Tweet

Inspiring Us to Change Our Habits and Change Our Lives

Guest post by: Lenore Miller

Article Overview: Cyndi O'Meara is the author of "Changing Habits-Changing Lives" and is a very passionate nutritionist. Cyndi's focus is on holistic food quality rather than the quantity of food or the components of food such as fat, carbohydrate and protein.

Inspiring Us to Change Our Habits and Change Our Lives

Cyndi O’Meara is the author of “Changing Habits-Changing Lives” and is a very passionate nutritionist. Cyndi’s focus is on holistic food quality rather than the quantity of food or the components of food such as fat, carbohydrate and protein.
Cyndi’s upbringing is the foundation for her passion and career choice. Her father was a pharmacist who became disillusioned with his profession and went to America to learn about Chiropractic and its philosophy of Vitalism. Cyndi’s parents decided that, unless it was life threatening, their three children would never be given medication.

Cyndi now has three children of her own, only one of whom has ever taken medication. This was to ease the pain of a broken wrist and the effects of the paracetamol lasted 13 hours, rather than the usual 4-6 hours. She believes that providing medication as a solution to every ache and pain creates a dependence on medication as a solution for a lifetime, and lowers our tolerance of the natural pain we experience in life. Cyndi also believes that this reliance on medication may lead to elicit drug use by programming the message that a little white pill will make you feel better, rather than using your own coping mechanisms to overcome life’s physical and emotional challenges.

Current diet philosophies are often all about how much of each food component we consume, without assessing foods for their overall nutritional value. A food may have a low fat content, but the list of ingredients could include sweeteners, fillers and colorings, which have no nutritional value and do not occur naturally but have been produced in a laboratory. Eating foods closest to their natural state provides for optimum nutritional content, nourishing the body and ensuring overall health. Cyndi also purports that eating this way is ideal for long term health and weight management.
So how did we get to a place in our society where the food we eat is so far removed from its’ natural state?

Around thirty years ago, the component parts of food began to be analysed. For example, butter was deemed to be unhealthy due to its 60% saturated fat content, while the unsaturated and mono-saturated fat content of margarine was offered as the healthy alternative. It was discovered over time that margarine delivered trans-fats, which are particularly unhealthy for the human body. Trans-fats have been removed from many margarines, however margarine remains an artificial, chemical-rich food and, according to Cyndi, is one of the most dangerous foods on the market, contributing to heart disease, cancer, diabetes and obesity.

And how is it that we are sold these products as healthy food options, when in fact the opposite is often the case?
Marketing is about selling a product regardless of its real benefit to us as individuals. Cyndi says we should look behind studies into specific foods and discover how they are financed, claiming that 98% of studies favorable to artificial sweeteners are funded by companies that manufacture them, not by independent research bodies.

Many people believe in the formula of `calorie in – calorie out`. So, if what you eat in calories equals what you expend in energy, your weight will be stable; eat more than you expend and you gain weight; eat less than you expend and lose weight. However, while agreeing that exercise is important, Cyndi believes that it is food quality that is the most important ingredient to outrageous health. In fact, she mostly shops at the fruit and vegetable store buying foods that she knows are unaltered and still in their natural state. She gets a couple of products at the grocery store, but very little that is packaged. If you do buy packaged goods, Cyndi recommends reading the list of ingredients, and asking yourself, 'do I really want to consume those chemicals’? In her latest newsletter, Cyndi presents the breakdown of ingredients in strawberry flavouring. She found that it consists of 35 to 40 chemicals, and very little, if any, real strawberry.

Once upon a time, flour used to be yellow in colour until refiners began to be used to extract the bran and germ from the wheat in order to preserve the flour longer. In doing this, much of the nutritional value and fibre was also removed. The white refined sugar sold today goes through about 15 processes, where substances such as lye and canola oil are added. White sugar is 99.4% sucrose and 0.4% ash with no minerals and no vitamins. There is nothing good in white sugar. However there are other sugar options like organic muscovado, which contains vitamins, minerals and trace elements found in the natural sugar cane plant and can be used wherever you would normally use white refined sugar. Cyndi believes that white flour and white sugar are major contributors to the increase in obesity and diabetes.

Cyndi’s approach to assisting others change their habits to change their lives is a gradual process. One person took 18 months to complete the program changing one habit at a time. However, at the end of 18 months, she no longer needed drugs for her arthritis, dermatitis or asthma. As an added bonus, she also dropped from size 16 to size 8 during that period of time.

In the past 11 years there has been a five-fold increase in depression. Cyndi feels that our intake of carbohydrates and proteins need to be reviewed in the context of the potential influence on our well-being. Traditionally, we consume carbohydrates for breakfast and protein for the evening meal. Carbohydrates release serotonin, a chemical that creates calmness in the brain, and proteins contained in meat and vegetables release noradrenalin and dopamine which motivate and excite - so we are calm in the morning and excited and awake after our evening meal.

In summary, fueling our body so that we feel energetic, healthy and happy is as easy as following Cyndi’s advice by changing one habit at a time. Start with breakfast - perhaps have one of her highly nutritious protein smoothies that will keep you energetic until lunch time. Recipes are included in her 21- day plan, so that making changes each day is easy and something the whole family can participate in.n order to have a wonderfully healthy, functioning body, ensure that 80% of the foods and beverages you consume are in their truest natural state, just as they were grown, and you’re sure to be off to a wonderful start in your journey to live an outrageously healthy life.

Related Articles
  Create Habits That Will Serve You Well
  Change Is a Life or Death Matter
  Create New Success Habits!
  Become a Better Version of Yourself
  Habits, life choices, decision,health,personal growth,personal development,spirituality

Article Tags: Changing Habits, Cyndi OMeara



Related Forum Posts
Re: Spellcheck? - [quote="TheAnonymousMan":2f894q6j]When discussing the majority of people I would definitely say that most people hit the "Change" or "Ignore" button without thinking too much about the correct spelling of a word. All bosses are concerned about is getting the report to the Directors meeting on time.[/quote:2f894q6j] That probably depends on what the "majority" are trying to accomplish. I have word set to alert me about misspellings and grammatical problems, so I fix most as I go. But I also add names etc to the dictionary because I get tired of seeing the red and green squiggles when I know the info is right. If you're only going to click "Change" or "Ignore" then why bother to take the time to use spell check????? Business people that I work for want the info compiled in a timely manner and they want it right - which is fine because that's the way I strive to do any project. Sending out a memo, letter, report etc with obvious spelling and grammatical mistakes makes the person and the company look bad as far as I'm concerned. Shri
Re: What I'm reading this weekend - Sept 10, 2010 - Glad you liked it David! I only managed to get partway through the list today because my one year old was looking for some playtime but I did read the Zen Habits one - I love reading Zen Habits while relaxing at a coffee shop!
Re: e-Commerce and e-Payment providers - Hi GT It is only fairly recently that people in South Africa have been able to get full use of Paypal as we were only able at one time to make payments but not receive them. Fortunately this has now changed. I have received money through Global X Change for one of the affiliate programs that I promote and have found them pretty good as the money is normally transferred directly into my bank account within 2-3 days and I have not had any problems with them. MichelleJ
Re: Obama Wants Social Security for Illegals - [quote="Alan Mater":3kaa8sg4] Obama WILL make changes... but they're not the changes we as a country need or should look forward to.[/quote:3kaa8sg4] Sad but this is exactly how I feel about it. Change is coming - but unless I'm really wrong, it is not a change this country needs. Amazing how much a good speaker with a good speech writer can do. If you paid attention to the things he said "off script" - much of it is frightening. Chris
Are you an Opportunity Addict? - 1) if you find yourself saying yes without thinking about how it will affect your other priorities 2) you have over 10 projects/inventions going on at the same time and this seems normal to you 3) you have spent hundreds and thousands of dollars on manufacturing, prototypes, etc. not to mention thousands of hours of your time....but you havent followed through on any of it 4) most of your projects are falling behind or have completely fallen off your radar....which is fueling your frustration The first step in recovery is to recognize this as a pattern of self sabotage. If you are clear in what your overall goals and objectives are, you should be able to create a lens through which you measure opportunities. You create your life, and your to do list. Change, Add, Remove, Adjust time-lines - whatever you like. But remember that every piece of unfinished business - stays that way J


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Tweet

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

Coaching Tip: Identify Your Core Values

Selling with Humor (and a Sorry Butt)

What Type of Business Should I Start?

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.