Youve read all the books, listened to all the experts on TV, and tried every diet pushed your way.

But it hasnt worked. You still havent lost the weight. Or, more likely, you lost some weight and then put it all back on.

We all know why: diets are often completely unrealistic and almost always unsustainable.

What if I told you that you that theres another way to lose weight, feel awesome, and actually learn something to take with you for the rest of your life?

Would you just sit down, randomly push on the pedals, and press any key at your whim?

Of course not. You wouldnt know what youre doing so how could you expect to make music?

Unfortunately, when it comes to applications like taking our health into our own hands, for some bizarre reason, this simple logic is ignored. We all want some quick fix, the magic elixir. We each want to be the exception to the rule. Dieting doesnt work for anyone else, but Im different.

Mozart, one of the greatest child prodigies of all time, took nine years to become a master composer. Prodigy is just another word for training. Even he couldnt shortcut it.

If you want to be fit and lean for the rest of your lifethe fantasy we all desiresomething you never have to think about, then wouldnt it serve you to think of your diet and lifestyle as a long-term project and not something that has an expiration date?

Thats why I look to the mastery model of skill acquisition to guide my clients toward their health and weight goals.

But it takes practice. It requires adopting a system, committing to daily practice, and trusting in the process.

Thanks to Robert Green, in his epic book, Mastery, heres how mastery works (and how you can apply it to your diet):

1. The Blueprint

If youre learning to play the piano you will need to immerse yourself in all of its elements: the pedals, the keys, your hand positioning, how to sit, where to look, the scales, the music theory, the sheet musicall of which provide the foundation for every piece of music ever played.

They arrange in such a way as to provide a blueprint for how you must engage the process.

This is where we begin. You will learn about diets (not dieting), nutrition, what foods are good for you, how much of those foods you can eat (hint: a lot), calories, sugar. The facts, in other words. The foundation you need to actually succeed.

Without this, youre just pushing random keys.

2. An Instructor / Coach

When learning to play the piano, you wont get very far without an instructor. How will you even know where to start? How will you know how to distinguish good from bad habits? The importance of the apprenticeship model for learning and skills acquisition cannot go unstated.

As your diet coach, its on me to prove that I have your best interests at heart. To create an environment in which you feel like its safe to be yourself. Someone you trust. Someone who keeps you connected to your intentions. Frankly, someone who knows what hes doing.

And perhaps most important of allsomeone whos been through what youre going through.

3. Identify and remove barriers to success

When learning to play the piano, there are obvious barriers to success: not knowing how to use the pedals, not knowing how those pedals interact with the keys, not knowing the exact sound each key makes. Thats why you need a model, an instructor, a coach.

But there are also other barriers to your success: people, habits, mindsets.

Maybe theres a person in your life who doesnt want you to spend time on a new endeavor. Maybe that person has a habit of not committing to healthy or inspiring practices. Maybe that person has a fixed mindset instead of a growth mindset and quits when things get too difficult. Maybe that person finds themselves giving in to easy temptations, and wants you to join.

As far as your health and diet are concerned, removing temptation is a necessary condition of success. You will not be successful if you are constantly beleaguered or oppressed by cravings and temptationsthe very things that youre trying to overcome. This is especially true at the beginning of your journey, as our primary objective is to re-establish center. Willpower is not enough. Self-control is overrated. You will constantly be led astray when chasing the treat, or trying to avoid it.

Barriers include all unhealthy foods that should be removed or discarded from your personal living environments (work, home, car, etc.), and which should be replaced with healthy options.

4. Practice and repetition

We learn best through practice and repetitionthrough actually doing the thing, rather than intellectualizing it. Would you learn to play the piano by reading about it, or by doing it? Which is infinitely more effective?

The more you play, the more easily youll be able to play. Not holding yourself to impossible standards of success, but by working your way through the music. Adapting to your internal orientation, your particular style, the demands on your life. The same holds true for living healthily.

Just as the notes give architecture to your playing, we will focus on the cues, rewards, and routine that define your current set of eating habits. We will train new routines by planning, preparing, and strategizing day by day, building out a framework of success that integrates into your particular lifestyle.

To think about it another way, after training healthy decision after healthy decision, no matter the context or challenge, this behavior will become natural to you. Youll have developed a whole new set of instincts. At a foundational level, your relationship with food will have changed.

5. Feedback and Accountability

If you dont seek feedback, or are resistant to critique, your growth will stagnate. It helps to gain as much feedback as possible from others, especially your coach or instructor, to have standards against which you can measure your progress.

If you dont seek out feedback, if youre not completely open to it, it will be all the harder to manage your most challenging, compulsive food binging moments. If youre not comfortable making yourself vulnerable and asking for help, why wouldnt you say F**K it and go off-plan and eat the entire pizza? Those same emotions that make it hard to ask for help are the ones that are teasing you to eat the pizza.

6. Automation and Flow

You started with the basics of playing the pianolearning how the pedals work, how the keys work, your hand positions. You practiced, over and over, because repetition is the mother of all skill. You sought feedback from a master, or at least someone whos much more experienced than you. You took that feedback. You put it into practice.

Now, you sit down at the piano and play. You dont consciously think OKAY, now its this key, now this key, because you dont need to. Because now, you know how to play the piano. Playing is automatic.

Easy, even.

Its the same with food, with your eating habits, with your diet: you no longer have to think about it. Its no longer a fight between healthy or unhealthy. Should I, or shouldnt I? Eating healthily is just what you do, instinctively.

Thats automation.

Flow is when you reach a point where your mind is totally absorbed in the practice. Everything else is blocked out. You become one with the tool or instrument or thing youre studying. The musician becomes one with the piano, and in the case of your diet, you become one with yourself. Because when it comes to your diet, you are the instrument. The food, your choices, are the keys.

It is not something that can be put into words because it is embedded in your body and nervous system. You just know it. You live it. You are it.

7. Mastery

Im stealing directly from Robert Greene here:

When you practice and develop your skill, you transform yourself in the process. You reveal to yourself new capabilities that were previously latent. You develop emotionally. Your sense of pleasure becomes redefined. What once offered immediate pleasure in the form of sugar or candy or plastic-wrapped fast food comes to seem like a distraction, a collection of empty entertainments now robbed of their allure. Real pleasure comes from overcoming challenges, feeling confidence in your new abilities, gaining fluency in skills, making choices that are right for you, and experiencing the power that this coherence brings.

You never stop practicing, because youre totally immersed in it. Theres no getting outside of it because its become you.

You can start today.

And some more good news: you dont have to master your diet to lose weight, to get in shape, to feel good, to look good, to finally have a solution thats realistic and sustainable.

The mastery model provides just that: a model. A new mental representation of how to go about treating your health and getting healthy. Its not a race, its a process. Its a skill you can train.

__

Photo credit:Getty Images

See the article here:
The 7 Steps of Mastery: the New Way to 'Diet' - The Good Men Project (blog)

People who eat a gluten-free diet may be at risk for increased exposure to arsenic and mercury -- toxic metals that can lead to cardiovascular disease, cancer and neurological effects, according to a report in the journal Epidemiology.

Gluten-free diets have become popular in the U.S., although less than 1 percent of Americans have been diagnosed with celiac disease -- an out-of-control immune response to gluten, a protein found in wheat, rye and barley.

A gluten-free diet is recommended for people with celiac disease, but others often say they prefer eating gluten-free because it reduces inflammation -- a claim that has not been scientifically proven. In 2015, one-quarter of Americans reported eating gluten-free, a 67 percent increase from 2013.

Gluten-free products often contain rice flour as a substitute for wheat. Rice is known to bioaccumulate certain toxic metals, including arsenic and mercury from fertilizers, soil, or water, but little is known about the health effects of diets high in rice content.

Maria Argos, assistant professor of epidemiology in the UIC School of Public Health, and her colleagues looked at data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey searching for a link between gluten-free diet and biomarkers of toxic metals in blood and urine.

They found 73 participants who reported eating a gluten-free diet among the 7,471 who completed the survey, between 2009 and 2014. Participants ranged in age from 6 to 80 years old.

People who reported eating gluten-free had higher concentrations of arsenic in their urine, and mercury in their blood, than those who did not. The arsenic levels were almost twice as high for people eating a gluten-free diet, and mercury levels were 70 percent higher.

"These results indicate that there could be unintended consequences of eating a gluten-free diet," Argos said. "But until we perform the studies to determine if there are corresponding health consequences that could be related to higher levels of exposure to arsenic and mercury by eating gluten-free, more research is needed before we can determine whether this diet poses a significant health risk."

"In Europe, there are regulations for food-based arsenic exposure, and perhaps that is something we here in the United States need to consider," Argos said. "We regulate levels of arsenic in water, but if rice flour consumption increases the risk for exposure to arsenic, it would make sense to regulate the metal in foods as well."

Story Source:

Materials provided by University of Illinois at Chicago. Original written by Sharon Parmet. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

Go here to read the rest:
Gluten-free diet may increase risk of arsenic, mercury exposure - Science Daily

Celebrity chef and paleo diet enthusiast Pete Evans has fired up on social media about reports on his controversial health claims.

Last year, Evans landed himself in hot water over his comments on toxicities in sunscreen and his recipe for baby broth that experts deemed highly dangerous.

Now, he has lashed out on social media and slammed reporters for writing fake news about his paleo diet.

Thank you to all the F grade journalists that continue to put out FAKE NEWS stories about Paleo or myself, he wrote on Instagram.

You do make me laugh when someone tells me of your lies, but I gotta say, I for one am one of your biggest fans and would love to give you all a big hug & cook you a delicious meal to say thanks.

Please keep doing what you are doing, as we could never have reached this many people as quickly as we have done without you.

Thank you to all the "F grade" journalists that continue to put out FAKE NEWS stories about Paleo or myself. Each and every time you create a lie, in your poorly researched article or sensationalist headline, you continually promote a paleo & low carb, healthy fat lifestyle approach to an even larger audience than we could have reached ourselves! Thanks to you, more people are becoming interested in what Paleo and LCHF is about, and they will have heard of someone that has reclaimed their health by adopting these simple principles and will do more research into the topic than you have ever done. You do make me laugh when someone tells me of your lies, but I gotta say, I for one am one of your biggest fans and would love to give you all a big hug & cook you a delicious meal to say thanks. Please keep doing what you are doing, as we could never have reached this many people as quickly as we have done without you. If you are interested in speaking and researching the TRUTH, then there is a ton of medical experts to speak to, that are getting amazing results by using paleo and LCHF as one of their tools for their patientsbut again that might not fit your job description as a modern journalist. The TRUTH.1. We promote breast milk as the number 1 form of nutrition for babies! 2. We do not promote drinking the milk of any other animal as it can cause so many health issues, however if you were to choose to drink it then camels milk has been shown to create the least problems. 3. We promote a healthy relationship to the sun to get adequate vitamin D levels and when choosing a sunscreen, then choose the least toxic. 4. The addition of fluoride to your families water supply should be a choice that families make. 5. We promote an abundance of vegetables (low carb) with a small to moderate amount of well sourced animal protein from land and or sea animals and enough natural fat to satiate with fermented veg and broths for good gut health. Basically meat and 3 veg! 6. You have a choice everyday of what you choose to eat. 7. Manu and I are great mates! 8. The writers for Womans day/weekly, daily mail/telegraph mamamiahilarious

A post shared by Healthy Paleo Chef (@chefpeteevans) on Feb 13, 2017 at 3:40pm PST

He goes on to explain that paleo is mostly a diet of meat and 3 veg and calls out magazines for printing misleading claims about him and his fellow My Kitchen Rules host Manu Feildel.

Manu and I are great mates! he said in response to reports they were feuding.

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I think Pete looks extremely fit and healthy. I think if people dont like Paelo way of life then dont eat it,no need for nastiness.My friend has Rheumatoid Arthritis, has followed Petes recipes (and her kids also) she is now off all medications and never been healthier let alone slimmer and more energetic all within 6ths of changing her lifestyle.

Pingback: Pete Evans releases another rant about his paleo diet Starts at 60 | Globall News

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Pete Evans releases another rant about his paleo diet - Starts at 60

Not your average Android news -- a diverse mix of advice, insight, and analysis with veteran Android journalist JR Raphael. Try it with margarine for a low-cal treat!

This New Year's, I decided it was time for a change. I set out to make a resolution and stick with it. And now, a month and a half later, I'm happy to report that I've lost a huge amount of weight -- and I'm feeling more focused and less bloated than ever.

I'm not talking about body blubber here, mind you (though if we're being fully honest, I probably could stand to cut back on the ol' candy). I'm talking about my mobile tech habits -- and specifically about the apps on my own personal Android phone.

I've had a bit of an app problem for a while now. As I pointed out in December, I've had around 1200 different apps installed on my Android devices at various times over the years. Sure, some of them have been things I've merely tried out for work, but still -- I mean, c'mon. That's a lot of apps (even if only a fraction of them is present at any given point).

Having lots of apps, as I've realized from paying attention to my own phone-based behavior as well as from observing other people's on-screen swiping habits, has the tendency to result in a few different things:

First, it makes it more cumbersome to find the apps you really need. Sure, you can set up your home screens in a sensible way -- but whether you place all your shortcuts there or dig around in your app drawer for certain items, having more clutter certainly can't help.

Second -- and perhaps most pressing for me, personally -- having more stuff on your phone makes you more prone to engage in something I like to call mindless phone-meandering. You know the drill: You find yourself with a moment of "dead air" in your day -- a few seconds or a matter of minutes without some form of active visual stimulation. Maybe your dinner companion got up to use the bathroom. Maybe you're standing in a checkout line and have an entire 60 seconds without anything to do. Or maybe you're on an exercise bike at the gym and find your mind and fingers unusually free.

You feel that familiar itch and -- probably without even realizing what you're doing -- find your hand reaching down to grasp your phone. With nothing in particular that you truly need to accomplish right that very second, you find yourself mindlessly swiping around on your screen in search of a distraction. Maybe you open Facebook. Maybe you scroll around in a news app or two. Maybe you just open up your inbox or even your app drawer and swipe around in there, desperately seeking something -- anything -- to fill the mental silence. (You'd be amazed at how many people I've seen do exactly that in a brief moment of non-stimulation.)

Hey, I'm not one to judge; I've definitely been there. More times than I'd like to admit. Over the past several months, though, I've found I prefer being less connected and remaining fully present in my physical environment-- or with whatever primary activity I'm devoting myself to at a particular moment.

That doesn't mean I'm no longer interested in mobile technology or in Android -- far from it. It simply means I want to use my devices deliberately and in a way that enhances my life rather than passively allowing them to distract me. I want to actively perform tasks when I choose, in other words -- but I don't want to do the mindless phone-meandering dance in an effort to avoid any time alone with my thoughts.

I'd been working on this on and off, with varying levels of success, since sometime last year. But no matter how hard I tried, I kept falling off the wagon and shuffling back into my old habits. So after my latest news-cycle-driven slip, I decided to go nuclear. Technology was controlling me instead of my controlling technology, and that's exactly the opposite of what I wanted. It was time to make a change.

I went through my app drawer and carefully considered every item inside. With each app, I asked myself two questions: One, was this something I had actually used within the last six months? If not, it was just creating clutter and serving no meaningful purpose. ("Maybe I'll need it one day (even though I haven't touched it in half in a year now)" doesn't count.) And two, was this something I actively and deliberately used in a way that enriched my life -- or something I passively and mindlessly opened in a way that took away from my life?

With that two-pronged test, I ended up uninstalling more than half the apps on my phone -- including every news and social media app on the list. I realized that obsessively "checking in" on the news or scrolling through this-or-that social network in the evening had started to feel more like an obligation than something I enjoyed. And so it was time to cut those cords.

I still follow the news and keep up with social media, but I do so in limited doses during the work day -- at my desktop computer -- and rarely outside of that. And man, do I feel better as a result. Lighter, more present, and more focused and able to think. When I use my phone, it's for something deliberate and at the center of my attention. Digital distractions are still a mere few taps away, of course, but not having them readily available right at my fingertips makes an enormous difference. It's a whole new world I'm finding myself inhabiting, both online and in the physical space around me.

Your situation and your preferences may vary, and I'm certainly not suggesting that everyone should go out and uninstall everything on their mobile devices. This is not a one-size-fits-all sort of remedy. But on a broad level, it is something that can help you refocus your life and your phone on what matters to you -- what you actually use and what you want to use -- and cut out the surrounding bloat. Think of it as an early spring cleaning: You can eliminate unnecessary distractions and help yourself focus on what's really important. And whether you eliminate a few apps or axe several dozen like I did, you'll almost certainly be better off for it.

(There's also the more obvious surface-level benefit of freeing up space on your phone and cutting out pointless background processing tasks -- which may or may not be significant for you but could definitely make a difference on some devices.)

Here's the best part: If you uninstall something and genuinely miss it, you can always go back and reinstall it. That'll take a whopping 30 seconds to do. But if you uninstall something and realize you either don't miss it or are happier without it, well, that's a good sign that your own personal Android app diet has been a success. It's an easy way to figure out what you really want and need and to clear out all the other crap that's just getting in the way.

For me, trimming the fat and dropping dead weight has been a revelation. My Android phone is now both more useful and less distracting. I put off my commitment as long as I could, but this new digital diet turned out to be just what the doctor ordered.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got some delicious frickin' candy in the other room with my name on it.

Read the original post:
I went on an Android app diet, and I've never felt better - Computerworld

Diving headfirst into a diet can be exciting, but after a few days or weeks, the endless parade of greens and small portions starts to all blur together and you find yourself daydreaming about saturated fats from a greasy drive-through. We all cheat on our diets and a new study that surveyed 1,000 people found that the most prevalent diet cheat food was pizza (with about 53 percent of respondents listing it as their go-to rule-breaking food). Of course, this information should be taken with a grain of salt since the study was commissioned by the Chicago area's Home Run Inn pizza chain.

Heres the breakdown of our favorite cheat foods, besides pizza:

Anything deep-fried: 39 percent

Candy and chocolate: 32 percent

Grilled meat (like burgers): 20 percent

Alcohol: 20 percent

Pasta: 19 percent

Cakes and pies: 16 percent

The survey also uncovered some dieting stereotypes: that women were more likely to get busted with chocolate than men were, but men were more likely to cheat with a burger or steak. If youre from the Northeast youre more likely to cheat with sweets like cake or cookies. If youre from the South, fried foods and soda are more your weak point. .

If you want the skinny on cheat meals and whether or not they work (by satisfying an urge for something outside your regimented dietary realm), we break it down here.

See more here:
More Than Half of Americans Cheat On Their Diet With This Food - The Daily Meal