femalenetwork.com

Last year just wasn’t for the faint-hearted. The tragedies and endings that marked it derailed not a few people’s goals, leaving many of us happy just to have survived unscathed. But survival is so last year. For 2010, we should focus on living—and living well. Here’s a 2010 life makeover plan to help you get started.

1. Live green. Increased environmental awareness was the silver lining in the rainclouds that brought Ondoy. World leaders didn’t achieve much in Copenhagen, but our small efforts might just become tipping points for bigger actions. There are baby steps to living green, like refusing to use plastic bags whenever possible and bringing your own reusables, like cups and utensils, to avoid using more plastics. Greenliving.lifetips.com lists more doable steps, among them using home-made remedies, like garlic juice or blended peppers, to get rid of pests, and maintaining houseplants to ward off pollutants.

Pear-shaped pretties rejoice! This Yahoo! News article claims that having big hips, large thighs, and a well-padded behind is beneficial to your health. Researchers from Oxford University have discovered that carrying fat around your lower body area, rather than your midsection, actively defends your system against diabetes and heart disease.

According to the research, the fat around your waist tends to discharge comparatively more harmful fatty acids than the fat on your bum. Additionally, belly fat releases “cytokines”—molecules that set off inflammation and make your body susceptible to heart and blood sugar problems. However, if you have a thick pair of thighs, the fat they contain traps these unwanted molecules and prevents them from attacking the liver and muscles, helping you avoid a host of troublesome health conditions such as insulin resistance. As a counteractive measure, the fat in your thighs and bottom also produces “friendly” hormones that safeguard your arteries and manage your blood sugar level.

We all know the drill: new year, new beginnings, new promises to better ourselves in one way or another. But truth be told, New Year’s resolutions can be the most difficult promises to keep, regardless of how determined we are to follow through from the onset. We start off well enough by avoiding shopping sprees and cigarettes and chocolate cake (and so on and so forth), but as the days wear on and the grind wears us down, we inevitably turn back to the comforts of our old ways. Of course, there are those that succeed, against the laws of nature, in fulfilling their pledges of improvement—and we heartily salute them!

But the fact still remains that resolutions can test even the strongest of men and women, as many of our readers will attest. Scroll down to find out some of the most challenging New Year’s commitments you’ve shared with us thus far.

Doing something I’ve never done before. – Ryan Puno, 22, copywriter

Getting enough sleep and still getting to work on time. – Mark Castillo, 34, marketing executive

Trying to control my expenses. So far I’ve been listing every penny I spend. They say it works the same way as counting calories. – Arlene Amante, 22, management trainee