Are you doing what you think you should be for optimal health? These are common mistakes made by women who really are trying to do what's best, but are sometimes misinformed: 1) Using sunscreen too much: It's important to protect yourself from the harmful rays that cause skin cancer, but some sunlight is good for us.
If you'll be outside for less than 20 minutes, or it's not a particularly sunny day, skip the sunscreen.
Sunlight converts a compound in our skin to Vitamin D and is a major source of the vitamin, providing nearly half the amount we need--the other half complemented by our diet.
2) Drinking bottled water: Tap water in virtually every community in the US is not only safe to drink, but supplemented with fluoride.
This mineral has been supplemented in our water supplies for decades, as a universal way to supply it to the population.
Suffering from cavities was drastically reduced after this was introduced in the late 1940's.
Nowadays tap water is too often replaced with bottled water to drink.
Bottled water--unlike community water sources--is seldom regulated.
3) Skipping a meal to save calories: Think skipping breakfast will help you lose weight? Think again.
Study after study over many decades proves that a morning meal will help increase your metabolism and also give you a good head start on getting the nutrients you need throughout the day.
4) Passing on fruit to save calories: Bad idea.
Too many women skip the glass of orange juice or fresh peach to save 50 calories, but won't blink at a second glass of wine! Skip the "empty calories"--those that do not provide nutrition along with the energy--like candy, alcohol, and chocolate.
5) Walking away from weights: Many women have the impression that if they weight lift to increase muscle mass they will look bulky and unfeminine.
It is extremely difficult to develop the kind of figure seen in body-builder magazines, and many women who slave their way up to that muscle-freak look walk about the streets looking perfectly normal and feminine until they flex! Growing your muscles burns calories to begin with, but the bonus is that walking around with the extra muscle mass (that is virtually undetectable until you go into "flex" mode) increases your metabolism 24/7.
Keep burning calories while you rest, just from being fit.
If you'll be outside for less than 20 minutes, or it's not a particularly sunny day, skip the sunscreen.
Sunlight converts a compound in our skin to Vitamin D and is a major source of the vitamin, providing nearly half the amount we need--the other half complemented by our diet.
2) Drinking bottled water: Tap water in virtually every community in the US is not only safe to drink, but supplemented with fluoride.
This mineral has been supplemented in our water supplies for decades, as a universal way to supply it to the population.
Suffering from cavities was drastically reduced after this was introduced in the late 1940's.
Nowadays tap water is too often replaced with bottled water to drink.
Bottled water--unlike community water sources--is seldom regulated.
3) Skipping a meal to save calories: Think skipping breakfast will help you lose weight? Think again.
Study after study over many decades proves that a morning meal will help increase your metabolism and also give you a good head start on getting the nutrients you need throughout the day.
4) Passing on fruit to save calories: Bad idea.
Too many women skip the glass of orange juice or fresh peach to save 50 calories, but won't blink at a second glass of wine! Skip the "empty calories"--those that do not provide nutrition along with the energy--like candy, alcohol, and chocolate.
5) Walking away from weights: Many women have the impression that if they weight lift to increase muscle mass they will look bulky and unfeminine.
It is extremely difficult to develop the kind of figure seen in body-builder magazines, and many women who slave their way up to that muscle-freak look walk about the streets looking perfectly normal and feminine until they flex! Growing your muscles burns calories to begin with, but the bonus is that walking around with the extra muscle mass (that is virtually undetectable until you go into "flex" mode) increases your metabolism 24/7.
Keep burning calories while you rest, just from being fit.