc.

VEGETABLES – Asparagus, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots corn, lettuce, cucumber, mushrooms, green beans, peas etc.


ESSENTIAL FATS – Olive oil, canola oil, flaxseed oil, sunflower oil, safflower oil etc.

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Getting Started

Getting started is always the most difficult part and it does not matter whether it is to lose 50 pounds, improving your health or just keeping fit and staying in shape. The most common excuse that I hear is that people do not have the time. Everybody has the same 24 hours in a day but why do some people manage to fit everything that they need to within those 24 hours and others cant? The answer to that is habit, people have formed habits in their lives that consume all of their time and they find it difficult to change these habits. Simple habits like spending hours in front of the television (the “idiot box” as known to some of us) or sleeping for more than 8 hours a day, these are some of the habits that we can change to create more time in the day. Just by waking up an hour earlier every morning and going to bed an hour later every night is equivalent to adding an extra month to the year, you do the math. You actually need less than 2 hours a day to achieve your fat loss and fitness goals.

The first question you should ask yourself is “What do I want to achieve with regards to my fitness and health?” Once you know what you want to achieve, you can get started by setting a goal towards that achievement. Having a written goal as a start is in fact more important than starting with the best fat loss or fitness program on the planet. Click Here! for the best mini goal setting program on fat loss and the best fat loss program on the planet, this will help u get started and help you achieve you’re your fat loss and fitness goals.