10,000 Steps to Excellent Health

Everyone wants their health to be good but not everyone has enough time to get in proper work outs and make sure that this is possible. This is the reason that health experts are pushing people to adopt the ten thousand step method. The ten thousand step method is an idea that claims all you need to try and do to increase your health is to walk at least ten thousand steps every day--this way you won't have to work out as intensely at the gym. Walking is a great, low impact, physical exercise. How often have you heard a health care provider say "just a single walk around the block helps your health"?

Obviously, getting in ten thousand steps on a daily basis will be quite a job. That's lots of steps to take! The good news is that you almost certainly already take most of those steps each day already and don't know it yet. Your objective ought to really just be boosting your step count by two or three thousand. So how will you do that without feeling like you're wasting an entire day walking about?

Increasing the step count can be achieved easily employing these obvious methods. One classic example of this is actually hiking the stairs instead of taking an elevator or escalator. Parking at the far end of the parking lot is also advisable at the mall or the store. To further this idea, you can also remain parked in one spot and walk your shopping bags out to the car as you accumulate them-instead of carting them all over the shopping center as you run your errands. Choosing public transit is excellent since it includes a walk to and from a bus or train stop which is fantastic for increasing your step count. The most obvious way to do it, of course, would be to just take a short walk each day.

Some less clear methods to grow your step count are also available. Write your grocery store shopping list in a different arrangement. Lots of men and women organize their lists based on the aisles of their stores. You can decide to order your list according to category just like meat, product and dairy. Then go shopping as outlined by the order on the list. Sure you may find yourself running back and forth through the store but it's great for taking more steps every day. Put your mail box on a post at the curb as an alternative to on your door or in your wall. This ensures that the simple act of checking the mail can create a couple dozen steps each day.

There are many ways to take extra steps on a daily basis. As you become familiar with walking 10,000 steps each day you'll come up with plenty of creative ways to get to that number. Thankfully, every step you take--whether it's walking toward the refrigerator or running on a treadmill, counts toward your end step count goal. Try to have fun with your undertaking!

Working Yourself Up For Your Workout

The same New Year's Resolution gets made by a lot of people every year. Every year they promise "I will get healthy this coming year." Each year they say "this will be the year I'll get in shape." Of course, both these things take loads of work. If you've made resolutions such as this for the year you have probably already read the same basic information on multilple web sites. To improve your health you have to eat healthy foods and get plenty of exercise. Surely there has to be something else that you can do! The truth is that there is: you can prepare. It's really hard to just jump onto the healthy and balanced wagon and change every little thing instantly. First it is advisable to produce some plans. You will be more likely to succeed if there is a plan in place.

Acquiring the right tools is the first thing you need to do. Obviously you do not need to wear particular shirts or pants when you train, but you do need to have good shoes. You must not try to work out in the same sneakers that you wear when you run errands. You should find the correct footwear for your workout. If you don't do that, it's very likely that you'll end up with a lot of injuries in your feet, ankles, legs and even the rest of your body too. Ask a professional for advice on the types of shoes you should wear (trainers, running shoes, etc). The sort of shoes you require will depend upon which kind of training you do.

If you need help figuring out what to eat and when, meal planning is usually a big help. When you first start trying to eat better it's easy to think that you'll have the ability to just start picking the better stuff every time you go to a grocery store or a restaurant. This will not constantly turn out to be true. Old habits die hard, particularly in the market. It's less difficult to know what to get at the store and cook at home if you plan your meals in advance. You can pre-plan your days or even your months all at once. This will help you save time each night when you would ordinarily be stressing out over figuring out what to make for dinner.

Do a bit of research. You should do some investigating before you will be ready to make wise decisions about things like eating and working out. Don't worry, you'll be able to still take measures toward health during your learning process. In the long run, you'll be happier that you realized things in advance of starting your new project. Knowledge may be the easiest way to really improve your health.

Wanting to get healthy is a great objective, but with no some preparation it's unlikely to happen. First you'll want to plan out a path to follow so that you don't ever get stuck wondering what to do next and accidentally find yourself distracted away from your goal. Good luck and remember: fun is okay too!

A Review of P90X Workout Plan

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If you wish to lose weight, it's very easy to get bogged down by all the fad diets and exercise programs that are out there. That is because the fat reduction and health market is very marketable. Obviously there are going to be people that hope to score a few bucks off of vulnerable people who are trying desperately to improve their lives. For each and every good offer there is, there are several terrible offers too. Trying pinpoint which offers are good and which are bad could be a nightmare. This article looks especially at the P90X Workout Plan. This is a new health and fat reduction process that is being peddled on the net and we want to give you an objective review of it.

According to its own website, the P90X Workout Plan is a bestselling product. It was designed by Tony Horton and includes a workout routine as well as meal plans and diet tips. This 90 day course guarantees people who do it extreme changes. The fundamental plan seems to be that if you do this program you'll drastically turn around your life. According to the website, "extreme" isn't a great enough concept to explain the changes you'll undergo if you complete the whole program.

Obviously simply no program could make these extreme changes in as few as 90 days. While 3 months is often enough to see obvious results, you'll need more than 90 days if you totally desire to lose a lot of weight and alter your life. For folks that have twenty pounds or less to lose, 90 days should be adequate. More than that, however, will demand more days for safe weight-loss. We aren't positive how to feel about a task with this severe hype.

The nicest thing about this system (which consists of DVDs) is that the workouts are nicely varied. The maker of the program accepts that to really shed pounds, you should do a variety of different types of workout routines. This course encompasses yoga, cardiovascular exercise, weight training and endurance exercising. We also appreciate that the system insists that changes in lifestyle and diet are also necessary to really turn a life around.

The simple truth is that there are different things that have to be done if you need to truly alter your life. Simply exercising on a daily basis for 90 days and planning for the best won't get the job done. This course will coach you on how to adjust how you eat. There are different work out plans that you can do. If a person follow this promotion to the "tee" you can absolutely begin to make some important changes. Like any well-known program, obviously, you need to check with your doctor prior to starting it. Your physician should be able to help you figure out whether this program can truly help you. Do not simply buy depending on buzz. Do your homework!

Choosing Fast Food That's Good For You

Almost every single article about losing weight and getting healthy explains readers to avoid drive through windows like the plague and to carry out all of their own cooking. There's some benefit to that. Now and then, though, you definitely do not wish to make a whole meal for your family or even just for yourself. Sometimes almost all you desperately want is to go to the drive through and get home quickly. Why shouldn't you have the ability to do this every now and then and not have a bunch of guilt about slipping up on your diet program? This may be possible because lots of the popular fast food destinations making the effort to make their menus better now. Here's how you'll be able to eat healthfully when you're at a fast food spot.

Aim at the side dishes. It was not that long ago that all you could get in a fast food diner was French Fries. Now virtually all of the famous fast food places have widened their menus. Now quite a few of them offer salads. You could also choose Chili. Baked potatoes may also be purchased. You could possibly get fruit. There are a lot of options that you can choose that do not force you to consume foods that have been deep fried. When selecting your meal from the drive through, select a variety of side items instead of choosing a pre-made "meal deal".
When you choose to do this you may keep your fat content and calorie counts low.

Your beverage ought to be water or juice or milk. Drinking a large soft drink allows hundreds of empty calories into your diet. One portion of soda pop is eight ounces. That helping typically is made up of at the very least a hundred calories and more than a few tablespoons of sugar. Most fast food soda sizes start at twenty ounces. Generally, though, they're 30 ounces. Choosing a soft drink as your beverage increases your calorie absorption by thousands and adds way too much sugar to your diet. It is much healthier to select milk, juice or perhaps regular water.

Choose a drive through depending on whether or not it has better options available. Arby's by way of example, does not provide burgers. As an alternative it is possible to pick from roast beef sandwiches, salads, wraps and various healthier items. Wendy's, while no stranger to the hamburger, likewise includes plenty of other meal choices: large salads, large baked potatoes and other tasty items fill its menu. Not every thing is McDonalds featuring its deep fried chicken parts and also other terribly unhealthy items.

Simple logic states that the simplest way to lose pounds and get healthy is to ban fast food from your diet altogether. Most of the time this is a good concept but if you make good choices, there's no reason you can't visit your drive through from time to time. Every now and then, letting someone else cook dinner is just the thing you need. When you choose healthy menu items, you do not have to feel terrible about visiting the drive through.

Online Violin Lessons - What you need to succeed

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I am a music teacher, but in observing musicians who learned via a music teacher and musicians who figured out music on their own, I am beginning to question the utility of teaching music—or at least the ideas that music lessons must start at an early age and continue for many years and that the only way to learn music is through a teacher.

I was educated in the classical realm, taking nine years of both piano and violin lessons. After graduating college in music education, I started to play non-classical forms of music, specifically the fiddle. I began to be exposed to self-taught musicians.

The bottom line becomes, who takes responsibility for a person's music learning?

My experience in the classical world was that for the most part, with some input from me, my teachers chose what I played. I wasn't "allowed" to play some pieces because they were "too hard." I had to play etudes, no matter how hateful they were. Ditto for scales and arpeggios. Although I can see the utility of various forms of exercises now, they were presented as something you do, without a whole lot of connection to one's goals in music.

The worst part was that my teacher's opinion of how I played mattered so much that it affected my relationship with my instrument and my sense of self. Although now I think I could take lessons without this happening because I am mature enough to avoid falling into that emotional trap, my teenage self was not able to. My self-esteem rose and fell on the quality of my lessons because the point of the lessons was to please my teacher. Sometimes I did. Many times I didn't.

In contrast, many bluegrass musicians I know have become very good by setting their own goals and working on the things they liked. Bluegrass musicians don't learn in isolation—they get information from each other at jams and other gatherings. I know of musicians who have followed other players around at festivals so they could learn a lick or two off of that person.

Bluegrass musicians may play a lot—not a bunch of isolated exercises—but working out tunes by ear and playing along with recordings. Practice consists of playing the things one feels like playing at that time, so the practice session is more fun than drudgery. No one tells a beginning banjo player that Foggy Mountain Breakdown is too hard—if the player wants to work on it, he or she does. There may be performance-related goals—such as a concert coming up, so practice may focus on particular pieces across a number of weeks, but it's not the same kind of pressure as performing for a grade each semester.

Now, with the internet and computer technology many tools exist that can help people learn to play an instruments. Youtube has many videos of traditional bluegrass masters as well as young hot shots playing all the classic bluegrass tunes and songs, not to mention online lessons. You can get programs for the computer that slow down a track on a CD without changing its pitch, which is wonderful to work with. There are free metronomes. Companies that make and sell instruments often have resources online for learners because they want people to succeed. Music aficionados have created endless web pages that teach about the structures of music as well as the playing of particular instruments. Tablature and printed music abound on the web along with audio files so you can hear what you are learning.

The advantages to having a music teacher include the music teacher's expertise on the instrument, the music teacher's expertise on the process of teaching, and the fact that music lessons on a regular basis can help with goal setting. So getting a music teacher may help you out—if the music teacher can let you stay in control of the learning process and goals.

Playing music is one of the greatest joys possible in life and I hope everyone who wants to learn has an opportunity to do so. I have played music with people who didn't speak English—we communicated through the sounds of our instruments. Being able to play music has opened many doors in my life that would have remained closed if I did not play.

But it is really important to understand that music teachers do not have a patent on music learning. If you find a good music teacher, enjoy and count your blessings. But don't let rigid, narrow-minded music teachers talk you out of something that can be so life-enhancing.

Additional Resource:

Online Violin Lessons

American Immigration

Beginning in the 1870's and lasting into the early 1900's America experienced an Industrial Revolution. With the rise of new businesses came the rise of new business tactics and these tactics led to domination by the large corporations and trusts. Since there was big growth in businesses there was a greater demand for jobs. Millions of people immigrated to America during this time from poor countries to try and make money and live a better life. Since there was a large workforce the revolution continued to grow however this occurred at a great cost. For example as the number of workers increased the working conditions worsened. There was also a sense of nativism among American workers and this led to the American workers mistreating immigrant workers. There were defiantly several hardships but the workers were able to preserve and this made the industrial era very prosperous for many people. When analyzing the amount of immigrants arriving, the mistreatment of immigrants by Americans, and corrupt business owners it is evident that there was a great cost to the rise of industry yet these costs did not affect its growth.

The United States saw a large increase in immigration as the 20th century approached. The reason many immigrants began coming to the United States is due to the external problems faced in European countries as well as the rumored success stories from America. An example of an external problem was during the 1800's when the United States saw a massive amount of Irish immigrants due to the potato famine that caused starvation in many families. In addition to famines there was a widespread agriculture depression in Europe and this led not only to starvation but also to unemployment for farmers. These problems led to many wanting to start fresh and they thought the best place to do so was America. Many immigrants came to America and found that the stories they heard about America were not entirely true. Many immigrants struggled to become familiar with American customs and the big industry style. Immigrants that were able to find were usually paid very poorly and could not support their families and this led to poor standards of living which would be similar to that of their former country. Even though there were several downfalls for immigrants they continued to come to America and the workforce continued to grow.

Work was not the only hard thing for immigrants when coming to America. Many immigrants had to deal with intense racial and religious discrimination. The American workforce began to dislike foreigners because they were taking jobs from "pure" Americans. Americans began to act superior towards these immigrants the irony of this is that many immigrants left their European countries because of racial and religious discrimination. The act of nativism has been evident in American history since the birth of the nation. An example of early nativism was the Alien and Sedition Acts which gave the government the right to deport any immigrant for no specific reason. These acts and the actions of the American people during the Industrial Revolution show that not only immigrants would have to work hard in order to succeed in a new country they would have to take a good amount of discrimination. This sense of nativism was clearly a cost of the Industrial Revolution yet the immigrants did not stop coming to America so the workforce continued to expand and industries kept growing.

The main reason many Americans lost their jobs to immigrants is because the Americans did not want to sacrifice their pay or increase their hours. During the Industrial Revolution there was no minimum wage set by the government therefore employers paid workers barley anything. There was also no working hours set so many employers required their workers to work an insane amount of hours per week. The conditions in many factories were horrid since they were overcrowded and had insufficient air flow. There were also no child labor laws so it was very common to see young children working around dangerous machines and this led to serious injuries and death. These injuries and deaths led to the rise of labor unions which sought to correct the problems in factories. However once labor unions were formed it was already to late many children lost their lives and many adults' lives would be changed forever due to the poor health conditions. It is evident when examining the factory conditions and the rise of labor unions that even though the horrid conditions were a great cost of the Industrial Revolution the rise of labor unions was a benefit.

Business owners thought they were kings and this led to corruption. Business owners tried to affect the government by getting politicians elected who would aid the business's cause in order to make the owner millions of dollars. One of the most famous corrupt business owners during the industrial era was William Marcy Tweed who was also referred to as Boss Tweed. Tweed fixed several elections in order to be elected to the New York State Senate. When Tweed was on the Senate he stole millions of dollars from taxpayers to fund his luxurious lifestyle. Tweed's corruption continued for several years. Thomas Nast however began to expose Tweed's corruption through his weekly cartoons. Eventually Tweed was arrested in 1871 and he went to jail. There were many other business owners like Tweed several failed to recognize the living conditions of their workers and some used force on their workers. However Jacob Riis' novel How the Other Half Lives and Lincoln Steffens The Shame of Cities showed the difference between the lifestyle of the rich and the poor. These novels motivated the government to enforce change in business operations.

It is evident when looking at urbanization that it came at a great cost however there were defiantly some benefits. Immigrants endured the most of these costs because they had to suffer hard working conditions and the discrimination from nativists. The benefits however were there because due to the Industrial Revolution there were many technological advances that would be critical as the 20th century began. The progress made during the Industrial Revolution is evident but it did indeed come at a great cost and the progress made kept the United States a global superpower throughout the 20th century.

Sources
David Benett, The Party of Fear: From Nativist Movements to the New Right in American History (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1988).
Ellis Cose, A Nation of Strangers: Prejudice, Politics, and the Populating of America (New York: Morrow, 1992).
James Crawford, Hold Your Tongue: Bilingualism and the Politics of "English Only" (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1992).
Roger Daniels, Asian America: Chinese and Japanese in the United States Since 1950 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1988).
Oscar Handlin, Race and Nationality in American Life (Boston: Little, Brown, 1957).
John Higham, Strangers in the Land: Patterns of American Nativism, 1860-1925 2d ed. (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1988).
Maldwyn Allen Jones, American Immigration, 2d ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992).

Additional Resource:

Immigration to America