February 12, 2020 at 01:00PM by CWC I understand the reasoning for cutting toxic people out of your life, yet I often worry that ridding my contacts list of those who suffer from nuanced personality disorders like narcissism isn’t morally sound. After all, developing a personality disorder isn’t a choice, and while people who suffer from them can sometimes work to alter their behavior patterns, they can’t necessarily change who they are. That reality does not make them inherently bad or unworthy of human relationships so much as complex and complicated. And I’m staunch in my opinion about this, largely because of my experience of being friends with a narcissist whom I refuse to cut out of my life. For background knowledge, “a narcissist is a person who lacks empathy, is deeply entitled, grandiose, often quite superficial, chronically seeks external validation and admiration, has difficulty managing things like disappointment, and will often—when frustrated or disappointed or stressed—manifest those emotions with rage they can’t manage,” says clinical psychologist Ramani Durvasula, PhD, author of Should I Stay or Should I Go: Surviving a Relationship with a Narcissist. “At the core, they’re deeply insecure.” Narcissists tend to have a lot of difficulty with situations wherein they feel unimportant, less than, or ordinary, adds clinical psychologist Aimee Daramus, PysD. “They have to feel like the most special person in the room, however they define that,” she says. In short, they can be energy vampires and difficult to be around—let alone depend on for any
Month: February 2020
You only need 3 ingredients to make the best, healthiest stir-fry sauce ever
February 12, 2020 at 12:00PM by CWC [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfK9aDhqU_8] Want to transform your cauliflower rice from basic to unforgettable? Watch Chef Dale Talde get it done. When the work week draws to a close and the contents of your fridge can best be described as “this and that,” an easy stir-fry can transform that rando bell pepper, quarter onion, single lonesome egg, and bag of sad carrots into a dinner miracle. Of course, though, one component of your dish will make or break the entire meal: the sauce. Rest assured you never have to be satisfied with the pre-bottled sauces again, because we learned the easiest, best stir-fry sauce ever from celebrity chef Dale Talde on the premiere episode of Well+Good’s new video series, Cook With Us. The series, which launches today, invites some of our favorite chefs and foodies into the kitchen to, well, cook with us. Literally. In the episode, Well+Good senior food and health editor Jessie Van Amburg challenges Talde—a three-time contestant on Bravo’s Top Chef and co-founder of Food Crush Hospitality—to whip up a 30-minute healthy fried rice recipe. The catch: it has to be high in protein, vegetarian, and rice-free. However, before adding anything to the pan, the cuisinier immediately pulls out the ingredients he needs for a shockingly easy and flavorful sauce: 1/2 cup tamari sauce (aka gluten-free soy sauce, although you can use soy sauce too 1/4 cup rice vinegar 1 Tbsp sesame oil According to Talde, the tamari acts as the base
There’s a reason people swear by shea butter—the benefits can’t be beat
February 12, 2020 at 03:00AM by CWC Shea butter has been a go-to in many beauty regimens—especially when it comes to pregnancy and mitigating stretch marks. That’s because besides being super moisturizing, while also providing many other noteworthy benefits. “Shea butter comes from the nuts of the shea tree, which is native to Central Africa,” says Dr. Josh Axe, DNM, author of the best-selling book Collagen Diet and host of The Dr. Axe Show. “The outer shells of the nuts are removed. Then they’re crushed and slowly roasted into butter. Finally, the butter is commonly kneaded by hand in a basin of water to separate the fatty acids. These fatty acids, or oils, are removed from the butter, cooled, and hardened to make what we know to be shea butter.” Shea butter is perfectly safe to use for most skin types, adds Dr. Sonia Batra, MD, co-host of daytime show The Doctors, and it has been used in cosmetics for centuries due to vitamins and fatty acids that hydrate and calm the skin. Intrigued? Keep reading to learn about its many other benefits and possible side effects, as well as pro tips on how to use it. Photo: Getty Images The benefits of shea butter 1. Shea butter moisturizes skin and hair If you have dry, dull skin, shea butter may become your new best friend. “Shea butter works as a skin-conditioning agent,” Dr. Axe says. “It helps retain moisture by forming a protective barrier on the skin’s surface, which
Why it’s so much harder to train at higher altitudes if you’re not used to it
February 12, 2020 at 02:00AM by CWC Altitude training is not for the faint of heart. Perhaps you’ve heard of the technique where elite athletes spend weeks—if not months—training at high elevations to strengthen their athletic performance. As a casual runner, who spends most of my time in New York City, I’ve always envied athletes’ ability to spend time several thousand feet above sea level, pushing their race-day performance to the next level. So, when I found myself living part-time in Aspen, Colorado, where the elevation tops around 8,000 feet, I was ready to take full advantage of the terrain as I prepped for the Los Angeles marathon. Training at high elevations is both physically taxing and mentally challenging, because there are many, many variables to consider: extreme weather conditions, freezing temperatures, altitude sickness, dehydration, and icy (if not rocky) terrain. Typically done at around a minimum of 2,400 meters (or 7,800 feet) above sea level, logging miles in altitude boosts oxygen-carrying red blood cells and has the ability to make you a stronger athlete in time. Ready for day one as a “newbie” altitude trainee, I turn to Asics pro-runner Lyndsay Flanagan for some advice on how to perform at high elevations (she’s currently training in Boulder, Colorado at 5,328 feet). First up, Flanagan strongly suggests taking your time to acclimate accordingly. “When you first come up, you want to spend the first two to three weeks getting in mileage and gradually add in harder sessions. The biggest thing
Why the food labels of the future may include a carbon footprint score
February 12, 2020 at 01:00AM by CWC Last month, plant-based protein company Quorn became the first major brand to introduce carbon labeling on its products. The brand asked a third-party company to evaluate the emissions impact of 30 of their products—information that it’s publishing on its site and on the packaging of these products. The goal is to help consumers understand the environmental impact of their food shopping. Certainly more people are considering where their food is coming from—and how that affects the planet—but a carbon footprint label is certainly a new thing for most people. Questions about what the number on the packaging means, how it’s calculated, and even if it’s authentic are all worth considering. After all, brands haven’t been shy about deliberately confusing consumers into buying products in the past. (Exhibit A: Splitting up different sources of sugar on the label so they are lower on the ingredients list.) Here, sustainability experts give the full low-down on how a food carbon footprint is calculated and what to keep in mind when grocery shopping, in terms of sustainability. How is a food carbon footprint calculated? In simplest terms, a food carbon footprint calculates the total greenhouse gas emissions generated to create a particular item. “To calculate a carbon footprint for a food product, you need to total the sum of the greenhouse gas emissions produced or used throughout the product’s entire lifecycle, including production, distribution, use, and disposal,” says Laura Timlin, the director of business services at the
Dermatologists say the “big four” are all you need to beat oily skin
February 12, 2020 at 12:00AM by CWC If you’ve got oily skin, you likely know all too well that there’s a fine line between when your complexion looks happily dewy and when it’s straight-up greasy. The trick to being on the right side of that line all comes down to finding the right routine—but that doesn’t require a zillion tubes and bottles. In fact, according to dermatologists, as long as you’re using the right ingredients, you can get the job done with only four products. Oily skin occurs thanks to an overproduction of sebum in your pores, and derms say there are a few reasons why this happens. The environment (more pollution=more oil), your stress levels (more stress=more oil), and your hormones (your period=more oil) can all play a role in how oily your complexion is on any given day. And, as anyone who’s dealt with oily skin likely knows, increased oil production also goes hand-in-hand with acne. Breakouts can happen when excess sebum gets trapped inside of a pore. Down the line, that sebum mixes with bacteria and dead skin and a pimple forms. It’s not all bad news, though: Research has shown that people with oily skin tend to have fewer wrinkles as they get older, and that sebum is packed with free-radical fighting vitamin E, which helps to fend off environmental damage (and let me take this moment to remind you that people pay good money for vitamin E). Since your skin is already providing you with one
Jennifer Aniston’s 5 wellness habits that keep her looking ageless
February 11, 2020 at 08:00PM by CWC Fifty-one years ago today, the heavens broke open and down came Jennifer Aniston. Since her big break in Friends nearly 30 years ago, the SAG award-winning actress and producer has blessed us with her talent in countless TV shows and movies—hardly appearing to age in the process. So how does she manage to circumvent time? Good skin care is part of it, of course, but her habits go beyond just serums and scrubs. Aniston takes her health and fitness seriously. So seriously, in fact, that she can do a three-minute plank. She has a go-to elliptical routine, too. (Using the elliptical doesn’t just involve flailing around till you break a sweat? News to me.) But she’s also learned that true wellness is all about balance. “I went from being a crazy workout girl to sort of saying, ‘My body wants a little bit a of break,’” Aniston told Women’s Health in 2014. “I kind of stay with more simple stuff and taking walks and not being neurotic about working out and eating right. I started to enjoy life a little bit more.” Keep reading to find out exactly how she does it, along with the skin care routine that makes 51 look so good. These 5 Jennifer Aniston skin care and wellness tips are easy enough to add to your own routine 1. MOISTURIZER AND SPF ARE non-negotiable Aniston previously told Now to Love that she spends a lot of time in the
Gabi Butler’s triple flips are hard to copy, but you *can* steal her ab workouts
February 11, 2020 at 07:00PM by CWC Watch Netflix’s hit docu-series Cheer and you’ll quickly see that the Navarro College cheerleading team practices pretty much all the time. That’s how you win national titles, after all. But what you don’t see on screen is that Navarro star Gabi Butler—a longtime cheerlebrity who now hosts her own clinics while flying and tumbling in Miami’s Top Gun squad—takes her cheerleader workout routine beyond the mat. When Butler is at home or at the gym, she always does a 10-minute core series consisting of one-minute sets of 10 different exercises: crunches, leg lifts, plank hip dips, and more. (Here’s a similar ab session led by star trainer Charlee Atkins.) She’s also a fan of the core workouts in P90X, an at-home fitness program. Abs aside, Butler loves getting a full-body workout at a boutique fitness class. “I love hot kickboxing. It’s in a hot room, and the whole time you’re going hard on a punching bag. 10/10, highly recommend it,” she says. You can also catch her sweating it out at SoulCycle. No matter which type of workout she does—be it cheer, kickboxing, or spin—Butler always refuels with her go-to protein shake. “It’s one scoop of vegan protein powder, a whole banana, honey, cinnamon, vanilla, almond butter, and almond milk,” she says. “It will change your life. It’s healthy and tastes like a milkshake. I drink it when I’m done with workouts because it’s such a good recovery drink.” Protein shakes are dietitian-approved, too:
5 curling irons that won’t damage hair, according to stylists who use them all the time
February 11, 2020 at 06:04PM by CWC Nothing quite says “I spent $60 on a professional blowout” (without actually having to spend $60 on a professional blowout) like knowing how to curl your own hair. Once you know how to give yourself effortless bends or bombshell waves, you’ll want to style your hair yourself all the time. (For free!) And with the right curling iron on hand, that newfound hobby won’t result in damage to your strands. Because, in breaking news to exactly no one, too much heat is bad for hair. Heat can crack your cuticle (the outermost layer of a strand), which can result in proteins leaching out. This leaves hair dry, frayed, and brittle. While you’d be hard-pressed to find any sort of hot tool that’s actually good for your hair, there are certain things you can look for to lessen damage. Keep scrolling for the best ways to protect your hair from heat. How to protect your hair from a curling iron Even the safest curling irons on the market still run the risk of doing some damage to your strands, so it’s important to take certain precautions during the styling process. 1. Prep ahead of time: “If you know that you are creating a hairstyle that uses hot tools like a curling iron, you should prep your hair the day before to avoid heat damage,” says Garnier hairstylist Millie Moreno. “I always recommend applying a hydrating mask and blowdrying hair the day before to have it ready
This woman set a world record with a 4-hour plank—here’s her secret
February 11, 2020 at 05:06PM by CWC Just a one-minute plank makes my whole body shake, so my jaw dropped to the floor when I heard about a new world record of 4 hours, 19 minutes, and 55 seconds. Dana Glowacka, a vegan athlete, and yogi, makes her world-record plank hold look easy, but she’s the first to admit that it took a lot of dedication and hard work. “My son found a record plank in the Guinness World Records book and told me I could do it,” she tells me. “We even didn’t know who the person who hold the plank was, but I was ready to plank right away and see how long I could stay strong. My first attempt was four minutes.” Four minutes to more than four hours? If you’re wondering how she did it, she says the biggest thing is simply starting your day with a plank every morning. “Holding planks in sets is safe and helps develop the mind-body endurance,” she says. “Let’s say you can hold one for two minutes. Start with three sets a day.” View this post on Instagram A post shared by Dana Glowacka (@dbg_plankdoyoga) on Oct 22, 2019 at 6:44pm PDT //www.instagram.com/embed.js You can spread those sets all throughout the day to build up your mental and physical endurance. Glowacka recommends doing your first set in the morning, second before lunch, and third later in the evening: Set 1: 2 minutes in the morning (can be on