Christmas Food Checklist Sources of christmas food checklist information from the Web

Go easy on salt, as too much salt is one of the causes of obesity. Make it a point to really cut down on salt. Try to bring down your salt intake to half of what it was last year.

Watch your fat intake. Each fat gram contains 9 calories so by reading the total calories on a food and knowing the quantity of fat, you can estimate the % of fat, which should in no way exceed 30% of the food.

Drink plenty of water. Our body needs a lot of water so give in to water. Water is not just way to flush out toxin but if you have more water in your body you will generally feel healthier and fitter. This it self will discourage any tendency to gorge. The best thing about water is that is has no calories at all.

Psst. I would like to let you in on a secret. As it is I understand that most of us tend to put on weight particularly in the mid section, right. It is the tummy that seems to have a mind of its own. Well I will tell you a sure shot method to reduce the flab around the waist line. Mind you this doesn't hold true for post pregnancy tummies. This is what you have to do.

Breathe in air as strongly as you can and as you do so, tuck in your tummy as much as you can. Hold it like this for a few seconds and then slowly release your breath taking care not to let out your tummy. Try to keep breathing like this at least fifty or sixty times in a day.

In fact breathe like this whenever you can remember to do so. After the first day, you should feel the muscles of your stomach tightening each time you do this. Then you know that you are on the right track. If you practice this without fail for 20 days, at the end of the twentieth day, you will have lost at least an inch.

Any work out should start with a 5 to 10 minute warm up and should end with a 5 to ten minute cool down session. Whatever physical exercise you are involved in, you must remember to warm up before the exercise really starts. Do not just plunge into the water and start thrashing about, to put it figuratively.

We take great care about the quality and quantity of coal or wood we put in the cooking furnace or fireplace. We should also give it enough air to burn properly. This enables the fire to give maximum of heat and reduce smoke and ashes to a minimum. We should not forget that there is a similar fireplace in our stomach. We must think of the after-effects of the food and drink we take. The difference in the proportion of three basic elements of water, fire and wood in our body depends upon the food we eat.

As laymen, we should see that the fire in the stomach is well maintained and should be knowledgeable on the type of food that does not agree with us. We should, therefore, avoid such unsuitable foods. We must know that a particular food which may be good for certain people may not be suitable to others eg, curd/yoghurt, buttermilk, suitable to people having more elements of fire, would not be suitable to people having more elements of water in them.

Because of lack of exercise, overheating, eating between the meals when not hungry, eating more indigestible foods like concentrated sweet-fried things causes problems of indigestion and fail to produce enough heat in the body.This leads to increase in water content and reduction of heat in the body, resulting in problems like dullness, heaviness, increase in fats, common cold bronchitis and later on asthma, arthritis rheumatism etc.

Eat intelligently. The difference between man and beast is that we are driven by intelligence while beasts are driven by instinct. Don't just eat something because you feel like eating it. Ask your self whether your body really needs it.