I watched a show last night on TV. It was called " The Biggest Loser" , have you ever watched it? I remember watching it last season and I was fat and envious of the intense training they had. I remember thinking to myself "Wow, if I was there I would SO be thin!!" Well, I never went on that show but here I sit at almost 12% body fat ( for a chick I am considered "lean"). Anyway....Last night there was this one woman, man she drove me NUTS with self sabotage. I am sure she is not even aware of the fact she does it, so many people do it. Do you?
She said she could not ride on an airplane because it would make her sick, she began to cry and heave and said she should go home even.....Leave the damn SHOW because of a ride on an airplane!! Leave the show which was offering to help her day and night lose the 100 pounds of fat which weighed her spirit down. Leave the show which so many other people applied to be on because she had to ride in an airplane. I mean, how about setting a limit on yourself as soon as the bell is rung!!
Later in the show she said she KNEW she would be picked for an added burden by the other challengers..She just KNEW she would be picked to fail, she just KNEW she had not lost enough weight to make the cut...SHE JUST KNEW SHE WAS A FAILURE, so why bother trying. How can you set yourself up like that? We see it all the time though.

I could be thin like her if I had the self discipline to not eat all the donuts and ice cream in the house at 10 o'clock at night. Here is helpful advice if this is you....Make a clean home for yourself. Don't allow junk food in until you are in a safer place emotionally that they WILL NOT TEMPT YOU! By cutting out that binging alone you save yourself from 19 pounds of extra fat gained this year!

I could be physically fit if I only had TIME to go to the gym. Between my job, errands for the family, and my down time at night I have no time to work out. Even if I did have some time, I am too tired at the end of the day to work out. I promise you this....I PROMISE YOU THIS...if you start taking 30 minutes a day just 3 times a week ( so that is what? 1.5 hours out of 168 hours in a week!) you WILL have time, you WILL get more energy and soon you will see changes which will encourage you to work out more. Soon, in a few weeks or even for some a few months you will forget you really liked this TV show, or that news program. The world will not come to a screeching halt if you skip TV a little bit and walk around the block. Your body will begin to change completely, though!

I could look as good as him but I can't give up my *insert food here*. I also can't STAND *insert food here* If you tell yourself you won't like a new food program before you even give it 100% of your effort you are no better than the 3 year old child staring at a plate of veggies that EVERY PARENT EVER has said "just try it, you may like it" So are you setting yourself up here just like a small unreasonable child having a tantrum. I can't say it any other way. I can't imagine the self reasoning to tell yourself you could have the physical appearance you have always wanted but you can't stomach the idea of eating differently to get there. With that mind set, when you become so obese and develop diabetes and heart disease....just wait till you see the foods you will have to give up in order to just STAY ALIVE!!

If you approach this with 100% effort, with 100% open thoughts to how to get to where you want to be, you will get there! If you start off making excuses for yourself before you even tie your running shoes, you will NOT get to where you really and truly want to be. So right now, be HONEST with yourself. Why are you telling yourself these things? What are you afraid of happening? You may like oatmeal? You may develop a love for aerobic fitness?

Are you afraid of failing? If you tell yourself you will do ANYTHING it takes, how can you fail?

If you are willing to do all that it takes, you WILL have the physical fitness you want!!

Everything we eat does something for us, or to us. We are all eating to maintain a specific size, what size is determined by how much and what foods we eat. A lot of people make the mistake of skipping meals or going on extreme diets which cause the body to actually go in a panic mode and it ends up slowing down fuel burning ( metablolism) and looks to our muscles for added energy. Some people make the mistake of eating an abundance of anything because they think the 30 minutes on the treadmill 3 times a week will make up for it. In both extremes the body has no idea what to do so it stores fat.
It is so important to understand food, and digestion when atempting to change your eating styles. It is like knowing to put gasoline in your car for fuel rather than alcohol or peanut butter. How our body works with food is specific NOT hit or miss.
We digest food, good wholesome nutrition, roughly at 3 hour intervals. If you are eating the right foods and feel hungry an hour or 2 later, you are not eating enough. ( I mean real hunger people, not when you open the fridge door over and over looking for something to do) and if 4 or 5 hours go by and you have not felt that twinge of hunger, you are eating too much at one time.
An important step right now, for people who are looking to change is discover what amount of calories your individual metabolism needs. You can find out more about that on so many sites, but here are a few:
http://www.weightlossforall.com/calculate%20cals.htm
don't want to do the math? try here
http://www.shapefit.com/dailycalorie-calc.html
and another
http://www.caloriesperhour.com/index_burn.html
Now take one day and consider how many calories you normally eat, when you feel hungry and when you do not. Now if you are saying " But Moe, I am not hungry when I wake up, in fact I am not hungry till lunch or even later" then something is very wrong with your metabolism and you need to eat MORE! Remember it is not always about eating less. Yes people ( that's right I said YOU PEOPLE) who skip meals can still be gain weight, in fact MORE WEIGHT because their body dines on muscle stores while they feel proud they have not eaten yet....hence fat is stored and muscle destroyed.
So, today if you are trying to change and have no damn idea where to start, this is an excellent starting point.....time to EAT!!

This weekend someone noticed I lifted weights. He noticed it just by looking at me, what a nice ego boost that was. Well, not really an ego boost but more a confirmation I AM doing this right and I am heading towards the goals I have set for myself.
While visiting them I noticed they had some boxes which said "6 weeks to the new YOU!!" on the covers. I asked what it was about and teased that they had new bodies inside of boxes. I could not help it, I opened them and looked it over. It had motivational tapes, diet plans and even a resistance band to help them work out. I asked why they had not used any of it yet and of course jokes were made etc. Wow, six weeks to a new you and you have had this box for 12 weeks now, how is that working for you?
It really showed me how much a choice can influence us on a daily basis. Remember the talk about choices and how to make one, each day and to stick to that choice each day. When they made that purchase for that program ( how much is that program anyway!?!?) they had made a step towards a choice but each day since then had made a different choice. Yikes....They had come so close. Now like countless others that box will be either given away, sold at a yard sale or sit in a closet somewhere and wait for the choice to be remembered.
My basement is filled with other people's new choices. I have a Cardioglide machine, I have a Nordic Track, I have a wonderful treadmill, as well as 2 aerobic steps. I have 2 full weight benches with complete weights as well as 3 Olympic weight bars to go with it. I have a complete gym in my basement and I acquired it all for free.
People all spent money on these items, made a good choice to change their lives and then some how managed to self talk themselves into a really bad choice....Complacency. It cost me absolutely nothing to have a full gym at my ready because other people can't stick to a choice, one choice repeated daily until it becomes so routine and needed it is like breathing. Imagine making a choice to not breathe?

If you are interested in benefiting from other people's lack of initiative go to www.freecycle.org and join your local group! You can get gym equipment, workout tapes/DVD's etc. There is a plethora available for the taking!

make a choice

Well, about 10 weeks into my decision to change my life I came across an interesting link. They talked about the exact amount of calories based on body weight and activity ( STAY WITH ME PEOPLE) one would need to see weight loss. Well, I am a normal lazy American and this was interesting. I thought to myself, hey this will let me do as little as possible and get results! It did, too. It cast out all those ideas of working so hard you sweat blood just to lose 4 pounds of fat. It showed me a way, a truth and a light that I had never seen before.
Years ago I was very interested in weight lifting. I joined a gym and worked very hard at it, and I got very fit but I was still "fat". However, this site showed me what to do in order to not be fat and look sleek and muscular and lean. I would not just look thin, according to what I was reading, but I would look like I worked out! Well sign me right the hell up for this! I was all over it!
Very soon, in my hands I had the complete printed version of a book called Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle. Gregg, my husband, had printed it up for me and tabbed the chapters and handed it to me in a rut colored 3 ring binder. I read this book, I did the math to figure out my calories and mapped out my goals in log term.
Using the tools in this book I took my 37 pounds of weight loss I had achieved so far on my own and lost an additional 27 pounds of fat that I had no idea I could lose! My goals keep going and I am more and more educated on the human body, despite my college degree in it already!
I learned about body fat percentage, how much cardio is too much cardio. Read that last part again, because it is a really great thing to know.
We CAN do too much cardio!! WOOHOO, I knew it! However, most of us are in danger of doing to little so settle back down. I encourage anyone who wants to dig out of a rut, who wants a way to get completely healthy and have it explained SPECIFICALLY HOW and to find great motivation along the path, check out this book!
Here are some great links as well

www.fitren.com
www.weightlossforall.com

If you do nothing about this today, you will wake up fatter tomorrow.

After my stint with yoga I also discovered a new channel on TV, FitTV. A whole channel dedicated to fitness, who knew? They have different workout programs for different interests. I KNEW I was not interested in jumping up and down and smiling and that had been the only other options I had known about....Until I saw Gilad: Sculpt and Tone. This was a turning point for me, a golden beam of light from the heavens which shone down on the remote control and blessed me with a new insight. He did not jump around, he had no bounce in his groove but he used free weights and this new thing called "push ups".
One morning dressed in sweat pants and a sweatshirt I tuned in to Gilad, standing ready with my hand weights and my yoga mat I began my first real moves towards a rapid sculpting program. Yes, sculpt is a funny word to those seasoned in fitness, we know you can't sculpt off fat, but allow me to use it for now. I began to sweat, my heart was pounding, I was focused and tired. I forced out a few push ups and rested while Gilad continued, I squeezed upwards for a few stomach crunches until my ab muscles began to come to life and told me to lay the hell back down!
For an hour I did this, for one hour 3 or 4 times a week and yoga began to be a thing of the past in way of fitness. Soon I could do more push ups, more crunches, more lunges and squats and shoulder presses...soon I could see new muscles develop and inches gone from places like my mid section, my arms and my chest.
I had increased my workout incredibly and the pay off was obvious to me! I did not need to do traditional aerobics to burn off fat. This is a medical break through, people all around the world should know this!
My point with this is, you may not know all the options to burning off fat and have a mental image of wedgies from leotards and happy smiles jumping off small buildings and back up again. This may not be the approach you want to take, in fact you may HATE this idea as much as I do. If you do, know there are options, look into circuit training. A faster paced weight lifting program which makes you burn fat and feel powerful and healty and accomplished. Wedgie Leotard and plastic smile not included.
If you DO like aerobic jumping up and down, get out the pom poms and work up that smile. Jump up and down to music or the sound of traffic even.
Make sure today to move your body harder than yesterday and you will see a result, you will feel a result. Apply the idea to make each day a bit more physical than the day before and soon you will be SHOCKED with the results.
Days turn to weeks, which turn to months which turn to years. What will you do today to change the results over the years to come?

Do you ever sit and imagine changing yourself? Picturing the roll on your belly as flat or your thighs which rub together looking firm and fantastic in a pair of shorts? What stops you from taking the steps to being that image you have in your head? Have you been over weight for a while now and you just can't imagine the steps from fat to thin?
It is about making choices, or one choice. If you decide right now to no longer accept the fat on your belly, or thighs or hanging over your bra strap or keeping you out of your favorite pants, then take that choice and run with it. Decide right now to make a plan for today. If you are not taking steps to change it then you are becoming what it is you do not want to be.
Today, sit down and write goals. Be specific, I would like to wear a size....., I want to look like....., etc. Read that list and KNOW the list.
When you are tempted to go off your plan, to eat that pizza or that ice cream, remember your list and ask yourself how much closer to the goals you will be if you eat that food.
When you have a moment to fit in some sort of exercise, walking, bike riding, even some push ups and you decide to sit and watch TV instead, ask yourself how this choice is going to affect the time it takes to reach your goals.
Before you take any action, remember what the choice will affect.

So today, as you go about your day, ask yourself if this action will help you or make it worse for you. Weigh out what it is worth to you and act on that choice.

Become who you want to be simply by making the choice to be that person.

Well, here I am, er was when I decided it was time to stop this crazy spiral into the potato chip bag. Now wait, don't leave. You may just now have thought, but I do not eat potato chips and well, that is ok I did not really either. I can't even remember all of what I ate "then" and it is not relevant to the posting anyway.

I first started with the book written by Dr. Phil The Ultimate Weight Solution: 7 Keys to Weightloss Freedom. Great book, great place to start if you are trying to not be the emotional eater. If you just want to lose a few pounds you can also check out his rapid start book, this outlines the food plan really well. What I liked most about the rapid start is the calorie values for the crap food we think is part of our daily right as adults to consume without thought or care as to the glycemic index, the fat to protein ratio etc. Oops, did that last sentence get to "techy" for you? Did it make your eyes glaze over and make you look at the "fat" me again and wonder where I was going and if I could offer any help to you? Did the mention of the word glaze cause you to think of a donut? Ok, sorry, keep reading I won't do that again for a little while.

Now...sit still for a moment while I softly say a word. Don't close the window or run away or think of that donut again when I say this word to you. Exercise. Ok, hush, wait don't leave...I know, trust me I KNOW! You have no time, no energy, no desire, no need, no motivation...yeah yeah I KNOW! I began with something as simple as Yoga and walking with my toddlers in the twin stroller two or three times a week. This was how I started. Let me tell you though, nothing motivates me more than having sore muscles from Yoga, I mean COME ON, this is a relaxing stretching routine done to center my spirit and mind. My mind and spirit were apparently crumpled up in the back of a dresser drawer for a very long time. Taking them out and stretching them looking for a center caused muscle pain. WOW, I was more out of shape than I thought!

So let me break down this post to you in simple terms. I ate roughly 1,200 calories a day and worked out gently EVER SO GENTLY for three days out of seven every week for 3 months.

Here is a diet example from one day

Breakfast

1 slice WHOLE WHEAT TOAST

1 teaspoon natural peanut butter

8 ounces low fat yogurt

Snack

small apple

low fat cheese stick

Lunch

large bowl fresh spinach salad

1/2 cup low fat cottage cheese

1/2 chicken breast

Snack

1 ounce feta cheese

small apple

Dinner

Large Salad

Chicken Breast

fiberous veggies like broccoli

Snack

low fat frozen yogurt

Here is me at the end of those 12 weeks, you can see the extreme difference in my face. I lost 37 pounds from this adventure so far. There are more details to add but I will write more about it later.

Stay Dedicated to the choices you make for yourself and you WILL see results!