That's Fit

The body is an amazing piece of equipment. I am in awe every day, really, when I think about how my body -- even after an attack by cancer -- is able to survive, even thrive. Wired for sustaining life, our bodies give and give and give. It's only after a whole bunch of abuse or a whole bunch of disease that it generally gives out. Simply amazing how our bodies last for as long as they do.

Here are some amazing body facts featured in Laura Lewis' book 52 Ways To A Healthy You -- yes, our very own That's Fit blogger, Laura Lewis. She's a wealth of knowledge, a fountain of wisdom, and while I've only just skimmed her book so far, I plan to dive right in very soon. And then I'll be back with more. For now, though, take some time to marvel at these six human body feats.

• The human body has 45 miles of nerves.

• A nerve impulse travels at the speed of light.

• Each square inch of human skin consists of 20 feet of blood vessels.

• Your tongue print is as unique as your fingerprints.

• Twenty-five percent of all the oxygen in your body is constantly being used by your brain.

• The average human heart beats about 100,000 times every 24 hours.

With all of its potential, just think how great our bodies would work if we treated them like they deserve to be treated, if we ate right, exercised right, slept well, minimized stress -- you know the drill. Think about it. And see what you can do to let your amazing machine serve you the best it can.

We loved Jennette Fulda's book chronicling her incredible weight-loss journey. We found it to be entertaining, inspiring, and real, all at the same time, and now you have a chance to find out why -- Jennette is giving away a signed copy of her book, Half-Assed: A Weight-loss Memoir to one lucky That's Fit reader!

To enter to win, just leave a comment below before 5 PM Eastern on Friday, July 4 telling us all about your inspiration. Has something or someone inspired you to lose weight? Live healthier? Work harder? Tell us all about it! We'll randomly choose one winner amongst the eligible entries and announce the winner on Monday, July 7. Some other important details:

• To enter, leave a confirmed comment below telling us what inspires you.
  
• The comment must be left and confirmed before 5 PM on Friday, July 4.
• You may only enter once.
• One winner will be selected in a random drawing.
• One winner will receive a signed copy of Jennette Fulda's Half-Assed: A Weight-loss Memoir.
  
• Open to legal residents of the 50 United States, the District of Columbia and Canada (excluding Quebec) who are 18 and older.
  
  

Click here for complete official rules.

Meet Carla Birnberg, a self-described writer, babymama, and wife. Also known as "MizFit," this self-starter once owned a boutique personal training studio where she worked with clients from all walks of life and learned that the key to lifelong fitness is a healthy helping of education, motivation, and humor.

Educational, motivational, and humorous this woman is. Now a health and fitness columnist -- see her column in Austin's The Good Life (click on "Fitness" under "Gusto Departments" on the right) -- this cool gal authors her own blog where daily posts feature recipes, tips and trends, viewer mail, freebies, and for the purpose of this post: Monday Facetime. Yep, every Monday, you get to see MizFit via video as she teaches something related to fitness.

Wondering about flax seeds? See what MizFit had to say on February 18 about the nutty treat that is oh so good for you in an Omega-3 kind of way. Want to perfect your crunch technique? MizFit got down on the floor on February 25 and to show you how. On March 3, this spunky girl talked about weight training in preparation for some specific instruction that will begin next Monday.

I recommend you pay MizFit a visit when you get a free moment. I think you'll love what she has to offer. You just might learn a thing or two. Click here to meet my friend.

All you need to remember for this diet plan is the number 5, says Harley Pasternak, trainer to the stars and author of The 5 Factor Diet.

Eat five meals per day, advises the most sought-after trainer among celebrities. Besides three main meals, have two substantial snacks so you never get hungry. Also, try to include these five components in every meal.

• A lean protein, such as chicken, fish, or egg whites.

• Filling carbs, like sweet potatoes, beans, brown rice, or oatmeal.

• Healthy fats. Try olive oil or nuts.

• Five grams of fiber, best obtained through fruit, vegetables, or whole grains.

• A sugar-free beverage. Water, tea, coffee, an unsweetened energy drink, or diet soda all count.
  

And finally, exercise five days per week. Strive for 25 minutes on a treadmill, take a Pilates class, or power walk with a friend.

Curious to know how celebrities squeeze fitness into their daily lives? Want to know the secrets of the stars? Bi-weekly our That's Fit fitness expert Fitz sits down with the celebs we want to know more about, and digs out their great and not-so-great methods to staying healthy.

I'm thrilled to death about my guest this week, Dr. Mehmet Oz., vice chair of surgery and professor of cardiac surgery at Columbia University. I, along with millions of others met Dr. Oz a couple of years ago when he started appearing on the Oprah Winfrey show as her health expert. Kind of like the way she introduced Dr. Phil; except that Dr. Oz is truly brilliant in a non-subjective kind of way, easy on the eyes, and easy to understand.

I've been teaching fitness for almost two decades and have earned a Master's Degree in Exercise and Sports Sciences. I'm always hungry for new and relevant information. Rarely I find it. But, Dr. Oz always teaches me something new. He breaks highly advanced medical concepts down, so that everyone can understand them and how they affect our lives.

Dr. Oz is a major force in the push for real deal, gimmick-free healthy living. Mehmet is one of Oprah's favorite things, and a host of his own talk show on the Oprah and Friends radio network. He has a series on the Discovery Health Channel called You:Staying Young. He also happens to have best selling books out: You:Staying Young and You:On a Diet. I'd like to shrink down small and run around in his brain for a while to absorb all that he has to offer; either that or be his apprentice for a week. Since I probably can't do that, I invited him for an interview. Enjoy it. I did!

Fitz: How did you make the transition from cardiologist to wellness guru?

Dr. Oz: I spent the first few years of my career doing general medicine; you have to learn all other aspects of being a doctor before becoming a cardiologist. I got a great education on how the entire body works. Medicine is somewhat of a narcissistic profession, and I've spent a lot of my life keeping myself healthy. I saw the lifestyle mistakes others were making which led them to me, and I started to feel kind of guilty for not sharing what I knew about health and fitness. The stuff I've been pursuing my whole life! I lettered in eleven sports; everything from water polo to football. I love how you feel after working out; there's a lot to learn in life from pushing your body.

Fitz: How old are you?

Dr. Oz: I'm 47.

Fitz: Do you have children?

Dr. Oz: I have four kids. Ages twenty-one, seventeen, thirteen, and eight.

Ever heard of the inspirational author Sark? Take a look at her Planet Sark website and you'll quickly learn that this woman has a true passion for living.

"Leaps of faith can put us in a new spot we couldn't see from where we were before," writes Sark as she spreads her message about living creatively, keeping the soul alive, and waking our spirits. "Amaze yourself," Sark recommends in her book, Inspiration Sandwich: Stories to Inspire Our Creative Freedom.

"We all do things that are amazing," says Sark. "I rode a bicycle 3,000 miles and felt amazed the whole way. My brother Andrew talked me into climbing Half Dome in Yosemite -- the back way, by trail. There is a cable stairway pounded into the rocks and very steep. I froze halfway up in a panic attack and amazed myself by continuing to the top! When it was time to write my first book, I heard so many voices in my head that said, No! I amazed these voices by shouting, Yes! and writing my book. Invite your fears in, then tell them to sit down and shut up!"

How might you amaze yourself? Shed those unwanted pounds you can't seem to whittle away? Tackle that exercise program that always gets away? Climb a mountain? Run a race? It's your choice. And the amazement will be all yours.

Padma Lakshmi is an Indian-American supermodel, actress, chef, cookbook author, ambassador for the United Nations Development Fund for Women, and host of Bravo TVs Top Chef. She can also add "blogger" to her resume because this accomplished one has been recapping snippets from her reality show via her video blog.

Lakshmi, a culinary goddess who features in her cookbooks recipes for a delicious low fat diet, reveals more than critiques of Top Chef contestants on her blog. She also shares tidbits about her own approach to food and drink. Through my own tour of her blog, I learned that she's a big lover of breakfast -- it is the most important meal of the day, you know -- and while she doesn't consider herself a big drinker, she does enjoy white wine, red wine, and single malt Scotch. She also loves green markets and enjoys cooking with items grown by local farmers. Lakshmi likes to take classic recipes, like macaroni and cheese, and add one or two ingredients to add a twist. And she's all for basic cooking. The better the chef, the more simple the cooking gets, she says.

There's quite a lot to learn Lakshmi, whose cookbook Easy Exotic was awarded Best First Book at the 1999 World Cookbook Awards at Versailles. See for yourself what this top chef has to offer by visiting her blog.

Hard work got you down? Feeling tired? Stressed out? Hmmm. Lots of us are. In response, most folks take a nap, get a massage, or check out a movie. My good friend Art Adkins took a different route for stress relief though. Instead of just chilling out, he wrote and published a book! Ever think of doing that? I thought it was a pretty cool concept.

Art is a Sergeant with the Gainesville Police Department in Florida and a former LAPD Sergeant as well. He's spent 27 long years in law enforcement and to him, creating a murder mystery involving the criminals and cases he's been involved in for decades became his escape. The Oasis Project is a clever and exciting tale of a family's murder and the secrets surrounding it. Art brings the case to life in the way that only a true law enforcement officer can do.

I'm impressed that in efforts to just relax, Art put his mind to work. Where many people choose TV time as the decompressor of choice, Art kind of took on a part time job. Is there something productive you can do when you're frazzled? Maybe you could quilt, scrapbook, write or woodwork. Maybe you can create some extra income for yourself while you're doing it too! The Oasis Project is not only a fun and exciting read, it's a little bit of motivation for the rest of us to do even better.

I don't buy into the whole no pain, no gain mentality. The way I see it, the less pain I experience, the more I have to gain. For a while, running gave me pain up and down my shins. The pain stopped me in my tracks and forced me to rest and recuperate. Had I not taken a break, had I kept on running in spite of the pain, I would have surely gained very little. Well, I may have gained a severe injury and maybe a trip to a medical clinic but physically and mentally, my gains would have been nonexistent.

I'm not alone in my thoughts about pain and gain. Author and celebrity trainer Harley Pasternak is right with me on this one.

According to Pasternak, many people think if their muscles don't hurt, they're not having a quality workout. This is simply not true, he says. While some training can be intense and can produce some level of discomfort, pain is never a requirement for a successful workout. Don't forget, he says, that pain can be a warning sign of an exhausted muscle or a torn ligament.

If you're a no pain, no gain advocate, you'd do best to toss that myth right out the window -- before you get hurt.

Now here's a way to walk, and it comes straight from Mark Fenton, author of The Complete Guide for Walking for Health, Weight Loss, and Fitness. It's a simple six-day schedule -- you get the seventh day off -- and it's intended to boost the intensity of walking workouts for a greater benefit in less time. Check it out, try it, and tell us what you think.

Three days of the week: Engage in 30-60 minutes of purposeful walking. Walk the kids to school, walk to the store for milk, or walk with a colleague at work -- call it a meeting and you'll kill two birds with one stone. Break up your walking if you wish -- 10 minutes here, 10 minutes there -- but walk with a mission. Walk as if you're not late but have no time to spare.

Two days of the week: Get moving for 25-45 minutes of high intensity walking. Walk very quickly and tackle some hills while you're at it. Do this walk all at once and not in mini-chunks of time, and be aware of your breathing. Make sure you aren't gasping for air.

One day per week: Take a 90-minute walk. It can be a hike or even a family excursion in a park. Speed isn't important for this one. Just go long.

My husband and I both set our alarms for 6:00 AM on weekdays. We don't get up at this early hour, though, because we snooze, and snooze, and snooze until an extra 30 minutes has passed. Then we roll out of bed and get on with our days. Why we don't just set our alarms for a later hour, I'm not sure. But we should -- because our extra eight-minute intervals of sleep are not doing us one bit of good. We aren't even really sleeping during these short spurts of time.

The average snooze button allows for seven to nine minutes of quiet, not long enough to get back into a deep sleep, says Michael Breus, author of Good Night: The Sleep Doctor's 4-Week Program to Better Sleep and Better Health. Breus suggests the snoozers of the world set their clocks for when they absolutely must be up and spend more time in nourishing sleep. Put your alarm on the other side of the room, he says, so you have to get up to get it. Also, open the curtains as soon as you step out of bed -- the daylight tells our brains it's time to wake up.

Are you a snoozer? If so, you might want to join me in listening to this wake-up call. The bonus sleep will surely do us good as we tackle the days that lie ahead.

FitSpirit explores the mind-body connection and the intangible benefits we gain from our efforts to stay physically fit.

You know that sinking feeling you get in your gut when something happens the way you don't want it to happen? Ever felt completely deflated because things just don't go according to plan? I have. It may be a not-so-pleasant interaction with someone, a job disappointment, or a family insecurity that dashes our spirits and leaves us feeling a little lifeless. Sometimes it's our very own body image that puts us in a spirit-less mood.

My spirit has been dashed on many occasions. And I admit, sometimes it's body issues that send me spiraling downward. I know it's not just me. People everywhere, and especially women, have long battled with shame related to their appearance. In fact, body image is one of 12 areas author Brené Brown has identified as the most vulnerable for women. She calls it a "universal trigger," so powerful and so deeply rooted in our psyches it affects the shame we feel in other areas, like sexuality, parenting, and health. The sad thing is that body image is just that -- an image. Our pictures, thoughts, and feelings about our bodies have little to do with our actual appearance, says Brown, who has interviewed nearly 400 women about the topic.

Recently, I wrote a post about "What Not to Wear's" resident make-up artist, Carmindy, and her tips on how to get great, glowing skin. The Californian beauty always looks fantastic without being overly made-up, so I thought it would be cool to check out her advice on how to get that naturally beautiful look.

Those of you out there who are also Carmindy fans, especially New York City-area residents and fashionistas who'll be in town for NYC Fashion Week, are in for a treat as the artist will appear at Byrant Park on Monday September 10th, as a part of the Word for Word Author Series.

Carmindy, who has penned a book called The 5-Minute Face: The Quick and Easy Makeup Guide for Every Woman, will appear at 12:30 p.m. and 1:45 p.m., and give away some of her best secrets and tricks of the trade including tips on how to enhance your best features and how to look great without spending hours primping. The author will also be available to sign copies of the book. If you love to look great and have fun with makeup, mark the event in your calendar.

People are either going to love the author interviewed in this article or they're going to hate her. Corinne Maier, a French mother of two, has written a book called No Kid: 40 Reasons Not to Have Children. From what the interviewer says about the book, it sounds as though Maier is pretty fierce and truly feels her life was better before kids. In the actual interview though, she seems slightly more humorous (albeit in a dark way).

Maier believes the French Government promotes the idea of family in that country in order to keep the economy running -- more kids equals more consumers to sell goods to after all, and also ups the amount of future earners contributing to the country's pension programs.

But Maier also has plenty of personal reasons not to have kids, 20 of which are listed in the piece. They include:

• You will lose touch with your friends.
• Your child will kill your desire.
• Children sound the death knell of the couple.
• You will be duped into thinking there is such a thing as a perfect child.
• You will be expected to be a mother before you are a professional or a woman.
• Children are dangerous. They will take you to court without a second thought.

Some of the reasons are harsh and some humorous, but I also think that some ring true. Possibly the most shocking thing about the book is that this woman, who lives in a society where having kids is often thought to be the only way a woman can really ever be fulfilled -- and in which those of us who haven't had or don't want children are viewed with pity or scorn -- is willing to admit that she regrets having children.

What do you think, is Maier selfish and crazy or courageous and honest?

You'd think by now there wouldn't be any more room for "firsts" in the weight loss and fitness industry, but the authors of a new book called "Zodiaction" beg to differ: they are promoting their book as "the first-ever workout program based on your astrological sign."

For the record, I have no idea if that's true or not.

But anyway, do you think it makes sense to pick a workout based on astrology? Obviously they do, and they don't stop at just workout suggestions. They also give ideas on what your physical "trouble spots" might be, individual dieting vices, and even what kind of clothes you should be wearing during exercise. Based on this summary of the book by each sign my abs are my trouble spot, I tend to eat too much, and I should be working out in big loose sweats.

Yes, yes, and no thanks (yoga pants all the way). Okay then, moving on to the next crazy fad!