What Contributes to Obesity: Calories or Inactivity?

Obesity is steadily becoming a more hot topic in American, which is good because there needs to be more awareness. With more discussion, comes more debate and such. Nutritionists have one opinion, personal trainers have another, and doctors even another. We’re just glad that they all agree that it is an important issue and we need to do all we can to combat it. In this video, Hungry discusses both sides of the coin: is it how many calories you eat or is it your inactivity? Or both?

In addition to talking about studies and what research suggests, we give you some tips on how to combat gaining unhealthy weight for yourself! We always love feedback so feel free to comment here or on the video! Watch this video to stay hungry and fit!

Apr222015

How to Be a Vegetarian

Often times, when people find out I’m a vegetarian, they look at me sadly like they just found out I have a terminal illness. Funny thing is that I choose to be a vegetarian. And many other people do too! Now, the transition into being a vegetarian isn’t always so heartfelt and easy. There are tons of books out there with the purpose of instructing one on how to be a vegetarian. This is going to be a much simpler guide. I’m not telling everyone to be a vegetarian, I’m just showing you how to in case you were ever curious–how to get enough nutrients in a plant-based diet. Sometimes people turn into starch-atarians when they go veggie, but fear not–there is plenty of protein when you come this way!

Apr162015

Beware the Text Neck

On Saturday, April 4th, the LA Times came out with an article called “Head’s up on ‘text neck'” in their awesome Saturday Mind & Body section. I believe this is one of many articles, studies and research journals that are to come in the future. Why are they coming our way? Because of our current lifestyle habits regarding electronics. It’s frightening to think how quickly cell phones, tablets, and such invaded our lives and started messing with our posture and behavior. It’s also frightening how much this behavior can severely damage our bodies–especially our spines.

Talk about bad posture

Mar312015

How to Take on a Challenge

October 4th, 2015. Lake Tahoe, CA. Elevation 6200-9000 feet. Spartan Ultra Beast. 26+ miles. 50+ obstacles.

I haven’t REALLY challenged myself for over 4 years. I was a slacker in high school, even though I was involved in a lot. I did it all, going through the motions, but rarely applied myself. I never studied, rarely practiced outside of class or practice, and as a result, I prevented myself from moving to the next level. College was a little different since I took on so much that it was mathematically improbable for me to be able to complete everything without trying. Still, I lost valedictorian because I didn’t care. I missed Olympic trials because I wanted to be big.

Jan162015

Healthy Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

I think I talked many times about how baking is therapy. Not shoving sugar in your face, but the act of baking itself. It’s the act of creation and producing something, I think. Also getting to work with your hands helps too. Bringing several ingredients together to make something completely different is fun and satisfying. The process consumes you so you aren’t thinking about the challenges or difficulties in your life. Also, another great byproduct is the delicious things themselves! However, we don’t want to feel guilty about eating this “invention,” we should instead enjoy them.

This recipe is based on of this one here. It’s an incredibly easy recipe that’s hard to go wrong (just make sure you measure). It doesn’t take many ingredients, in fact, if you bake often, you’ll probably have most of them in your pantry. Sometimes Hungry doesn’t like when I bake “healthy” recipes, but I’m thinking that this time he did because they didn’t last over 24 hours (and there were at least a dozen of them). Praise to healthy oatmeal raisin cookies! This recipe is a crowd pleaser without making you feel the guilt!

Stiiir it up

Dec172013

Want to Increase Your Willpower?

One of the most simplest yet most effective core exercise requires more willpower than it does strength (although that certainly helps, too). What am I talking about? The Plank, of course! When I train clients, I experience more people dropping out due to sheer loss of willpower rather than muscle fatigue. Because it’s hard to fatigue your core. Although some people do go until their muscles fail, which is something I absolutely admire. You can tell when this happens–the entire body will start to shake and they will fall on their face. Admirable. But go ahead, try a plank real quick, go as long as you can. Notice how you kind of get bored and your willpower muscle starts to fail? Let’s change that.

So I challenge you to try to do a plank every day for the rest of the year. Train your willpower (and your core), bat down your boredom and focus on strength and discipline. I believe and I know through experience that practicing the plank over and over is the true way to increasing your willpower enough to actually plank until muscle fatigue. Who’s with me?! Plank every day to stay hungry and fit!

Question of the day: Which exercise do you find you stop doing out of boredom/lack of willpower rather than muscle fatigue?

BONUS…SNAKE PIC

Dovah being silly

Nov062013

Welcome to the Family…. Dovah!

Ever since I was a little kid, I wanted a pet snake. There are few animals, if any, that I do not like. I’ve never had a fear of snakes and it’s hard for me to understand how other people do. If they are massive and/or venomous it’s easier to understand, but how can you say someone like Dovah is scary? After years of failing to convince my mother, who is petrified of snakes (not turned to stone), I finally convinced Alana.

After a hunt on Craigslist and some promises that people couldn’t keep (don’t expect anything from Craigslist), we ended up going to our local Petsmart. Petco had a baby ball python but it wasn’t quite as cute as the one at Petsmart. We bought a basic starter kit for desert reptiles, some extra caves and logs for climbing and basking, and some frozen baby mice. (Sorry everyone, I don’t enjoy feeding it but it has to be done.)

We asked if they knew what the snake’s age and gender was but they weren’t sure. They estimated him to be under a year old but since gender testing in snakes is so mean and inhumane, we decided it would be best just not to know and we took him to be a boy. Since we are going to be getting a female dog and we already have a balance of males and females in-house, we decided to keep that ratio.

We had to decide a name for our new buddy and our typical method is think of a character from something “nerdy” that fits well. For a snake, for us, that means anything related to snakes or dragons in mythology, video games, books, etc. I thought of some Japanese words and some Naruto characters, but our quest ended shortly when I suggested a unisex name that was a no-brainer.

Hi!

The Elder Scrolls video (first computer) game series moved into the mainstream this year when Skyrim was released. Most people just didn’t know about the series before this game and really no one knew about it before Morrowind was released for the PC and XBOX. However, Alana and I can both remember playing these games (Arena, Daggerfall, Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim) since we were little. There was also Battlespire, Redguard, and a bunch of mobile games as well, but these were not as good as the major releases. Let me save you from our love for the series for now (It has been a pyramid effect… with Morrowind at the top. They really screwed up with Skyrim, in my opinion… which includes over 800 hours on Morrowind and 400 on Skyrim… before January of 2012.) (Editor’s Note: also check out the soundtrack…Jeremy Soule is brilliant. I actually use his ambient music for my meditations!)

In the world of Tamriel exists the land of Skyrim, which was and is heavily populated by dragons. The native word for dragon in their tongue is dovah. What a perfect name for our little dragon. Dovah. It reminds us of a series that we have been attached to since 1994! A series that we have thousands of hours of gameplay and tens of thousands of more hours of thought. It’s a cute name but a powerful name. It was perfect. He just hasn’t learned it yet.

He likes to hug

So Dovah is a “male” ball python. He is about a year old and weighs a few pounds. Dovah is about two feet tall but you’ll always find him in his cave wrapped in a ball. He is a picky eater and usually misses the pray and ends up snipping at my thumb. We’ll work on developing his senses. Ball pythons can live for up to 30 years and can grow anywhere from 4-5 feet typically, depending on how much you feed them. We will keep him on the small side and far away from the cats. The cats would eat him now but he might have the upper hand in a few years.

I don’t want to say too much now because we don’t know very much about him and haven’t spent a ton of time together, but we will keep you updated! It might seem like a strange thought but becoming more familiar with nature and animals can help you understand new ways to use energy, and energy utilization is a great way to stay hungry and fit!

Cute lil guy

Oct282013

4 Golden Rules of Spotting in the Gym

First off, we apologize for the lack of posts recently. As you can see, the website has gotten a makeover and will continue to be tweaked and such since we’ve moved to a new platform. Thank you for your patience and loyalty!! Alrighty, on to the post.

This applies to everyone. Whether you workout alone, with others, at home, or in a gym, you should know how to properly “spot” others. What does “spotting” mean? It means helping and guiding a friend, a workout buddy, a stranger in need. When they’re lifting weight that’s heavy for them and they need that extra push or that extra set of hands to make sure that dumbbell doesn’t fall on their face (from experience, this doesn’t feel good). Let’s look over a few tips that can help:

1. Take out at least one earphone. You need to be able to listen to your workout buddy. They may not be able to talk well, they may be under some stress from heavy weights. They may be grunting something to you that’s hard to hear. You need to give them your undivided attention so that if they need that quick help, you’re there to give it to them.

hoorah

2. Keep eye contact on your buddy at all times. And I mean at all times. It could be that split second you look over at a new person doing who-knows-what that your buddy drops the dumbbell on his face. Not okay. Put in the patience and dedication to helping your partner or stranger friend and focus for the maybe 30 seconds that they are doing their set.

3. Maintain proper form. This is not only important for the person doing the exercise, but also the spotter! If I’m in the wrong position to help Chris with bench press, I might throw out my back. If I am in the wrong form for helping him in chest press, there goes my knees or my groin! It’s important to be ready before they start the exercise, to have ample control and safety over your body–whether that means crouching or kneeling down on the floor. Be ready!

Digging deep for a squat

4. Do an honest evaluation. Are you sure you can deadlift the amount of weight your friend is benching? Because that’s what it comes down to. If they completely fail, you have to be ready to deadlift that weight. This goes for everything. Is your friend putting up too much weight for you to be able to properly spot? Be honest. There should be no pride in this evaluation because it could cost both you and your friend an injury if you are foolish about this one. If I don’t think I can handle spotting some of Chris’ sets, I tell him we could find someone stronger. Do the right thing.

There are others that we could mention, but they don’t come near the importance of these four. Learn these four and you will eventually become a master spotter and a popular gal or guy at the gym. Everyone loves a good spotter! “Just one more” depends on it and, often too, so does injury prevention. Use these rules to stay hungry and fit!

BONUS KITTY PIC

Chris’ new Skyrim hat

Sep252013

College Student Fitness and Nutrition Guide

We were recently contacted by an individual who asked us to take a look at a graphic and a link you will be later in this post. It is a somewhat long but simple and comprehensive guide to basic fitness and nutrition for college students and those who live a similar lifestyle. I read the post briefly and after realizing that there was nothing wrong or harmful in its contents I decided to share it. I think it is a very useful resource for students to print out and hang up in their rooms.

During our last leg workout, beasted calves hamstrings, and jump squats!

The credit for the post is given to the site which is linked below. I will keep the woman’s name who contacted us anonymous. Here is a Hungry&Fit generally-approved article and–more importantly–graphic that individuals can use as a basic guide for creating a great regimen for college fitness and a healthy lifestyle. (It doesn’t say much about nutrition and diet.)

As the page states, “Starting out at college is a time of excitement, anticipation, and oftentimes, extreme nervousness. There are a whole host of prospects that can leave any freshman filled with anxiety, from making friends to maintaining good grades to knowing which classes to take. One of the biggest sources of anxiety for students, however, is unrelated to academics: A large percentage of students greatly fear the famous and dreaded freshman 15. The truth is, this isn’t an irrational fear: Most college students will gain between 15 and 25 pounds by the end of their sophomore year. One of the main causes of the freshman 15? Lack of exercise: Not only do the majority of college students not get the recommended amount of exercise, one in three just don’t exercise at all. To be fair, finding time for exercise in the midst of busy college life can be challenging, but there are some great ways that that particular hurdle can be side-stepped. Today’s infographic takes a look at the best ways for college students to stay fit—even in the middle of a dorm room. From cardio to strength training to flexibility, there’s a myriad of ways in which even the biggest of couch potatoes can beat the freshman 15.”

http://www.thebestcolleges.org/the-best-regimen-for-college-fitness/

That is the image and below it is the link. Credit goes to TheBestColleges.org who we enjoyed working with and look forward to working with again in the future. They originally posted it in early August of 2013. Being hungry and fit is a lifestyle so creating a solid regimen is one of the best ways to stay hungry and fit!

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BONUS KITTY PIC

Saturdays are obviously for family naps

Jul262013

How to Choose the Right Dentist for Your Kids

Having the right dentist for your children is important. Choosing a dentist for your child is like choosing a doctor; taking the time to research your options to decide on a specialist is the best way to make sure everybody has a good experience.

If your child is reaching the age where it’s time to start seeing the dentist regularly, or you’ve moved to a new area and find a new dentist for your kids, you likely understand how stressful it can be finding a new dentist. It isn’t a process to be rushed, however, because if you don’t get the right dentist for your child, there could be problems down the road. Check out these tips on how you can find a good dentist for your kids.

Ask for Recommendations

One of the best ways to find a dentist for your kids is to ask friends and family for recommendations. You likely have some family friends with kids that are going to the dentist, so asking them which dentist they go to and whether they like the services is a good way to find a dentist.

If you’re moving to a new city, you can ask your current dentist for recommendations or referrals to a new dentist. Even if you’re moving to some far away city like Olathe, your dentist might have a recommendation for a Kansas City cosmetic dentist that he or she knows through conferences or conventions. If you like your child’s current dentist, this can be a great way to find a new dentist because you’ll be getting a valued opinion on a new dentist.

Find Out Policies

If your child has trouble going to the dentist, you likely know the nightmare that it can be whenever a checkup is required. Before settling on a dentist, check out certain policies that relate to your situation to see if the dentist is a good fit for you and your child. For example, if your child is too scared to sit in the chair by his or her self, see if you’ll be allowed to go back there to hold hands. Some dentists might have a policy against parents doing this, which is why it’s important to check policies before making a decision.

On the flip side, some dentists might require the parents to be in the back room. Whatever the situation is, make sure you double check the relevant policies so you can find a dentist that fits your and your child’s needs.

Check the Accreditation

This should be a no-brainer for parents searching for a dentist for their kids, but sometimes it’s often overlooked. Check to see if the potential dentist you’re considering is accredited with the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry. This is the most respected accreditation for child dentists, so make sure that the dentist has this accreditation before agreeing to any sort of agreement. All it takes is a simple question to find out if the dentist is accredited.