Longevity For You

Arthritis Pain and Your Diet

Arthritis pain may appear in many different forms, affecting millions of Americans, especially among the elderly.

Arthritis pain is no more than joint inflammation.

The Arthritis Foundation recommends aspirin as one of the medications to treat arthritis pain. The down side of taking aspirin is that, with increased dosage, aspirin may cause many side effects, including nausea, stomach pain, and impaired hearing.

There are other medications, including non-steroidal antiinflammatory drugs and corticosterioids. But, again, these drugs are not only harmful but also have adverse side effects.

Chinese medicine uses medical wisdom to treat rheumatoid arthritis. This medical wisdom avoids the use of drugs. Essentially, it uses a simple diet of fish, vegetables, and rice, with a small amount of chicken. This diet is also known as a "poor man's diet."

Given that arthritis is joint inflammation related to allergic relations to foods, it makes sense to use your diet to control your arthritis pain. An allergen is a substance that produces an antibody within the body. These allergen symptoms become arthritis pain. It is not just what you eat but is is what you do not eat that counts.

Common food triggers of arthritis pain include all dairy products, all citrus fruits, chocolate, corn and wheat, and red wine. There are many other foods that may cause allergen reactions in different individuals. Anti-inflammatory foods include beans, fruits (except citrus fruits), flax seed oil, and wheat germ. Pain-free foods include brown rice, vegetables (except tomato).

Too much iron in the diet may also trigger arthritis pain.

Arthritis Free For Life: Cure your arthritis naturally from home in one month!.

Meals That Heal Inflammation is a nutrition-based practical guide to relieving pain due to arthritis, asthma, back pain, and diabetes. Learn to manage your pain through diet.

Also, visit my web page: Pain Management.

Stephen Lau

The Seven Pillars of Wisdom

Ways To Boost Your Brain Power

To improve your memory, improve your memory skills, which are dependent on your awareness of and attention to your senses, such as sight, sound, smell, and touch. How your brain collects, stores, and processes information holds the key to a poweful memory. If you sharpen your senses, you also sharpen your brain power. Memory is no more than a learning skill, which has little to do with aging. As long as your cognitive skills are functional, you can improve memory through acquiring memory skills.

1. Perform any activity that is out of the ordinary, that is, something that you normally do not do. For example, learning a new musical instrument not only demands reading music, concentration and focus, and coordination of hands and fingers, but also involves general sight, sound, and touch. Alternatively, you can do small tasks using your nondominant-hand, such as writing your name with your left hand, if you are right-handed. According to Professor C. Katz Lawrence of Duke University, performing several nondominant-hand tasks in your everyday life will enable you to tap into a certain part of your brain you seldom use, as well as to force your brain to concentrate on doing something that you would normally breeze through. Genius Brain Power keeps your brain fit.

2. Enhance your brain power through relaxation to remove undue stress and rejuvenate brain cells for optimum performance. Deep Zen Meditation is the effortless way to recoup your brain power through total calm and peace of mind.

3. Aromatherapy activates your mind and harnesses its potentials through the scents of basil and rosemary. Research shows that inhaling these scents increases beta waves that heighten the awareness of the brain. For hundreds of years, healers from all over the world have applied aromatherapy to stimulate the nervous system to boost brain power or improve memory.

4. Boost your brain power with your green thumbs. Gardening is a good exercise for  for the brain: knowing the plant names and their growth characteristics, the soil conditions, and abstract spatial thinking,a mong others. Why don't you start your own Organic Food Garden to enhance both your physical and brain health?

If you wish to increase your brain power, you can. If there is a will, there is a way. Don't let forgetfulness get you down as you get older! Your brain has over 100 trillion cells, and you use only five percent of them. So, the more connections you can make between your brain cells through seeing, hearing, touching, and smelling, the better and more efficient your brain becomes in collecting, storing, and processing information. Aging cannot slow down the brain, but non-doing will.

Visit my web page: A Healthy Brain.

Stephen Lau 

Flexibility Stretching To Live Longer

To live long, keep your body supple and flexible. Flexibility fitness is a key factor in maintaining good posture, both of which are critical to longevity.

1. Without good posture, you cannot breathe optimally. The importance of optimal breathing cannot be overstressed: optimal breathing provides more oxygen and nutrients to different parts of your body for optimum health. In addition, optimal breathing avoids short and rapid breaths; research studies have shown that rodents, one of the fastest-breathing animals, have the shortest lifespan. For more information, read The Yoga Science of Breath.

2. Good posture prevents muscle stiffness and muscle tension, both of which are sources of pain as you age. Muscle pain and muscle inflexibility in the elderly are responsible accidents and falls.

What is flexibility fitness?

Many people exercise for fitness, strength, and endurance. Flexibility fitness exercise, on the other hand, focuses on stretching to improve coordination, that is, to reduce the time taken to send messages from the brain to the muscles. In other words, your brain tells you to move certain muscles, but your muscles do not respond appropriately or soon enough. This lack of muscle coordination is responsible for accidents and falls, which are too common among the elderly. Use Balance Exercises for Fall Prevention for better balance to avoid falls.

Flexibility stretching facilitates joint mobility, which is critical to joint health and mobility.  There are two types of flexibility stretching: "static" flexibility stretching, and "dynamic" flexibility stretching.

1. In "static" flexibility stretching, you stretch a muscle for a certain length of time, and there is little or no movement involved. This is good for muscle flexibility and joint health.

2. In "dynamic" flexibility stretching, you use slow movements to stretch your muscles into different stretched positions, as in yoga. This is ideal for muscle coordination and muscle strength.

Use it or lose it - this applies to muscle health, and flexibility stretching holds the key to good maintenance and preservation of your muscles. If you wish to live longer without the aches and pain and without having your life cut short due to accidents and falls, keep stretching your muscles.

Visit my web pages: Good Posture, and Exercises.

Stephen Lau

The Dangers of Extreme Weight Loss

Given that an ideal body weight not only gives you a better body image but also makes you healthier, many people become obsessed with weight loss that they would do anything just to lose pounds or to lose belly fat. But fast weight loss may have many health hazards, including sudden death syndrome.

You can lose weight through weight loss exercises, but compulsive exercise may overstress your heart as well as result in stress injuries.

You can lose weight through smoking or not giving up smoking. Nicotine can eliminate calories, but at the expense of damaging your heart and lungs. Give up the nicotine addiction.

Dieting is the most common method of weight loss. There are too many "fad diets" in the consumer market, and many simply "starve" you. Calorie deprivation is the cause of yo-yo dieting and the failure of many weight loss attempts.

Induced vomiting to lose extra pounds is common among adolescents and young adults. Use of laxatives and water pills may lead to eating disorders. In addition, the loss of potassium and dehydration contribute to gallstones, cardiac disorders, and hair loss.

Obesity surgery does not solve weight loss problems. In addition to many complication, obesity surgery can bring weight control only for the first few years.

Weight loss is a complex and complicated health problem. Get a FREE copy of my e-book All-Round Weight Loss to find out more.

Stephen Lau

All About Stephen Lau

Maintaining Mindfulness While Being Busy

Humans learn how to deal with the pain of loss. As a matter of fact, we learn at an early age that being busy is a way to deal with the loss of a loved one. In other words, many people deal with grief by staying busy.

Last week, my father-in-law passed away, and a memorial service was held last weekend. My wife had been busy preparing for the memorial service, such that she seemed oblivious to her loss.

I must say getting busy has immediate payoff. In life, many of us use the same strategy to deal with difficulties in our lives: we keep ourselves busy to avoid unpleasant or difficult experiences. We keep ourselves busy to earn more money, to gain more respect, or both. We get busier and busier - it has become addictive. Unfortunately, at the end, everything falls apart, and we become distressed and disillusioned.

Be mindful of your busyness. Mindfulness requires you to take time to explore your inner self - that is,  what is most important to you. You can be busy, while maintaining your mindfulness.

A Buddhist teacher once said: "When you are washing dishes, wash dishes. When you are talking on the phone, talk on the phone." But many people are talking on the phone, while driving!

Mindfulness is "concentrated" relaxation because your mind focus on the present moment, not the past, and not the future. Remember, only the present is real to you.

For more information on mental wellness, go to: Mental and Spiritual Wellness.

Stephen Lau

Younger and Healthier for Longer

Miracle Drink for the Diabetic

My wife was diagnosed with diabetes last year. In the first few months, her blood sugar level was high, and in spite of the medications, it fluctuated on the higher end.

Recently, her blood sugar level has come down dramatically with a miracle drink recommended by her friend.

Here is the recipe for that miracle drink for the diabetic:

1 bitter melon (obtainable at any Chinese supermarket).
1 cucumber.
1 green pepper.
2-3 stalks of celery.

Chop all ingredients, and put them in a powerful blender. You may juice them. But I prefer to add one cup of water, and place them in a powerful blender. You get the fiber as well.

This potent drink is excellent for diabetes.

She drinks 2 cups a day, and her blood sugar is now normal without any drugs. Bitter melon is such a potent vegetable that its extracts are now available in supplement and sold over the Internet. My wife has not tried the supplement. I think the natural vegetable drink is much better, especially the celery for controlling high blood pressure (often a symptom of diabetes).

For more information on diabetes, go to The Diabetes Miracle Breakthrough.

Stephen Lau

Younger and Healthier for Longer

Is Alcohol Good For You?

According to CNN (21 April 2009), recent studies show light drinkers are healthier than those who abstain. But they also have higher rates of liver disease.

Alcohol research can be baffling and confusing, with one finding contradicted by the next.

Is alcohol good for you?

"One drink a day for women and no more than two for men is thought to be good for coronary heart disease," said Dr. Samir Zakhari, director of the division of metabolism and health effects at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.

And is beer good for you?

Beer may cause your blood sugar to drop drastically, thus stimulating you to eat more.

Beer has about 7 calories per gram of alcohol, which may go right to your stomach, leading to weight gain. One 12-ounce serving of beer every night may add up to an extra 10-15 pounds per year, if you do not burn those extra calories.

Your liver, in the process of detoxifying excess quantities of alcohol, may become filled with fat, resulting in a characteristic “beer belly.” Typically, fat distribution shifts to your belly and trunk, and some men may even grow “female breasts” as estrogen accumulates in their system. If you want to retain your body shape, simply drink less.

If you have problems with alcohol, maybe it is time to quit the addiction.

Stephen Lau

Younger and Healthier for Longer

The Emotional and Psychological Changes of a Calorie-Restriction Diet

Calorie restriction can bring about unfavorable physical changes that may impact your long-term health at the expense of weight loss..

In addition, a calorie-restriction diet may bring about emotional and psychological changes, which may lead to eating disorders.

If you are consuming 3,000 calories a day, you start slowly and gradually reduce your caloric intake to about 2,500 calories. That’s OK. However, any drastic and dramatic reduction in weight loss will damage your health. Do not let your diet becomes a “starvation” diet with less than 1500 calories.

Research studies have documented emotional and psychological changes resulting from a calorie-restriction diet. These changes include:

• Personality changes: such as loss of ambition, a narrowing of interests, decline in intellectual pursuit

• Lack of concentration; inability to perform daily tasks

• Decrease in sexual interest and loss of libido

• Extreme sensitivity to noise

• Poor judgment, inability to make decisions
• Irritability and moodiness, and even depression
• Deterioration in personal appearance and grooming
  
• Increased preoccupation with food (especially food talk and food thoughts)
  

Calories are important to weight loss. Without reduction in calorie intake, there is no weight loss. However, too drastic and too dramatic reduction often leads to eating disorders.

Just beware! You need to know How To Eat Less.

Stephen Lau

Younger and Healthier for Longer

The Physical Changes of a Calorie-Restriction Diet

Calorie restriction can bring about longevity in animals. Calorie restriction can help you lose weight.

But a calorie-restriction diet may bring about physical changes that affect not only your weight, but also your physical being, in fact your overall wellbeing.

If you are consuming 3000 calories a day, and you start slowly and gradually reduce your caloric intake to 2500 calories. That’s excellent. You kill two birds with one stone: you lose weight and you improve your overall health.

However, an individual needs 2000 calories for optimum health maintenance. If you reduce your calories to 1500, you have put your body in a starvation mode. The diet becomes a starvation diet.  Worse, if your caloric intake falls below 1500 calories to 1000 to 1200 calories

With a reduction of calories, and accompanied by vigorous activity, you can lose up to 20 percent of your body weight. This is what most weight watchers would go for.

However, research studies have documented physical changes resulting from a calorie-restriction diet. These changes include:

• Weight loss of 20 percent

• Decrease in body size, especially in the upper thighs and upper arms

• Reduction in heart volume by about 20 percent, followed by diminished work output of heart per minute by as much as 50 percent, as well as a slower pulse rate

• Reduction in body temperature

• Accumulation of body fluid in the ankle and the wrist.

• General fatigue

• Decline in sexual activities

• Thinner and drier hair

• Frequency of urination

Calories are important to weight loss. Without reduction in calorie intake, there is no weight loss. However, too drastic and too dramatic reduction will have adverse effects on the body. Beware! You need to know How To Eat Less.

Stephen Lau

Younger and Healthier for Longer

Can Calorie Restriction Stop Aging?

Research on animals has indicated that calorie restriction can prolong life.

But is this applicable to humans? Can calorie restriction really stop aging? Scientists do have any consensus opinion, let alone definitive answers.

What is calorie restriction?

Calorie restriction is eating less than what your body needs to maintain health.  Your caloric needs are based several factors, including your height, your weight, and metabolic rates (i.e. the amount of your physical activities.

Say, if you need 2000 calories a day, and you consume only 1600 calories, you are on a calorie restriction diet.

The key question here is not whether it will prolong life. Consuming fewer calories will definitely reduce weight, and weight maintenance is an important factor in longevity, as evidenced by centenarians who are never overweight.

The crucial questions are: Is calorie restriction safe? Do you get adequate nutrients to maintain health for longevity and anti-aging living? How much less should you eat?

Nobody has the answers because your constitution and makeup are uniquely yours. Only you can tell what your body needs. The bottom line is: simply eat less. As for anti-aging and longevity, leave that to your Creator.

Stephen Lau

Younger and Healthier for Longer