Cold Showers:
     You Ever notice whenever someone is trying to clear there thoughts when waking up in the morning they splash there face with cool water. Well it turns out that a Cold shower is a great way to start your day with the added benefit of boosting your metabolism & increasing your circulation. Cool on the inside clean on the outside, its all about your Hygiene, jump starting your circulation, & lets face it when your clean your more relaxed & confident about your self.

Eating to Live:
     As complex an wonderful as your body is, it's still an engine & it needs fuel. Science has proven that you should never really go more then 5 hours without eating unless you sleeping. You should never really skip meals if you can help it. skipping meals slows down your metabolism an in turn lowers your ability to burn calories slowing weight loss. So if your watching your weight (or ignoring it hoping it will go away on its own) get on a eating schedule & stick to it.

      Also start your day with a good breakfast to give the old metabolism a kick start. As the saying goes, its the most important meal of the day... & it dictates how much energy you will have overall. Also know that its not necessarily how much you eat as much as what you eat. Every meal you eat should consist of Lean Protein for example: egg whites or skinless chicken. the goal is to get about 25 to 30 percent of your daily food intake. Studies show that this will give you a consistent boost throughout the day. Even while your grinding levels away on the ole PC. Other tips include eating Complex Carbohydrates Like wheat bread instead of white, oatmeal over sugary cereals. Preparing your food with Black Pepper, Ginger or Red Chile Pepper gives almost any food a small buff to burn more calories immediately after consumption. & we MMo players love our buffs.

Aerobic Exercise
     I know, I know hitting you with the E word is like cross's an garlic to a vampire. But nothing will help boost you metabolism more then short burst of exercise. I don't care if its a game on the Wii, walking around the block, or a quick session of Dance Dance Revolution. Get Moving my Botha's & Siestas'. if nothing but for a few minutes at a time. You will feel better, your circulation will improve, your stamina will increase. & a lot of the aches & pains that have slowly crept up on you after years of gaming will be reduced or disappear completely.

Weight Lifting
     If for some reason your still here after my aerobic rant, this may be the one that breaks you & send you running from the room. (at which point the Aerobic mission would be complete lol) But seriously ... You need to try an get some sort of free weight or resistance training into your daily routine. Nothing ridiculous it could be as small as a couple of 5 pound dumbbells that sit on your desk. By using small weights with short reps in your daily routine you will effectively boost your metabolic rate, increase calorie burn an, increase the efficiency of everything on this list by as much a 15%. Its one of the better things you can do for your self, your body, & mind. Its also one of the few things that you can do that once you start can become as addictive as the games we play.

Fidgeting (if you just skipped down to this one go back an read the rest lol)
     I will continue to pound this one rule over an over again... Get Moving. Our Metabolism slow down 5% for each decade after 40 (or 35 if you play World of Warcraft cause I know you haven't moved in 5 years) to counter this one of the best things to do is to just move more throughout the day. Shake a leg, wiggle your fingers, stretch your toes. Every little moment increases circulation & an stretches your muscles. We are not designed to sit still, its not in our nature or physical make up. A Sedentary lifestyle is not something that comes naturally its something we have trained ourselves to do. And its up to us to un-train this unhealthy an dangerous habit.

Thank you for reading this!
      In writing pieces like this, my intentions is to help with you things that I have learned over time, but in turn It also helps save me. These are small steps to get you started, its up to you to decide what works for your life an build on it. Trust me when i tell you I struggle with my weight an the mirror every day. I'm uniquely qualified to write something like this cause I live with the struggle of being a big person & know what its like. I also know I love gaming & it wouldn't be the same if one of you were lost. That's why I added this section to my site. I would like to share my experiences to help someone, everyone, stay in the game a little longer. This is the first of what I hope to be many more articles. They will sometime step on toes, they will sometime get personal, they will even cast a light on the dark corners that we don't always feel comfortable talking about. But they will always attempt to enlighten an convey a sense that you are not alone. They will always attempt to impart truth. They won't always be politically correct but they will always be from the heart. Be Strong, Play Hard, but more importantly Get Educated Daily.  Robert Wiggins Aug 2010