Small Changes Can Create Big Results
One small goal
each month can
lead to a healthier
lifestyle by year end.
-Lona
Create a Healthy New Year
One small goal a month for twelve months makes a big difference in your health.
There’s a sense of anticipation about what the future we hold at the beginning of a New Year. A time when people make resolutions.
Did you know only eighty percent of the population will break those resolutions before the year is out. Almost half of all people will break them before January 18th.
What if this year you choose to make small goals you can live with?
What if you could add a new goal each month?
Please read this blog and digest it (along with your enzymes). Next, go sit somewhere quiet. Decide what you plan to do over the up-coming year.
Here are some examples of month by month goals that improve health and longevity. Please don’t do too many at once or you will fail. Find an item you are interested in and figure out a way that works for you.
Goal: Drink More Water
Drink one more bottle of water every morning upon rising. This amounts to three hundred and sixty five (365) more bottles of water this year. We all know more water in our body can make us feel better over the years. Here is an article about the benefits of staying hydrated.
Goal: Give up Soda
Instead of having four a day, what if you had three a day for a week. Then two a day for another week. The third week you have one a day. Then one soda a week. One every two weeks. Once a month. You keep subtracting sodas until you find you only have them on rare occasions. This is more sustainable than giving up sodas cold turkey and breaking your resolution before mid-January.
Goal: Get More Sleep
What if you set an alarm clock to go to bed? A very different concept.
Figure out the time you usually go to bed and set your alarm. Do this for a month, which gives you the habit of consistency. Next, set the alarm fifteen minutes earlier than usual for the following month. Do this again and again until you are in bed by nine.
Every hour of sleep before midnight is worth two after midnight. This is due to hormones. This article explains why nine p.m. is the ideal time to go to sleep.
Goal: Read labels
What if you started to read labels more carefully?
How many products contain sugar, soy, corn, or harmful fillers?
What if you decided to eliminate these add-ins from the foods you purchased?
Example: sugar. To begin you could read each label and only purchase bottled foods that don’t have sugar. The next month you could add in frozen foods. The following month you could start researching products in the refrigerated aisle. Soon you won’t be adding sugar unless you are doing it deliberately.
Soy could be your next target. By the end of the year you will be able to read and decipher labels. Doing too much too soon makes shopping overwhelming. In our Education Section we have three links on how to read labels.
Goal: Become Gluten Free
Start by incorporating meats, vegetables and healthy fats into your diet. Gradually use the items in your pantry and when its time to purchase more, only buy gluten free replacements.
Eat a gluten free meal once a day for a month. Increase to two days a week, then three, until you are totally gluten free.
What is gluten?
Gluten is a family of proteins that are naturally found in certain cereal grains, such as wheat, barley, rye, spelt, kamut, couscous, farro, semolina, bulgur, farina, wheat germ, cracked wheat, and matzo.
Gluten is in processed products: crackers, bread, breadcrumbs, pasta, seitan, wheat-containing soba noodles, some veggie burgers, cookies, and pastries.
Gluten can be found in beverages: barley malt, malt vinegar, soy sauce, certain salad dressings, sauces or gravies thickened with flour, bouillon and some broths, certain spice blends, flavored chips, beer, certain kinds of wine.
Goal: Get In Shape
Start by changing your daily routine to include actions that make you move about and exert yourself easily. Tell yourself you will take the stairs instead of the elevator or escalator. Walking is the simplest way to get back into shape so park at the back of the lot so you have further to walk. Go to the park or on a hike with a friend once a week for the sole purpose of enjoyment.
Stretch because it makes you more flexible. Start once a week for five minutes and build until you are where you want to be.
Goal: From Omnivore to Vegetarian
Begin incorporating more whole grains, beans, legumes, nuts, and seeds into your diet.
Eat one vegetarian meal a day. Slowly cut out animal products, starting with the choice that would be easiest for you. Some start with red meat, others with chicken.
Decide how many times a week and the number of weeks you plan to do this. Incorporate one day a week where you eat all vegetarian meals. Then two days a week. By year end you can re-evaluate where you want to be.
Here are some of my goals for 2020:
Drink more water.
Watch one health related YouTube video every day.
Read five pages of a book each night before bed.
Choose the low-carb option.
Go to bed earlier.
Eat my last meal by six p.m.
Attend 1 yoga class per week.
Cook at home two nights per week.
Broth fast 1 day per week.
I will start with one goal and add a new goal each month. By the end of the year I will make significant changes to my life and my health with small doable choices.
Doing this over the last few years has allowed me to release excess weight, gain more flexibility, and to feel better overall.
What type of healthy changes can you create for yourself in 2020?
Texas Biological Medicine is here to help you and your family stay healthy. Call our office at 972-233-8339 to schedule your appointment to improve your overall health.
Bring on The Heat
Researchers looked at the diets of nearly 23,000 adults living in Southern Italy over an eight-year period. They found that those who ate chili peppers regularly were 40% less likely to die from a heart attack and more than 50% less likely to die from a stroke.
Regularly is defined as four or more times a week. For those of you who need a little boost, plan on turning up the heat. If you don't choose hot peppers, you can always add an OMEGA supplement, NADH, Ionic Magnesium and Electrolyte Stamina for minerals. Laird Superfood makes a Daily Jumpstart Drink with Lemon, Ginger, Cayenne and Lucuma. Add hot or cold water. How does it get any easier than this?
Hot apple cider with a pinch of Cayenne pairs well with a cold morning. So does bone broth, which warms your insides which improves mood function, modulates the immune system, and rebuilds bone with collagen.
Education is Our Goal
Scientists have failed to get pandas to eat synthetic food, because they are hard to bamboozle. We’re not trying to bamboozle anyone with this information and we'd like you to eliminate synthetic foods.
Labels can be confusing and so can the ingredients. Read about it here.
Even the government encourages you to read the labels in this blog.
More information on how to read labels here.
Would you like to learn how to love exercise. Read all about it.
For the love of potatoes, are they safe? Find out here.
Three tools to shift you into happiness.
How dancing fights depression, parkinsons, and other diseases.
Refills & Supplementation
Start the habit of taking your supplements each morning as one of your goals for the year. We found a way for you to order many quality supplements HERE.
Please don't self diagnose. Call us at 972-233-8339 and we will give you an appointment or answer questions about the supplementation you are taking over the phone.
Seasonal Foods
Holy pumpkin seeds. We need to eat these veggies...
Artichoke
Beets
Broccoli
Brussels sprout
Cabbage
Carrot
Cauliflower
Celery
Chard
Chicory
Fennel
Leeks
Lettuce
Mushrooms
Onion
Pumpkin
Radicchio
Radish
Spinach
Swiss Chard
Turnip Greens
Seasonal Fruits
These puns are pit-i-fully. So are some of these fruits...
Apples
Avocado
Bananas
Clementine
Coconut
Grapefruit
Kiwi
Orange
Papaya
Pear
Pineapple
Tangerines
Apple
Seasonal Fish
Don't flip flop...
Bass
Cod
Cuttlefish
Grouper
Hake
Mullet
Octopus
Redfish
Red Snapper
Sardine
Sole
The sole reason for this section is to get you eating more seasonally.
This Office Reads
Lona recommends:
Undoctored: Why Health Care Has Failed You and How You can become Smarter Than Your Doctor by William Davis, MD. Dr. William Davis changed the lives of millions of people by teaching them to remove grains from their diets to reverse years of chronic health damage.
Tricia recommends:
Bone Broth Diet by Dr. Kellyann Petrucci. As a naturopathic physician and weight-loss specialist, Dr. Kellyann has helped thousands of patients achieve spectacular weight loss and more youthful-looking skin through her bone broth diet.
Ramona recommends:
Soar by T. D. Jakes. You don't have to be an entrepreneur to think like one and take flight with your dreams.
The satellite went into orbit on January 1st causing a New Year’s revolution so we decided to step 'it' up because...
You get dizzy when you waltz. We know that is the way of the whirled.
You know you need to build up fitness with exercise and good health. In addition, your naturopathic doctor said ‘no whey.’
We all realize there is a better whey. May that whey become clear this year.
Warm Winter Drinks
Nineteen healthy Vegan drinks here.
Healthy tea for cold winter afternoons here.
We found a great way to start your day. Recipes here.
Avocado Recipes Anyone?
Eating healthy fats supports skin health, enhances the absorption of fat-soluble vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients, and may even help boost the immune system.
For the Love of Lemons gives us 51 recipes for avocados.
Sardines anyone?
A goldfish might be the most expensive fish but sardines can be tastier. Sardines are an excellent source of omega-3 fatty acids.
Here is why you should have a can of sardines in your pantry.
Six delicious ways to cook sardines.
Sardine hacks for a better snack here.
WikiHow gives us the scoop on How To Eat Sardines alone with a few recipe ideas.
Seventy percent (70%) of adults are deficient in vitamin D.
Let's inactivate the flu virus this year. Add Vitamin D3 with K2 to your winter supplementation to boost your immune system and defend yourself against the Flu Bug!
Lona Smith
