Need a Private Coach to keep you pumped and focused on your weight loss training? Need a little guidance on how to work effectively for 45 minutes in the gym or home? Need support and guidance on how to stretch those tight hamstrings after your run?
I guess you can tell from my blog entries of late, that I have been playing around with another tool for core training in the past few months, using the TRX Suspension Trainer with both my personal workouts, my private strength/resistance clients and now my Pilates Mat students.
Defying gravity with a new challenge is making all of us stronger, sleeker and determined to continue using the tool. The tool permits a full and complete range of motion throughout a workout, which in turn creates a more functional, safer and more successful method of training. Read the rest of this entry →
I am not completely sure that these “interesting facts” are irrefutable, but my personal testimony is that it sure feels good in the process. The ‘after-effect’ of the Hot Yoga class is complete mental and physical release and relaxation. I am close to the point of renewal for my 10-series sessions at Surya Yoga Academy in Hoboken. Here are a few of the reasons I will continue to regularly participate. Read the rest of this entry →
This question came in in the past week from another site for which I contribute Strength Training commentary, VitalHealthZone. Given that the writer and I share the same age, I thought it was purposeful to share my response, given perhaps the differences in our perspectives on managing peri-menopause and the required work, nutrition and support of a body over 40+
Just finished a long day and a glorious one. Thanks to two fabulous classes of Pilates students (both new and old) an amazing yoga teacher, Anayra Calederon, the warmest temperatures January could offer, a luxurious hot bath and the soulful music of Eva Cassidy.
The renewed pursuit of Yoga as a healing, stretching and relaxing practice will be a new experience, for me in 2010. I took my second class today, at Surya Yoga and haven’t stopped gushing about the studio and the two fabulous instructors I had the pleasure of working with (Kelly and Anayra.) I signed up immediately for a 10-session pack and enjoyed Kelly and Anayra on Thurs and Sat, respectively. My plan is to use the 10-pack, re-new regularly as another mind/body part of my regmine going forward. Surya Yoga, YES!
Juice, Vitamins and a Choline Cocktail. Choline Cocktail? Yeah I know. It doesn’t particularly sound like something you want to have at a party. I will say this though, if you drink it for 5-7 days before a party, you will probably enjoy yourself a whole lot more than if you didn’t.
I have begun reading a book, by Dr. Eric Braverman, entitled,
“Younger (thinner) You Diet;” It is about how understanding your brain chemistry can help you lose weight, reverse aging and fight disease. I figured if reading the book could help me (and my client/friends) do just two of the three things suggested in the title, we would be way ahead at the end of the game.
Turns out, the book is not particularly new information. It is all about natural health, natural healing and natural food nutrition and dietary habits. Not at all unlike, the content of the Perricone Prescription, his dietary recommendations are consistent because the rule of order is the same.
As the populace ages, we are all looking for the foods, activities, creams and potions that will help to keep us feeling, looking and living like time hasn’t passed…at least not by us so quickly.
Now for sure, I do not ever want to be 20 years old again. But I have to admit, having a 35-year old cast a wandering eye in my direction in passing down the street, does not feel bad at all. It should be no surprise, therefore that specifically using a regimen that will keep those eyes on me – or you – if you want them, that costs nothing but time and energy to make happen will be the order of the day going forward, for most, if not all of us.
What is in it? So what is in this miracle cocktail? Does it really make a difference?
Great stuff is in it. All identifiable in english. Yes, it has made a difference for the past 3 short weeks that I have been using it. More important is why I am
using it. According to Dr. Braverman’s research, extracted from the book, dopamine, which creates brain power, acetylcholine, which controls brain speed, serotonin, which keeps the brain in synch and gaba which maintains the rhythm of the brain, are all brain chemicals the can positively affect the way our bodies respond (or not) to food and thus our weight gain or loss challenges. Deficiency in any of them can lead to food addictions and subsequently obesity.
The book provides a little quiz to help the reader find the area of deficiency in terms of chemical imbalance based on your behaviours. So out of the four areas, my deficiency was most noted in acetylcholine which is why I sought out the vitamin support for it.
We all know that women over the age of 40 years of age have major shifts in our body’s chemical and hormonal balance. Everything seems to take more time, energy and work. This analysis of the brain’s chemical responses to one’s physical state just range crystal clear for me.
My Special Preparation
The Choline Cocktail comes in a powder form, very easily mixable with a hand blender/Mix & Go Cup. I have a little fresh pre-mix vegetable/juice blend that I love to make as a pre-cocktail to support the Choline Cocktail.
This is the added anti-aging mix that I know is the hardest part for most people. Yes, it adds a little more work to the process, yet the end result is absolutely delicious for the body and for your life.
I use my Juicer and 5-6 carrots, two apples (green and red), fresh ginger root, sometimes strawberries, maybe half a cucumber. I usually get more than 12 ounces of fresh juice which I then use to blend in the Choline Cocktail.
There is no taste from the added nutrients, minerals and amino acids of the Choline Blend except for a little additional sweetness. After a high protein breakfast of egg whites and turkey bacon, this vegetable/juice/choline drink definitely keeps it all together for me.
My legs (hamstrings, quads and glutes) are very strong, but following a few consistent weeks use of the cocktail regimen described above, along with my regular 30-60 minute workout schedule and protein-dominated diet, I can honestly say, I see a change in the body fat content in my system.
Look for part two to this post in another 30 days! Signing off now to go make some juice!
This to me is likened to taking a pill to lose 20 lbs in a week. The issue still exists when you stop taking the pill. I believe we all need to work to maintain what you have, work to get what we want and ultimately love and accept what we end up with – after giving it your best shot, of course! Anyway, this article made me smile and chuckle a bit. Tell me what you think.
Gina
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WILLY MANRIQUEZ has perfected a sales pitch that stops most women dead in their tracks.
“Do you want me to take away the laugh lines from around your eyes in less than a minute?” Mr. Manriquez, a salesman for the skin care brand Freeze 24/7, asks shoppers as they roam the cosmetics floor of Henri Bendel in Midtown. The makers of Freeze 24/7 products claim to reduce the appearance of wrinkles by relaxing facial muscles.
Most passers-by welcome Mr. Manriquez’s anti-wrinkle demo, he said. But he occasionally meets a skeptic like Janice DiGiovanni, 47, who owns the Absolute Laser spa in Rhinebeck, N.Y. The motto of her clinic, which offers laser procedures and acid peels, is “We do what skin care products promise to and don’t,” Ms. DiGiovanni said last week, as she settled onto a stool in front of Mr. Manriquez and prepared for disappointment. “I’m thinking moisturizer is a moisturizer is a moisturizer.”
Mr. Manriquez dabbed an eye serum and an antiwrinkle cream around her right eye. “Your muscles are getting used to relaxing, so your smile lines are not as deep,” he said. “You look better already.” Ms. DiGiovanni, who said she regularly gets antiwrinkle Botox and Restylane injections, held up a mirror and examined her face with an experienced, critical gaze.
“I can actually feel the plumpness around my eye. It feels more firm,” she said with some surprise. Then she demanded
that Mr. Manriquez “freeze” her left eye. “I have to say I’m excited.” Excited she was indeed. She left the counter after spending $385 on four products.
But some dermatologists and plastic surgeons are skeptical of Freeze 24/7. “It’s like putting glue on your face to lessen the movement,” said Dr. Trevor M. Born, a plastic surgeon in Toronto. “The numbing agent in it
may make you lose the perception of the surface of the skin, making you feel that your face is swollen and tighter.” Thanks to visceral responses from first-time clients like Ms. DiGiovanni, upstart Freeze 24/7 has become a force to be reckoned with in the cosmetics industry. When it was introduced at Henri Bendel in October 2003, the brand had only one product, which was displayed on a rickety coffee table. Today, it has six products and is sold in more than 1,000 stores in the United States, including Nordstrom, Bloomingdale’s and, as of last month, 447 Victoria’s Secret branches.
The company had sales of $25 million in 2005, up from $5 million in 2004, said Scott E. Gurfein, the president and chief executive of Freeze 24/7. Out of every 10 people who stop for a skin care demonstration, he said, eight or nine plunk down $115 for the antiwrinkle cream.
“Put product on, see product work, buy product,” Mr. Gurfein said. “It’s not rocket science.”
In a world of demanding consumers accustomed to the immediacy of high-speed Internet connections and instant messaging, Freeze 24/7 has become the leader in a new cosmetics category: instant skin care. Traditional skin care items, including prescription creams like Retin-A, take one to three months to show any kind of result because of
the time needed for ingredients to slough off dead skin cells and stimulate new collagen growth.
Fast-acting products that offer immediate brightening, lightening, lifting or tightening effects often work by using ingredients that temporarily camouflage blemishes, spackle the skin, or stiffen it, making it feel tauter. But many of those instant products do not provide long-term benefits, doctors say. Quick-fix beauty items are to cosmetics what cellphone cameras are to technology: they are fun to use and offer instant gratification, but their results can be fuzzy.
“Skin care is like dieting,” said Karen Grant, the senior beauty industry analyst for the NPD Group, a market research firm. “You have to invest time and effort. There is no instant miracle cure.”
Try telling that to the shoppers who are attracted to Freeze 24/7′s cool, ice-cube-like packaging and its cool —
or coolant-like — name. The word “freeze” suggests that wrinkles may be frozen temporarily, Mr. Gurfein said. The antiwrinkle cream is supposed to work by relaxing facial muscles in a less invasive fashion than Botox, the injectable toxin used to paralyze facial muscles temporarily, he said.
The company says the freezing effect comes from two ingredients: gamma aminobutyric acid, a substance found in the
human nervous system that can block signals between nerves and muscles, and gynostemma pentaphyllum extract, derived from an herb used in traditional Chinese medicine. The company contends that gamma aminobutyric acid, a molecule that stays on the skin’s surface, activates smaller gynostemma molecules and sends them through the skin,
where they signal muscles to relax, according to Gene Beilis, a pharmacist who is the vice president for product development at Freeze 24/7.
But the company has no scientific evidence to back up its claim that its products actually affect facial muscles. Asked to
provide microscopic data showing that the ingredients penetrate the skin, Mr. Beilis said that the company has “not gone into deeper levels of testing.”
“You wouldn’t be able to see the chemical interactions occurring under a microscope anyway,” he said.
Nava Dayan, a senior principal scientist at Lipo Chemicals, which makes raw materials and ingredient technology for the cosmetics industry, said there is a standard test performed on cadaver skin, the Franz diffusion cell method, that can show whether a cosmetic formula permeates superficial and deeper levels of the skin.
Because the Food and Drug Administration defines cosmetics as products that do not fundamentally alter the skin,
cosmetics companies are not required to prove if or how their products work on the skin’s appearance.
In 2003, Freeze 24/7 had an outside company test the product by having a researcher treat the faces of 20 women and visually assess their wrinkles. The test concluded that each woman had an “observable decrease in the appearance of wrinkles” around the eyes ranging from 50 to 90 percent. Those results suggest that the product does something to the surface of the skin, but does not indicate that muscles are involved in the process.
Dr. Born, the plastic surgeon in Toronto, theorizes that Freeze 24/7 really works by numbing the skin on impact and then solidifying when it dries, making the face feel tighter.
Mr. Beilis agreed that gamma aminobutyric acid is a powdery substance that coagulates when it dries, gripping the skin in place. Another ingredient in the product, eugenol, a clove derivative used in dentistry as an analgesic, “gives you a
cool, numbing, tingling sensation,” he said.
But Freeze 24/7 devotees do not care about science as long as the product worksinstantly, said Mr. Gurfein, the company president. He said the brand has been successful because other skin care companies “focus on technology against a demographic that doesn’t care how a product works; they just want it to work.”
At Henri Bendel, Freeze 24/7 is the best-selling skin care line, far outstripping beauty brands created by doctors, including N. V. Perricone M.D. and Patricia Wexler M.D., said Claudia Lucas, the store’s senior vice president and merchandise manager for beauty. But even if the products work only superficially, they may have a long-term benefit, said Dr. Diane C. Madfes, a dermatologist in Manhattan.
“You are instantly limiting the movement of the skin by putting a restrictive barrier on your face,” Dr. Madfes said. If such a product is used daily, it may train the face to stop making movements that cause furrows, she said. “So you
may prevent new wrinkles from forming or already-existing wrinkles from getting worse.”
Dr. Born offered an alternative treatment for frown lines: Scotch tape. Ever since they were teenagers, five of his
patients have been taping their foreheads every night, and they have no frown lines now that they are in their 30′s and 40′s, he said. There are no published clinical studies that prove Scotch tape reduces wrinkles, but it costs only $2.19.
