Why you should have a Beachbody Coach!

There are so many programs and "gimmicks" out there that tell you you can lose weight, get healthy and be all smiles and cheer while you do it.  But how many people do you know, yourself included, who have bought one of these items and gotten so overwhelmed and frustrated after hitting a roadblock or needing help that you just give up?  What if you had someone to help you succeed, someone who knew your product inside and out and would always be there to make sure you were doing what you intended to do when you bought your program?

In case you didn't figure it out, I am a Beachbody Coach!! It might not be everything that I am but it sure is a huuuuuuge part of my life for alot of reasons.  I help people with health and fitness, i might not know everything but I certainly am not afraid to admit it before i find out the answer.

Want help? Got a question? Just ask! Nothing to be scared of!!

Healthy food isn't as healthy if you over eat it, did you know that?

So, anybody that has talked to me before about what you are eating and how your food is making you feel than you know i love talking nutrition. And after scrutinizing what the girls have been eating ever since they started on solids its a huuuuuuge unknown area for alot of people!! Even things we think are healthy aren't always going to help us!

Here are some foods that you should limit! (note that i said limit, not avoid)

Fruits- bananas, grapes and mangos are the highest sugar fruits so I would recommend that you LIMIT them. I would suggest pears, apples, and any berries. A serving is 1 cupped handful.

Veggies- raw or steamed. 2 cupped handfuls eaten 4 times per day. Examples, cucumbers, tomatoes, leafy greens, broccoli, spinach, asparagus, green beans, sprouts, celery.

Carbs- 1 handful per day of quinoa, brown rice oatmeal or cream of wheat and or a hand sized sweet potato.

Lean protein- stick to chicken, tuna, egg whites, turkey, or non oily fish like salmon and tilapia.

Beverages- water!!! Unsweetened herbal teas!

So if you are really trying to shed weight stay away from dairy products, juice, bread, salad dressings (make your own with balsamic vinegar and evoo), spreads and high sodium foods! NO TURKEY BACON for my bacon lovers and no sliced cheese!

I promise if you even start making small tweaks with this plan you will see a drastic change!!! What food do you try and CONVINCE yourself is healthy to eat UNLIMITED amounts of that you KNOW you need to CUT BACK ON??? (Mine is definitely grapes! And peanut butter, i love peanut butter. lol)

Exercise As A Family

     Having kids is EXPENSIVE!!  All parents know this, and even non-parents know it too!  So when suddenly one parent stops working for maternity/paternity leave than there usually isnt alot of extra cash floating around for taking the family out, let alone doing family activities that give everyone adequate exercise every day.  Babies and toddlers spend an awful lot of time strapped into car seats or plopped in front of the TV. Not only does this prevent them from practicing their emerging motor skills and strengthening their heart, lungs, and muscles, but it can also set them up for a sedentary lifestyle, and even obesity, as adults. A good habit of physical activity, on the other hand, will last a lifetime.  A workout doesn't have to be running laps or lifting weights, which requires you to set aside blocks of time. Think of exercise as just leading an active lifestyle, which you can do with your kids, and you'll be able to fit in more than you think.

As a bonus, exercise with family does double duty as quality time -- no small consideration given our jam-packed schedules. Let these creative ideas help you turn every day into an opportunity to get fit -- and have fun -- together.

1. Go for pre- or post-dinner walks

Whether you head into town or just cruise the neighborhood, building a walk into your daily schedule ensures that it won't get put off. 

2. Crank the music and bust a move.

Try a dance off, or create a routine to the kids favorite song.

3. Make a game out of household chores.

Pretend that dust creatures are invading earth and it's up to Captain [insert child's name] to save the day by capturing them with the broom.  Or give each child a cleaning cloth and a wall or window to wash and time who can clean it the fastest!

4. Sneak workouts into other activities.

Have your toddler walk instead of riding in the cart at the supermarket, and take the stairs or walk up the escalator whenever possible. 

5. Turn TV commercials into fitness breaks.

Invent silly names for simple exercises like squats, push-ups, and sit-ups, and then do them together till the show comes back on.  Call them princess sit-ups or Bob the Builder muscle builders. You can also play "coach," in which you take turns "ordering" each other to "drop and give me five," or "follow the leader," in which one person leads the others in fun, simple moves like clapping, wiggling, and marching.

6. Have a weekly sports night.

Every Wednesday, for example, get everyone up and moving. One game to play is the fit-deck shuffle. Create a series of playing cards featuring family-friendly exercises, such as bear-crawling or ape-walking. Each family member picks a card and performs the exercise pictured until all the cards have been dealt. You can also buy a ready-made set of exercise cards from FitDeck (fitdeck.com).

7. Walk or run for charity.

Model the value of exercise -- and of giving back to society -- by teaming up with your children for a fund-raising race.  

8. Put kids to work in the yard.

If autumn brings down leaves in your area, make a game out of catching them on a windy day -- see who can catch the most yellow, orange, or red ones.  Then rake them into piles -- give the kids child-sized rakes so they can help -- and have fun jumping in them, or take turns completely covering one another in leaves. After a snowfall, let kids help clear the porch or walkway, then see who can make the most snow angels. Older kids can help build a snowman -- and even toss a few snowballs.

9. Team up for gardening.

Kids are great at digging up dirt, so let them turn over the soil and help you plant new bulbs. Research shows that gardening is as good as weight training when it comes to preventing osteoporosis, and if you're planting vegetables, it can make them more appetizing to kids. In the summer, set up a sprinkler to water the lawn and challenge kids to duck the spray!

10. Walk the dog.

Or, let the kids walk the dog together if they are big enough to handle it.  Find a local dog park, get the furry friends some off leash time too.  Plus the kids can run around with the dogs outside in more open space for longer periods of time without fear of valuable fragile stuff getting knocked over at home. Haha.

Emotional vs. Physical Hunger

Do you know the difference between emotional hunger and physical hunger?  It's ok if you dont, i didn't either before I started looking deeper into it.  I had a basic understanding, based on my own assumptions but i definitely clarified things upon researching better.  Emotional hunger can be powerful. As a result, it’s easy to mistake it for physical hunger. But there are clues you can look for that can help you tell physical and emotional hunger apart.

• Emotional hunger comes on suddenly. It hits you in an instant and feels overwhelming and urgent. Physical hunger, on the other hand, comes on more gradually. The urge to eat doesn’t feel as dire or demand instant satisfaction (unless you haven’t eaten for a very long time).

• Emotional hunger craves specific comfort foods. When you’re physically hungry, almost anything sounds good—including healthy stuff like vegetables. But emotional hunger craves fatty foods or sugary snacks that provide an instant rush. You feel like you need cheesecake or pizza, and nothing else will do.

• Emotional hunger often leads to mindless eating. Before you know it, you’ve eaten a whole bag of chips or an entire pint of ice cream without really paying attention or fully enjoying it. When you’re eating in response to physical hunger, you’re typically more aware of what you’re doing.

• Emotional hunger isn’t satisfied once you’re full. You keep wanting more and more, often eating until you’re uncomfortably stuffed. Physical hunger, on the other hand, doesn't need to be stuffed. You feel satisfied when your stomach is full.

• Emotional hunger isn’t located in the stomach. Rather than a growling belly or a pang in your stomach, you feel your hunger as a craving you can’t get out of your head. You’re focused on specific textures, tastes, and smells.

• Emotional hunger often leads to regret, guilt, or shame. When you eat to satisfy physical hunger, you’re unlikely to feel guilty or ashamed because you’re simply giving your body what it needs. If you feel guilty after you eat, it's likely because you know deep down that you’re not eating for nutritional reasons.

     Simply put, Emotional hunger leads to alot of typically bad food decisions and can typically give itself away if you know that what you suddenly crave is in no way nutritious or will probably make you slightly hate yourself half an hour later.  Physical Hunger makes the stuff my girls usually make funny faces at look just as appealing as chocolate coated cavity givers.  Mind you with physical hunger everything looks good so you can still make bad decisions, its just alot simpler to make good ones.

Need tips on how to stop emotional eating? Keep following my blog, tips coming soon!!

Can You Recognize If You Are Emotionally Eating??

    Emotional Eating, do you think its only for overweight people? I promise its not.  Emotional eating is so much more.  Its turning to food for comfort, stress relief, or even as a reward rather than to satisfy true hunger. 

    Most emotional eaters feel powerless over their food cravings. When the urge to eat hits, it’s all you can think about.

Mindful eating is a practice that develops your awareness of eating habits and allows you to pause between your triggers and your actions. You can then change the emotional habits that have sabotaged your diet up until now.

   Ever made room for dessert even though you’re already full or dove into a pint of ice cream when you’re feeling down? Congratulations you’ve experienced emotional eating. Emotional eating is using food to make yourself feel better—eating to fill emotional needs, rather than to fill your stomach. 

   Using food every once in a while as a pick me up, a reward, or to celebrate isn’t necessarily a bad thing. But when eating is your primary emotional coping mechanism—when your first impulse is to open the refrigerator whenever you’re upset, angry, lonely, stressed, exhausted, or bored—you get stuck in an unhealthy cycle where the real feeling or problem is never addressed.

     Emotional hunger can’t be filled with food. Eating may feel good while its happening, but the feelings that caused the eating are still there, plus you usually feel worse than you did before because of the unnecessary calories you consumed. Than, you feel guilty for messing up and not having more willpower. Compounding the problem, you stop learning healthier ways to deal with your emotions, you have a harder and harder time controlling your weight, and you feel increasingly powerless over both food and your feelings.

Are you an emotional eater?

• Do you eat more when you’re stressed?
• Do you eat when you’re not hungry or after you already feel full?
• Do you eat to feel better (to calm and soothe yourself when you’re sad, mad, bored, anxious, etc.)?
• Do you reward yourself with food?
• Do you regularly eat until you’ve stuffed yourself?
• Does food make you feel safer? 
• Do you feel like food is a friend?
• Do you feel powerless or out of control around food?
  
  
      So now that you can recognize if you are emotionally eating, do you think its so simple as to just stop?  Sadly not the case.  Don't worry, keep following my blog, I still need to go over the differences between emotional and physical hunger, as well as tips to stop your Emotional eating and switch over to Mindful eating instead!

Fitness Personality - 8 Colors Test

So i have people ask me all the time about fitness programs and if i can describe them.  Everytime I tell them about what they ask for but also try to help them figure out if its a program that would actually work for them.  Now, every fitness program can in fact work for everybody but not everybody will work for every program.  And let's face it there are SO many programs available its overwhelming trying to pick one.

I always tell people who come to me the same thing.

If you don't enjoy your workouts than you won't stick with it in the long run!

Now i have no problem giving my opinion about if i think someone will enjoy a program or not.  I have sampled just about every program Beachbody has thanks to Beachbody On Demand and I always go back to the same style of programs.  Because I enjoy doing them!

Did you know that your personality can tell you not only about your characteristics but also your fitness style and why you are drawn to certain activities and environments?  The 8 Colors of Fitness has figured it out and even has made an online test you can take so that you can see exactly what kind of fitness personality you have!

Go check it out and find out what your fitness personality colours are!

http://the8colorsoffitness.com/?option=com_frontpage&Itemid=1

After you find out than come back and let me know what you thought about it!  

Schedule Yourself Into Your Own Day!

I tell my friends (that is how i refer to them instead of clients, because honestly they become my friends quickly enough) to always make sure they take time for themselves.  All i hear all the time is how busy and crazy and hectic everyone's schedules are.  Especially my mom friends who are constantly telling me that they put their own well being onto the back burner because by the time they take care of the family and the household they have little to no time and energy left for themselves!!

STOP.

Take a minute.

Pay Attention.

I am giving you a gold nugget right here.  Want to know the easiest method to increasing your own sense of self wellness and increased daily health? 

Easy.  Look at your daily schedule, whether its on your phone, in a big leather bound book that weighs 20lbs in your manhole sized purse or if its a big wall calendar in your office.  Now, take a pen and write this down;

"Me Time!"

Now, i know you might be thinking, "well thats silly why should i do that?"  Simple. If you write it down than you are going to see it, or at least think about it and KNOW that you will have some time to just do anything for yourself.  It could just be sitting in a dark room for 5 minutes (if you are a mom than you know just how sacred 5 minutes alone can be)  or reading a few pages of that book you bought 3 months ago and haven't cracked yet!

Spending just a few minutes a day on YOU is the first thing you should do to create a better sense of wellness in your life.

Stay tuned, cuz every week I will have a new wellness tip for you!!

Trust the new beginnings

Alrighty so Mondays for everyone usually tend to symbolize the beginning of the work or school week, right? Well I certainly see it as a beginning, and so that is what has inspired this weeks Motivational Monday quote!

I never want to feel a sense of dread when a Monday approaches, so i always have something nearby to keep my spirits up and my mind focused on the possibilities of the upcoming week instead of dwelling on everything i didn't complete last week.  

I had an insanely busy weekend, i neglected doing some much needed work because my daughters wanted to cuddle.  Probably because we tried our best not to go outside if we didn't have to because it feels like -36 Celcius.  I have zero regrets though, because i am my own boss than i can make those decisions and only have myself to answer to!! Small kids tend to get pretty antsy when trapped inside, especially mine.  

But today is a new day, with new beginnings!  

Fresh week, what will you do with your fresh start?

Be happy because you Choose to be!!

Some people get the weekend to unwind or get away from life's obligations for a a little while.  Not in our household, weekends are just a continuation of every day for us!  And personally i am fine with that, because than the routine we set up Monday through Friday doesn't get unwound over the weekend.

I am a firm believer that your attitude is contagious.  If you start the weekend, or any day really, with a poor attitude or expecting the worst than somehow that is exactly how things will work out.  So today i challenge everybody to go out and spread a little positivity to someone who you think might appreciate and benefit from it!

Have a great Saturday everybody!

Study your face off!

I am currently parked in the corner of my local Starbucks getting some focused Me time in on my studying and planning.  By my calculations everything i managed to accomplish at home yesterday over the span of 6 hours i can easily eclipse within the 2 hour time frame my fantastic friend Christina has given me while she watches my youngest.  Plus, the last time i just got to sit in a Starbucks for the sheer pleasure of enjoying a latte was probably about 5 years ago... minimum.

The reason my friend graciously kicked me out of my own house this morning was simple.  She has been helping me in my endeavor to acquire my A.C.E. Group Fitness Instructor Certification.  It was a birthday present back in December which has alot of reading involved.  Hard to get done with any depth of focus when my 19 month old wants to cuddle with her sippy cup and watch yo gabba gabba.  You mom's know where i am coming from right? right.

So i am supposed to be approaching week 6 of my studying... i am at week 2. I am behind, and its been driving me crazy.  I have reread the same 5 pages a dozen times... and i HATE being behind.  So i am cracking down on my own excuses.  Luckily i have an amazing support team behind me for it.

Friends willing to remind me and encourage me with whatever i choose to do.
A husband who tries to help where he can when he is home.
An entire team of people scattered throughout the greater United States and Canada who share the same passion for fitness and a healthier lifestyle.

Now that i have updated you fantastic people, its time to study my face off!!

Send knowledge vibes ;)