Want To Lose Fat? Get Out of Your Comfort Zone!

by Teodora Sklayne

Do you go the gym regularly for years and haven’t changed a bit or even put on fat since? Do you want to lose body fat using the same routine for years?

Very often, especially in commercial gyms, I see people doing the same routine over and over again. If I were to come back 6 months later, I would see them lifting the same weights, or using the same cardio machine, obviously looking either the same or worse.

The very wise Albert Einstein has said it right – “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Basically it’s as simple as that – in order to progress, changes for better must be made on regular basis. Action leads to results. Many people tend to feel too ‘comfortable’ to make the necessary changes or afraid of failure.

Let’s look at comfort zone and how it can affect people’s lives. The comfort zone is a behavioural state within which a person operates in an anxiety-neutral condition, using a limited set of behaviours to deliver a steady level of performance, usually without a sense of risk (Alasdair White 2009).  Highly successful people step outside their comfort zones all the time in order to accomplish their goals. And we are talking about success anywhere – at work, at home with the family, or in the gym.

So how do we get out of the comfort zone?

Well you need to open your eyes to the world full of options and try different things. Some things might be easy and enjoyable; some will be hard, unpleasant and painful. Yes, change is painful whether literally or metaphorically. However if you embrace that pain positively, not only you will achieve your goals, but the journey will be much more empowering. So be prepared to go through that pain – whether it would be those last 2-3 reps of an exercise that are really hard and painful or pushing trough those last 20 seconds of the interval training.

The fact that you are in the gym doing some exercise is not enough to get you to your fat loss goals. You must push yourself and get out of your comfort zone. Perhaps working with a personal trainer or in a class with group of people with similar goals will help you go out of your comfort zone. Those last few reps or pushing yourself by increasing the weight you use, are the one that counts; they are the one that will lead you to success and will make you stronger and leaner. So don’t waste your time in useless everyday boring routine and try something new today!

How to Detoxify Your Everyday Life – Part I - Plastics

by Teodora Sklayne

Unfortunately, we live in a very toxic world. There are toxins in our everyday life - in cosmetics, plastic containers and bottles, cleaning products and detergents, even baby bottles. There are things, however, that we can do to avoid some of those toxins , by replacing the bad stuff with good.

Plastic for example is everywhere. Most plastics nowadays contain Bisphenol-A also called BPA (unless stated otherwise). There is an abundance of evidence that it is toxic for humans and animals. BPA is an estrogenic, which basically means that it mimics estrogen in the body and binds to estrogen hormone receptors. Unnatural hormone as this cause numerous health problems – brain health, cardiovascular health, and reproductive health are affected as well as it can lead to cancer, weight gain and obesity.

BPA can be very difficult to completely avoid, because it is used in making food containers and beverage bottles and cans, as well as it is contained in metal tins and receipt paper.

The everyday access to plastic is unavoidable in the present world; however we can do few things to reduce our exposure to this poison:

Buy glass containers for food instead of plastic

You can avoid using any plastic containers at home by replacing them with glass ones. Good brand is Pyrex. They have plenty of variety of container shapes and sizes. They even have containers with lids that you can put your lunch in.

Warm food and plastic

NEVER use plastic containers in microwave, or put warm food in them. All chemicals including BPA are released at high temperature. Warming up plastic or eating up warm food from plastic container is one guaranteed way to poison you with BPA over time. Another reason to avoid take-away food, as it usually comes warm in plastic containers...

Drink from BPA-free water bottles or ideally glass bottle

You can find many brands that offer BPA-free plastic bottles. For UK a useful one is Bobble BPA-free plastic bottle, which filters the water as you drink. It will save you money on buying mineral water all the time and simultaneously will help you avoid BPA. Another option is buying glass bottles of water, but that can be inconvenient to carry around.

Avoid tinned food – especially tomatoes

As mentioned above, food cans contain BPA in their lining. Acidity in foods like tomatoes causes BPA to leach into your food. Instead you can use fresh tomatoes or choose tomatoes in glass bottles and jars. In general try to have as little tinned food as possible, fresh or frozen are much better options, as the nutrients are much better preserved.

Below is a chart from chemical analyses of 97 canned foods by Southern Testing and Research Division of Microbac Laboratories, Inc., North Carolina.

BPA IS AT UNSAFE LEVELS IN ONE OF EVERY 10 SERVINGS OF CANNED FOODS (11%) AND ONE OF EVERY 3 CANS OF INFANT FORMULA (33%)

  

These are very simple things that will neither cost too much, nor compromise convenience. Don’t procrastinate, protect yourself and your family and do it today!

How Not To Bench

Easy Vegetable Stir Fry

One of the nutritional principles I first teach my clients is the importance of a high vegetable intake.

Vegetables provide important fibre, vitamins, minerals, and other phyto nutrients that help with detoxification and estrogen balance (especially Cruciferous vegetables)

Vegetables also quite low in calories meaning that you can fit quite a lot of them into your daily targets. Keeping hunger at bay becomes especially important when eating in a deficit when loosing body fat.

Variety and rotation of colours is important to get a broad spectrum of different health promoting nutrients and also avoid developing food sensitivities. 

Go Organic

I recommend to choose organic vegetables whenever possible because although some studies have shown they don’t have any more nutrients in them than non organic produce the fact that you are going to be exposing yourself to less pesticides and fertilisers is only going to be a good thing.

If you are truly budget strapped then spend the time to properly clean your non organic vegetables before preparing them.

"I can't eat vegetables, I don't like the taste"

I hear excuses all the time about how vegetables don’t taste good but I find this is often due to lack of creativity with cooking. 

Yes I agree if I were to attempt to eat only plainly steamed or boiled vegetables I would not enjoy the taste andget pretty sick of it too.

Ensure not to over cook your vegetables and make them too soft otherwise this will also negatively affect the taste. 

Combing The Vegetables Into A Balanced Meal and Limited On Time?

I understand that limited time can be a factor for the busy professional so following the below tip can save you around 10 minutes of preparation-

• Use ready cut and washed vegetables.

• Ready Cooked meat/fish or tinned fish-  Look in the packet for the least amount of ingredients and additives as possible. 

• Canned beans, lentils, ready cooked quinoa,  potatoes or rice are valid carbohydrate sources.

• Healthy fats are easy to add in the form of adding nuts or oil to your meal. 

Using tinned food is not ideal as there are some concerns surrounding the BPA (a form of plastic) they use to line the can's. Some studies have shown this can leak into the food however tinned food is a better option than not eating at all or opting for more processed ready meals if you really don't have the time to prepare fresh food. 

The quantities of food you use are of course always in the context of hitting your macro nutrient targets for the day. It only take a small amount of time figure this out and quantities can be adjusted as needed.

Ingredient's

1 large Onion (92 grams)

2 large Carrots (192 grams)

12 Asparagus Spears (146 grams)

2 large sticks of Celery (224 grams)

1 head of Cauliflower (408 grams)

1 bunch of Chard (140 grams)

8 grams of Butter Oil (Ghee)

Fresh Garlic and Ginger.

1 MSG free stock cube mixed in to ½ a cup of hot water.

Salt, pepper, chilli’s and other herbs and spices to taste etc

3 other vegetable combinations ideas-

1, Broccoli, Red Onion, Spinach, Sweet Pepper, Parsnip and Green Peas

2, Brussels's Sprouts, Spring Onions, Mange Tout, Mushrooms, Turnip and Zucchini 

3, Non cooked version - Romaine Lettuce, Jerusalem Artichoke, Cherry Tomatoes, Cucumber, Beetroot and Bell Pepper.

Cooking Instructions

1. Wash then cut up the vegetables into relatively even sizes, the smaller you cut them the faster they will cook. 
2. Using a large wok pan, stir fry the onions in the butter oil for 2 minutes until lightly browned.
3. Add the vegetable stock cube liquid and Cauliflower and stir fry for 2 minutes
4. Add the Asparagus and stir fry for 2 minutes
5. Add the Carrots, Celery and stir fry for 2 minute.
6. Add the Chard and stir fry for a further 2 minutes
7. Finish off by adding the fresh garlic and ginger and any herbs and spices you wanted.

Macro nutrients per serving (4 servings) work out to be approximately (I rounded up)-

104 KCAL

5 grams Protein

18 grams Carbohydrate (7 grams fibre)

2 grams of Fat

There we have it,  4 delicious and filling portions of vegetables prepared in 15-20 minutes if you washed and cut fresh vegetables and 10 minutes of you use ready prepared vegetables.

Boost Your Health With Kefir

Looks a bit like cottage cheese but don't eat the grains!

Kefir is one of the best natural sources of pro-biotic’s, Kefir fermented for only 24 hours contains around 3 billion CFU per ml. So for example if you were to have 100 ml’s of this twice a day it would give you 600 billion CFU, that’s quite a boost to your friendly bacteria and will provide numerous health benefits.

The bacteria breaks down lactose, so Kefir is suitable for people who are lactose intolerant to unfermented milk products.

How to make Kefir, it’s dead easy!

The beauty of Kefir is that it’s so easy to make. All you need to do is put some Kefir grains in a jar topped up with whole milk - preferably raw unpasteurised dairy from Guernsey cows, goat or buffalo (A2 Milk).

You can find your nearest supplier here - http://www.naturalfoodfinder.co.uk/unpasteurised-raw-milk-uk

Leave the sealed jar in a cupboard for at least 24 hours. You will find the kefir will separate from the milk after a period of time. Give it a shake to mix it back together.

Give the jar a shake to mix it back together, hold the lid closed!

The longer you ferment, the higher content of good bacteria and the more ‘tart’ flavour it’ll have. Therefore you can adjust this according to your taste.

Once this is completed, scoop out the Kefir grains (you can use a sieve or I use a pasta fork) and transfer them into a new batch and repeat as often as needed.

Refrigerate the Kefir and aim to consume 25-100 ml in the morning and evening with a meal.  Start of with small quantities and steadily increase the dosage to avoid any gastric disturbance or upset.

The finished product!

Remember to fit it into your macro nutrient targets; it’s only around 67 kcal- 4 g Protein, 5 g Carbohydrates and 3 g Fat per 100 ml so it’s easy to incorporate into your daily intake.

The Kefir will multiply over time so please share with friends and family. The best place to find fresh Kefir grains (better than a dry Kefir starter kit) is on ebay. Here is and example of a seller-

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Organic-Milk-Kefir-Grains-1-teaspoon-/271150577174?pt=UK_Health_Beauty_Natural_AlternativeTherapies&hash=item3f21d57616&_uhb=1

If you want to improve your gut health while enjoying a delicious alternative to yogurt then make the effort 

and start incorporating Kefir into your daily diet.

Source of information - http://heal-thyself.ning.com/profiles/blogs/probiotics-pusher

'Healthy' Eating Doesn't Mean Boring Eating

I thought I would post up some examples of what is cooked up in the Sklayne kitchen to illustrate that whether following a diet or not the food that you eat certainly doesn't have to be bland or boring.

You are only limited by your imagination.

If you feel your cooking skills suck then the best way to get better action is with PRACTICE! Invest in a cooking course if you really are clueless.

Stir Fried Squid with vegetables

kcals: 414kcal | fat: 13.26g | carbs: 32.14g | prot: 44.54g Per Serving

Stuffed Cabbage with Spinach and Carrots

kcals: 412kcal | fat: 17.08g | carbs: 28.60g | prot: 35.38g Per Serving

Sea Bream with Broccoli and Carrots

cals: 385kcal | fat: 8.77g | carbs: 15.16g | prot: 60.66g Per Serving

These are just a sample and I will post more up in future if I get enough requests. With the required effort to educate yourself on food and it macro nutrient content your 'diet' never has to be boring.

If you would like to know more and are interested in coaching then please visit www.upfitness.co.uk or email caroline@upfitness.co.uk

Results of Teodora's mini pre holiday cut

Teodora decided for the sake of looking better on the beach to do a mini diet just before we went away recently on holiday. Here were the results-

This was achieved mainly through subtle manipulations to her eating over a 6 week period.