I hate the word diet.  It might just be me but the word ‘diet’ has such a restrictive connotation to it.  I have had a few people talk to me about the diets that they are on and what they can and can’t have.  Every time I tell myself I can’t have something, that’s all I think about and all I want.  I have also noticed that people that follow diets tend to either be on them or off of them.  There typically is no in-between.  I watch these folks be super restrictive about what they eat, then take a break and go crazy with what they eat.  This usually results in gaining most or all of the weight back or even put on weight after these binges.  This cyclic style of eating can wreak havoc on our bodies.

Living a healthy lifestyle at face value can seem like exactly the same thing as being on a diet.  The big difference, at least for me, is focusing on how eating clean and balanced makes me feel.  I’ll be the first to admit that while I’d like my nutrition to be on point 90% of the time I am probably closer to 75-80%.  I can’t remember exactly at what point this became a lifestyle for me, but at one point things just started to click.  I stopped being a slave to my calorie count and fitness tracker and just started living a healthy lifestyle.  For me this means working out for about 30 mins 5-6 days a week.  I always need at least one rest day per week and sometimes if I skip my morning workout I just let it go.  Staying on point with my nutrition is a little harder because I am definitely an emotional eater and can’t say no to free food.  I am usually pretty busy during the week so my meal plan consists of a lot of the same foods every day.  I will switch it up week to week but to make grocery shopping easier and to make sure I don’t waste food I try to only buy things that I know I’ll eat on a certain day.

The idea of balanced nutrition is a little new to me.  I’ve always had some go to meals and snacks that I’ve relied on in the past, but now I have been really pushing myself to eat vegetable at every meal.  This one has been a little harder for me because I don’t like to snack on veggies and in my mind they have to be part of a meal.  Making this shift has been hands down one of the things that has made me go from being relatively healthy to feeling amazing.  I judge meals now based on their veggie to protein to carb ratio.  It is absolutely amazing to me how hard it is sometimes to get a meal that is primarily veggies and isn’t refined carb overload.

I will add a little disclaimer that there can be a time and place for a diet, depending on your goals.  I would just caution you to make sure your short term goals align with your long term vision.  As always, if you are looking to lead a healthier lifestyle, just send me a message and I’ll help get you started.

It’s not the workouts or the shakes.  It’s not the challenge groups.  It’s not even the “Thank You’s” I get from folks when I help them with their goals, even though that is a close second.

The one thing that has made the most positive impact on my life is the personal development books I’ve had the chance to listen too.  I could make recommendations and talk all day about each of them but the one thing I have learned is that change in your life really comes from the inside.  If your heads not in the right place anything you try and accomplish on the outside will fade with time.  Seriously, how many times have you heard people jump from goal to goal and you just can’t keep up with what they are trying next?  If you don’t have a solid understanding of yourself and your source of motivation I can almost guarantee whatever you “try” next won’t stick.

We often get caught up in comparing ourselves to others and with social media that’s made it even easier to do.  I would challenge you to figure out what makes you…you.  Stop looking at everyone else’s journey and start living yours.  I can tell you one of the things I struggle with the most is being a shy introverted person.  I don’t know how many times people have thought I am not friendly or just plain stuck-up.  I would like to think we live in a world of extroverts, but maybe that’s just because they are the ones doing all the talking.  Finding my place as the quiet one that sits back in the corner and observes the situation has taken me a long time to accept. I can’t honestly say I’ve totally accepted it either, but I am getting there.

I love learning though about the science behind it all.  You gain a much better understanding of people when you start to take a look at what might be going on inside their brain.  Going one level deeper you also start to understand why we need all types of people in this world.  We need the more aggressive outgoing types to get stuff done, while the quiet more observant types are in the background providing checks and balances on the actions being taken.  You need the sensitive people who empathize better with people one on one and also the less sensitive folks that may do a better job of looking out for groups as a whole.  The amazing thing is not one way is better.  Our lives are so dynamic and we get so caught up in the differing views and beliefs that sometimes we just need to take a step back.

So if you are looking for a good book to get you started, shoot me a message and I’ll talk through what you are hoping to get out of diving into the wonderful world of personal development and make a few recommendations.  You first audio book through audible is always free so you have nothing to lose.

This week has been more emotionally challenging for me than physically challenging.  My husband was on nights so Sunday night through Wednesday night (into Thursday morning) has been all me.  I think Monday morning was the worst because I stayed up way too late and watched the end of the Superbowl.  I got all my workouts in though and made it to work on time.

I totally revamped my meal plan and it’s taken about the whole week to get adjusted to eating that early in the morning.  For weeks 1-3 I was having a shake when I first woke up, this week it’s been eggs, veggies, and lentils.  I think the hardest part was the texture.  I can’t exercise on an empty stomach so I have never been concerned about having food in my stomach and getting sick.  The act of eating in the mornings has taken a good 3 days to get used to.  I also moved my main Shake to dinner.  This has made it way easier for me to make less excuses at dinner time.

I can’t say that my nutrition has been horrible.  I follow the timed nutrition throughout the day, but there is just something about having a glass of wine with dinner or before bed that still has a strong hold on me.  I know I feel better when I follow the timed nutrition and get good sleep.  Now I just need to get out of my head.

I’ve already decided that I’ll be bumping up a bracket in the meal plan.  I have been eating more food earlier these past few weeks and its help curb some of my evening cravings.  I am hoping that by adding a little bit more to each of my meals will help even more.

I weighed in on Sunday morning and maybe only lost a pound or two, but the definition I am seeing in my stomach looks awesome.  The one thing the scale will never measure is how I feel.  I can tell that I am getting so much stronger and overall I just feel healthier!

I want to start out this review stating that my nutrition has been less than stellar.  Instead I am going to briefly focus on the fact that I’ve gotten every workout in so far.  That’s 18 different workouts, every morning for 3 weeks.  This program is unique in that they are only releasing the workouts one week at a time.  I could use the fact that since it is an online only program and I don’t want to burn through my data streaming the workouts, but I have been pretty good at downloading the workouts ahead of time so I am not wasting my data on something I’ll only watch once.  I love that the moves are the same, but they change up the number of reps and order of them.  This way I kind of know what’s coming and can get through the workouts relatively quickly.

Even though my nutrition could use an improvement I am still feeling a difference in the way I feel.  I am spreading out my veggies, healthy fats, carbs, and protein throughout the day and it has been making a world of difference in my energy level.  I am still eating the same amounts of food, just grouping it and spacing it out differently.  I also think I am eating more throughout the day and that has resulted in feeling less hungry/satisfied in the evenings.  I am having a tough time giving up my wine though and even downloaded a yoga routine to try and help distract myself….didn’t work…

I sat down and revamped my meal plan for week 4.  I got so focused on getting it put together that I realized I forgot my shakes!  Who does that after drinking them consistently for 3+ years…apparently I do.  I also didn’t have a solid plan for dinner so I moved my once religious breakfast shake to dinner.  We’ll see how that goes.

I am excited to wrap up this final week of Phase 1, recalculate my calorie bracket, and get started on the next Phase!  If you want to join me, just go to the contact me section of my website and send me an email.  We can sit down and talk through goals, and find a program that works best for you!!

Eight weeks down, only about four left to go, and I am really not looking forward to going back to work.  I know I probably really shouldn’t be saying that but deep down there Is a part of me screaming “DON’T DO IT”  I also know that I don’t want to be a stay at home mom.  More power to the women that chose to do that, but it’s just not for me.  I miss my routine and even though I have tried to stick with it for the most part sleeping in until 8 am is just way too late for me.  I am definitely enjoying a slowed down pace of life though.  I get to visit with family more often, takes naps with my baby girls, and in general not feel so “busy” The question I’ve been asking myself lately is what I do now.  I have been feeling some pressure to continue to keep chasing “The American Dream”.  Somewhere along the way my desire to continue with the rat race is fading away and my dreams of living a relaxed life keep creeping in.  Every time I feel this way I can’t help but think of the Mexican fisherman story.  We work our asses off to enjoy a little bit of life, instead of taking the time to enjoy a little bit of life now.  To me balance isn’t going full speed until you crash, take a couple of days to reset then doing it all over again, although I feel like that’s the cycle I’ve gotten myself into.

One of the things I was able to do with my time off is work towards setting goals based on feelings and experiences instead of outcomes.  We focus so much on the outcome that once we reach it we think there is going to be this magically feeling we get, but  I can almost guarantee that once you reach a goal the first thing you think is “Well is that it”  Let’s take the financial goal of being rich.  How many times have you said “If I make $ amount of money I’ll be happy”.  Then you work towards $ and when it comes you expect that all the sudden all your problems disappeared and you are magically happy.  It never seems to happen that way.  The amount of money you wanted to make comes and you don’t feel any different.  So now instead of focusing on the outcome of the goal you focus on the feelings.

So the goal I am going to work on now is to feel less busy.  I am starting by enjoying the time I have off.  I am going to keep taking trips and naps when I can.  When I go back to work, or maybe even sooner, I am going to get myself some help.

I am also going to keep visualizing my dream job, one in which I still get awesome benefits, but have a more flexible work schedule.  I know it’s out there and I will continue to stay high energy to attract it, but first time to relax outside a little more before the baby wakes up.