Optimum nutrition is considered to be a revolution in health care. When you fuel your body with optimum nutrition, you are giving yourself the best possible intake of nutrients to enable your body to function and be as healthy as possible. The nutrition is what helps your body perform all sorts of basic functions…detoxification, strengthens your immune system, provides natural antioxidants, and provides digestive enzymes…to name a few.Preventing or reversing disease-states is but one more function of optimum nutrition. Science is showing us every day that nutritional deficiency is contributing largely, if not actually causing, illness and disease in our bodies. But optimum nutrition is about more than just keeping disease and illness at bay. It is about living optimally, where we have room to stretch our physical, mental, and spiritual “muscles” to the full, without overstepping the threshold at which cellular health in any of the systems of the body becomes threatened.Your nutritional goal should be to give yourself the best possible intake of nutrients to enable your body to function and be as healthy as possible. Optimum nutrition consists of eating the right amounts of nutrients on a proper schedule to achieve the best performance and the longest possible lifetime in good health. When you are providing the proper balance of nutrients to your body, your daily diet will consist of the right quantities of protein, fat, carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals, and fiber to maintain a healthy body and to sustain the desired level of activity for the best quality of life.Apart from being essential to general good health, optimum nutrition is so fundamental and powerful that it can speed healing and improve weight, energy, immune functions, sleep, mental acuity, feelings, attitude and just about any aspect of your being. It is a state of profound physical, mental and emotional well-being. Optimum nutrition is within all of our grasps; it starts with a commitment to a lifestyle.HEALTHHealth is not merely the absence of pain or tension, but it is a joy in living; a real appreciation of what it is to have a healthy body with which to experience the many pleasures of this world. While it may sound simple…this isn’t an easy task.Because of the nature of processed food and depleted soils, most nutritional experts believe that the current diet provides enough vitamins and minerals for survival, but not for optimal health. Minimizing the intake of processed foods is essential for restoring your digestive health.Many health benefits are due to another group of health-promoting nutrients called phytochemicals, which are found in fresh, raw fruits and vegetables. Now, that’s coming back to the basics. Yet many people continue to be surprised that something as simple as coming back to basic nutrition, balancing your diet, and keeping healthy can go a long way to relieving daily aggravations such as skin problems, slowing down signs of aging, and keeping you looking better year after year.QUALITYSo, the fact is that food is not only vital fuel, but also fundamental “medicine”…and it is vital that we pay attention to the quality and quantity of fuel that we feed our bodies. Optimum nutrition helps the body to cleanse and repair itself, restore energy levels, rebalance hormones, the blood sugar level, brain chemicals, and generally improve one’s quality of life. The quality and balance of our food intake is therefore a key factor in determining our overall health.In whole foods, you will find the greatest concentration of quality nutrition per calorie of intake. Research has shown that optimum nutrition is achieved through the eating of a variety of natural foods that are packed with vitamins and minerals. It is about finding the foods and nutrients that will help you achieve better health and vitality, and avoiding those that may not suit you. Once optimum nutrition is in place, you can look forward to a consistent high level of energy, emotional balance, alertness, physical fitness, resilience against infectious diseases, and longevity.SUMMARYIn short, optimum nutrition is about providing the body cells and tissues with the vitamins and minerals they require to function to their best ability. I am now completely convinced that the concept of optimum nutrition is the greatest step forward in “medicine” for over a century, no less important than Louis Pasteur’s discovery of disease-causing germs or the discovery of genes. If this lifestyle of optimum nutrition is applied from an early age, it is likely to be your best guarantee for a long and healthy life.You should, of course, consult with your health care professional before starting any diet, exercise, or supplementation program. The information provided in this article is for informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for advice from your health care provider. Just make sure that you do your own health research as well…it will be a learning experience for which your body will thank you with improved health if you diligently fuel it with optimum nutrition on a daily basis.
Skin Care Tips For Healthy Skin Rejuvenation – And Not a Skin Care Product in Sight
Healthy skin care for beautiful skin is all about taking care of your skin from the inside. It’s less about what skin care products you put on your skin and more about what you do to keep it healthy. Healthy skin will always be beautiful skin.Ten per cent of skin ageing is intrinsic, being dependent on your genes. Look at your parents: how has their skin fared as they’ve got older? They are a good indicator of how you might expect your skin to age. Eventually everyone looks older, but some age sooner than others.Other factors – extrinsic, or lifestyle, factors – such as smoking, stress, bad diet and the weather can literally leave their mark in the form of lines, sags and wrinkles. The good news, though, is that you can take charge and choose which ones are going to affect your skin’s ageing by being careful about exposing yourself to the sun, never smoking, sleeping well, eating healthily and avoiding toxins and pollutants.Skin Care Tips 1 – Protect Skin From The SunUp to 80 per cent of premature ageing is caused by overexposure to the sun’s harmful ultraviolet rays: a completely preventable source of ageing. Sun damage causes collagen and elastin to degenerate, as a result of which the skin sags and takes on a leathery appearance and texture, age spots develop and coarse wrinkles and broken blood vessels appear on the skin’s surface.Sun damage over the years can develop into skin cancer, which may stay invisible for 20 years or more. For all these reasons it is vital that you protect your skin, especially the skin on your face, with a sunscreen containing a minimum sun protection factor of 15 (SPF15). (Note that, because of the way in which sunscreen works, it is never necessary to use a higher factor than SPF30, whatever the conditions.)Skin Care Tips 2 – Stop SmokingAs well as polluting your body with thousands of toxins, smoking takes its toll on the skin. As a result, smokers age badly. Smoking promotes the formation of free radicals in the body, which affect skin renewal at a cellular level, as well as restricting the circulation to many areas of the body, thereby starving the skin of the vital oxygen and nutrients it needs for a healthy complexion.Many smokers develop lines that run from their mouth to their nose and have hollow cheeks from the inhaling motion. If that’s not enough to put you off smoking, the fact that it also discolors the skin, hair and nails might be.Skin Care Tips 3 – Steer Clear Of ToxinsToxins found in polluted air, drugs, pesticides, food and food additives, and chemicals are eliminated from the body by the liver, kidneys and lymph system. Good skin depends on healthy blood getting to the dermis and filtering the toxic waste away. An insufficient blood supply or blood high in toxins or accumulated waste under-nourishes and overloads our systems. The skin then becomes a dumping ground for excess unfiltered toxins, which produce free radicals. As a result of toxic overload, we often see deep furrows between the eyes and puffy under-eye bags. But the solution lies in your hands: steer clear of toxins in the first place, boost your circulation and detoxify your body.Skin Care Tips 4 – Get A Good Night’s SleepWe need beauty sleep so that our faces and bodies can relax and de-stress. Go to bed with a clean face for eight hours’ sleep to give your skin cells the chance to regenerate. A lack of refreshing sleep or any kind of sleep deprivation shows itself as saggy eyelids, bags under the eyes and dark under-eye circles, along with a pallid complexion. Keep your bedroom well ventilated and not too dry, otherwise your skin’s moisture will evaporate during the night, giving you dry skin.
Alternative Financing Vs. Venture Capital: Which Option Is Best for Boosting Working Capital?
There are several potential financing options available to cash-strapped businesses that need a healthy dose of working capital. A bank loan or line of credit is often the first option that owners think of – and for businesses that qualify, this may be the best option.
In today’s uncertain business, economic and regulatory environment, qualifying for a bank loan can be difficult – especially for start-up companies and those that have experienced any type of financial difficulty. Sometimes, owners of businesses that don’t qualify for a bank loan decide that seeking venture capital or bringing on equity investors are other viable options.
But are they really? While there are some potential benefits to bringing venture capital and so-called “angel” investors into your business, there are drawbacks as well. Unfortunately, owners sometimes don’t think about these drawbacks until the ink has dried on a contract with a venture capitalist or angel investor – and it’s too late to back out of the deal.
Different Types of Financing
One problem with bringing in equity investors to help provide a working capital boost is that working capital and equity are really two different types of financing.
Working capital – or the money that is used to pay business expenses incurred during the time lag until cash from sales (or accounts receivable) is collected – is short-term in nature, so it should be financed via a short-term financing tool. Equity, however, should generally be used to finance rapid growth, business expansion, acquisitions or the purchase of long-term assets, which are defined as assets that are repaid over more than one 12-month business cycle.
But the biggest drawback to bringing equity investors into your business is a potential loss of control. When you sell equity (or shares) in your business to venture capitalists or angels, you are giving up a percentage of ownership in your business, and you may be doing so at an inopportune time. With this dilution of ownership most often comes a loss of control over some or all of the most important business decisions that must be made.
Sometimes, owners are enticed to sell equity by the fact that there is little (if any) out-of-pocket expense. Unlike debt financing, you don’t usually pay interest with equity financing. The equity investor gains its return via the ownership stake gained in your business. But the long-term “cost” of selling equity is always much higher than the short-term cost of debt, in terms of both actual cash cost as well as soft costs like the loss of control and stewardship of your company and the potential future value of the ownership shares that are sold.
Alternative Financing Solutions
But what if your business needs working capital and you don’t qualify for a bank loan or line of credit? Alternative financing solutions are often appropriate for injecting working capital into businesses in this situation. Three of the most common types of alternative financing used by such businesses are:
1. Full-Service Factoring – Businesses sell outstanding accounts receivable on an ongoing basis to a commercial finance (or factoring) company at a discount. The factoring company then manages the receivable until it is paid. Factoring is a well-established and accepted method of temporary alternative finance that is especially well-suited for rapidly growing companies and those with customer concentrations.
2. Accounts Receivable (A/R) Financing – A/R financing is an ideal solution for companies that are not yet bankable but have a stable financial condition and a more diverse customer base. Here, the business provides details on all accounts receivable and pledges those assets as collateral. The proceeds of those receivables are sent to a lockbox while the finance company calculates a borrowing base to determine the amount the company can borrow. When the borrower needs money, it makes an advance request and the finance company advances money using a percentage of the accounts receivable.
3. Asset-Based Lending (ABL) – This is a credit facility secured by all of a company’s assets, which may include A/R, equipment and inventory. Unlike with factoring, the business continues to manage and collect its own receivables and submits collateral reports on an ongoing basis to the finance company, which will review and periodically audit the reports.
In addition to providing working capital and enabling owners to maintain business control, alternative financing may provide other benefits as well:
It’s easy to determine the exact cost of financing and obtain an increase.
Professional collateral management can be included depending on the facility type and the lender.
Real-time, online interactive reporting is often available.
It may provide the business with access to more capital.
It’s flexible – financing ebbs and flows with the business’ needs.
It’s important to note that there are some circumstances in which equity is a viable and attractive financing solution. This is especially true in cases of business expansion and acquisition and new product launches – these are capital needs that are not generally well suited to debt financing. However, equity is not usually the appropriate financing solution to solve a working capital problem or help plug a cash-flow gap.
A Precious Commodity
Remember that business equity is a precious commodity that should only be considered under the right circumstances and at the right time. When equity financing is sought, ideally this should be done at a time when the company has good growth prospects and a significant cash need for this growth. Ideally, majority ownership (and thus, absolute control) should remain with the company founder(s).
Alternative financing solutions like factoring, A/R financing and ABL can provide the working capital boost many cash-strapped businesses that don’t qualify for bank financing need – without diluting ownership and possibly giving up business control at an inopportune time for the owner. If and when these companies become bankable later, it’s often an easy transition to a traditional bank line of credit. Your banker may be able to refer you to a commercial finance company that can offer the right type of alternative financing solution for your particular situation.
Taking the time to understand all the different financing options available to your business, and the pros and cons of each, is the best way to make sure you choose the best option for your business. The use of alternative financing can help your company grow without diluting your ownership. After all, it’s your business – shouldn’t you keep as much of it as possible?