New Year Resolutions = Failure; Concise Goals = Success

With the new year upon us now, and everyone making their new year resolutions, the gyms are once again packed to the gills with people trying to lose weight and get in better shape. The sad thing is that the vast majority of people will give up on this resolution by as early as February without having accomplished anything.

Here's my opinion on resolutions…I say forget about the resolutions for good! For one, they are usually too vague and have no time-line laid out for success. For example, normally a person may make a vague, non-specific new year resolution such as "I want to lose weight" or "I want to improve my bench press" or "I will finally get in better shape".

Instead of these vague resolutions with no time line, decide on a lazer-targeted GOAL with a specific time period and write it down. Make sure it is realistic, but still will be a great accomplishment. Then write down the steps you are going to take to achieve that targeted goal. Come up with a specific plan for success.

For example, here are better examples of targeted goals that people might make:

"I will lose 12 lbs in the next 2 months"
"I will add 30 lbs to my deadlift in the next 6 weeks"
"I will increase my pullups from 6 to 12 in the next 6 weeks"
"I will lose 1-inch from my waist in the next month"
"I will learn to perform a butt-to-ground one-legged squat in the next 2 weeks"

Notice how all of these examples are very precise goals with a specific time-line for success. Also, since you have written the specific goal down and written down the plan you will take to accomplish the goal, you are much more likely to be successful. Keep the written goal and plan somewhere that you will see it on a daily basis. This is very motivating and sets most people up for success, because nobody wants to fail at a goal that they've formalized in writing. It's like a little personal challenge that you are determined not to fail.

Here are a couple examples of how I used these goal setting techniques to achieve various fitness goals for myself in recent years:

Example #1: About a year ago, I decided that I wanted to deadlift 405 lbs (4 wheels on each side of the bar). At the time, I was about 25 lbs shy of that goal, so I set a goal and a detailed plan to be able to increase from 380 to 405 in 5 weeks (as that's what I thought was a realistic time frame). I don't want to go into the full details, but basically I used a staggered progression instead of a linear progression for a 3x per week routine…and voila! I had successfully worked up to the 405 goal that I set for myself!

Example #2: This one was a semi-failure, kind of…read on. About 3 months ago, I had decided to throw handstand pushups back into my routine. I hadn't done them in a long time and could only get about 5 reps at first. I decided that 12 consecutive reps was my goal and laid out a plan to increase to a dozen by 4 weeks. By the beginning of the 4th week, my plan was working wonders and I was up to 11 reps per set. Now here's how I ended up failing to reach the goal. I tried to go for the 12 too early and ended up straining a muscle in my upper back. In hindsight, I should have listened to my body and realized that I needed another week, but I went for it too early and got hurt. So the plan was working, but I had a little snag that stopped me just 1 rep short of my goal. Oh well, I'll definitely get it next time!

Hopefully this article has given you ideas on how to make precise targeted goals as opposed to vague resolutions. Now go ahead and decide what you want and go for it! Make it realistic, but still a challenging achievement that will excite you. If your goal has anything to do with losing body fat around the midsection and developing a more defined body, a fully comprehensive plan is already laid out in the

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Nitric Oxide Supplements Review

Nitric Oxide (NO) is a gas that that is important to a broad range of bodily functions including controlling blood circulation and helping to regulate activities of the brain, lungs, kidneys, stomach and plenty more. For the most part it facilitates communications among cells. For bodybuilders, the most interesting process in which NO is involved is the dilation of blood vessels. This is known as vasodilation and that is exactly why you should be interested in NO and what it can do to improve your performance.

Vasodilation refers to an increase in the flow of blood through the body, which means faster and more efficient delivery of nutrients like amino acids, creatine, glucose, and oxygen to the muscle fibers. This helps your muscles to grow bigger and recover faster while facilitating the removal of waste products like lactic acid and CO2 that can decrease performance. Greater blood flow also enhances the delivery of anabolic hormones like testosterone, growth hormone and insulin-like growth factor-I, all of which are important for muscle growth. Other benefits of increased blood flow include reduced inflammation and a bigger and longer-lasting "pump," too.

In our bodies NO is synthesized by L-arginine by an enzyme called nitric oxide synthase (eNOS). This catalyzes the conversion of L-arginine to nitric oxide and citrulline. Under normal conditions our bodies produce it only in very small amounts-enough to do what needs to be done and that's it. Production of NO is increased during exercise but not necessarily to the degree that we'd like to see. Some of the numerous benefits of boosting our bodies' output of nitric oxide include:

Numerous studies such as one conducted at the University of Texas, have shown that supplements can boost the body's production of nitric oxide more than just exercise alone. Another study published in the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology showed that a pre-workout stack of L-arginine combined with citrulline can boost measurably boost nitric oxide levels. Their research showed that the combination of the two supplements increased nitric oxide levels more than either supplement taken alone.

There are a lot of different

NO-boosting supplements on the market. Knowing what was discovered in the British study though, in looking for supplements to boost your NO output, you might want to look for one that contains not only L-arginine but citrulline as well. There are other ways to up your body's NO production as well including:

You should also know about a possible side effect. Specific dosing guidelines have not been established so don't go too overboard supplementing with L-arginine because you might just wind up with a case of diarrhea. It's not very common but it does happen. If you're supplementing with L-arginine you should start with a low dosage to understand your body's tolerances and see if you have any side effects. Increase your dosage until you achieve the optimal balance of maximum benefits/no side effects. Also, remember to consider other supplements that your might be taking because many of them are fortified with amino acids including arginine.

Most of the heavy duty research into the science of muscle growth is relatively new with the majority of the really interesting stuff just happening in the last 10-15 years. The point being that research into the benefits of NO is just really starting to gain ground. I have no doubt that in the next few years we'll be hearing a lot more about what this amazing molecule can do-not just for the muscles but for the entire body.

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Photoshop Fast Track for Newbies

Photoshop Fast Track for Newbies is a set of videos, which demonstrate the many features of Photoshop.

 The tutorials demonstrate Photoshop as well as newer versions that have been integrated with Creative Suite (CS) products, from CS2 to CS4.

The video tutorials include:
- The Workspace
- Selections
- Painting and Drawing
- Resizing Images
- Image and Color Modes
- Layers
- Creating Text
- Layer Styles and Effects
- Photo Retouching
- Saving Images
- Tips and Tricks… "Removing Red Eye"
- Tips and Tricks… "Photo Merging"
- Tips and Tricks… "Lighting Effects"
- Tips and Tricks… "Photo Framing"

Additional videos for CS2 updates:
- Adobe Bridge
- Image Warp
- Layers: Refined
- Lens Correction
- Red Eye Tool
- Smart Objects
- Spot Healing

Additional videos for CS3 updates:
- Auto Align
- Auto Blend
- Black and White
- New Blend Modes
- Brightness and Contrast
- Bridge CS3
- Clone Source
- Curves
- Interface
- Photomerge
- Quick Select Tool
- Refine Edges
- Smart Filters

Additional videos for CS4 updates:
- Adjustments Panel
- Bridge 3
- Content Aware Scaling
- Dodge and Burn
- Drag and Drop in Tabs
- Extending DOF
- Masks Panel
- Panels in CS4
- Tabbed Interface
- Target Adjustment Tool
- Web and PDF

Also included are several bonuses:
- Ecover Magic (Adobe Action Scripts): Action scripts to create ecovers for eBooks, software boxes, CDs, DVDs, membership cards and many more. The scripts work with Adobe Photoshop version 6.0 or higher.

- A Guide to Digital Photography: An eBook, which covers the basics of digital photography,

- The Handy Color Schemer: An easy-to-use software that helps users choose coordinating colors for websites, logos, images, and others.

- Picture Gallery Maker: A software that enables the user to create web pages with pictures galleries on them. It's simple to use and includes six templates, although users can also create their own templates.

- Bonus articles on Photoshop, design, and other related topics: A total of 86 bonus articles are included. The articles cover various topics of interest to designers and digital photographers.

- Unadvertised Bonus: As a special bonus, buyers of "Photoshop Fast Track for Newbies" will also get 109 additional video tutorials. These include: 27 tutorials with additional training in Adobe Photoshop CS; 20 tutorials on Photoshop CS2; 37 tutorials on Photoshop Elements; 10 tutorials on maximizing your digital camera; and, 15 tutorials about ImageReady CS.

Product Details:

The videos are in digital format (Flash and Shockwave) and can be either viewed online or downloaded into the customer's hard drive.

Format:

Digital video, compatible with both PC and Mac
PDF transcripts of the tutorials

Thoughts on the Product:

Video is the best way to learn how to use software, in particular, a graphic editing software such as Photoshop. The tutorials begin with the most basic topic (e.g., "The Workspace"), and progress to the most complicated (e.g., "Lighting Effects" for the Fast-Track set).

Each tutorial is only a few minutes long. The presentor is clear and demonstrates each step of the process. Learning is fast and easy when you can see the results of each step right away!

The best way to go through the videos is to have your own copy of Photoshop open at the same time, pause the video, do the same step yourself, and see if you achieve the same results.

Even the most uninitiated Photoshop user should be able to follow along without difficulty. Finally, the PDF transcripts come in handy for quick reviews of the lessons.

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Photoshop Video Tutorials Reveal Great Photo Editing Techniques

Adobe Photoshop is an incredibly powerful program this can do some pretty amazing things. There are a variety of tools included that allow you to turn any ordinary photo into an incredible image. And the most important thing is that you will have so much fun with this program that time will fly by. Before you know it the simple task of removing a zit will turn into transforming the background into the Taj Mahal and the subject a crowd of clones.

One of the most popular tools is the smudge tool that allows you to quickly and easily erase wrinkles, pimples, scars, zits. etc. Photoshop has found the fountain of youth and the people in your photos will look years younger. You can also remove the shine from oily faces, improve skin tone, and remove additional weight, turning everyone into super models.

One of the most common problems with photos is the phenomenon known as "red eye" and regardless of how advanced your camera is or how great your skill as a photographer it is difficult to avoid this problem. Red eye is caused by light reflecting back from the pupil of the subjects eye once the flash is reflected. Even though you can find cameras that have advanced flash settings that claims to conquer the red eye occurrence, there is really no 100 percent guarantee to remove it. Photoshop has a red eye tool built in, so with a click of the mouse you can easily and quickly rid yourself of one of the most common reasons photos are discarded. In fact, you can even remove the red eyes even those of your pet car or dog.

There are a variety of other tools that allow you to clean up your photos, including fixing lighting problems. The brightness and contrast tool, color enhancing tools, and sharpening and blurring tool make the process of editing photos quick and easy. Shadows can often cover your subjects faces, again ruining your photos. Photoshop will help you brighten up the photos simply by using the sliders on the brightness and contrast tool. Also, it can bring out the vibrant colors of a particular photo. Shaking hands can create blurred images however with a few clicks using the sharpening tools you can easily straighten items out and give you amazing results.

Another, often unavoidable, flaw in photos is the appearance of strangers or other objects in the background that distract the viewer from focusing on the subject. Sometimes you might even find that a stranger has actually posed for the photo but don't realize it until its too late and you can't retake the picture. Using Photoshop, you can crop elements out of the picture. Regardless of whether it's a stray dog, an airplane going across the sky, or a complete stranger ruining the great moment, you can easily cut them out of the picture and fix the portion where you edited out the element as if nothing was there before.

Feeling creative? Using Adobe Photoshop you can give in to your artistic desires. Change colored photos to black and white or make them look as if they were taken 60 years ago by applying a sepia effect. Turn a photo into a water color or pencil sketch. All that is takes is a good imagination.

Take your skills to the next level and swap out your background. Always wanted to be in Paris? Paste a photo of yourself onto a layer that has an image of the Eiffel Tower on it.

These are only a few things you can do with this program. Regardless of your photography skills you easily create professional quality images with this powerful program, and by viewing Photoshop video tutorials.

Master Adobe Photoshop In Just 2 Hours With Breakthrough, Photoshop Video Tutorials  - Guaranteed (Even If You're A Total Newbie)!

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Realistic Pencil Portrait Mastery Review – Pros And Cons

Christopher Sia is the creator of the Realistic Pencil Portrait Mastery Home Study Course.

He is a teacher and he taught hundreds of students to draw pencil portraits from beginner to advanced level and has helped his students to achieve their dreams of becoming masters in pencil portrait drawing.

Realistic Pencil Portrait Mastery Review – What Exactly Is This Course?

Christopher Sia has certainly put in tons of effort in putting together what I call the "Complete Pencil Portrait Drawing Package". It consists of 5 drawing lessons in PDF format with a total of 208 pages, 605 of illustrations and images – to guide you step-by-step with detailed descriptions through the entire home-study course.

I think that the step-by-step guide in the home-study course is really useful because it isn't just another pencil portrait drawing guide that you normally see online.

Most of the other pencil portrait drawing books and courses that could be found online have beautiful completed illustrations with lots of descriptions with the expectation of you being able to learn from such way. However, my thought is that providing a step-by-step tutorial is the best and most effective way of learning, rather than figuring out how to draw each part based on the reference completed picture.

The big question is, while there are so many drawing books and courses available on the internet today, is Realistic Pencil Portrait Mastery really worth the money?

To answer this question and to find if this course is really for you, let's talk about some of the pros and cons of this course.

Realistic Pencil Portrait Mastery Review – The Pros and Cons

The Pros:

Realistic Pencil Portrait Mastery Home Study Course is designed for anyone who wants to create realistic pencil portraits on the "real master level" that most artists in the world rarely reach, the quick and easy way.

In my opinion, it doesn't matter at all if you're a beginner who has never done any pencil portrait drawing before. This course is definitely the easiest way to start creating stunning pencil portraits.

Unlike any other drawing books and courses that need tons of drawing materials to get started, you only need 2H, 2B, and 5B wood cased pencils which you can get them easily in your local art or stationary stores.

Another thing worthwhile to mention is that they offer a 60 day money back guarantee. This means you get to try the entire home-study course WITHOUT anyrisk for 60 days. If you don't like it for any reason, just send an email to them and they will simply give you a full refund.

Other than that, you get free updates as a subscriber to their mailing list which ensures that there is a constant stream of content which compliments the course more.

The Cons:

I feel that the member area have pretty large downloads and certain files may take you longer time to complete the downloads due to their sizes with lots of illustrations. In addition, the home-study course is currently only available via instant download without any shipping of physical products.

However, it is understandable there will be no risk of product damage as these are downloadable digital files

Conclusions:

Overall, there is no doubt that Realistic Pencil Portrait Mastery is regarded as one of the best valued pencil portrait drawing course available on the internet.

I haven't seen any pencil portrait drawing book and course provided with such learning materials available at such a low price.

All in all, this is a great home-study course to move to the next whole new "real master level" of pencil portrait drawing.

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Review Of Jeff Anderson’s Combat The Fat Program

If you've ever been in the military then Jeff Anderson's Combat the Fat (CTF) program will bring back memories of basic training. Even if you haven't been a member of the military, then you'll at least get a bit of insight into the fitness training style of the military and if you follow the program, you'll reap some of the same benefits.

Jeff presents CTF a way of life based on his experiences in the military. He presents it though in a way that makes it accessible and doable for anyone, regardless of their current fitness level-it's not just a program for experienced fitness buffs or ex-military guys. He relies heavily on the use of military strategies and tactics to keep you motivated and striving to hit your goals-and that's a good thing. There are too many "warm and fuzzy" (and useless) programs out there.

Jeff begins by asking you to read the entire book thoroughly before begging the program. Next, he reiterates the fact (that no one wants to believe) that there is no magic bullet for achieving fat loss. It takes structure, discipline and persistence to not just get rid of excess fat but to keep it off.

Next, he launches into the heart of the program. CTF is based on the premise that there are 8 metabolic factors involved in getting rid of excess fat. Ignore just one of them and you won't get the results you want. The 8 factors include:

Mission planning:

Setting goals and creating your own personalized plan of attack to get rid of the fat is the heart of this factor. Without a detailed plan of where you want to be and how you're going to get there, you're doomed to failure;

Stop dieting:

In case you haven't figured it out by now, trendy diets don't work. This section talks about getting the proper balance of lean proteins, complex carbohydrates and healthy fats;

Chemical warfare:

In this section Jeff talks about the importance of avoiding artificially-fortified and foods and vegetables treated with pesticides. Here, Jeff also talks about strategies for eliminating toxins from your diet, maintaining proper Ph and more;

Nutritional fire power:

CTF includes its own 46-page nutrition guide that provides a detailed plan for adopting healthy eating habits. This section is truly awesome and very well done;

Fat-blasting hormones:

In this section Jeff talks about ways to ramp up the body's own fat-burning hormones and keeping the endocrine system in tip-top shape;

Maximum metabolism:

This section covers boosting your body's metabolism to achieve greater fat loss. This section is particularly well done;

Military "PT":

In this section Jeff talks about exercising the military way, providing practical, real-world ways of incorporating these strategies into your training routine; and

Killer instinct:

This last section covers how have and maintain the proper mindset to achieve your fitness goals.

Overall, I'd say that CTF looks like an excellent, no-nonsense program that can really help you to achieve the results you want. If you're looking for a warm fuzzy program that gently nudges you along with positive reinforcement though, you might want to look elsewhere. Jeff's got a no holds barred, in-your-face style that challenges you to achieve your fitness goals without mincing any words.

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QUICK NUTRITION QUIZ – How do Your Breakfast and Lunch Food Choices Stand Up to the Test?

Which is a healthier meal choice for breakfast?

Meal #1: a low-fat blueberry muffin and an orange juice
Meal #2: a cheese and veggie omelet with chicken sausage and a half of a grapefruit

Meal #2 is the winner by a landslide!

First of all, Meal #1 is about 95% carbohydrates; and quick digesting, insulin spiking carbs at that. Now don't get me wrong, I have nothing against carbs in general, and I have a whole lot against all of the extreme low-carb fad diets that eliminate entire food groups.

Meal #1 is bad because you need to strike a much better balance of carbs, protein, and fats.  And there is NOTHING remotely healthy about a low-fat blueberry muffin!  Usually, they are made mostly of sugar and refined wheat flour (which breaks down just as fast as sugar in your body).  It's just junk food labeled as "low fat".  And low-fat doesn't mean healthy.

Meal #1 will be sure to promote fat storage via the insulin surge you would get from this meal, and would also leave you starving again about an hour later.

Meal #2, on the other hand, provides a huge diversity of vitamins, minerals, and trace nutrients, as well as an excellent balance of quality protein, healthy carbs, and necessary fats to keep your appetite satisfied and body and mind functioning properly.  Also, don't forget that whole eggs are healthier than egg whites!

Which is a healthier meal choice for lunch?

Meal #1: a tossed salad with breaded chicken breast
Meal #2: a roast beef and swiss sandwich with tomato on whole grain bread

At first glance, it might seem to be a toss up. The seemingly healthy word "salad" might even fool you into believing that meal #1 is healthier. Well, meal #2 is the easy winner here. Why?

Well, because of the word "breaded" in front of the chicken breast in meal #1. "Breaded" almost always means deep fried in deadly artery clogging, belly fattening hydrogenated oils (trans fats), which have been implicated recently as THE main culprit in heart disease and many other degenerative diseases. Unless the breaded chicken specifically says "baked" or you baked it yourself, you can guarantee that it is deep fried in nasty hydrogenated oils.

If you understood the full story about what these artificially produced industrial trans fats do to you internally, you would never even be able to take another bite of something deep fried.

On the other hand, meal #2 is made up of mostly wholesome nourishing real food – real meat, real cheese, real tomato, real grains; no industrially produced oil artificially altered under high heat, high pressure, flushed with hexane solvents, deodorants, and bleaching chemicals like the oil that is soaked into that breaded chicken breast.

The only areas for improvement on Meal #2 is if you can find grass-fed beef and use sprouted grain bread.  Sprouted grain breads have some nutritional benefits over just plain "whole grain" breads.  Also beware of whole grain breads that aren't 100% whole grain.  Some companies label their bread whole grain, but the first ingredient might still be refined wheat flour (which is a no-no if you want to lose fat).

I hope you enjoyed these quizzes and hopefully they will help you to make more informed and healthier food decisions.

For more detailed information on meal balancing, the insulin process, healthy fats, healthy carbs, problems with trans fats, and other nutritional strategies that will make you lean and mean, grab a copy of my internationally best-selling book The Truth About Six Pack Abs. Click here for Truth about Abs reader reviews

Source 4 Foods Never To Eat