Who’s to be believed and who’s to not is a common dilemma health enthusiasts face when searching for some quality health and nutrition tips. Often there are as many different views about the same thing as there are experts, and understanding which one is right can be baffling.
Thankfully, many health tips are based solely on good science, so there’s no question of disagreement. Here are 6 such tips.
1. Say No to Sugary Drinks
Sugary drinks are downrightly unhealthy. They provide us with excess calories and little real nutrients. Moreover, we tend to over consume them.
Our brain registers calories coming from sugary drinks differently than calories from solid foods. As a result, when we drink sugar-based liquids, we end up consuming more calories than when we should. Consumption of excess calories contributes to weight gain and many diseases.
Sugary drinks are linked with not only obesity but also all sorts of health problems including Type 2 Diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
When it comes to spiking up your calorie count, fruit juices are just as bad as soda. They, too, contain a lot of sugar, and contrary to the popular belief, the antioxidants present in them do not neutralize or even reduce the harmful effects of sugar.
2. Process Junk Food is Unhealthy (and real food is not)
If there is one main reason why so many people are so fat today worldwide, it is processed junk foods.
These foods are engineered to be hyper rewarding to the brain. That’s why we eat more than our usual capacity when a plate filled with processed food is in front of us. In some cases, the problem can become very serious and lead to food addiction.
Besides tricking us to overeat, processed food provides us sugar and refined carbs in unhealthy amounts. Excess consumption of both is associated with many diseases in addition to obesity.
3. Drink Coffee – It’s Good For You
Here’s some good news for coffee lovers: coffee is actually good (provided you don’t overdo it).
Several studies have brought multiple benefits of drinking coffee to light, one of which is its ability to aid fat burning (This also explains why almost every other commercial fat burning supplement has caffeine as its one of ingredients).
Caffeine is reported to improve the metabolic rate by 3% to 11%. It also increases the fat burning in healthy people by 29% and in obese by 10%.
Studies show that the risk of Type 2 Diabetes, which affects 300 million people worldwide, is significantly less, from 23% to 50%, in coffee drinkers.
Those who regularly drink coffee are also 65% less likely to suffer from Alzheimer’s disease, an incurable condition that usually affects elderly.
Coffee is good for you, but too much of it can be harmful. You should avoid drinking more than 4 cups a day; otherwise, all good will be undone and unpleasant symptoms might cause discomfort or, worse, increase your risk to certain health conditions.
Symptoms associated with over consumption of coffee include jitteriness, anxiety, dizziness, irritability, upset stomach, fast heartbeat, insomnia, and tremors.
4. Eat a Handful of Nuts Daily
There are many reasons why you must have nuts daily. Studies show they can help you lose weight and fight diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
A study done to understand weight-loss potentiality of almonds revealed that it increases weight loss by as much as 62% in comparison to complex carbohydrates.
Besides helping you shed extra weight, nuts also boost metabolism and improve digestive health.
Just like in case of coffee, nuts can cause several ill-effects if you overeat them, the most prominent being weight gain. Eating too many salted nuts can cause an additional side effect: spike in blood pressure.
How much is too much? Well, experts don’t recommend eating more than 20 to 35 gm of nuts in a day.
5. Get Adequate Sleep
Lack of play might make you dull, but that’s nothing compared to lack of sleep. In addition to affecting your learning and thinking abilities, sleep deficiency can lead to weight gain, reduced sex drive, and several health issues.
Several studies show that lack of sleep can reduce physical as well as mental performance. Continuously sleeping fewer hours than recommended can even lead to depression.
One study also proved a strong link between inadequate sleep and weight gain. Lack of sleep, the study proved, increased the risk of obesity in adults by 55% and in children by an astounding 89%.
A warm bath with or without aromatic oils, listening to soft music, a few minutes of meditation in the day or evening, and half an hour of rigorous exercise are all natural sleep aids. Try one if falling sleep or staying asleep is an issue.
6. Drink Lots of Water
Drinking water at regular intervals helps prevent dehydration, boost metabolism, and promote weight loss.
Dehydration can reduce your physical performance, impair mood and concentration, can cause headaches. That’s why the American College of Sports Medicine recommends drinking 17 ounces of liquid two hours before exercise and a sip at regular intervals during exercise to prevent dehydration.
In some people, dehydration can trigger headaches and migraines. A few studies have shown that drinking water helps relieve such headaches and migraines.
Water has a positive effect on metabolism. A couple of studies have shown the metabolism increases by about 25% for 1 to 1.5 hours after drinking water. This translates to loss of 96 calories if you drink 2 liters of water in a day.
Those who want to lose weight would benefit from drinking water before meals. According to a study, half a liter of water consumed half an hour before meals led to 44% more weight loss.
Don’t get lost in the maze of conflicting health tips from so-called experts. Instead, embrace tips based on good science, which are known to work for everyone, every time.