Home » Blog » Nutrition

Estimated reading time: 4.5 minutes

My clients often ask me: are beans fattening? If you have the same question, I have written this article so you can learn how and when to eat beans to preserve their non-fattening qualities in this article.

Sometimes it’s difficult to make a healthy food choice. It is not your fault. One cannot possibly know everything about each food.

On one hand, there is so much to know about so many foods that unless you are a nutrition expert you often feel lost.

On the other hand, there are many misconceptions about certain foods that it makes it difficult to distinguish between what is true and what it is not.

One of those tricky foods are beans. But there are many others. If you want to learn how to use Glycemic Index and Glycemic Load to determine if a food is fattening, you can learn how to do it with my FREE Online Course.

So when My clients ask me whether beans are fattening, I always tell them that it depends.

When people ask me about my favorite weight loss advice I always answer: Be Happy. When you feel happy, it is much easier to improve something so important as your relationship with food, exercise, and sleep while getting in control of your weight. You will then feel much more empowered and ready to manage appropriately the rest of the things that matter in your life.  But how can we get there? What can help us to get there? Let’s explore the topic a bit more and let me try to help get as close as you can to happiness, so you can better manage and be in control of your weight.

We all have commitments, problems, families to care for, and misfortunes. Some of us may be more fortunate than others. Some of us can’t simply organize or get any better at improving our lives. We get in a tunnel where everything seems dark and deep, and there seems to be no escape. The more miserable we feel, the deeper we dig into the tunnel. 

There are many things that can help you move from that tunnel, one step at a time. Feeling that you are in your right weight is one of those steps but there are many others that you might want to explore if you haven´t done so. For example, think about spending time outdoors, especially in contact with nature. Enjoy the sight of water running down a fall, the sound of a rushing river, or the peace of a creek. Breathe the smell of flowers or trees. Observe an animal, maybe simply a squirrel or a butterfly. Really spend time in nature and your mood will improve. Your senses will become more receptive to other changes you might need to make in your life. Being outdoors will increase your vitality, which is essential when thinking about modifying your current lifestyle. According to the lead author of a series of studies at the University of Rochester published in the Journal of Environmental Psychology, “Research has shown that people with a greater sense of vitality don’t just have more energy for things they want to do, they also have more resilience to physical illnesses. One of the pathways to health may be to spend more time in natural settings.”

You can also explore options like meditation, yoga, listening to music, or learn a new skill like drawing or cooking. Save some time a week to play a board game with your kids, go to a concert, or find time to have a coffee with a friend. Just look for those activities that may help you feel good and optimistic. 

An optimistic way of thinking, living, and feeling can help you tremendously when coping with your more-or-less complicated life and misfortunes. And being optimistic is not just about seeing rainbows—it can also help you build your new project in life! Obviously, it can help you tremendously when trying to change things in your life like learning how to manage your weight.  It will not return your health, your marriage, or your loved ones. It is not even going to bring you money, total peace, or satisfaction. But it is going to help you think and act in the right direction to be able to cope and manage your weight in the best possible way. 

So if you are trying to lose weight, practice my weight loss advice; be happy and don’t feel miserable for getting rid of the food you loved in your past life. It’ll be easy to change the bad habits and learn new ones and to re-educate your way of nourishing your body and the way to enjoy your food. 

Get rid of the negative thinking and move to a positive one where you shouldn’t feel like you are missing anything. The only thing you will be losing is weight, which you shouldn’t be missing at all!

Home » Blog » Tip of the Week

Estimated reading time: 2.5 min

Today I’m introducing a new series of posts: Tip of the Week.

Every Thursday I’ll be sharing with you one very practical tip that you can implement right away. To make it more interesting, I’ll do it in a form of a mini-quiz and give you a chance to check your own knowledge first.

Here comes the first Tip of the Week:

When is the best time for you to eat sweets, if you are watching your weight?

#1: Two hours after a main meal.

#2: Straight after a main meal.

#3: Never. You can’t eat sweets if you are trying to manage your weight.

Check my last interview where I reveal all the things you didn't know about me....

Meet Arantxa Mateo and find out about her 32 Mondays online program and new book. She spent years researching how we can have optimum health and manage our weight for life, spurred on by being overweight when she was a child in Spain. Also learn how a near-death experience started Arantxa on her spiritual journey of self-awareness and creativity.

A few winters ago, I found out the hard way how important it is to recover the electrolytes lost after a workout. I started to feel dizzy every day until one day I almost couldn’t stand up. That wouldn’t have been that scary by itself. If it wasn’t that I had a brain aneurysm in my 30s. Now, anytime I have headaches or some sort of dizziness, everyone around me freaks out.

It took me a whole day at the emergency room, a head CAT Scan, a consultation with the head of the Neurology Department at Yale Hospital, and another with my family doctor, to figure out that what was causing the dizziness was something which I should have known better.

I had just moved from Chicago, where you can’t exercise outdoors during the freezing winter, to Connecticut, where for me, winter felt very mild, so I changed my gym routine to an outdoor workout year round.

 You probably know that when you sweat during exercise, not only do you lose water but also electrolytes.  Don’t get me wrong. I’d always known that… but I made the assumption that during my new winter workout while running outside under cold conditions, I wouldn’t be losing that much water or electrolytes, so I didn’t take any of my usual sports drinks. After a few days running on the cold weather, I started feeling dizzy.

 After figuring out that what was causing the dizziness was the low levels of electrolytes, I started to take my sports drink every time after exercising, no matter how warm or cold it was. And I immediately began feeling better again.

Weight Loss and Fitness is the #1 New Year’s Resolution every year: To follow the last insane but miraculous, ineffective but famous, weight loss diet in the market to lose weight “fast”.

Many people have approached me this year to try to convince me to create a new program more “commercial” and “catchy” than my original 32 Mondays Weight Management Program. But I am here to stay and maintain the ideas and principles of my method. After many years researching about weight loss management there is something I know for sure: there is no miraculous diet to lose weight. 

32 Mondays Weight Management Program is the anti-diet. You didn’t gain weight overnight and you won’t be able to lose it in 5, 10 or even 60 days not gaining it back unless you learn the principles to manage your weight.

Contrary to what many people think, weight loss is not about willpower but about education. There is so much information about weight loss and weight loss management that it is very difficult to know what’s important and what’s not unless you are constantly following the new studies and keeping up to date with the scientific world.

You really need to learn how to lose weight: What, How Much and When to eat and exercise and How to maintain a healthy lifestyle. 

The last miraculous diet will give you a temporary fix and you’ll go back to the old you as soon as you stop that diet. Trust and believe in yourself and invest in your education to change your eating habits towards a weight management friendly lifestyle that you’ll be able to maintain forever.

Some of my new clients get restless after the first 2 o 3 lessons because they don’t see an immediate weight loss result, even after I had advised them during the first lesson that it might occur. During the initial lessons you get the basis for the next ones. But for those that really believe in me and my method, after a few more weeks learning from my program, they start to see that not only they lose weight but that they gain vitality, energy and overall happiness.

Weight loss is a long term commitment with yourself and an educational process one step at a time to stay with you forever.

I am going to share with you a secret for you to succeed in whatever you do. This is how a successful habit change works:

• One New Habit = 85 % chance of success

• Two New Habits at the same time= 35 % chance of success

• Three New Habits at the same time = 10 % chance of success

Now. What do you think... should you implement all new changes at once, or should you keep applying new habits and incorporating them into your lifestyle one at a time?

And now, after this tip, go and water your New Year’s Resolution one drop at a time to maintain your resolution to lose weight for your entire life.

Happy 2019!

Arantxa

Have you ever wondered why Americans are more overweight than people from other countries? 

You might have guessed some of the reasons: huge portion sizes, little exercise, too much sugary foods, no mindful eating, stress, etc.

To me, however, there is one factor that plays a key role here: the American food manufacturing industry.

Not only the ingredients of the processed food are addictive, but they are also the worst thing you could eat in terms of your weight management.

What’s the problem with eating manufactured meals?

This is one of the questions that I frequently get from students, clients and even in social media: can I have breakfast cereal if I am trying to lose weight?

And it makes sense. Because on one hand, you are chased with the idea that you have to eat breakfast if you are trying to lose weight, but on the other, you don’t have the time to prepare it and therefore you wonder if breakfast cereal could be a good option for you. 

But first things first. If you are still not sure whether you need to have breakfast if you are trying to lose weight and/or what makes a good breakfast, you can check my blog: what's the best breakfast I can have?

Now, if you think that breakfast cereal could be an easy option for you, let me help you understand what makes a good breakfast cereal and how to choose the right one for you.

Guest Post by Sarah Cummings

Photo by Alan KO on Unsplash

Recently, I had the pleasure to be interviewed by Jacques Hopkins. If you are interested in learning a bit more about me, what I do, my believes, my commitment to my students and my confidence that I can help you have a better life if you let me teach you how, I think you should listen to the interview.  

This is how Jacques introduced me: 

"Not too long ago I had the pleasure of having Arantxa Mateo come on the show to discuss her online course business. There are a lot of weight loss plans and diets out there, but she has a different approach to the concept of weight management. Arantxa is very invested in her students’ success, and it was great to speak with her about her online course. Along the way, we chatted about some challenges specific to her niche and some advice that will be useful no matter what you plan to teach in your own course!"

People are not looking for perfection. They are looking for you to solve their problem.

-Arantxa Mateo

You can listen to the interview HERE

GUEST POST by Scott Reid

One of the choices when looking at using a protein powder as a help to lose weight is which type to go for. The main choice is generally between whey-based protein and plant-based protein powder, however there are many aspects to consider.

A lot of people than want to use protein powder as a help to lose weight, can’t tolerate whey protein for various reasons, including bloating and potential allergy problems. Plant-based protein powder can be the perfect option for those who can’t use whey for that reason.

However, there are also many other benefits which you get from a plant-based protein powder that you cannot get from any animal-based protein product, including fibre content and some types of vitamins and minerals.

 In this guest blog post, author Scott Reid offers you a quick run-down on six of the key benefits of choosing a plant-based powder.

1. Great for those with allergies

Want to lose weight fast and with no effort? Looking for a magic diet to lose weight for good?

Then this book is not for you.

You didn’t gain weight overnight, and whoever promises you that you will lose weight fast in a healthy way and stay in shape while still maintaining your old habits is not telling the truth.

So how can you lose weight instead?

The answer to this question is right in front of you.

In this book, you will find a 15-step program that will take you through the necessary aspects of losing and maintaining your weight, a concrete map that will steadily lead you to your goal, with guaranteed success after 32 weeks:

• It’s not a diet.
• Your lost pounds will never return.
• You will never be hungry.
• You can keep your treats.
• You will feel happy and energetic.

 

To be able to manage your weight on your own after you’ve completed the program, you will also learn:

 

• how your body reacts to certain foods and their combinations

• why meal timing is important

• how to read product labels and shop wisely

• what hormone balance has to do with weight loss

• how to easily incorporate exercise into your life

 

Are you leading a busy life, maybe running a family?

 

So is the author of this book, an entrepreneur and mother of two with no personal cook or trainer. That’s why each step of the program comes with practical tips - a grocery shopping list, a menu plan for a week, and more - to show you how to incorporate it in your life from day one.

Have you noticed how most people gain weight after following a diet? If you want to learn why diets don't work and how to lose weight healthy, this post is for you.

One thing I have learned over and over again, as a creator of my program and working with students, is that if you REALLY learn what’s important and leave aside what is not, you’ll succeed.

In my webminar Why Diets Don’t Work and How to Lose Weight Healthy Instead, which you can watch here, I cover all you need to know so you never consider dieting again and you learn how to lose weight healthy instead.

Have you ever wondered why most people gain weight after following a weight loss diet and how to lose weight healthy so you don’t gain it back instead?

The problem with most diets is that you just follow the instructions of the diet on what exactly you should eat but you don't really learn anything during the process. When you "are finished" with the diet you won’t have learned anything but how to follow specific instructions, or numbers, or calories. 

From the educational point of view, you didn’t learn anything, so you are in the same place you were before you started your diet.

The moment you go back to be on your own without a diet telling you what to eat every single meal, you’ll eat what you were used to eat before because that’s what you know to do. In the end, you'll gain the weight back.

If you were also following a diet low in calories your body will have learned how to work with less energy or calories, so once the diet is over and you go back to ingest more calories than before, your body will store them as fat to save them as a source of energy to have it available in the future just in case you decide to go on a low calorie diet again.

 That’s Yo-Yo Dieting: When you lose weight and gain it again over and over. 

Do you love bananas! Does it happen to you that when you are on a rush, you just grab a banana and you think you’ll have your hunger under control. But, is that really true? Are bananas really the healthy “on the go” snacks per excellence? Have you ever noticed that after eating a banana your feel hungry too soon?

Every time I am being asked if it is right to eat bananas for weight loss and I say that it depends, my students start to change their face. No! don’t tell me I can’t eat bananas! I Love bananas! 

I am sensing you are starting to sweat thinking about all the bananas you are already eating.  

Don’t panic, and let me explain what’s behind bananas and what can you do to make sure that they are one of your healthy “on the go” snacks.

Bananas have high GI and GL Values