Dieting and Exercise can be extremely overwhelming for the average person who is trying to start their diet. Instead of jumping in head first into hundreds of diet websites, although beneficial, these three easy steps will help you begin your adventure Today instead of Tomorrow.

1. Consume 1 oz of Almonds per day - After discovering the several benefits of consuming Almonds, I can say with complete certain that eating 1 oz per day is extremely beneficial and easy to begin doing. However, make sure the Almonds substitute in as part of your XXXX calorie diet as one of your snack meals. Also, if you’re allergic to nuts, eating Almonds will not save you - you’re still allergic. Sorry.
2. Eat Salad Before Meals - Supposedly it takes the brain 20 minutes before it realizes we are full. Starting your meal with a low calorie salad with minimal dressing or 10 spritzes (10 calories) of Wishbone Salad Spritzer and several vegetables will help insure you don’t eat too much of the food that has too many calories. However, don’t assume just a little bit of lettuce and dressing is a salad because although it has low calories, there is minimal nutrition.
3. Eat Whole Grain Bread instead of White - Although this is said regularly, switching the bread you consume really isn’t that hard. Yet, people still eat it. Why would they continue to choose to eat bread that lost most of its’ nutrition from bleaching and sifting is beyond reasonable or logical thinking, but maybe this is why a majority of America is overweight.
4. Increase Fiber in your Diet - Sprinkle your Special K cereal with flax seed, add some tomatoes or mushrooms to your omelette, add some chick peas to your soup or salad, and eat brown rice instead of white rice. Why should you eat an increased amount of fiber? Because it can help prevent Cancer, Heart Disease, Diabetes, and most importantly Constipation - Who honestly likes that pain?

It is that easy.

Celebrities such as Angelina Jolie and Lisa Snowdon reveal the secret to a healthy, slim body and it isn’t by starving yourself. The answer is obvious - Have More Sex. According to Fox,

“The Ultimate Sex Diet: The Secret Formula for a Slimmer, Healthier, More Passionate Life” by Kerry McCosky is due out early next year.

Sandra Bullock recently exclaimed her secret to success was “Mind Blowing Sex.” Could leading a healthy life be correlated with success as well? Absolutely.

Finally, alongside the ability of sex to aid in your diet adventure, it also has several other benefits:

1. Reduced Depression
2. Stronger Heart
3. Improved Immune System
4. Longevity

However, before you start trying to use your new found secret, make sure its consensual!

Almonds are both delicious, healthy, and received a ton of press recently: they were featured on Oprah and on The Top Ten Foods for a Trimmer Belly [via: Celeb Diet] list. However, what exactly makes Almonds healthy? What will they do for YOU?

A current proposal presented to the FDA is suggesting eating “one ounce of nuts per day will decrease the chance for heart disease.”

Almonds contain mono-unsaturated fat, vitamin E, folic acid, magnesium, copper, protein, fiber, and antioxidants.

Benefits of some of these nutrients…

• Vitamin E: “Vitamin E acts as a powerful antioxidant by neutralizing free radicals in the body that cause tissue and cellular damage. Vitamin E also contributes to a healthy circulatory system and aids in proper blood clotting and improves wound healing” [source]
• Folic Acid: There is research indicating folic acid helps prevent Fetal Abnormalities, Alzheimer’s Disease, Parkinson’s Disease, Heart Attacks and Strokes, and cancer. [source]

In addition to all of the previous listed benefits, Almonds can play an important role in lowering LDL (bad cholesterol), raising HDL (good cholesterol), dilate blood vessels (help prevent hardening of arteries), decrease blood pressure, and assist in weight loss.

Have I convinced you to eating Almonds yet? If not, peruse some of these Almond Recipes that I have personally tried and prefer, but they are not necessarily the healthiest:

• Almond Amaretto Bars
• Almond Pistachio Saffron Curry Sauce

Also, I wouldn’t over indulge on almonds because although they are extremely healthy, 1 oz of Almonds is still 160-200 calories.

Is there anything else you would be interested in learning about on Almonds? Comment.

There are several popular diets today, but they aren’t all necessarily healthy, safe or worth while - even if they are endorsed by celebrities (are they doctors?). I do not recommend the use of any such diets, but learning about them can only help if you consult your physician.

Here are some examples of specific diets currently going around in the media.

The Blood Type Diet:

The principal of this diet is you eat foods based on ones blood type.The theory is based on when the specific blood type evolved.

• “O” type blood should eat high protein and eliminate grains.
• “A”type blood should be a vegetarian.
• “B” type blood should eat various foods. I think this is non sense.

Overall, this diet is nonsense. I have not found any Scientific basis for any of its ideas or values.
Hay Diet:

The essential of the Hay Diet isn’t to roll around in a bale of hay and graze with horses if that was your first thought. The principal behind this diet is to never eat protein and carbs together because our bodies digest them differently. Although it is true -the Enzyme trypsin is secreted by our body to breakdown protein, and the enzyme amylase is secreted to metabolize carbs, the question that remains is whether or not our body can secrete both enzymes at the same time and work effectively alongside one another. I do not have an answer to this, but it is definitely worth further investigation.

The Paleotech Diet:

The Paleotech Diet consists of three snacks and three meals of lean protein such as egg white, chicken and fish, low glycemis index carbs such as whole grains, brown rice, and yams, and Omega 3 found in almonds, walnuts, and salmon. While at the same time, omit caffeine processed foods and sugar completely. This is a balanced diet and consumes foods from all food groups and keeps your metabolism going since you are eating every 3 or four hours.

Zone Diet:

Similar to Atkins, while focusing on the glycemis index, this diet is based on foods with high protein and low carbohydrates. However, this could potentially be dangerous due to the unnecessary strain the excess protein may place on our kidneys.

South Beach Diet:

A good enhancement of Atkins. This diet teaches us the good carbs and the bad carbs. And we should stay away from the bad carbs. This diet is currently being supported by several people, but the best knowledge that can be learned from this diet is the emphasis on the difference between “good” and “bad” carbs.

Soup Diet:

The main purpose of this diet is to consume Cabbage soup. Although Cabbage detoxes our body, how much cabbage soup can one person eat? I get sick after I eat the same thing twice a week. I could never imagine eating the same thing everyday of the week.

Hoodia, one of the latest and trendy diet pills currently on the market has made its’ way into the main stream in America. Unfortunately, the target market is women trying to lose weight who are willing to do anything to shed some extra pounds. A pill, Nicole Richie allegedly used at one point, may have some undocumented side effects associated with it although there haven’t been any studies to prove it just yet.

1. 1. 1. Hoodia suppresses appetite. The compound released by Hoodia is 100,000 times more powerful than glucose. Is it possible Hoodia induces hyperglycemia, which is characterized by loss of appetite?
      2. There are also implications using Hoodia could have negative side effects on the liver although it is undocumented and unproven at this point.
      3. There is also the possibility Hoodia may react negatively with other medications.

Although none of this is complete or documented with proof, these are some of the negative possibilities that could occur from use of Hoodia and it may be wiser to attempt to try to lose weight another way.

Here are some examples of some healthy ways to help you on your quest for a better body.

• Best Butt Trimming Exercise
• Healthy, Devilish Eggs

The Canadian McDonald’s Website has its very own food calculator. You should check it out if you have not been to it yet. This calculator shows the nutritional value on the entire menu. I’m still amazed at the fact that a meal of a Big Mac, large fries, and a large soda adds up to over 1400 calories. You can take a look at the food calculator here.

I know we all love salad, but the worst part of it is the dressing—it always kills the purpose of trying to eat healthy. Do we all actually take a measuring cup and get the exact serving amount of dressing? Of course not, we pour a ton of it on like normal human beings do. We could be eating 300 calories worth of dressing for all we know. But Wish-bone Salad Spritzers put a stop to this—its spray-bottle form allows us to count the number of calories of dressing we are putting on our salad. Each spray is only one calorie! And get this—each serving size is ten sprays! This means that we can enjoy a salad full of our favorite dressing with only ten calories! And the sprays go a long way—I only needed eight sprays to put on my salad. These Salad Spritzers come in Balsamic Breeze Vinaigrette, Italian Vinaigrette, and Red Wine Mist Vinaigrette.

The Special-K Diet has been around for a few years already. But does it really work? From my experience, it has.

The Diet:

• Eat a serving of any Kellogg’s Special K cereal with 2/3 cup skim milk and fruit for two meals a day.
• Eat your third meal as you normally do.
• For snacks, choose from fresh fruits and vegetables, a Special K Bar or a pouch of Special K Snack Bites.
• Consume beverages as you normally do.

The diet says that you can lose up to five pounds in two weeks. So I did the diet, and I lost five pounds in two weeks! It was hard to adjust to eating cereal for two meals a day, but after a few days, I got used to it. However, the last step (consume beverages as you normally do) confuses me. There is a huge difference between having eight glasses of water a day, and four cans of soda a day. I don’t drink soda, so water was the only beverage I consumed. My favorite part of the diet is that after the two weeks, it reduces the calorie intake that I was used to having. I do not eat the cereal two times a day anymore, but I am able to keep the weight off—I find myself eating smaller meals than I usually do, and not craving any snack foods. If you haven’t tried the Special K diet, I definitely recommend it!

First things first, cut soda out of your diet. Drinking soda brings in the most unnecessary calories. Trust me, this habit may seem hard to break at first, but when you notice the difference you will not regret it! Drinking water instead of soda is the fastest way to get rid of your water weight, and if you keep this up for a year, you can lose up to twenty five pounds! It is recommended to drink eight glasses of water (four water bottles) daily to keep healthy.