Cape Cod Holistic

A sound holistic lifestyle always starts with a healthy body. That is why physical fitness should be given utmost importance. Overall physical health is necessary to attain better emotional and mental health. However, to some people, it may not be easy to attain physical fitness and health. Thus, they find it harder to attain and maintain a holistic lifestyle.

Follow the following guidelines and attain the physical fitness you need and deserve.

1.    Consult with a fitness instructor from your gym. Before getting into any form of physical fitness plan, you should first ensure your safety. Present your medical records to the instructor so he could assess which activities you should avoid and which ones you should spend more time at. There might be certain physical limitations you should observe, depending on the state of your body and your medical history.

2.    Before getting into any physical fitness plan, also consider taking a good diet. Essential nutrients from food intake should be given utmost attention because doing so would greatly complement any physical program in the long run.

3.    Warm up before any exercise. Warming up is important because it conditions the body for a strenuous activity. It is like slowly taking up a challenging task at eventual stages. When you do so, you could easily avoid spasms and muscle injuries. Warm ups also help the joints secrete necessary substances needed during the entire duration of the activity.

4.    Have a focus program each day you go to the gym. For example, today, when you go to the gym, mainly do chest exercises. On the next gym day, work on the arm muscles; on the next, do the back muscles and so on. You could also spend a day doing cardiovascular workouts.

5.    Cardiovascular exercises should be done on a regular basis. During the days when your program does not require you to do any particular fitness exercise, do cardiovascular activities instead. You could spend longer time with the treadmill or you could allot an hour at the stationary bike. Such activities would not heavily involve main muscle groups as in weight lifting, but they would effectively improve blood circulation in the body.

6.    When lifting weights particularly for upper body muscles, observe proper posture and form. Doing so would ensure that the activity would effectively target the intended specific muscles. Proper posture could help assure physical safety. When lifting weights for example, a bad posture can lead to spinal injuries.

7.    Regulate breathing while doing the physical fitness program. Inhale oxygen when you are doing the less stressful part of the exercise task, then, exhale as you put more pressure into your muscles. When your oxygen intake and exhalation is regulated, you would avoid spasms because oxygen supply to the muscles would be assured.

8.    Do not forget to stretch after every exercise task. Stretching improves flexibility of muscle groups and facilitates for a quick muscle relaxation activity. Stretching is also the much-needed break your muscles need after being pressured and challenged by the workout tasks.

10.    Above all, observe overall discipline. Force yourself to regularly and religiously do your physical fitness program. Be on the guard when it comes to food intake.

You see, physical fitness is never achieved overnight. You have to exert a lot of effort and ensure determination if you are aiming to get an overall physical soundness. When you succeed in doing so, you could find it easier to attain a holistic lifestyle.

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Volunteering or helping other people is one effective a way to take a break from the pressures of work and personal life. It is also a way for you to expand your social sphere or use your skills for the greater good. But did you know that you can help yourself by helping others to advance their career?

Yes!

Here’s how:

1. Helping other people allows you to expand your personal network which is an important component of career development. – At the taproot, a personal career network is a collection of all of the people you know who have information that can help advance your career. Your personal network may be composed of past and present coworkers, professional associates or contacts from other companies, suppliers, customers, consultants, recruiters, former teachers and classmates, and friends. However, you cannot and should not develop a personal network solely for singular and self-serving purpose of advancing your own career. If you do this, you will be left with contacts who are shallow and more interested in helping themselves than you.

2. Helping other people allows you to get into career support group – A career support group is composed of group members that act as sounding boards, advisers and devil’s advocates for each other. Helping other people can help you get experience in your field of interest and establish a strong camaraderie in the field. You help yourself by helping other people because you are able to practice important skills like teamwork, problem-solving, project planning and task management. Practicing these skills while helping other people gives you more confidence in stretching your own wings at work.

3. Helping other people provides you career learning experience – Helping other people provides you opportunities to acquire/improve knowledge, competencies, and skills for the advancement of your career. It can boost your career as it is a good way to show leadership and management skills. It is also an excellent opportunity to show your good work ethic and dedication for a good cause. Many companies today encourage social responsibility and giving back to the community. Listing your volunteer work as one of your added activities tells your company that you share their values.

4. Helping other people sharpen your communication skills and other skills used in the workplace such as teamwork, project planning, task management and organization – Helping other people can build social competence and assuage anxiety about social relationships. It gives an opportunity to develop and refine social skills. It also helps foster a sense of trust in other people in general. Helping other people helps an individual to have a broader perspective of life which consequently contributes to a more inspired and dedicated outlook towards career and work.

5. You help yourself by helping other people because it allows you to work for a cause of your interest. It also allows you to think and re-think your goals in life and thus it gives you better career perspective and direction. Volunteering can be your stepping stone or your way of knowing what you really want in life.

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After being out of circulation since the Spanish conquest of South America, the food plant Quinoa is staging a comeback in the world’s food arena. Acknowledged by the world’s nutrition experts and food scientists as one of the world’s most nutritionally rich (if not the richest) food sources, Quinoa’s re-appearance couldn’t be more timely.

As a food plant that had been extensively cultivated by Colombian cultures all the way to the Incas, Quinoa has a more than 6,000 year track record of providing nutritionally rich diets to the people in the Andean valleys and surroundings.

Marginalized after the rise in popularity of the grains barley, corn and wheat, it suffered the most when its cultivation was outlawed by the Spanish regime.

Present-Day Farming

Presently, it is now grown in high and cold regions of the countries Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia Chile and Argentina, although in reduced quantities. This is, of course, mostly due to economic and social reasons.

Harvesting and threshing, done mostly by manual labor, consume great efforts and time (days on end). Aside from this, Quinoa needed an extra laborious process – the rinsing of the seeds to remove the bitter saponin before it can be deemed fit for consumption.

Farming Conditions

The Quinoa also has an outstanding ability to withstand and adapt very harsh environmental conditions like cold and drought. Normally, seeds germinate when conditions are suitable, although in the wilds, they may remain in the soil for 2 or 3 years without germinating.

The plant has strong resistance to droughts, but it requires sufficient humidity at the start of farm time.

Nutritional Value

The plant’s natural nutritional values are incredibly rich and considerable. For one, it has all of the 8 essential amino acids needed by the body, excluding lysine which is good for tissue growth and repair.

It also has great quantities of calcium, and the other minerals like iron, copper, phosphorous, and manganese. It also has most of the vitamin B types and riboflavin (B6). Not least of them all is the considerable fiber content of this incredible seed.

Medical Notes

Quinoa is being recommended by health professionals as a natural source of large quantities of magnesium which is good for cardiovascular maintenance. Magnesium relaxes blood vessels, and consequently lowers the risks of high blood pressure and other heart illnesses.

The leaves, stems and grain have been known to have some medicinal properties like anti-inflammation, as analgesic, and as a disinfectant of the urinary tract. It is also used in cases of fractures and internal hemorrhaging.

Food Use

To date, there are around a hundred food preparations and recipes that use Quinoa as the primary ingredient. These include tamales, salads, pickles, soups and casseroles, stews, pastries and sweets, desserts and beverages. It also include making of breads, biscuits, and pancakes.

Quinoa is most versatile because many of its parts can be used for a number of preparations. Usable are the whole grain, the roasted flour, small leaves, and instant powder.

To date, there are three main varieties of Quinoa that are commercially available – the white or sweet variety, the dark red and the black variety. The seeds are all similar and almost of the same size.

By this time, you may have already heard about the re-discovery of the “super food” called Quinoa. The most exciting thing about quinoa is its health benefits due to the presence of many beneficial vitamins and minerals.

Being one of the staple foods of the Incas dating back to some 6,000 years ago, its re-discovery is a saving grace among today’s mass-produced but less-than-nutritious staples.

What is Quinoa, and how important is it in today’s circumstances in food and nutrition?

Seeds

Quinoa is actually the edible seed of Chenopodium quinoa, a plant species related to spinach and amaranths. Though the leaves are sometimes used as vegetables, the seeds of the Quinoa are more valuable and are used as food.

The seeds are treated (and cooked) as cereal or food grains. It was regarded as a sacred crop by the Incas, and was commonly referred to as the “mother grain”. It was said that during the planting season, the emperor (or a high Inca leader) would lead the sowing of the first quinoa seed with a golden shovel.

When the Spaniards arrived (and later prohibited the cultivation of the Quinoa crop), there was a decline in the production of the food crop. With the rediscovery of the many health benefits of the Quinoa, there had been a resurgence today in the renewed cultivation of the crop in many parts of the world.

Quinoa Varieties

There are three types of this almost-flat oval-shaped grain – and they also differ in color (and slightly in flavor). The most common is the white variety, while the black kind is very rare.

Quinoa grain has a nutty flavor when cooked. It also becomes soft and has a creamy texture that is easily digestible. There is also a quinoa flour used for other cooking purposes.

Nutritional Content

There is a long list of beneficial ingredients present in Quinoa. First, it has all the complete nine essential amino acids. It is also high in the amino acid lysine which is necessary in tissue growth.

It also has a considerable amount of minerals needed by the body. A 40-gram uncooked Quinoa contains 30 grams of carbohydrates, 6 grams of proteins, 3 grams of dietary fiber, 2 grams of fat, 21 micrograms of folate and 3 IU of vitamin E.

It also contains 25 milligrams of calcium, 89 mg of magnesium, 174 mg of phosphorous, 315 mg. of potassium and 0.96 mg of manganese.

Health Benefits

For one food source so rich in magnesium, Quinoa is perfect for cardiovascular health because magnesium helps relax blood vessels. Consequently, it lowers the risks of high blood pressure and other related heart problems.

The minerals copper and manganese in Quinoa boost the body’s immune system and protects the red blood cells from damage. Its rich fiber content (insoluble) is suited to fight against breast cancer and gallbladder stone formation in women.

Super Food

There are many food crops that are rich with one or two very important nutrients. With Quinoa, there is an abundance of many essential nutrients that some nutritionists consider it as a complete food source. It can also slow the uptake of the sugars involved with white flour, white sugar and other “fast” carbs. This gives the body more time to absorb the remaining nutrients before they’re burned up. Some even qualify Quinoa as a “super food”.

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