Eating 75% of our capacity helps us lose weight

Dieting healthily means reducing calorie intake while avoiding meals with unbalanced nutrition. Some people think that dieting can be done by avoiding carbohydrates such as rice, breads and noodles. This is not the correct way to diet. Avoiding too many foods can result in the following:

1. Rough skin
2. No energy
3. Anemia
4. Increased susceptibility to disease

Precisely speaking, reducing food intake for a diet should mean reducing the excess foods consumed. These include the following:

1. Sweets
2. Snacking between meals
3. Eating snacks or sweets while watching TV after dinner
4. Overeating

As a beverage, we prefer having unsweetened teas or water rather than sodas or juices. Even when on a diet, it is definitely necessary to eat well balanced meal in order to get proper nutrition.

A healthy diet requires us to get a variety of nutrition and eating 70-80% of our capacity so that we don't end up overeating.

The Deadly Quartet

It is said that abdominal fat obesity can lead to high blood pressure, diabetes and hyperlipidemia (high cholesterol), also known as the deadly quartet. This will result in angina, myocardial infarction (heart attack) and stroke among other conditions which are mainly due to arteriosclerosis. Also, it is known that people in this situation are 30 times more likely to suffer from these diseases than a healthy individual.

During the time when food was more scarce, the elites were those who could accumulate more fat in their bodies in order to survive harsh food shortages. On the other hand, in this current age, most of those who can accumulate fat effectively end up building up too much unnecessary fats and will face a high risk for the deadly quartet.

DietMaster NY has just opened a lesson room

DietMaster New York Inc has just opened a lesson room on the 59^th floor in the Empire State Building. This space is for those who would like to learn the right theory and mechanism to lose weight healthily and beautifully, to prevent life style disease such as high blood pressure, diabetes, hyperlipidemia and even those who are interested in learning English and Japanese.Please feel free to contact us for a free consultation.

TEL: 212-601-2770
E-mail: us_el_master@dietacademy.jp

 View from our lesson room.

The Difference Between Diet and Weight Loss

You can lose weight by walking wearing a steam suit or using a sauna. However, these methods only work by removing water from you body and do not reduce your fat. Burning fat is different from losing water weight.

Water consists of 50-60% of our total body weight. 8-10% of our water weight is found in our blood.

Reducing water weight only leads to temporary weight loss. However, dieting burns fat. Water has zero calories and therefore you will not gain fat no matter how much water you drink. In addition, if you lose too much water weight you run the risk of dehydration. While dieting, you intake less water from food so it becomes very important to drink more water than usual.

Special recipes that help you lose weight

I sometimes see people who are eager to lose weight aggressively. They study various diet methods deeply and take pills or receive medical treatments that pumps out inner fat. As a result, they sometimes experience terrible health situations.

One weight loss method is to follow the Japanese prison meal system. While no one wants to go to prison, we cannot ignore the benefits of eating 3 balanced meals at a lower calorie count. For men it's 1500 kcal a day, and for women it's 1200 kcal a day. These figures are in line with the average basal
metabolism and do not account for calories consumed
for activities such as exercise. Because of this, most
people lose about 12 to 13 kcal after a year of prison in
Japan. However, longer than one year will start to
damage a person's health.

You may be interested in this method if you don't actually have to be put in prison. The Japan Diet Academy has DVDs and a 300 menu recipe book that offers the same dishes served in Japanese prisons which were recreated by the famous nutritionist in Japan, Dr. Asako Aramaki. Currently we have a 2 week, 14 day menu available in English.

If you are interested, please contact us for more information.

Our Natural Ability to Store Fat

Although obesity is the result of too much fat accumulating in the body, you should not give too much offense to it. Human beings have always battled hunger in its history. Even now people are battling hunger.

Our bodies were designed to survive during a shortage of food by minimizing the amount of food needed in order to cope with starvation. The body stores the food as fat in order to prepare it for periods of food shortage.

In short, gaining fat was essential to surviving hardships during human history. However, in present, wealthy countries where people can eat anything anytime, this ability works negatively.

Eating whenever we want, or eating too much leads us to obesity.

Fat is not a bad thing but if it exceeds a healthy amount, it will cause a burden to our health.

The Risks of Apple Shaped Obesity

As mentioned before, there are two types of obesity, apple shaped and pear shaped. There is a much higher risk in developing a lifestyle disease when an individual has apple shaped obesity. Through a CT scan, we can see there are also two ways someone can develop apple shaped obesity. One is through high abdominal fat, the other is through high subcutaneous fat.

It is clear that someone with high abdominal fat has a greater risk for high blood pressure, hyperlipidemia (high cholesterol) and diabetes. It is said that inner fat takes a direct effect on our organs. However, abdominal fat is easier to reduce than subcutaneous fat.

In order to reduce abdominal fat, men need to reduce their food intake to about 1500-1800 kcal and women, 1200-1500 kcal a day. Also, they will need to include about 30 minutes exercise and muscle training.

If you discover you have over 100mm (3.9in) of inner fat, you should reduce your food intake and to exercise. You should be able to reduce 1/3 of your inner fat within a month.

BMAL-1

BMAL-1 is a type of protein which is generated more at night than during the day and it is thought that BMAL-1 is closely related to why eating food late at night is stored in the body much more than food eaten during the day.

Actually, BMAL-1 is generated the most around 2am and the amount is 15-20 times as much as the amount generated at around 3pm, when production is minimal.


While more research is needed, at present it is said that BMAL-1 is what causes us to store more fat after eating late at night.

Alcohol, Beer Bellies, and the Importance of Basal Metabolism

Yomiuri newspaper, on of the major newspapers in Japan, has recently reported that the beer belly often seen on middle aged men has nothing to do with the amount of beer they drink.

A comparison of those who drink a lot of beer and those who do not revealed a lack of difference in the size of their belt lines. These results were announced in Japan yesterday at a Japanese institute for alcohol and drugs.


Drinking beer is not always the main cause of gaining fat. The main cause is a continuation of an intake of an excessive amount of calories. A good balance is generated between calorie intake and daily calorie consumption. Please note that general alcoholic drinks, such as beer, contain about 7kcal per 1g.

If you want to avoid gaining weight, you have to at least know your basal metabolism. This will help you make decisions on how much food you should eat during social situations. You will be able to make better judgements if you have the proper knowledge such as your basal metabolism.

Breaking the Chain

Yesterday I wrote about the chain reaction that contributes to overeating even when dieting. It is important to cut the chain to avoid subconscious excess eating habits. One effective method is to review your grocery shopping habits.

Review how you are storing your food, cooking and serving dishes, and dealing with leftovers and cleanup after a meal. Reviewing these actions will enable you to avoid subconscious eating habits.

When going grocery shopping, it is best to do the following:

1. Set up a schedule for when to shop for foods
2. Go shopping when you are not hungry
3. Make a list of items you need in advance
4. Avoid buying instant and pre-made foods

Such tips should help prevent impulse buying and making unnecessary purchases.

Chain Reaction

It is important to make a daily record of what you eat. This will help you identify your pattern of eating and find any activities that may cause overeating.

Situations that cause overeating become a chain reaction. If you analyze the chain carefully, you can take counter actions that can prevent the reaction from occurring altogether.

For example:

1. Keeping sweets within reach
2. Eating when you are not hungry
3. Disappointment in your inability to prevent overeating 
4. Give up dieting altogether

The point is whether or not you can cut the chain before it becomes longer. This will help you make your lifestyle one that prevents building fat.

The Lack of Nutrition Education

Japan Diet Academy offers certified qualifications to those who learn about diet methods and theory through our e-learning. Of course student must pass the final exam, but so far 99% of learners were successful in obtaining the qualifications. In average it takes about one week per course.

The certified qualifications are the Regular Diet Master and Senior Diet Master courses. Both are qualified by the NPO Japan Diet Study Institute.

Effective April, 2008, medical examinations on metabolic syndrome has been under insurance coverage by law in Japan. Although not talked about as much since the earthquakes, obesity is still a serious issue that the government is working on.

Despite the increases awareness of obesity, people still eat high calorie foods and do not exercise because of technological advancements, such at the PC and so on. Besides, the most important factor is that there are no lessons on proper nutrition. This is a serious situation. If there were such lessons, people would be more likely to pass up certain foods that cause excessive weight gain. The issue is that the Japanese government is responsible for protecting food companies.

If you think you do now want to gain weight and want to maintain a healthy condition, it is up to you to learn proper dieting methods and theories. The Japan Diet Academy gets you certified in diet knowledge.

Dangerous Diets

It is extremely dangerous for your health to reduce your calorie intake to below your basal metabolism no matter how eager you are to lose weight. Doing such will cause you to lose bone and muscle mass as well.

Taking pills that cause diarrhea put a heavy burden on your organs. There is also a risk of damaging your intestines. Also, pills that weaken the appetite or prevent fat from being absorbed should only be taken under a doctor's supervision. Individuals should not take these pills on their own, even if they are available without prescription.


Liposuction and surgeries such as stomach stapling or gastric banding are also questionable since we do not know what the effects of these treatments will be in 20-30 years.

Purposely causing an internal disease or starvation puts a heavy burden on our body. Therefor.e it is important to know the correct and healthy theory for dieting, such as the teachings of Diet Master. You lose the purpose of dieting when you create an unhealthy condition for yourself.

MONALISA

As mentioned before, MONALISA stands for Most Obesity kNown Are Low In Sympathetic Activity. Our autonomic nerve system is composed of sympathetic and parasympathetic nerves. Many obese people's sympathetic nerves work at a lower level.

When we are more active, our sympathetic nerves our also more active and we are less likely to gain weight. However, since we live in a world of convenience, we have to work harder to get enough movement. This situation causes our sympathetic nerves to become and as a result, our body uses less energy and we build up more excess energy as body fat. This is the theory behind the MONALISA hypothesis.

Please be careful and try to work more activity into your lifestyle.

What is a True Diet?

One major misconception that dieters have is that dieting is for reducing weight. For example, running a marathon of 42.195km (26mi) may cause you to lose 5-6kg (11-13lb) of weight. However, you are only reducing 330g (.73lb) of body fat. In short, you will have to run 3 full marathons in order to burn off 1kgm (2.2lb) of fat.

When we refer to weight, it includes everything such as fat, blood, water, muscles, bones, and so on. Trying to reduce your weight only by dieting will reduce body fat as well as muscle mass. Of course water will be the first factor when we see a drop in our weight. However, body fat cannot be reduced as easily. Although our weight can be reduced quickly, this is not a true diet.

The correct method for dieting is to reduce body fat without losing muscle mass. When you are losing weight, it is important to continue resistance exercises as well as when you gain weight. A true diet can only be accomplished when we combine both dieting and resistance exercises.

Denmark - The First in the World to Adopt a Fat Tax

In order to extend people’s lifespan, Denmark has adopted a fat tax effective October 1, 2011. The tax will be placed on food products that contain too much animal oil and fat, such as butter. The government decided in March to adopt this tax in order to prevent lifestyle diseases throughout the nation. This is the first tax on fatty foods in the world.

Over the past 50 years, more studies have been done on fatty acids and we have more information on how each fatty acid works in our body. Such information leads us to understand how we can intake fatty acids in healthy ways.

It is well known that saturated fatty acids contain animal oils and fats which increases our cholesterol. However, unsaturated fatty acids, such as linoleic acid which is found in vegetable oils and fats, help us reduce cholesterol. When the tax announcement was made, corn oil, soybean oil, and margarine which all include lots of linoleic acid became in stronger demand.

How can we easily tell the difference between unsaturated and saturated fatty acids?
Generally, food products that contain saturated fatty acids are solid at room temperature, like butter, while others are liquid. For a long time, it was believed that liquid oils were better for your health than solid ones. However, recent studies tell us that linoleic acid, although it helps us lower cholesterol, reduces LDL, also known as “bad” cholesterol, as well as HDL, or “good” cholesterol.

Besides this, the Hungarian government has decided to adopt a junk food tax on high calorie food products such as potato chips, snacks, and soft drinks. WHO commented as this being the second tax on food, following Denmark.

Our Stomach is Not a Trash Can

It is not good manners to have left overs. However, we cannot afford to say that while we are dieting. In fact, it is better to leave food left over in order to lose weight. Just a few extra bites may cause us to consume too many calories. For example, one dumpling has about 60 Kcal and one piece of sushi has about 40-50 Kcal.

Do not eat extra food just to clear them off the table. Your stomach is not a trash can. If you feel guilty throwing food away, pack them up and store them. Be careful, these foods may become easy foods to snack on when you feel like eating something. Try storing them in the freezer so that you can plan when to use them. Unless you are confident that you can endure your cravings, throw leftovers away.

For your information, here are the calories of a few possible leftovers:

one soft boiled egg	60Kcal
one dumpling	60Kcal
one piece of sushi	40Kcal
one bite fried noodle (yakisoba)	40Kcal
1/4 Japanese Salisbury steak (hambagu)	100Kcal
1/2 Japanese croquette (korokke)	100Kcal

For more information, visit our website or feel free to contact us.