What, how, and when you eat are all equally important.

How do you go about controlling those factors? After all, to stay healthy, you need to eat the right amounts of food every three to four hours, throughout your day, everyday, for the rest of your life.

Breakfast is certainly the most important meal of the day. It kicks your entire mind and body into gear, and kick-starts your metabolism, which burns off calories and also controls your insulin levels for the rest of the day.

Your focus should be on refueling your body every 3 to 4 hours. The foods that we eat control how good or bad we feel, and how much energy we have to get through the day.

That’s why it is important to eat the correct balance of foods: the consumption of lower carbohydrates (which helps to moderate fat intake) in conjunction with the consumption of higher amounts of protein has been proven the most beneficial way to eat. Following this plan helps to fight heart disease, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and lowers your chances of diabetes.

You must change your eating habits for life, instead of dieting. It is the smartest, healthiest way to live your life, and you are worth it.

People who are obsessed with being thin are equally obsessed with dieting. Dieting can be a full time occupation that never pays off.

A great deal of time and money is spent on various weight loss schemes, but what is not considered is that diets do not work, people work. One needs to aim for a permanent lifestyle change and not just a few days or weeks of an extreme plan.

The one thing that most diets have in common is reduced calorie intake and portion control. This is why stored fat is used for energy and fat is lost.

The obsession with being thin can be very harmful, a fact made obvious by the proliferation of eating disorders in today’s society.

Additionally, those people whom either are not thin, or don’t “feel” thin, often torture themselves by feeling unattractive. They do not appreciate their strengths and feel so much embarrassment and shame about their “condition” that they deprive themselves of opportunities to become fit. They put off exercise until they are thin as if it were illegal to not conform to an ideal body type.

This attitude is self-defeating and very destructive. What is truly important is having health, endurance, lean muscle mass, and energy, even if not necessarily being thin.

The latest fad has been “low fat” foods, which are usually higher in sugar, which is far worse for you than the fat. High sugar causes increased insulin levels.

Avoid fad foods, diets, and the rest, and stick to what works: planning and eating the right balance of foods throughout your day, for the rest of your life.

Vicki Craig-Topp is a certified fitness trainer and aerobic instructor. Deborah Munkasy is a licensed Mental Health & Marriage Couselor & Family Therapist in private practice.