sxc.hu

If you follow this blog, you know my workouts have increased in quality, duration, and frequency since I started blogging.  The results have started to follow suit and now I look stronger, I feel stronger, and I am stronger.  In fact, I’m so excited to workout now that last week I noticed I was already warming up to workout before I was even going to workout.

The first thing I do every morning is check my computer.  Lately, I’ve been making curl motions or bench press reps on the sofa because I’ve gotten myself so geared toward working out.  In fact, I’m almost ready to declare myself addicted to working out again.  It’s awesome when you get to that point because you don’t drag yourself to the gym, you want to go to the gym.

Working out is getting fun again.  It sucks when the workouts are arduous and boring, but when they get fun, you get a high than I’m sure is much better than anything you can inhale.  If you’re not addicted yet, keep going.  Eventually, working out will become a part of you.

Post from: EveryJoe

Addicted to Working Out

Motivation is why we start working out and the lack thereof is why we stop working out. Now, keep in mind I’m not talking about music here. As I’ve mentioned previously, music does help while you workout (scientifically proven if you want to argue with me), but what gets you in the gym week in and week out to improve yourself?

SXC.hu

If you’re not working out currently or at least not taking it seriously, you need to ask yourself why not. Take out a piece of paper (or notepad since we’re all computerized) and list what reasons you would have to workout. Here is a sample list:

• money (insurance, food bills, you name it)
• health (live longer, mental health + physical health)
• more attractive (more toned, vibrant)
• easier life (stairs are easier to climb, dog food is easier to lift)
• clothes fit (can be relaxed in your clothes)

Really, there are no good reasons not to workout and plenty of reasons to hit the gym. You need to find the reasons that light a burning desire within you and use them to fuel your motivations. Remind yourself just how important your motivation is to you and working out will come along.

As far as reminders go, if your memory isn’t enough for you, take a huge ass poster and just plaster it to the front of whatever you look at when you wake up/go to sleep. That poster should read:

WORK OUT!!!

MOTIVATION #1

MOTIVATION #2

MOTIVATION #3

If you’re starting fresh or from lackadaisical beginnings, just attack working out.  It’s fun.  Plan an all-out campaign on getting in shape, looking good, and having people marvel over how you’ve turned your appearance around.  Your physical well-being will positively seep into other aspects into your life and you will feel rejuvenated.

Post from: EveryJoe

Motivation For Working Out

Ambition: Aspire to climb as high as you can dream.

Motivation is a huge key to getting and staying fit. The problem isn’t so much motivation as is ambition. Unless you’ve been fit your entire life, you’ve said to yourself at one time or another “I want to get fit”. That’s motivation right there. Want being the key word. You want to get fit. You may have even said “I need to get fit”. Honestly, that’s not motivation, that’s simple observation. If you want to get fit then you are already in the right frame of mind. Now you just have to take that motivation and mix it with a little ambition and a lot of dedication and discipline and get that boll rolling!

Some people use the excuse that they don’t have time, but they seem to find the time to watch 4 hours of television every evening. If you have time to watch TV then you have time to get an hour workout in everyday. If you have 15 minute breaks throughout your work day, use them to get a quick exercise in instead of sitting down, shooting the breeze with your co-workers while chomping down the Twinkies. I love Twinkies too, but they stick to you.

Take a look at your lifestyle, maybe even write down you day-to-day activities. Take a hard look at that list and see what kind of changes you could make to start yourself on a path to better fitness. Start with the small things. Sometimes it’s the smallest changes that can make a big difference. Work your way through the list and you may find that by making these changes you are also being more time efficient and can get other things done throughout the day as well.

All it takes a little bit of change.

Image: Sportswall.com

Post from: EveryJoe

Motivation Is Key To Fitness

True or False?

If you lose weight, you will lose cellulite.

Place your bets now, and click below for the answer.

Losing weight will shrink your fat cells, but not make them disappear.  Therefore, the look of your cellulite will improve, but it won’t vanish completely.

Cellulite is pockets of fat that have worked their way through the bands of tissue that connect your muscles to your skin.

Unfortunately, no one knows what causes it and why some people have it and some people don’t.  Obviously, the more fat you have, the better your chance for cellulite will be, but thin girls are not immune.

I have it on the back of my thighs! I’ve always had it.  Anyone else brave enough to admit it? Or admit that they don’t have it and risk the rest of us shunning you forever more?

grounded fitness, fitness, health, yoga, pilates, strength training, personal trainer, cardiovascular, cardio, exercise, wellness, weight loss, blog, blogging, fitness blog, weightloss blog, cellulite, fat, pop quiz, loldogz

Post from: EveryJoe

Pop Quiz: The C Word

The good news is Thanksgiving was wonderful. I spent a little time with the boy’s big, friendly family, then headed to my parents’ for dinner with just the 4 of us.  I ate lots, but not too much and had a great time.

The bad news is 1. I forgot my camera so I didn’t get to take any pics to share with you guys, and 2. I’m sick again.

I have no idea how it happened, but I was so achey I had to bail on going over to my boyfriend’s band’s house to celebrate with them. I’m feeling a little better today after some coffee and a short trip to work.  I’m off to the gym now and am curious to see if it’s packed or deserted.

So, since this Thanksgiving post was a bust, how was everyone else’s? Did anyone else have to work and want to commiserate with me?

grounded fitness, fitness, health, yoga, pilates, strength training, personal trainer, cardiovascular, cardio, exercise, wellness, weight loss, blog, blogging, fitness blog, weightloss blog,

Post from: EveryJoe

Thanksgiving Recap

Looks like Susan and I have opposite Thanksgiving eating philosophies.

While many people will starve for days before and after Thanksgiving, in order to give themselves permission to stuff their faces with Thankgiving appetizers, main courses, side dishes, desserts, and leftovers, I will be eating a mindful breakfast, a few healthy appetizers, a nice big Thanksgiving dinner, and small slice of pie. I will workout the day of Thanksgiving just like normal.

Holidays have morphed,  not only into an excuse to eat whatever we want, but also into a source of food guilt, over exercising and stress. And weight gain. I don’t need that anymore.

If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that there will always be holidays.  There will always be Christmases and Thanksgivings and weddings and birthdays and anniversaries. There will also always be holiday food. I’ve also learned that a perfect way to ruin a holiday is by focusing on the food. Stressing about the food.  Worrying about the food.

Don’t stress.  Don’t feel guilty. Indulge. Have a second peice of pie.  Don’t beat yourself up. Don’t prep days in advance by altering your food choices, and don’t over compensate for days afterwards by working out like a maniac. 

Give thanks. Give thanks that your body is healthy.  Give thanks that you can afford to put food on your table.  Give thanks that you can see, hear, laugh, love and share. 

That second peice of pie doesn’t seem so important now, does it?

grounded fitness, fitness, health, yoga, pilates, strength training, personal trainer, cardiovascular, cardio, exercise, wellness, weight loss, blog, blogging, fitness blog, weightloss blog, Thanksgiving, pie, thanks

Post from: EveryJoe

Thanksgiving- Just Like Any Other Day

Yes, yoga has taught me yet another lesson. You don’t need to spend a lot of money or be a conspicuous consumer to be happy or have nice, meaningful things or a beautiful existence.

One of the key lessons of yoga is that it teaches you to appreciate the simpler things in life. To be present. To be in the moment. This practice alone has not only helped to quiet my mind, in recent months it has also saved me a lot of money.

In fact, my shopping habits have changed significantly. I buy less processed, ready-to-serve foods and eat more healthfully and more simply. I’m cooking at home and packing my lunch a lot more, and it is making a big difference.

Instead of heading out to malls, I now spend my time looking for vintage and resale shops, and I am finding a lot of bargains, not to mention a lot of cool, unique and thoughtful items for my home and my wardrobe that aren’t mass-produced.

Now I will say this–it does take a little more time to shop this “new” way. But even that aspect alone is an exercise in mindfulness for me. It has taught me that I don’t need to scoop up every new and shiny thing that I see, but instead to take the time to really scavenge through and find what I am looking for. And I feel a lot better when I return home from shopping these days. I know I have spent the time and have been aware of every purchase I make, which has really helped me fight off the urges and impulses that used to leave my credit card on the verge of melting, and my bank account deflated.

I am also finding that I value things now, much more so. When I go back and look at what I have purchased, having taken the time and put some thought into it, I am finding that I really like what I have brought home much more than in the past. Those old shopping days when I would spin through a mall, bring home bags of stuff and often wind up disappointed that I had spent so much, and gotten so little satisfaction are over. This change in my way of thinking has really transcended across every area of my life, and now it is saving me money and making me feel more peaceful and content. That’s really saying something.

Now that I am thinking about it, I am going to sign off, hit my mat and see what else awaits me. It’s really quite a journey. It’s helping me in even the most unexpected ways.

I would love to hear about everyone’s journey toward a more sustainable lifestyle. There are so many creative ways to think about improving your daily life that are as unique as each individual in the universe. Let’s really be sustainable together, and share some of these ideas with each other.

I can’t wait to hear.

Peace.

Post from: EveryJoe

A Simpler Life Can Be Beautiful

This might be a totally dumb question, but I always kind of thought you did “opposite” exercises on the same day (like I would do biceps and triceps/quads and hams), but Jillian Michael’s book said not to…..can I still do them on the same day? I think it’s kinda fun. :-)

Here’s my caveat: I have never read Jillian Michael’s book, so I’m sure some of this may be out of context. Maybe just for her plan, thats the way she prefers to have people work out, maybe she said it as a rule- that something bad will happen if you work out antagonist muscles on the same day. Whichever she meant, I stand by what I am about to say.

UGH. Give me a break.

I am a firm believer that you cannot know something you have never been taught.  Up until 6th grade, I said “hippoMApotomus” because my parents never corrected me since they thought it was cute. It wasn’t so cute when, by some twist of fate, I had to do a report on them in front of the class.

I am also a firm believer that you can’t blame someone who has been taught wrong. If they have no frame of reference- how will they know?

So, no Holly, no dumb questions- just opportunities to learn and for me to start fights. So thank you.

Specifically in this situation, not working antagonist muscles on the same day is crap. If anything, its a BETTER idea, because you can ensure you are working them the same amount and building muscle balance to cut risk of injury, and for asthetic reasons.  Either way- it doesn’t matter. I can’t even really argue with this point, because I can’t possibly imagine the rationale behind it (if anyone knows, please feel free to share.)

Professionals in the fitness field are trying to sell a product.  They make up rules to make consumers feel like they don’t know enough about fitness and NEED their product in order to succeed.  The audience for these products primarily does not know very much about fitness to begin with (otherwise they could do it on their own, right?) so taking that lack of basic knowledge and throwing do’s and don’ts on top of it confuses consumers into buying into it.

When my docotr tells me something- I believe him. He’s known me since I was little and has my best interests at heart. But, beyond that, he is the professional, he went to school for many years, so he’s proven himself.  I don’t need to know everything he knows. I couldn’t point to my pancrease if he asked- and as a responsible professional he knows that.  He’s not going to heap a ton of medical jargon and possible diseases and risks on top of me to confuse and scare the crap out of me: because I don’t need to know it. All I need to know is basically what is going on, and how to fix it.

Fitness is the same way. I know all of you are in different stages of your fitness goals, but, like I said, most fitness products are geared towards beginners because they are easily sold. All a beginner needs to know is eat less, eat better, move more.  They don’t need to know about glycemic index and fat burning heart rate zones and  aerbic and anaerobic thresholds. But that doesn’t make me money, and doesn’t get you to spend yours. A confused consumer is a consumer that spends money.

If something makes fitness sound confusing- its probably unneccessary information. You don’t even have to believe me (gasp!) if you don’t want to. I encourage you to disagree, or go find a second opinion, because I would rather you learn and become informed than blindly follow anything anyone has to say.

I can assure you, however, the only rules I can think of for fitness have been around for years and years: stretch after warming up, get atleast 30 mintues of cardio most days of the week, never strength train the same muscles on consective days (they need time to rest and rebuild) and when strength training make sure hit every major muscle group. It doesn’t matter how you mix these up, combine them, what order you do it. That’s the fun part: its up to you. Do whatever you want and don’t get sucked into the games.

grounded fitness, fitness, health, yoga, pilates, strength training, personal trainer, cardiovascular, cardio, exercise, wellness, weight loss, blog, blogging, fitness blog, weightloss blog, Jillian Michaels, antagonist muscles, guru

Post from: EveryJoe

Enough Already “Fitness Gurus”

I always go for nonfiction because I like to learn.  I’m not a big “reading for leisure” person.  There, I found Caroline Knapp’s Appetites: Why Women Want.  And what a find it was.

Caroline’s book examines women’s appetites, why we feel the need to supress them, and how we can embrace our appetites in a world that tells us “no”.

Appetite is not only used in regards to food.  Appetite refers to everything women want, but are told that we shouldn’t: food, sex, material possessions.  We are always told not to want too much and supress out appetites: don’t eat too much, you have to keep a slim figure, don’t talk about your sexual appetite, you’ll sound like slut, etc.

Its no wonder we abuse these things. 

So why do we have an appetite for what we do?  An appetite is a longing we are driven to fulfill.  We eat to become full. What is fullness? Gratification, satisfaction, pleasure. 

When you think about it this way, its obvious why people abuse food.

Anorexics, bulimics and EDNOS (eating disorder not otherwise specified) shun food, ie: gratification, satisfaction and pleasure, because they feel they don’t deserve it. Instead, they take pleasure in depriving themselves of these feelings, to take control of the fact they cannot achieve real happiness. If you feel you don’t deserve to eat, or feel pleasure, then atleast you can control your own misery.

The overweight, binge eaters, and the obese desperately search for those feelings of gratification, satisfaction and pleasure. If they don’t or can’t gain those feelings through their own self worth, relationships, or  self image, they can simulate those feelings of gratification, satisfaction and pleasure through food. Its short lived, however, and ends in feelings of guilt, which leads them right back to the fridge to rid themselves of those feelings once more.

And there are those in the more innocuous middle.  Those that feel that any indulgence, ie: gratification, satsifaction and pleasure must be earned and any weakness is grounds for punishment.  Those that will only allow themselves to have dessert if they run 5 miles, those that add another 30 minutes of cardio to make up for yesterday’s second helping, those that eat whatever they want one day, and then starve the next as punishment. Everything has to be this perfect balance of strength and weakness, calories in and calories out, restriction and overcompensation. 

My favorite quote from the book says:

“One woman’s tub of cottage cheese is another’s maxed-out MasterCard; one woman’s soul-murdering love affair is another’s frenzied eating binge.  The methods may differ, but boil any of these behaviors down to their essential ingredients and you are likely to find a particularly female blend of anxiety, guilt, shame and sorrow, the psychic roux of profound- and often profoundly misunderstood-hungers.”

When I was younger, I went through a Bible-thumping phase. I sat up late and night and highlighted the heck out of my Teen Bible. But as I read, and prayed and reflected, I felt worse and worse about myself. Everyting I read about desires, and sexual thoughts, and envy and lust had me convinced I was going to hell. The more I supressed those feelings, the more I thought about them, and the more dpressed and ashamed I became.  No matter how hard I prayed I couldn’t stop thinking about boys and sex. I was 14 years old for Christ’s sake. I began to think, “how can  a god that gave me these feelings, these hormones, these thoughts, then punish me for them?  How can he design me in this way and then use it against me?” It was then I put my Bible away and never picked it up again.

Women have so many more opportunites than we did 100 years ago. We can vote, go to college, hold jobs- more doors are open to us than ever before. We are equal; we are entitled; we are human. Why do we continue to be ashamed of and supress our most human desires?

Don’t forget to enter this week’s giveaway!

grounded fitness, fitness, health, yoga, pilates, strength training, personal trainer, cardiovascular, cardio, exercise, wellness, weight loss, blog, blogging, fitness blog, weightloss blog, appetite, sex, hunger, credit, hormones, body image, Appetites: Why Women Want, book, Caroline Knapp,

Post from: EveryJoe

Appetites: Why We Supress Them and Why We Should Stop

It’s winter in the northern hemisphere, and I don’t know about you, but I’ve already seen a fair number of pretty cold days.

For me, this isn’t such a bad thing.  I use this time to turn my thoughts inward, and that normally benefits my practice and my outlook. 

What I do find helps make the transition to these homebound days a little easier is turning a private space within my home into a meditation and practice room.  I can’t move everything out.  I know that.  But I do spend a few days each year clearing out things I don’t need, moving them into another space, and making room for my daily meditation and yoga. 

This is especially important for me, because I also tend to practice and meditate much more frequently when I find myself indoors more during these colder months.   Instead of mornings or evenings, I find myself doing both.  And if I’m off, I add a mid-day routine to my schedule. 

I change my shopping habits a bit, too.  I stock up on things like notebooks (for journaling), and look for items I just love to look at and focus on during my meditation.  This year I am changing my diet quite radically, too, and am trying the “raw food” vegetarian regimen I wrote about the other day.  Figure I won’t be moving about quite so much when the snow starts falling here, so I am going to experiment.  So far, so good.  I kind of do miss eating hot meals though, during these cold days and nights :-) But I am going to give it my best shot.  Also have removed as many processed foods as humanly possible from my diet to help clean out my system, and really use these months when life is a little more dormant by nature to calm down–and pare down–everything.  A little less stimuli can be a very good thing.

Winter is a wonderful time to do a really deep dive into meditation.  The world is quieter.  My thoughts are more focused.  Let’s face it, when it is 20 degrees and there is about 18 inches of snow on the ground, you are forced to think about everything you do, how you’re going to do it, and how you are going to get to where you need to go.  It’s only natural.  So I am going to go with the flow and take full advantage of these winter months to sow the seeds for real growth, spiritually and physically, too, with my practice.    

Would love to hear from all of you on how you plan to grow your practice during these cold winter months.  It’s a great time to nurture and enhance your bodies and your minds.

Peace.

Post from: EveryJoe

Change of Seasons, Change in Practice