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Three Tips to Make New Years’ Resolutions STICK.

jasonmachowsky

2 min

Three Tips to Make New Years’ Resolutions STICK.

Image: Kookkai_nak / FreeDigitalPhotos.net My post on making S.M.A.R.T. resolutions at Food Network’s HealthyEats.com inspired me to take the “resolution” advice two steps further. I wanted to provide insight not only about how to make effective New Year’s Resolutions, but also how to make sure they STICK. Your resolutions should be goals that you are striving for every day, every month of the year until you reach them or modify them. In other words, they should not be a w

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Cutting Cravings via “Distraction”

jasonmachowsky

1 min

Cutting Cravings via “Distraction”

Image: Karen Shaw / FreeDigitalPhotos.net I had an interview a couple of weeks ago with an editor at Fitbie (MSN’s health and wellness site) and she asked me to recommend some great “distractions” to prevent cravings, particularly at work where we tend to not have much to do for some reason?!? Most of the answers and ideas I gave are nothing new…in fact, most people know the answers…it’s just a matter of doing them! But in case there’s a few you may not have heard of, check

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Losing Weight…One Pound at a Time

jasonmachowsky

1 min

Losing Weight…One Pound at a Time

Image: maya picture / FreeDigitalPhotos.net During a time of year when everyone is focused on not gaining weight (enter the egg nog, ham, latkes, kugel, etc.), why not focus on actually losing weight? Contrary to popular belief, the holidays are not 45 days long, or whatever that period from Thanksgiving to New Years Day is. It’s about 4 to 5 days: Thanksgiving, Christmas (or Hanukkah or Kwanzaa or enter your religious observation here including Festivus), New Years and one

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Why are most diet and fitness programs’ results NOT typical?

jasonmachowsky

3 min

Why are most diet and fitness programs’ results NOT typical?

This is something that has bugged me for ages. So many diet, fitness and supplement programs (written, infomercial, etc.) are put out into the world and they are gobbled up (Turkey Day pun intended)…to the tune of over $10 billion dollars per year. I forget the exact number, but some ridiculously high % of the NY Times best sellers are usually diet books. Yet the vast majority of the claims on these programs and pills are appended with a seemingly harmless little “*”…until

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Taking Leaps…

jasonmachowsky

3 min

Taking Leaps…

Leaning Into It 🙂 I just took a big leap and am starting my first real monthly newsletter! For those that joined, expect the November edition next week! Before hitting the “Send” button I had butterflies in my stomach because I knew I would be reaching out to friends, family, colleagues and clients that I may have not talked to in months or years! I kept thinking, “What will they think? Will they reject my newsletter? Should I do it?” Then I clicked “Send” and felt 10,

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Halloween Tips for You and Your Kids

jasonmachowsky

1 min

Halloween Tips for You and Your Kids

What’s Scarier: Vampires or A Sack Full of Candy? Image: digitalart / FreeDigitalPhotos.net Halloween can be a scary time when it comes to making healthy choices for you and your kids. No matter what we do, there is an endless parade of sugary snacks available either coming from our homes or that of our neighbor’s. We know that hiding won’t save us from monsters, just like avoiding the candy will surely mean it catches us in the end. Instead, face the “candy monster” (no r

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jasonmachowsky

3 min

How Can We Eat More and Lose Weight?

I WANT TO KNOW: What are your experiences with small, frequent meals? If they have helped you, how do you think so? If not, what situations are you facing that is preventing you from having small, frequent meals or how have small, frequent meals not been beneficial to you? @JMachowskyRDFit, Facebook.com/JMWellness Since losing 35 pounds in 2005 by eating more and eating more often, the idea of restriction and “having willpower” has always fascinated me. Before getting into

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jasonmachowsky

3 min

Why Nutrition and Exercise “Plans” Are Not Enough

When some people find out that I am a registered dietitian (nutritionist) and personal trainer they ask me to write a quick ‘program’ that they can follow on their own to help them lose weight, improve their performance, etc. Like suddenly they will automatically know how to correctly perform all of the exercises I list or how to effectively integrate all of the new foods that I “recommend” into their lives. Most people want the magic bullet, the easy way out. That’s why

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jasonmachowsky

2 min

Why Long-Term “Dieting” Doesn’t Work

The NY Times article, “Why Even Resolute Dieters Often Fail” is an excellent example of why small, sustainable changes are the key to long-lasting weight loss. Going on a “diet” implies something to be done for a period of time and then stopped. Sure we may lose weight during a period of restriction/control, but have we fundamentally changed our relationship with the food that we eat? If we haven’t, then odds are we will regain that lost weight once our diet is over. While

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jasonmachowsky

2 min

Low-Calorie Meals: Friend or Foe?

A recent study out of Cornell University (Go Big Red!), looked at the impact of low-calorie meals on overall daily calorie intake. People were given access to all-you-can-eat buffets for all meals. However, part of the time they were asked to eat a small, 200 calorie lunch (i.e. Lean Pocket, Granola Bar) instead of their usual “lunch buffet”. One those low-calorie lunch days, they ate 245 less calories in total, despite consuming about the same number of calories at breakfa

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Add Flavor to Your Food for Zero Calories

jasonmachowsky

1 min

Add Flavor to Your Food for Zero Calories

Clove a Day Keeps the Doctor Away Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net And I’m not talking about artificial sweeteners! Some of the most flavorful additions to our meals can have zero (or close to zero) calories and zero sodium (put the salt shaker down!). But many people are intimidated by using spices in their cooking, or even in quick 5 minute dishes; however one piece of garlic or sprig of thyme can make all the difference between Blah and Booyah! You can add spices to any

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Who Has Better Posture?

jasonmachowsky

1 min

Who Has Better Posture?

Round 1: Sumo vs. Business Saw this advertisement in an airline magazine on my way to a wedding in Omaha last weekend. Take a look at the flat back alignment of the sumo wrestler vs. the hunched-over businessman. I bet they didn’t even consider it when doing the photo shoot. Goes to show you can be stable AND mobile 🙂 Although I didn’t run an FMS on these guys, odds are the businessman is rounding his back due to either: 1) Tight hip flexors that don’t allow his hips to f

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Knee or Lower Back Pain? Don’t Blame Your Knee or Lower Back

jasonmachowsky

2 min

Knee or Lower Back Pain? Don’t Blame Your Knee or Lower Back

Functional Movement Screen Hurdle Step Just as in any other crime, it is the victim that cries, not the perpetrator. Recent insights into human movement, spearheaded by Gray Cook and Mike Boyle have led to the development of the Joint-by-Joint approach which classifies the body into an alternating series of mobile and stable joints. For example, the ankle should be mobile, the knee stable, the hip mobile, lower back stable and so on. When a mobile joint becomes stable, whethe

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jasonmachowsky

1 min

Of Girlfriends and Green Smoothies Pt 2: My Fav Five

Below you will find my five favorite smoothie recipes. A good rule of thumb is about 3 to 4 big leaves of a thick green (i.e. kale, collards, swiss chard), a small bunch of cilantro or parsley, or a big handful of spinach for each piece of fruit. Add some water and ice, blend to taste. If you want to get fancy you can add juice, milk, yogurt, peanut butter or spices (i.e. cinnamon, vanilla). These are technically designed for high-powered blenders like VitaMix or Blendtec

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jasonmachowsky

2 min

Of Girlfriends and Green Smoothies

Since achieving my 35 pound weight loss journey in 2005 and subsequent foray into graduate school for Applied Physiology and Nutrition, I considered myself a relatively health conscious eater. I ended up trying a number of “diets” in grad school for about a week or so in the name of science…low-carb (Atkins), raw vegan and even a “food stamp” diet (I had to eat for a week only on the amount someone receives on food stamps…about $35 at the time. $5 a day.). Coming out the othe

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The Power of 10

jasonmachowsky

2 min

The Power of 10

The average adult gains about one pound per year and one pound equals about 3500 calories. 3500 calories divided by 365 days a year equals about 10 calories a day. While one pound does not sound like a lot, that becomes ten pounds a decade. This means if you are a svelte 180 pounds at 25 years old, you may be facing a hefty 210 pounds at 55 years old. So…back to the ten calories. Often we are too focused on our crash diets, multi-hour workout sessions and egregious errors

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jasonmachowsky

2 min

Workplace Wellness Works

There are a few silver linings in the upcoming healthcare reform law, one of which is an increase in employee wellness incentives. As reported by Stone Hearth News, in “2014 employers will be able to offer an incentive of up to 30 percent of an employee’s total healthcare premium (compared to 20% currently), if the employee is doing everything asked to improve his or her health and reduce medical costs”. And saving hard-earned money can be a very powerful motivator for posi

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jasonmachowsky

3 min

So, What’s a Registered Dietitian (RD)?

Unless you’ve been to a hospital, nursing home or personally know one, you may have never heard of a Registered Dietitian (RD). But you’ve probably heard of a nutritionist. When you hear both names, which do you think is more qualified to give you nutrition advice? My answer is, it depends. Let me start by saying that I am an RD…and I also consider myself a nutritionist. However, the key rule to know is: All RD’s are nutritionists, but not all nutritionists are RD’s. Her

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jasonmachowsky

2 min

Balanced Eating on Vacation – Part 2

One of my previous posts described how to indulge wisely when on vacation. The two articles I have linked today focus on using a little bit of planning to go a long way in preventing yourself from eating less healthy options on vacation that you did not even want in the first place. Imagine eating an hour before leaving for the airport, then taking 30 minutes to get there, 60 minutes in line for tickets/security and now a 90 minute wait before a 4 hour plane ride. That mean

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jasonmachowsky

2 min

Obesity and the Workplace

A recent article in The New York Times cites the workplace as a new source in the rise of obesity. This is not terribly surprising considering that the vast majority of new jobs in this country over the past 50 years have moved away from agriculture/manufacturing and have been focused on “services”…things like finance, law, computers/IT, consulting, administration, etc. Even seemingly active jobs, like being a healthcare professional (i.e. doctor, dietitian, etc.), require

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