Thursday, November 10, 2011
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Top 5 Foods for Healthy Hair
While external care (shampoo, conditioner, keeping the scalp clean etc.) are a must for keeping the hair healthy, a balanced diet containing hair-friendly nutrients is also of paramount importance.
Minerals like iron, calcium, potassium, selenium, magnesium etc. play a vital role in keeping the hair and scalp healthy. Protein is also crucial for ensuring good healthy hair growth.Protein deficiencies or low-quality protein can produce weak and brittle hair, and can eventually result in loss of hair color.
Let’s take a look at five super foods for hair:
Image Credit: se3dawy.com
Whole Grains
It is widely known that whole grains have more nutrients per unit than their refined counterparts. Add to this the large quantities of fibre they have which makes them really good for our digestive system. They can be easily digested, contain a lot of antioxidants and help keep chronic diseases like cancer, diabetes, obesity and constipation at bay. All these qualities also make them ‘super-foods’ for healthy hair.
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Vitamin C Foods
Vitamin C is brimming with collagen, a protein which helps in maintaining hair follicles, blood vessels and scalp. Fruits like oranges, lemons, pineapple, strawberries, guava etc are great sources of vitamin C. Green leafy vegetables also contain vitamin C and iron which is another great nutrient for healthy hair.
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Brown Rice
It is a good source of protein and it gives your hair the shine you’ve always wanted. Apart from this, it makes you feel full for longer durations and helps suppress your hunger pangs. Brown rice is also rich in vitamins and fibre.
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Dal
Legumes are widely accepted as rich sources of protein. An ½ cup serving of dal can easily offer about 6 gm of protein. Besides, dals are rich in minerals like potassium and magnesium. However, you should not solely depend on dal for your daily protein intake.
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Calcium-rich Foods
Calcium is also a key nutrient for maintaining hair health. Now a lot of calcium is used up by daily wear and tear and one needs to consume adequate calcium-rich foods to replenish lost calcium. Dairy products are excellent sources of calcium. So are grains. Calcium also makes your hair shine and not to forget that it also gives you healthy, stronger bones.
Friday, November 4, 2011
10 ways to boost your happiness
Life isn’t always perfect and we all get down sometimes. However, there are many things you can do to improve your cheerfulness no matter what comes your way. From instance happiness boosts to techniques for long-term contentment, here are 10 top ways to boost your happiness.
Watch a comedy movie
We’ve all heard that laughter is the best medicine, and if you’re feeling down in the dumps then this is definitely true. Laughter can not only release pent-up emotions, but it also produces endorphins to boost your mood. Furthermore, research has found that laughing burns calories and boosts heart health too. To get your happiness levels up and boost your well-being too, pop in a comedy DVD next time you’re feeling down.
Eat yourself happy
While our outlook often changes based on external factors, if your mood is often low it may be that you are suffering from a nutrient deficiency. Research has found that having low levels of omega-3 fatty acids (which are essential for good brain health) increases risk of depression and negativity, while research by Kuopio University in Finland found that taking B vitamin supplements could help treat depression.
Get outdoors
Research has shown that low levels of vitamin D can contribute to mood disorders and depression. While vitamin D can be found in some foods or taken as supplement, one of the best sources of the mood-boosting vitamin is sunshine, which helps the body to create vitamin D. To boost your supplies of vitamin D, try to spend 10 to 15 minutes outdoors two to three times a week during the summer months.
Have a workout
For an instance happiness boost when you’re feeling blue, try hitting the gym or heading out for a brisk walk or run. Exercise releases chemicals in the brain such as endorphins and anandamide which can boost your mood and leave you feeling great. Not only that, exercise is also good for boosting confidence levels and increasing self-esteem.
[See also: Foods that boost your mood]
Try aromatherapy
While many of us think of aromatherapy as an aid to relaxation, there are also many oils you can use to boost your happiness and help alleviate depression. Good aromatherapy oils to leave you uplifted include bergamot, geranium, neroli and jasmine. To lift your mood, try adding a few drops of these oils to water and burning on an oil burner, or create or purchase a room spray containing these essential oils.
Take a risk
To get the endorphins going and give your confidence a boost, try challenging yourself on a regular basis. While we don’t advise you to put yourself in any danger, if there is something you have been putting off for a while out of fear, now is the time to bite the bullet and see it through. Whatever your fear – be it asking out that special someone, joining a gym or applying for a job abroad – conquering your fears will leave you feeling great as well as helping you achieve your dreams.
Talk it out
If you are feeling seriously down and have been feeling low for a while, it is important to seek some help to get through this difficult phase. Seek out a friend or counsellor to listen to your problems, or visit your GP if you think you may be suffering from depression. No matter how bad you feel it is important to remember that you are not alone and there is no shame in seeking help. As they say, a problem shared is a problem halved, and even talking through your issues can help them seem less overwhelming.
Schedule in regular treats
To boost your happiness and satisfaction of life, it is important to make the most of those little things that boost your mood. Make a list of the day-to-day things that make you happy – such as having a catch-up with a friend, drinking hot chocolate in bed, or listening to your favourite song –and make sure you schedule one of these treats into every day. Planning regular treats not only gives you something to look forward to, but it can also subtly improve each day.
Do something selfless
It is easy to get bogged down in our own problems, so every once in a while it is good to put our issues to one side and help someone else feel happy instead. Whether you want to take on a long-term volunteering role, make a donation to charity, or improve the happiness of someone you know with a thoughtful note or gift, making an effort to make someone else smile is a great way to get some perspective, take your mind off your problems and increase your sense of purpose and fulfillment.
Set yourself a goal
Whether you aspire to get fit, obtain that dream job or learn how to cook something other than toast, most of us have something we long to achieve during our lifetime. Rather than putting off your dreams until a perfect moment which may never come, take some positive action and make a plan of how you will achieve your goal starting today. Having something to work towards will not only distract you from your problems, it will also reignite your passion for life and increase your excitement for the future.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Top 10 Legal Addictions
Top 10 Legal Addictions
In the Eighties, Nancy Reagan led a militant campaign to do away with drugs, from the backs of schoolyards to the cartels of Columbia. However, when her husband ultimately succumbed to Alzheimer’s, you didn’t see her telling him to “just say NO” to his medication. There’s a clear double-standard on how drugs are handled in this country, but there seems to be one unifying principle: if they government can somehow make a profit, it’s a-okay as far as the law goes. Nonetheless, substance abuse and addiction rages at full force on both sides of the law, and feigning an injury is a much less risky way to acquire an opiate than to cross the border and smuggle a plastic-wrapped portion of suspicious black goop. Addiction is good business for all involved. Here are ten of the leading example of those which the law doesn’t frown upon... |
10. Shopping  Compulsive shopping is a disorder, and one that can keep the economy churning, that is if the afflicted member is a responsible credit card owner. More often than not however, a frequent credit card swiper will live in bottomless debt with nothing but a household of canoes and flatscreen T.V.’s to show for it. Of course the government would encourage spending at inadvisable times if it means economic stimulation (and of course sales tax revenue), but the compulsive shopper needs more counseling than trips to the mall to right this wrong. |
09. T.V.  Visual stimulation can be just as addictive as any other kind. Cut off a shut-in’s cable subscription and watch how quickly a sweet, slightly-sedated old lady can become a common junkie suffering from violent withdrawal symptoms and uncontrollable behavior. Television is an endless stream of unilateral entertainment that simulates a fulfilling life one may be missing out on due to being terminally wheelchair-confined, or else just cut off from a greater society. Just pay the monthly bill and the loneliness can be neatly stuffed into a little old coin purse. |
08. MMORPGs ( Massively multiplayer online role-playing games )  How can a game consisting of orcs, wizards, and other medieval cliches consume so many souls and hours of sunlight? Unfathomable as it sounds, millions maintain a subscription to a network-based video game and treat it as a second life, one which they clock in more hours than in the actual world. Eat, sleep, energy drink, game: that is the complete life of many who’ve yet to leave their parents’ basement or pursue a real life of work that doesn’t involve trading furs or blacksmithing. And about the addictive nature of games like World of Warcraft, just see the video on Youtube of the kid that has a veritable stigmata over his mom taking away his WOW account. Scary stuff. |
07. Celebrity Gossip  Because people care (i.e. obsess) about the lives of the beautiful and famous; tabloids, TMZ, and trashcan journalism exists. For some, enough to make a handsome profit, it’s not enough to watch a movie and leave the stars onscreen. No, they need to see these people hunted down and in intimate, compromising settings that would be grounds for an assault charge in any other circumstance – an invasion of privacy that nobody deserves. Sure reality stars present a kind of voyeurism in their professions that makes privacy invasion a given, but for any artist who create their work in isolated, public arenas and seek not to take their work home with them, there becomes a fine line between celebrity reporter and peeping tom. |
06. Fast Food  Greasy, fattening food is cheap and ubiquitous. Literally, it can be acquired 24/7 and at every intersection, and purchased by the bucket for less than whats in your typical consumer’s belly button. Obesity is easy; in fact, it’s hard to avoid when healthy food costs more than the average consumer can afford with his weekly paycheck. Fast food is made cheap (often with artificial substitutes), hence it can be sold cheap and is a sad sap’s last option. When it tastes so much better than it benefits, it is again a huge draw. McDonald’s brags right on its golden arches how many billion burgers it’s sold, but it is not by any pure means: for one, McDonald’s loads their food with chemicals that simulate happiness, their hamburger buns with sugar, which is another petty alternative to just making good food alone. Only recently have the chicken nuggets started to be made with the frighteningly white meat of actual chicken, a step up from sickly colored ostrich meat. So as many struggle and fail to convert to a healthier diet, they “put a smile on” only because the milkshakes are loaded with too many chemicals to do otherwise. |
05. Gambling  Be it at a casino in a tolerant state or Indian reservation or behind the counter of any convenience store sales counter in scratch form, risking all your earnings for a poor chance at modest luck is a great way to grease up a business’ fat gut. Many seeking a magical and immediate escape from an under-educated life of manual labor and alcohol poisoning flock to pick up their daily lotto ticket or place their “lucky” numbers as if a million to one isn’t so far-fetched. And no business should be trusted that purposefully eschews visible windows and clocks in order to hide the passage of time. Lo and behold, any state with loose casino laws automatically resembles the inside of Donald Trump’s gentleman’s drawer. |
04. Pornography  It’s lure. It’s tasteless. And it’s a goldmine. Just ask Hugh Hefner or Larry Flynt or any infinite-aire that shovels gold from the sex industry. Nothing sells like sex, which is why it is so often introduced, if subliminally, to any cheap-shooting marketing campaign. Directly though, sex in a bottle always finds a customer-base. Nothing breeds desire like nature. Porn is available at the click of a mouse and on a special shelf (in opaque packaging) at most magazine venders. That’s not to mention seedy stores with conspicuous names like “Adult Mart” or “Pleasure Island” which make like X-rated Wal-Marts. No Christian activist stands a chance at taking down this invincible Goliath. |
03. Alcohol  Legal steadily since the twenties, when the government had the crazy idea to ban this braincell-shedding national pastime and deny itself unruly profits, booze is as potentially dangerous as it is ubiquitous. At any public setting (even Starbucks is getting in on the rocket), alcohol is usually available for purchase and without much restraint so much as the register keeps chiming (and as long as a designated vehicular man-saver is selected). While it seems unfair that its proven hazards outweigh those of marijuana and still maintains the legal status the plant does not, we won’t soon have a profitable poison at quite the summit which liquor has found itself. Budweiser will be forever both the king of beers and the king of the drug hill. |
02. Cigarettes  Unarguably a direct contributor to a smorgasbord of death options, the government has done nothing to do away with this consumable poison; while there may be myriad agencies dedicated the public safety of any other ingestible product, there is nothing deterring a cylinder of carcinogens from entering countless lungs each day, each hour. The only dissembling action the government has taken is to drive up the tax on the the stuff to levels that should prevent affordability for most costumers. Of course any addict will find a way to acquire the goods, scrape together every coin from beneath the couch cushions. In actuality smokers will just be perpetually bitter about the continually rising prices, doing little about it besides lighting up a butt. A perfect circle of death and taxes. |
01. Prescription Drugs  This is the most sinister of all the addiction-caterers in that you’re not even safe from your own doctor. Most every doctor will find a way to peddle a pharmaceutical drug to a person with some kind of condition, real or imaginary; it makes their job easier and feeds the business (i.e. the healthcare industry) that cuts them a check to be a drug-dealer in disguise. Most prescription drugs, after all, are just synthetic alternates to what unrefined, impure substances flow through the streets without requiring an RX slip. (Oxycontin is content-wise no different from heroine and consequently is just as addictive, abused as the poppy-based original.) And with new disorders, diseases, and conditions fabricated on a daily basis, there will always be a demand to meet the raid-proof supply. |
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