Archive for August, 2007

As I was perusing the aisles of my local Barnes & Noble bookstore at lunch a new book caught my eye. It’s called The Hot Diet, by chemical engineer AJ Djo. I picked it up and started reading. Page after page it drew me in with one simple premise… something in almost everyone’s diet was poison and causing us to gain weight. This poison is right under our noses, front and center at virtually every meal. Yet despite hundreds of diet books, thousands of seminars, and countless hours of research, it has escaped discovery.

I immediately started thinking about this and trying to guess what it might be… the author said it exists in almost all of our meals. Hmmmm….

Could it be Refined Sugar? This seems to be the villain in many diet plans and sugar, even small amounts, seems to be in almost everything we eat and drink. But the author dismissed this idea in the first chapter.

Could it be High Fructose Corn Syrup? This is certainly it. This fat inducing man made concoction has found its way into almost every processed product on the shelves. But AJ dismissed this idea in chapter two.

Could it be Salt? This has got to be it… Salt is in almost everything we eat, whether sweet, spicy, or salty. Pick up any box of sweetened cereal and you’ll find salt as one of the ingredients. Salt is a very popular additive but the author dismisses this as the poison in the first few pages.

Could it be Pepper? With a name like The Hot Diet, I was beginning to think it was a common spice like pepper. Certainly this type of spice was in most common foods and cayenne pepper was used for medicinal purposes. I was really certain this was it, until the whole class of spices was eliminated by an example in the book.

As I read further I was getting a little antsy. I had hoped to find the answer quickly, but the author kept the suspense going for three chapters when he finally revealed the secret. I had stood there reading for almost 15 minutes, unable to put the volume down.

When the item was finally revealed it all started to make sense. This substance was certainly in front of me multiple times a day. But the premise that this could be a reason that so many people find themselves overweight was hard to believe. The answer will certainly be controversial for some time to come.

As I put the volume down, I really started to think… could this be true?

Could this mysterious ingredient really be the culprit in our battle of the waistline?

As I left the store I headed for a nearby restaurant and had lunch.

As the waitress brought they tray of food, there it was staring me in the face.

It was right in front of me, something I had never considered before.

Could the “ice” in my drink really be all that bad?

Could this clear and solid form of water really be sabotaging my diet?

Could the cold that this induces really be slowing my digestion?

I had to go back and find out more…. Could this chemical engineer be on to something?

I stopped back and read on…

I still don’t know about this one…

What do you think?

Technorati Tags: diet, diet books

I love to listen to Audio Books. Over the past year I have downloaded over 35 business titles, and have enjoyed then while driving, running and working out. The amount of shared knowledge on these volumes has been amazing. Yet there is something missing from the whole equation. Even though the titles contained information on changing my life in many ways… my life remains very much the same as it has always been.

There have been some standout books and probably a half dozen that I’ve taken action on. The majority of the information, while interesting, has been processed by my brain and mostly forgotten. This is a sobering fact with learning, that if we don’t do something (take action) with what we learned, the knowledge is slowly lost.

This is the premise of Ken Blanchard’s new audio book, Know Can Do. Mr. Blanchard teamed up with Paul J. Meyer and Dick Ruhe to answer the question “Why don’t I do what I know I should do?” The book is written in Blanchard’s famous “fable” format and gets quickly to the heart of the problem.

In our modern world with a myriad of communication sources we are over-saturated with information on a daily basis. The TV blares out the latest news, sports and weather information. We then pick up the remote and flip over to HGTV and find out the latest home decorating techniques. A few more clicks has us on the food network with someone creating a scrumptious gourmet meal. Yet the only action most of take while sitting on the same old couch watching these shows is to eat some junk food out of a bag.

Ken talks about information overload and the fact that most people that attend his seminars and read his books never do anything with what they have learned. He has come up with some simple techniques to overcome this learning-forgetting cycle that so many of us experience.

His number one technique is to focus on just a few things, instead of being a seminar junkie and attending seminar after seminar and reading book after book. He suggests reading a book at least four times through and practicing spaced repetition. His tip to avoid information overload is learning less more, not more less. This is a book that should be required reading for learners of all types.

On a personal level, I have found that audio books give me a great preview of information and fill a usual unproductive time like driving with learning. But if I really want to take action on a subject I need to listen more than once and many times it’s necessary to pick up the written volume for reference.

Three books quickly come to mind that I’ve listened through multiple times and have picked up the corresponding printed book for reference. Here are three that have caused me to take action in the last few months…

Made To Stick by Chip & Dan Heath. This is a communicators bible. There is so much good information in this book with a simple checklist to see if your material will “Stick” in your audience’s mind. A must read for speakers, presenters, and marketers from all subject areas.

The Four Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss. If you are looking for a quick way to simplify your life and have more time to do the things you want, look no further. Tim Ferriss is the master of efficiency. He will get to the bottom of a problem and offer the quickest and most efficient solution. I was amazed at his answers to seemingly overwhelming daily problems such as e-mail overload, phone interruptions, and the crush of junk mail. Don’t end up in the Red BMW… read this book!

How To Connect In Business In 90 Seconds Or Less by Nicholas Boothman. I listened through this book for the second time on a driving trip last month. I found myself replaying different sections and doing some of the simple exercises over and over. Nick is a great speaker and this book is chocked full of great tips for communicating with people. This is one of the most practical and useful books you can buy if you are in sales, marketing, or just want to network with people.

Why not take a deliberate action today… Know… Can… Do…

Technorati Tags: Learning, Ken Blanchard

Could there actually be a difference between doing an action for one second versus five seconds? Could this tiny time period make any difference in your life? If you practice weight training this could be the secret weapon you are looking for. This small difference can turbocharge your results. Here is how it works…

When lifting a weight, instead of counting one-two up and one-two down count slowly to five up and then count slowly to five down.

This simple action causes the muscles to work harder in both directions, but the greatest results come in the five second descent. It ensures that there is a constant load throughout the exercise and that momentum is eliminated. This simple difference can reduce your overall workout time and allow you to achieve much greater results.

Author and adventurer, Tim Ferriss, used this as part of his 4 week workout routine with phenomenal results. In his amazing training experiment, Tim gained 34 pounds of muscle in just four short weeks, working out only two times a week for 30 minutes at a time. The results are greater than many people experience in 6 to 12 months of a professional fitness program with the total results coming with just four hours of actual training time.

I have modified my weekly training routine and started using the 5 second rule. Not only do I feel a much greater burn with each repetition, the overall workout can be shorter with similar results.

Try this simple tweak in your next workout and I think you’ll agree… 5 seconds does make a difference. Add in a great slow-carb diet and you will find results coming quickly. This simple technique works well with complete training programs such as Body for Life and Five Factor Fitness.

Remember… Count to five…

I ran into a post a few days ago by one of my favorite writers and adventurers, Tim Ferriss, that really opened my eyes to diet success. In the post Tim explains that he created a meal plan that limited his diet choices to a dozen items. He created similar meals over and over in a six week period. The dozen items were all low glycemic which helps keep blood sugar levels constant throughout the day. The result of his experiment with this “slow-carb” diet was a fifteen pound weight loss and an increase of ten pounds of muscle mass. The total fat loss was 25 pounds over six weeks.

His items consisted of…

Proteins:

Egg whites with one whole egg for flavor

Chicken breast or thigh

Grass-fed organic beef

Pork


Legumes:

Lentils

Black beans

Pinto beans

Vegetables:

Spinach

Asparagus

Peas

Mixed vegetables

Tim also cut out all “white” carbohydrates, drank only zero calorie beverages (water, tea, coffee, etc), and took one day off from the diet each week.

At first I thought this diet would be extremely boring and hard to stick to. I was intrigued by his success so I decided to try to stick to this for a week and see how it went. Here is what I found…

1. When I’ve tried to do any type of low carb diet I would feel extremely lethargic after a day or two. I was never able to stay on this type of diet more than three days. With the addition of the beans and legumes (slow carb items), I have found that I feel more energetic than normal without the highs and lows of most processed carbohydrates. I feel really good on this diet.

2. With the exclusion of bread and white carbohydrates I figured it would be very hard to find meals out that met the requirements of this diet. I was surprised at the variety I could create at places like Chipotle Mexican restaurants, El Pollo Loco, and Panda Express. With their bowl selections I could mix and match ingredients at will to come up with amazing creations. Black beans, pinto beans, and mixed vegetables work very well with chicken and lean beef.

3. At the end of the week, I weighed in with a three pound weight loss. I feel great and have more energy than I’ve had in a while. The meals are tasty enough that I actually look forward to eating them time after time.

4. This meal plan fits very well into my current “Body for Life,” fitness and exercise plan.

Tim Ferriss is the type of person looking for results. Pick up has amazing book, “The Four Hour Workweek,” and you’ll see what I mean. I think he has found a great diet combination here. It is simple, tasty and reasonably easy to stick to. Check out his blog post for more information.

Technorati Tags: diet, exercise, slow carb

I spend a lot of time in front of a computer and when I find something that can save me time I like to implement it into my daily schedule. One of the best things I’ve found is using hotkeys with different programs. With just a quick key combination I can do things that would require many more steps with a mouse.

Some of the hotkeys that I’ve found have really revolutionized the way I work. I use the popular Control-C for copying files and Control-V for pasting almost without thinking. These keystrokes are ingrained in my memory and they work in almost any program.

The big problem I have with hotkeys is that there are so many of them. Given the number of choices they can be hard to remember and I usually find myself searching the menus of my programs to refresh my memory. To overcome this I put my favorites on printed business cards and keep them on my desktop for quick reference.

I put the 5 most common for each program that I use regularly, so that with a little use they will lodge themselves into my long term memory.I usually have two or three under my monitor for quick reference.

Three of the ones I’ve recently discovered that have been especially helpful are…

Control-Enter in Internet Explorer or Firefox. Just put the name of the site you want to go to in the address bar of one of these browsers and hit control-enter. Viola… the browser automatically adds the http://www to the front of the name and then adds a .com to the back.  The site name plus control-enter = http://www.site.com. This save so much tedious typing and works well as long as the site you are going to is a dot-com.

Control-P in Powerpoint: Open your PowerPoint show and go to a slide that you want to expound on. Hit Control-P and the cursor turns into a pen. You can doodle and highlight things on the screen with just the flick of your mouse. Right click to change pen size, tip shape, and color. One very handy tool. Just click the ESC key to go back to your show.

Windows Key and E: This quick combination opens up Windows explorer (My computer) and is a quick and easy way to copy and move files around. I like this key combination because it opens explorer with all the folders closed which makes navigation quick and easy.

To give you a quick start remembering these popular hotkeys, I’ve put together a free download of the most popular ones in a Microsoft Word Template. Just download the file and print them out on Avery business card stock. Break them apart and keep them by your computer for quick reference. You can easily modify the template and add additional hotkeys as you discover them. You’ll soon be amazed how much time you save each day with these quick keystrokes.

Instructions for use:

• Download the Hotkey Cards Template for MS Word
• Open the template and modify as necessary
• Print out on Avery business card stock (10 Card)
• Break cards apart
• For portability, stack cards in order and clip together with mini clip
• Transport easily in pocket or purse
• Add to your Walleteer organizer

Please note these cards have been tested on WindowsXP and Microsoft Office 2003 applications. They may not work on older windows or Office versions and will probably not work on the Mac.

Technorati Tags: hotkeys, microsoft office

Write a letter, put it in an envelope and put a stamp on it. Put it in the mail. Wait a few days and amazing things can happen. Job offers come, overcharges are returned, articles are accepted, contests are won. Results that could not come any other way. The power of a simple envelope is amazing.

When you write a letter, someone on the other end will open it and read it. Unlike e-mail, a written letter is not easily deleted from the system. In todays technological world with e-mail, voice mail, and many web based apps, the written letter stands out from the crowd. Most people will not take the time to send one anymore.

You can increase the effectiveness of your letter with some customization. A high quality letter on parchment paper, sent in a linen envelope will say volumes about the sender. Just like a business suit with a power tie, a classy envelope with a powerful font and a custom postage stamp exudes style and power. You can send this Lexus of envelopes for just a few dollars, and the results can be amazing.

In the spirit of our deliberate actions series, you can send a unique letter today and find some amazing results. Here are a few ideas that come to mind to get you started.

Friends & Relatives: Grab a large colorful envelope and some crayons, markers, and colored pencils. Have the kids draw some pictures, grab some photos, and make a mini scrapbook page. Write a short letter about your family… what the kids are doing, how the vacation went, and what the future holds. Make it original, fun and upbeat. Send the letter off to grandma, the out of state relatives, or anyone else you haven’t seen in a while.

Letters To The Editor: Are you passionate about things in your community? Do you like local politics? Is there something that needs action in your town that seems to be lost in bureaucracy? Why not write a letter to the editor of your local paper? This lost art of political action can actually be very effective. Keep the letter short, to the point, and professional. Be sure to offer a solution… not just criticism. Most papers will print your letter if it meets their guidelines. Your opinion will be read by hundreds or thousands of people. One simple letter can really change things!

Resumé: When was the last time you updated your resumé? Have you thought about career advancement lately? Why not take a few hours some evening and put together a new one. Pick up a nice resumé kit and print yours out on quality paper.  A few hours spent in online research will give you some insight into the local job market. Write a short cover letter and customize it for each prospective employer. Do your homework and make sure you address it to the proper person. Send off a few and see what the response is.

Magazine articles: Do you like to write? Have you ever been published in a magazine?  Do you have specialized knowledge that others may be interested in? Why not spend a few hours over the weekend and put together an informative article for a specialty magazine. Polish it up and have a few people proof-read it for you. Send it off in a nice professional envelope with cover letter. You may be surprised to see yourself published and maybe even more surprised when the check comes in the mail. My Friend Karen Robertson has a great podcast about getting published in magazines that may help you get started.

I have personally had great results writing letters. They take a little bit of time but they are much more effective many times than an e-mail or phone call. I have had overcharges reversed, traffic tickets dismissed, and warranties fulfilled. I have received hundreds of dollars in rebate savings and even won a few prizes… all with the contents of a simple envelope.

Grab a stamp and send that envelope today.

Technorati Tags: writing, resumé, articles