For best results: LIVE IN THE MOMENT

One of the most important lessons that I have learned during my years of living a healthy and fit lifestyle is that you must live in the moment to ensure yourself a healthy future.

We are all tempted to quit or relax our healthy eating and exercise when we are outside of our routine.  There is nothing wrong with taking a break or allowing for a slip but by making a conscious effort to exist and enjoy the time and place you are currently occupying you might safeguard your healthy lifestyle.

For most of us the idea of living in the moment almost begs us to be carefree and indulgent.  The reality is that when you can focus on eating a well-balanced meal or just participating in exercise you won’t want to indulge or bypass physical activity.  By allowing yourself to enjoy the preparation, the smells and the flavors of a healthy and delicious meal, you will feel full and content.  When we eat mindlessly, not only do we not enjoy what we are eating, we also tend to over eat because it takes our brain longer to realize we have eaten passed our limit.

Exercise is another activity that is more beneficial when broken down to bite-size pieces.  When scheduling your physical activity focus on the positives and benefits that you experience when you exercise.  This will make you more likely to stick to your routine.  Before a run I do not think about the time it will take me to get ready, and how long I will be out in the elements.  Instead I think about how nice it feels to be in the fresh air. I try to focus on how my energy will improve almost immediately but maintain me for the rest of the day.

Being mindful and present in your life is one of the best ways to live a stress-free and healthy life.

A free cure for all that ails you: EXERCISE

Singing the praises of exercise

We are constantly being told that exercise is important for a healthy body and mind yet many of us bypass fitness and only focus on weight loss.  Here are a few good reasons to introduce exercise into your routine:

1. Simple exercise will help you manage your weight by burning calories when you incorporate it in daily activities like taking the stairs, take a walk after lunch, take a stretch and lunge break every hour.  This will burn calories and reenergize you.

2. By doing strength or weight training, your body continues to burn calories even after you have stopped exercising.  The other benefit is that by building your muscles, your skin in those areas will appear taut and younger!

3. Feeling sluggish?  It may sound counterintuitive but that is the best time to take a brisk walk.  Physical activity will deliver necessary oxygen and nutrients to your tissues giving you energy.

4. Sound body, sound mind.  Quiet your anxiety and stress by putting your body in motion.  The brain is stimulated by exercise and releases chemicals that act as anti-depressants.  Researches reported in The Archives of Internal Medicine that exercise was almost as effective as medication in reducing symptoms of depression.

5. Exercise as a weapon against certain diseases.  There is a list of diseases that can be prevented, managed or even reversed with exercise.  Avoid high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, osteoporosis, and certain types of cancer.  There are also studies being conducted now that suggest Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia might be avoided through exercise.

I only offered you five reasons to lace up and get your body moving but I promise you there are far more incentives than the ones I was able to list. 

From my own perspective I can say that I am not a natural born athlete and the thought of exercise has never brought me the same joy as a slice of cheesecake.  But I have made peace with exercise and now view it as yet another thing I must do in order to prevent issues down the road.  If you floss and brush, there is no reason why you can’t get up and move!

Living Lean and Dumping the Mean

I am a huge advocate of “living lean.”  There are countless benefits to adopting a philosophy that encourages living simply.

About 10 years ago my husband and I began to ‘declutter’ our lives.  We were already committed to eating healthy and exercising but now we were ready to further simplify our lives. 

One of the first casualties was our well-intentioned addiction to juices.  After reading the label one day, we realized we would be better off making our own instead of consuming all those sugars and chemicals.  Using an old, hand held juicer, my husband began to squeeze out the juice of two oranges every morning.  It was not the glass full we were use to, but when you live lean, and naturally, you begin to realize what a true serving size looks like, and it becomes enough to satisfy you.

The other must-have item that we improved upon was peanut butter.  For years we had been buying the fresh ground store brand.  Now we buy organic peanuts and grind them ourselves.  Even without any added sugar or salt or oils, the peanut butter is phenomenal.

We have also simplified the way we cook.  Gone are the days when we had countless sauces and condiments in our fridge.  Today we buy lean meats, vegetables and grains and season them with fresh herbs. 

Our exercise routine also got a make-over.  My husband bought a compact weight set and now we save money and time working out at home.  Our cardio workout still consists of lacing up and hitting the road for a brisk walk or a quick run.

When you make the decision to live lean, you are not just going to lose weight and improve your overall health you will also save money and time.   Money and time are two of the biggest causes of stress so by leaning out your life, you can eliminate a variety of health and life issues.  

Kiss your ego on the lips and RUN!

One of the biggest hurdles to get past in order to adopt and maintain a healthy lifestyle is the inevitable setback.  You work hard, you stay on track and the moment you are derailed your first instinct is to quit and abandon all that hard work because of one slip up.

I have traveled this road myself.  I have hit the plateaus, I have fallen off the wagon and spent days nursing my bruised ego with lots of food and inactivity.  What this rollercoaster taught me was that I had to take it easy on myself.  I had to let go of my giant expectations and get real with myself.  I also had to drop the ego and embrace the effort.

This is when I began to approach my fitness and weight as a competition with myself – not anyone else.

My husband and I are avid runners.  I have been running for over a decade and it is my exercise of choice.  My passion eventually led us to start a company for runners. So you may conclude that I am an awesome runner.  An elite.  But I am not.  I am, on a good day, average.  I was at a trail race recently where I came in second to LAST.  The last person was a gentleman in his deep 70’s, and he did not beat my time by much.  Although it was a small race, and it was my first trail race, on unfamiliar terrain, I still stunk it up pretty bad but rather than let that sideline me, I keep the experience on the forefront to remind me and to encourage others to STAY IN THE GAME. 

Although I will never boast a supermodel figure or be an elite runner, I am immensely happy with the results that my efforts provide me.  By being realistic with my goals I do not overwhelm myself and am more likely to remain focused and successful in my efforts.

Make friends with your ego.  Do not allow it to stray you away from your sense of humor about yourself as well as your goal to be fit!