Lose Your Health, Lose Your Mojo

Last year around this time I took a serious hit for several weeks with whatever mutant illness was plaguing the planet. I learned that “Without your health, you have nothing.”

While being sick, there were several things I wasn’t able to do:

• workout
• eat entirely the way I should
• spend time with friends and family
• focus
• work

The result:

• gained weight
• lost muscle
• less energy
• lost motivation
• no income
• no new blogs/business progress
• lost mental clarity
• cancelled client sessions
• less confidence
• lost voice so I couldn’t really talk to anyone
• less family/friend interaction
• etc.

I was pretty much a foggy-brained, productive-less couch potato. I completely lost my mojo in every area of my life…and once I started to feel better it took a little extra hard work to get it back and find my routine again. I’ll be honest, square one sucks, but I also know this is a great time to re-evaluate and set new goals (find the positive in everything)! That’s exciting, right?!

With that said, here are 8 preventative measures you can take to help secure your health:

1. workout – Weights, cardio, and flexibility are crucial here. Don’t skip any of these three components because they serve each other and function together. Weights build muscle which helps burn fat and keeps your metabolism up, makes you stronger, and protects! Cardio helps keep the health of your heart, lungs, veins, and arteries, etc., in tip-top shape! Flexibility helps improve your range of motion and keeps you safe while you’re doing both cardio and weight training. It’s also great for relaxation and a boost for your mental health.
2. eat clean – What you put into your body, you’ll get out of your body. Put in crap and your body will treat you like crap. Put in wholesome, nutrient-rich foods and your body will work for you, not against you! You’ll have more energy, a lower body fat percentage, and a stronger immune system (among several other things)!
3. drink lots of water – Your body is mostly water! Did you know that? It creeps around in every cell of your body and serves a useful purpose in every bodily function, so it’s important to keep a fresh supply running through at all times. Water is also how your body helps flush some toxins and other crud out of your system.
4. wash your hands – Always wash your hands when you’ve been out and about, touch lots of items and people, and before you eat. And always keep a travel hand sanitizer with you. We touch our faces a lot without much thought, and that’s one of the biggest ways we absorb germs that cause illness.
5. schedule a break – Our bodies need rest. If we’re always on the go-go-go and pushing ourselves every waking moment (which is easy to do since we all lead busy lives), our bodies become stressed. Make sure you schedule a rest day in your workout routine or plan something that puts you at ease and makes you purely happy. Read, have a power nap, get a pedicure or massage, have date night with your significant other, or do some yoga.
6. get enough sleep – This pairs well with #5 above. Our bodies do most of their repair work and recharging at night, so make sure you get 7-9 hours of quality REM sleep every night.
7. laugh – I’ve always believed the best medicine for just about anything is laughter. Stay positive, surround yourself with people that make you laugh, kick back with your favorite comedy, or buy a dog (seriously!)! You can’t help but feel good when you’re laughing.
8. regular check-ups – There are a lot of people who neglect their regular check-ups (I’m guilty)…whether it be dental, physical, optic, chiropractic, etc. It’s a good idea since some of the health issues that develop we can’t necessarily see or notice on our own. If anything, it’ll be a great little ego boost when the doc tells you you’re so stinkin’ healthy he/she can’t believe it (if you’re doing all of the above)!

Bottom line? Lose your health, lose your mojo. Find your health, find your mojo.

Yours in Health,

Tanya

I’m Sick! Can I Still Workout?

‘Tis the season for colds and influenza! When you’re on track towards a particular goal, it definitely puts an unwanted halt in your momentum and progress. A couple of scenarios usually play out: 1) you have the drive and dedication to try and push through your workouts anyway; or 2) you take a break entirely until you’re feeling well again. You know what these two scenarios have in common? They could both place you back at square one! Unfortunate, right? Pushing through your workout could end up prolonging the duration of your illness leading to very little gains towards your goals, and waiting until you’re completely well again could cause you to risk losing some of the muscle you’ve built and fitness level you’ve gained. It’s amazing how long it can take to build and how fast it can fade. Kind of feels like a lose-lose situation no matter what you do, right? So what DO you do?

There are two common types of illnesses to look out for: colds and influenza. We’ve all experienced both at some time or another. The two are quite different so your reaction to them as far as activity goes should be different, as well. Colds typically effect the upper part of the body in the chest, neck, and head while influenza typically effects the lower regions of the body in the intestines, tummy, and chest. Below are two lists of symptoms that are categorized as “Go get ’em, Tiger” and “Slow down, Rockstar.” The first list consists of symptoms that are typically associated with colds while the second list consists of symptoms that are typically associated with the flu.

Go get ’em, Tiger!

• stuffy nose
• light-moderate headache
• light chest congestion
• light coughing
• light-moderate sore throat
• sneezing
• light fatigue

Slow down, Rockstar!

• fever
• heavy chest congestion
• throwing up
• heavy coughing
• diarrhea
• upset stomach
• aching body/muscles
• heavy fatigue
• heavy coughing

When you’re experiencing severe cold or flu-like symptoms, it’s always a good idea to take a break. Don’t worry about losing any progress you’ve made up until this point. Your job is to get better as quickly as possible so you can get back in the saddle! Oftentimes when you have the flu you are unable to feed your body normally. When you can’t fuel your body properly for working out, you absolutely should not be trying to kill it in the gym! Lay low until you’re better! Your body needs to focus its energy on killing bacteria/viruses and healing itself. When you workout with high intensity while you’re sick your body starts trying to put its energy elsewhere to build and recover muscle tissue, etc., which can prolong your recovery. Even if you do feel well enough to workout, take it down a notch or two to a low or moderate intensity. This will help reserve enough energy for getting better without causing you to sacrifice all your previous efforts in the gym. Also make sure you get lots of sleep! Your body does most of its repair and recovery while it’s resting…this includes sickness/illness.

Keep in mind I am no doctor and this is just my opinion based on my personal experience and fitness knowledge. As always, consult your doctor and take their advice!

Yours in Health,

Tanya

Top 8 Fitness & Nutrition Apps

As technology continues to grow, there are a number of fitness, health, wellness, and nutrition apps that we can download to our mobile devices to help us log our food, track our workouts, set goals, meditate, connect with other like-minded fitness enthusiasts, get inspired and motivated, stay accountable, try new recipes, find close-by health food, etc. If you’re looking for anything health and wellness related, as they say, there is probably “an app for that.” I’ve decided to collect and share with you some of my personal top 8 favorite apps with you. Give them a try or search out your own to motivate and guide you through your healthy lifestyle!

LoseIt

LoseIt is a really seamless nutrition logging application and website. It allows you to set a calorie budget for the day, track food, input exercise, and stay motivated with peer support and friendships. There is a premium membership and free membership based on your preference or level of desired features. You can also connect devices and accounts like a fitbit tracker, fitbit aria, Facebook, Twitter, Run Keeper, Nike, etc. I prefer this app over the more popular Myfitnesspal below because of its ease of use, simplicity, and the way they set up inputting your food and selection of portions.

Myfitnesspal

This is the most well-known and universal nutrition tracking app. This platform contains a much larger community of people, so if community is what you’re looking for, this app might be your choice. However, the set-up and features are slightly more complex than LoseIt, but you get very similar types of features from both platforms. Additionally, if you have other apps, accounts, and devices you’d like to connect, Myfitnesspal syncs with a greater amount of these than does LoseIt.

Pact

Want to make money from your fitness and nutrition commitments? This is your app! Pact allows you to create, well, a PACT with the app for a weekly commitment to fruits/veggies, nutrition logging, and/or workouts. Complete your workouts? Get paid by the community from those who didn’t adhere to their pact. Don’t complete your workouts? You pay what you wager per missed activity. The motivation to get sh!t done is really high when money is involved!

Lift

If you’re aware, goal-setting is one of the best ways to help boost your achievement in any area of your life – including fitness and health. Lift helps you succeed with coaching, community, and data. So you can get guidance, encouragement, and set up reminders, learn from users and experts, and track your goals progress to keep you moving forward.

Instagram

I know that Instagram is not specifically a health and wellness application, BUT the usefulness of this app for health and wellness purposes is HUGE – at least in my opinion. The community of fitness and health people here is so big that you can find inspiration and motivation for the development and continuation of your own lifestyle in seconds. (come find me! @tanyathurnau)

Fitlist

I used to track my workouts (sets/reps/time/etc.) the good old fashioned way up until VERY recently. I seriously think I was the only one carrying around a notebook or binder and pen around the gym with me. Then it hit me – there’s probably an “app for that.” Duh!! I ran across this little gem, fitlist. It allows you to save your workouts (sets, reps, and all) for future use. You can add your own exercises, as well. It’s so simple that it’s easy and fast to use DURING your workout so you never skip a beat. You can see past workouts with a quick calendar swipe or even plan future workouts.

Calm

The mind is just as important as the body in a healthy lifestyle. If you’ve never made meditation a daily practice (even 5 short minutes), I highly recommend it. Calm is great and has categories for different types of subject-centered focus and has times ranging from 2-30 minutes.

Guided Mind

Guided Mind is another meditation app similar to Calm. There are 8 Guide Experts, 20 guided meditations, option to download your meditations so you can listen without an internet connection, TONS of premium meditations you can buy, 5, 15, and 30 minute meditations, and a variety of meditation topics to choose from.

Yours in Health,

Tanya

Nix The Negativity!

Are you experiencing negativity from loved ones, friends, or acquaintances? I find sometimes that some of the people closest to me are surrounding me with unexpected negative reactions to living a fit and healthy lifestyle. Maybe you experience some of the same reactions I do like ,”You’re starting to look like a man!” “When do you plan on quitting your diet?” “Skip your workout. You don’t need it! Hang out with us!” or “What, are you on a diet or something?” You can learn how to handle these sticky situations. By enhancing how you visualize success, you can trump the criticism and feel proud of your kick-butt achievements!

I have friends and family that try and offer me junk food all the time. I worked for YEARS in an industry where I served junk food. When I turn down eating this stuff I know isn’t what I want my body consuming, I get responses sometimes where the “offerer” goes on and on about how working out and being fit is vain, and eating healthy and exercising is for anyone who….(fill in the blank). It’s upsetting and discouraging sometimes because you want to feel like you’re setting a good example for others and encouraging people to live healthier, but that’s just not always the case because of the kinds of habits we’ve become used to and the “norm” that has gradually been set in place.

And, personally, as a woman, I think we’re sometimes made to feel guilty about doing anything for ourselves. Anytime we put our needs in front of someone else’s, the chance of getting criticized for it increases. But I feel like anytime we ARE doing something for ourselves we’re increasing our potential to be a better person for those we care about and those surrounding us!

The first step to overcoming this negative criticism has really nothing to do with family or friends or acquaintances, but with what you decide to tell yourself! People who think positive and believe in what they are doing perform better than those who don’t believe in positive thinking or engage in negative thinking. Visualize how you’ll handle the negative obstacles and give yourself the power to stay positive throughout the encounter. Visualize yourself succeeding!

After you’ve succeeded in visualizing and maintaining your positive attitude, show and tell what you’re after and what’s important to you. It’s, however, also important to note that saying too much will provoke an even more negative response, but just let the other person know your workouts are important and you enjoy eating healthy. The main impact you will make is after you SHOW them what your efforts are doing to your body and your health. Let people see the progress you make – trust me, they’ll notice – and you’ll have more than enough proof for them to see without overstepping your boundaries. Sometimes people don’t always know how important something is to you. The more they see and hear and notice, the greater your chance of support from them.

“Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference!” ~Winston Churchill

Yours in Health,

Tanya

Spring Clean Your Body

Spring has sprung! One of the first things I associate with Spring (and I’m sure many other people do, too) is Spring cleaning. The list is a long one! We all clean out our garages, donate the clothes we don’t wear anymore, move the couches and clean under the furniture, wash and clean out the cars, have garage sales to lighten our household loads, wash the windows, spray down the siding on the house, clean out or rearrange the cupboards and closets, and start planting or prepping the garden, etc. We focus so much on cleaning and organizing everything else around us, but you know what other thing we should really put on our list that could also use some serious Spring cleaning? Our bodies!!

Think about it for a second. We’ve been hibernating for several months. During those hibernation months we encounter some of the most indulgent, food-focused holidays and celebrating of the year. This is followed by the much anticipated New Year. Yeah, we claim our weightloss resolutions for the 1st of the year, but by Spring we’ve all but forgotten or lost motivation for our health and fitness goals. It’s really not surprising, if you think about it. A fresh, new year is exciting, but there’s not a whole lot to propel most of us forward after the initial excitement has passed. The Winter months (at least in Minnesota) are gloomy and snowy and the days are shorter with darkness settling in around 5PM. Not to mention, seasonal depression takes over bigtime the longer winter lingers. Let’s face it, with all of this going on we’re more likely to snuggle on the couch with a warm blanket, mindlessly snack on potato chips and comfort food, and watch hours of TV rather than head to the gym and prepare healthy meals after a long day at work.

Spring is a time of  birth/rebirth, growth, renewal, and a fresh new start! Everything around us is going through some kind of transformation, so why not take this time to transform yourself!?

Here are some Spring cleaning items you may want to add to the checklist for your body:

• Find a workout routine you love that incorporates all the elements: cardio, weights, and flexibility.
• Get yourself some fun new fitness toys to play with like training equipment (weights, resistance bands, a jump rope, etc.), a fitness tracker, or other fitness goodies.
• Clean out the refrigerator and cupboards, toss everything that’s not clean, and replace it with lean protein, complex carbs, fruits, veggies, and whole foods.
• Drink more water…at least a gallon daily.
• Go on a shopping spree and find a super-cute new pair of sneakers and a hot new workout outfit to get you excited about being active.
• Rearrange the furniture and create an environment conducive to making good healthy choices for transformation.
• Find a buddy and work on your bodily Spring cleaning together – it’s always more fun with someone else!
• Load up on some new music! Music is motivational and can really help you jam through a good workout!
• Create a dream board and fill it with photos of physiques you admire and quotes that inspire you!
• Subscribe to a fitness magazine or buy a new book to read. The more you educate yourself about health and fitness the more likely you are to live a healthy lifestyle.
• Buy yourself a cute new summer dress or swim suit in your goal size to help motivate you during your transformation.

I hope you decide to do some bodily Spring cleaning and add as many of these items to your personal list as possible! These are just some of the ideas I came up with, but if you think of anything else you’d like to add to this list, please share and comment below! The more ideas, the better! Happy Spring cleaning!

Yours in Health,

Tanya

8 Signs You Could Be Overtraining

More doesn’t mean better results. It’s important to balance work and rest in order to lose weight and repair precious muscle tissue for optimal results physically and mentally. When you’re in danger of overtraining, you are in danger of several factors that affect your health. Here are 8 important signs and symptoms of overtraining you should be looking out for.

SIGN 1: Illness/Sickness

Illness is a normal part of life, but what if you’re becoming ill more often or have symptoms of illness returning on a more frequent or daily basis? When we overtrain, our bodies are under an increased level of stress. With higher levels of bodily stress comes weakness in the immune system.

SIGN 2: Fatigue/Tiredness

One of the greatest benefits of living a healthy lifestyle is that it helps to increase and balance your energy levels so you have more stamina and mental clarity/focus throughout the day, but when you begin feeling chronically fatigued, that’s definitely a red flag for overtraining.

SIGN 3: Aches/Pains/Injury

As you’re probably aware, aches and pains come with the territory of working out. It’s called DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness) and it starts to make itself known about 24-48 hours after a workout. This type of ache and pain in the muscle is normal and it’s a good thing. It means change and growth and shape of the muscle fibers. However, if you’re feeling a massive pain in your knee with every step of your run or incessant popping and crackling of a joint during an exercise, then it’s time to pull back on the reigns, modify your training, or have it checked out. Another concern with overtraining is that you could be slowly shifting into improper form during your workouts, which could also be causing skeletal problems and alignment issues that lead to imbalances, pain, discomfort, and injury.

SIGN 4: Loss of Motivation

Although it can sometimes be tough to initially start a fitness and health routine and there are definitely days you’ll encounter where you “just don’t feel like it,” this lifestyle should, in general, be motivating and enjoyable once you get the habits down and find the workouts you really look forward to. So if, all of a sudden, you’re struggling on a daily basis to workout when it’s normally not such a struggle to get up and get moving, then take a look at how much you’ve been training lately.

SIGN 5: Extreme Change in Appetite

In relationship to overtraining you can notice either a loss or increase in appetite. If you’re experiencing a loss in appetite it is due to physical exhaustion as well as an increase in the release of appetite-suppressing hormones. If you’re experiencing an increase in appetite it is due to your body searching for extra calories for recovery and replenishment of your glyogen stores.

SIGN 6: Plateau/Lack of Progress

You’ve probably heard the phrase related to weight loss that says it’s all about “calories in versus calories out.” So since 3500 calories = 1 pound, then MORE calories out during your workouts daily means more weight lost in a week, right? WRONG! There really is more to losing weight than calories in versus calories out. There’s a fine line you don’t want to cross. Your body needs calories for energy. In fact, the word calorie literally means energy. If you overtrain, you’re sending your body a signal and it progressively doesn’t have the resources to properly take care of itself. Its first priority is survival mode, so your goals of weight loss or muscle gain (or insert goal) get put on the back burner as far as your body’s priorities are concerned.

SIGN 7: Changes in Sleep

In addition to feeling chronically fatigued, you can actually suffer from the opposite, as well. You can feel over-excited, restless, and have trouble getting to sleep or staying asleep at night. This happens especially if you’re overtraining at really high intensity levels (cardio or weightlifting like HIIT or Power Lifting). What happens is your Sympathetic Nervous System (responsible for “fight or flight”) gets excitable and your heart rate has a hard time coming down. This is also known as Sympathetic Overtraining. The ability of your body to enter into quality sleep and recovery mode is critical for health and physical progress.

SIGN 8: Difficulty Completing Workouts

As a general rule, you should be lifting to failure on your exercises in order to build and grow your muscles, add strength, get lean, rev your metabolism, etc., but when you try to progressively move through your workout routine from week to week and notice you’re not able to lift as much or perform as many reps as you did the previous week, then that could mean you’re working out too much.

In general, all of these signs and symptoms stem from high stress levels in the body. What happens when you overtrain is that your body deals with an increased level of stress. When your body is stressed the CNS (Central Nervous System) kicks in and the brain sends help to the receptors of the body where it is needed. Additionally, during stress high levels of cortisol are released from the adrenal glands. This can then lead to adrenal fatigue. Your body is such a dynamic, smart, and interconnected system that responds appropriately based on the signals we repeatedly send it. So if you’re noticing any of the signs above, it may be time to look at your current workout routine and make some adjustments. More time in the gym absolutely does not equal better results. You need to strike a livable and realistic balance between life and workouts that allows for optimal results AND the ability to be a rockstar in all the other areas of your life.

Yours in Health,

Tanya

Fitness and Nutrition Myths…BUSTED!!

It’s important to be well-informed about fitness and nutrition when you’re trying to reach your health and fitness goals, but there are a lot of well-known and generally accepted myths out there that can end up providing you with the wrong information. I hope that by giving you the correct information about these myths you can better speed towards your goals.

MYTH #1: Crunches will give you a flat 6-pack stomach

You can do all the crunches in the world, but unless you clean up your diet, you’ll never flatten those abs and see that six pack you’re working so hard on. The saying, “abs are made in the kitchen” is absolutely true!

MYTH #2: If you’re a woman and lift heavy weights, you’ll get bulky and look like a bodybuilder

It takes a lot of work and an extremely particular plan to become a bodybuilder. You will not get bulky because your body doesn’t contain enough testosterone naturally to take on that kind of look. I can’t stress enough how important lifting heavy weight is. You’ll become a tighter, smaller, and more shapely fat-burning package.

MYTH #3: You can spot-reduce fat

You cannot choose where your fat comes off – just like you can’t choose where it appears when it builds up. Your genetics will mostly determine how your body reacts to fat, and unfortunately, the place you want it to come off first is often the place it comes off last.

MYTH #4: Skipping meals or cutting calories helps you lose more weight

If you’re planning on skipping meals or going below 1200 calories, your body will do the exact opposite you want it to. Your body is extremely smart and will notice, causing it to turn on starvation mode. It will slow your metabolism, hold on to fat, and actually eat away at muscle.

MYTH #5: Carbs make you fat

The right kind of carbs are essential for energy. It’s important not to scarf down simple carbs all day long (reach for complex carbs and earlier in the day when you need the energy), but carbs in and of themselves don’t make you fat.

MYTH #6: As long as you exercise, you can eat anything you want

Eating clean and exercise go together and they always will. They feed and fuel each other. One without the other always results in disappointment. As they say, “You cannot out-exercise a poor diet.”

MYTH #7: The more you exercise, the better your results will be

Overtraining can result in plateaus, stress, exhaustion, sickness, and injury. Your body needs rest. Rest allows your body to recover, making it stronger and better able to tackle your next workout. All the really good stuff happens while you’re resting….PROGRESS!

MYTH #8: A fat free diet is the best diet

Your body needs fat. There are 2 kinds of fat in the body: essential fat and visceral fat. In order to maintain the essential fat it’s important to consume some healthy fats daily. A few examples are oils, nuts, avocados, and fish.

MYTH #9: Supplements can replace a clean balanced diet

The word “supplements” says it all…they supplement. I think it’s important to eat whole foods whenever you can and make sure that’s the main source for your nutrition. There are some really great supplements out there, though, you can use and add to your nutrition plan, optimize your nutrition plan, and fill in any gaps in your diet. Just make sure you do your research, read your labels, or speak with a nutrition professional for help.

MYTH #10: A calorie is a calorie is a calorie

Not all calories are created equal. You could eat a handful of candy for 200 calories or a dish of nonfat Greek yogurt topped with fresh berries and sprinkled with walnuts for 200 calories. Which do you think is going to do more for your body and help aid in weight loss? The dish of yogurt, right?

Yours in Health,

Tanya

10 Ways To Find Motivation

Sometimes we lose the drive to keep on a straight path towards reaching our fitness and health goals. Workouts get monotonous, food gets boring, we feel like we don’t have time, we cheat, we decide that skipping one day of eating healthy or working out won’t make a difference, but sometimes it can lead to a snowball of poor decisions that sends us off-roading way off course. Staying passionate about and motivated towards your purpose is an important part of your journey. So, I’m going to give you a list of things you can do to keep you on the right track!

1) Create variety in your workouts!
Working out the same way every week or month can get really boring. Switch up your workouts every month at least. Try new things and get outside (these Minnesota winters don’t always help)! You will have something to look forward to and your body will thank you for giving it something else new to do. You’ll see different (GREAT!) changes in your body because you’ll be working it an alternative way.

2) Find new foods and new recipes!
Get online, find a new cookbook, or browse the grocery store. Open up your mind to new foods and flavors! Food doesn’t have to be boring if you don’t want it to be. In fact, you should be excited about eating and fueling your body in a healthy way! You’ll notice some fun things happen to your body when you fuel it well.

3) Get a workout buddy!
Having someone you can count on to relate to and have fun with will give you a push. You can talk about your results, make goals together, and help each other reach them. You can bounce ideas off of each other as well and open each other up to new workouts, recipes, etc.

4) Subscribe to a magazine!
I LOVE magazines that provide health and fitness tips and advice! They often also have transformation stories that inspire and motivate. They help give me ideas every single month on workouts, lifting moves, targeting certain parts of my body, recipes, EVERYTHING! So you get a push every time your new magazine comes in the mail.

5) Use an event to motivate you!
Do you have a wedding, reunion, or vacation coming up? Do you just want to look swimsuit ready for summer? Use that as motivation! Mark your calendar with a big red circle or put a note up on your refrigerator, bathroom mirror, on your tv where you workout, or on your bedroom door (so it’s the first thing you see every day)! Keep in mind how you want to knock everyone’s socks off because of how great you look!
6) Weigh your options and evaluate the effects!
Is there a brownie staring you up and tempting your tastebuds? Are you having a bad day and want to binge on a giant bag of Doritos? Stop yourself and think before you act! Think about all the work you’ve done to get as far as you have. Then think about how you KNOW you are going to feel when you get done eating that brownie or downing those chips. Tell yourself you’re stronger than your urge and step away from the foods that are tempting you! You’ll be SO glad you did!

7) Just push play!
Even if you don’t feel like working out just do it anyway! Chances are, after you start you’ll end up finishing your entire workout! And if you weren’t in the mood to workout BEFORE your workout, you will be in the mood after 5 minutes of warming up! And afterwards you’ll be so proud you stuck it out! Keep in mind you’ll never regret the workouts you do.

8) Use your imagination!
Start thinking about the results you want and the way you want to look. Find pictures of people that inspire you with results similar to what you’re looking to achieve….imagine how you’d look and how great you’d feel being that fit and energetic. Imagine what you’d do with that energy and what losing those few extra pounds will allow you to do in the future that you can’t do right now.

9) Buy a new pair of kicks!
Remember back in elementary school when you were excited for the new year because you got to use your new lunch box and wear your new clothes? This is kinda the same deal, but fitness style. Get yourself a new pair of kicks and a new outfit to create a little excitement for your workouts! Looking cute and testing out new gear is fun!

10) Hire a Personal Trainer!

Having a personal trainer takes some of the guesswork out of a fitness program for yourself. Additionally, personal trainers are a great way to get ideas for exercises/routine, add extra accountability, or help you push yourself further than if you worked out on your own. Another great reason is safety. If you’re not working out safely, then you risk not being able to workout at all. It’s nice to have someone spotting you and correcting form. 

Yours in Health, 

Tanya

5 Questions To Ask Yourself Before Eating THAT

As a health and fitness professional, I see and hear more often than anything else that nutrition is the toughest part of developing a health and fitness lifestyle. I can certainly attest to and agree with my clients on this one.

There are times when I even make impulsive decisions that cause me to feel terrible about my moment of weakness. These decisions don’t leave a huge immediate physical impact on my body, but they often mess with my head, make me feel a little mental fog, and lose some of my energy. Then what happens? Sometimes I end up falling off the wagon completely because I feel like I’ve already failed, so what’s the point? I don’t think I have to ask for a show of hands for how many of us have experienced this situation, do I?

The reality of the matter is that it really doesn’t matter how others see us or what they think, it’s how WE FEEL about ourselves. We are the ones who suffer the consequences of our actions and impulsive decisions in moments of weakness.

So how do we fix this? The first thing we really need to do is learn to be less impulsive about the things that could interfere with what is truly important to us. Take these next few steps:

STEP 1: Grab a couple pieces of paper and a pencil (ancient, I know) and sit down with your thoughts.

STEP 2: Write down and clarify your goals and what’s important to you.

STEP 3: Determine and write down all the things that could possibly get in the way of you and your goals. 

STEP 4: Go through each of the scenarios you’ve come up with and create a solid plan of action.

I find that a lot of people are impulsive simply because they aren’t clear enough with themselves about what it is they truly desire. So when the moment of derail approaches, they are more likely to cave in because they haven’t thoroughly thought everything through. Without a clear idea of where you want to end up, you can’t create a good roadmap for how to get there.

So now that you have your roadmap and directions for your destination, when you encounter those moments where you have the opportunity to go off-roading, hopefully you’ll check back with your directions and stay on course. If you still find it difficult in that moment of weakness, ask yourself these additional five questions:

QUESTION 1: How will the decision to eat this make me feel physically tomorrow?

QUESTION 2: How will the decision to eat this make me feel mentally tomorrow?

QUESTION 3: How hard or long am I going to have to workout to burn this off?

QUESTION 4: Am I WILLING to workout that hard/long to burn this off?

QUESTION 5: Is eating this RIGHT NOW going to feel better than how I will feel when I hit the goals I want to achieve LATER?

If the roadmap doesn’t sway you from off-roading, hopefully the answers to these 5 questions will put a bitter taste in your mouth and cause you to push that (fill in the blank) away and stay on course.

Yours in Health,

Tanya