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Shed Fat the Asian Way
PAGE 2 OF 2
- Make exercise pleasant.
- start with 10-15 minutes of stretches, easy calisthenics and light weights (i.e. less than 50% of your maximum) so that you are warmed up before engaging in heavy exertion;
- combine two or three exercises that call on unrelated or opposing muscle groups into continuous supersets lasting at least 2-3 minutes each;
- keep weights low enough to allow 9-12 reps of every upper-body exercise and 12-20 reps of lower-body exercises;
- don't rest for longer than 60-90 seconds between supersets.
- Keep your brain engaged.
- Cultivate a positive outlook on life.
Your nutritional intake isn't the only factor your body considers in deciding how much fat to store. It also considers whether stores of fat will help or hinder your routine physical activity. In other words, its fat-storing and fat-burning programming is responsive to the uses to which you put your body. If you mostly sit around at a desk during the day, then come home and sit around watching TV, your body sees no reason to allocate your nutritional intake to nourishing vital organs and muscles. Instead, it sends much of the calories directly to fat storage. On the other hand, if you regularly use your body for sustained physical activity, it sends more nutrients to organs and muscles and decreases fat stores.
Don't be confused by the fact that many types of activities don't burn fat. Dieters tend to subject themselves to brief, sporadic and grim bouts of intense exertion. This approach sends all the wrong messages to your body. First, these workouts are accompanied by dread and anxiety, an emotional state suggestive of hard times which stimulate fat-storage rather than fat-burning. Secondly, grim workouts are rarely sustained for more than a few minutes at a time. Even a half hour isn't really long enough to give your body's fat-burning mechanism time to kick in. Consequently, needed calories are leeched almost entirely from blood sugar. Depleted blood sugar levels trigger intense craving for sugary foods and beverages. Whatever calories may be burned by grim workouts are replenished from new intake of unhealthy foods while fat stores are left intact or even augmented.
The only way to get your body to start drawing down fat stores is to engage in moderate, enjoyable activity for at least 40-60 minutes at a stretch. That would include hiking, jogging, cycling, rowing, tennis, swimming, playing with the kids and aerobics. It's smart not to rely on only one type of activity as that leads to boredom. Pick a combination of activities that you enjoy enough to engage in at least three times a week collectively for at least 40 minutes each. An example of a good weekly schedule is a 45-minute walk/jog on Monday, 75 minutes of tennis on Wednesday and a 3-5-hour hike on Saturday. Another is a 45-minute aerobics session each on Tuesdays and Friday, a 40-minute swim on Thursday and a 2-3-hour bike ride on Sunday.
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Calisthenics and weight training can be an effective fat-burning activity only if you genuinely enjoy them and follow these guidelines:
You may have noticed that intellectuals, artists and scientists have hearty appetites but tend to be thinner than average. That's because a brain engaged in a stimulating, enjoyable intellectual activity is a fat-burning furnace. Upwards of 40% of a body's caloric intake is used by the brain. That is why Chinese believe that fatty and sugary foods are best for intellectuals. To optimize the rate at which you shed excess fat -- not to mention your potential as an intelligent human being -- make a point of engaging in enjoyable intellectual effort every day.
The goal is to replace the intellectual passivity of watching TV with an active and stimulating pasttime like reading, art, craft or hobby for an hour or two each evening. You will not only burn more calories, but also lower overall anxiety and stress levels -- thereby reducing your body's instinct to add to fat stores -- and reduce the likelihood of snacking out of sheer boredom and desire for emotional gratification. Within limits, every human being has the choice of feeding the mind or feeding the body. Take part of the time and money you normally devote to food for the belly and spend it to feed your mind. Substituting a trip to the bookstore or library for one of your weekly trips to the grocery store will greatly boost your crusade to liberate the sleek you trapped beneath all that fat.
Over the long haul reducing anxiety and insecurity in your life pays big dividends in changing how your body allocates nutrients. The more anxiety, insecurity and dissatisfaction, the more your body allocates to fat. The more confidence, security and fulfillment, the more it allocates to increased energy and warmth. One path leads down a vicious spiral to fat and lassitude, the other leads up a virtuous spiral to vitality and a sleek physique. The choice is one within your power to make.
One of the most fundamental ways to reduce anxiety and insecurity is to cultivate a positive outlook on life. That means making a conscious effort to focus more on the good aspects of your life and current events. Constantly worrying about being fired would be focusing on the negative. Staying abreast of opportunities to advance your career would be focusing on the positive. Filling your mind with the problems of crime, poverty and disease would tend to increase your anxiety and insecurity and give you a negative outlook on life. Taking an interest in technological advances, outstanding achievements and economic progress would increase your sense of security and promote a positive outlook on life.
Shedding unwanted fat is really an exercise in cultivating a more physically active, intellectually engaged and emotionally satisfying lifestyle. Changes of that nature aren't produced by wishful thinking, crash diets or magic bullets. They require respect for how your body works and the discipline to make many small changes in your daily routine. But freeing your body from excess fat and your mind from needless anxiety is a goal well worth the effort.
| "A brain engaged in a stimulating, enjoyable intellectual activity is a fat-burning furnace." |