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Monthly Archives: August 2012

Forgiving Ourselves Just As We Are

By Maggie Lyon (@MaggieLyon) / August 21, 2012

If there was ever a time to cut myself some slack, it has arrived. I am just not able to be the perfectly humming, organized, and get-things-done machine I am used to being. Scratch that, I am not even close!

Being so pregnant has not only initiated major slowing down and doing less, but it has also asked me, heck, forced me, to look steadfastly at the ways I borderline tolerate my slower pace and productivity by shedding bright lights on the missing link: abundant love for, acceptance of, friendliness toward, and forgiveness of my waddling, napping, less-timely self.

I am hence using this post as my pledge towards greater nurture, greater willingness to say, hey this is who I am right now. Instead of falling into half-forgiving resign to my now necessary daily rest and my frequent bowls of vegan ice cream, I am letting myself delight in and downright lap them up!

My wish for you is exactly the same: PLEASE, no matter how much you feel yourself lagging, not measuring up, or just plain lolling, CELEBRATE it and you. Don’t just tolerate who you are today with a companion eye roll, but fully forgive and indulge yourself for not being the super-charged, fantasized notion of greatness that is made entirely of illusion anyway. You already are greatness incarnate. Believe me.

You’ll be surprised – I am certainly astonished every day – how life doesn’t fall apart at the seams when we are not on our most proactive game. The universe actually flows quite wonderfully without our anxious push.

We might as well nurture and act warmly towards ourselves as is then, no? And scrap the critical and intolerant voice in our heads, however sloth-like or behind the beat we are acting…

After all, there really isn’t any race to be won here. The Olympics are officially over. Go ahead and give yourself a break. Cut yourself some beautiful rippling slack. More than anything, be your very best, most adoring and open-armed friend. I’ll join you, right after I wake up from my afternoon snooze.

In sweetness and adoration,

Maggie

Maggie Lyon is a writer on wellness and spirituality, a motivational speaker, and a holistic lifestyle consultant.

Bribery and the Fit Family

By Kara Douglas Thom (@hotsweatymamas) / August 16, 2012

Yesterday was idyllic in terms of family fitness. All of us hopped on our bikes (The Boy in the Burley) and rode to the Minnesota Arboretum, where we spent about an hour playing in their Green Play Yard. It was a 5-mile ride, the temperature was in the mid-60s and no one complained.

Let me repeat that: No One Complained.

As an advocate of family fitness perhaps I gave you the impression that family fitness is an easy option for my family; that the children are enthusiastic to do something active and outdoors any time I suggest it; that these outings are filled with love and laughter, butterflies and rainbows.

Let me brief you on a scene from the bike ride before this one.

“I. Want. To. Go. Home.” Says my 7 year-old daughter, sobbing as we ride on the trail.

“Are you hurt?” I scream back at her. “Because if you’re not hurt you better stop crying! We are supposed to be having FUN!”

Fun, it was not. In fact, until yesterday we didn’t have a single ride where someone didn’t have a complaint, attitude problem, or objection to bike riding at all. And, it was never the same kid. It was never fun. I felt like a hack, promoting family fitness, even offering advice on how to make “exercising with kids easy,” when as of late, it was anything but.

But. I persevered. Isn’t that always, ultimately, the definition of success?

I have to make my kids do a lot of things they don’t always like to do: clean their room, shower, brush their teeth, eat their vegetables. I can’t any more give up on these things as I can on being active.

Last week our paper ran an article about Olympic triathlete Gwen Jorgensen, who has discovered her talent for triathlon a little late, and who–this does wonders for my confidence as a fitness-promoting parent–hated those gawd-awful family bike rides as a child. I quote from the article:

“When she was growing up in Milwaukee, Jorgensen hated biking. She had to be bribed with ice cream just to go on a ride with her family.”

That’s exactly what I do. Bribe them with ice cream. I admit, this flies in the face of the fit family ideal. Would I prefer they ride for the sake of the pure pleasure of the ride? Sure. But then I would have no power. Ice Cream is power. I’m a sucker for a scoop myself.

Another angst-filled ride earlier in the summer. The ice cream parlor is the building behind us.

Do you have other ways you bribe your kids to be active? Let’s all fess up right here.

Kara Douglass Thom is a triathlete, freelance writer and mother of four. She and Laurie Kocanda are the co-authors of Hot (Sweaty) Mamas: Five Secrets to Life as a Fit Mom.

A Powerful Change of Mind

By Maryanne O'Brien (@Live_Dynamite) / August 7, 2012

Most of our thoughts come and go without, well, much thought at all. They float in. They float out. Our patterns of our thinking become so familiar, and so subtle, that they often go unnoticed.

Typically, they grab our attention when our emotions flare up. On the bright side, we have inspired thoughts that spark ideas that immediately feel energizing. We feel an expansion that fills us and propels us forward in life. These positive thoughts unleash a cascade of neurochemicals that bolster our mood, attention, perception, motivation, action, memory and learning. (Clearly, a good thing!)

Other times our thoughts can be completely draining. They become filled with self-judgment, worry or some other strain of fear. We become trapped in negative thought patterns that release a completely different cascade of neurochemicals that dampen our mood, motivation and energy. (Clearly, breaking free from this habit is a good thing.)

We’ve all experienced it. Thoughts powerfully impact our emotions, actions, health and well-being. What we sometimes fail to recognize is that our thoughts are within our control to direct. We have the power to change our mind, change our thoughts and change our experiences. So, why not positively change your mind for the better.

Here are two daily practices to help you ingrain positive thought patterns. Each is designed to help you create the positive emotions and experiences that naturally direct your thoughts in a positive direction.

You may have heard them before. But if you’re not actively putting them into practice, it’s like you don’t know. So, give them a try for a week. They are simple. They make you feel great. And they always work when applied.

• Positive Mental Rehearsal – Before you fall asleep, visualize how you want to experience you day tomorrow from beginning to end. See everything falling into place. Feel the positive emotions that fill your day.

• Highlights – Make a list of everything you enjoyed and appreciated about your day. Share your highlights with your family and friends over dinner.

“Every thought you produce, anything you say, any action you do, it bears your signature.” –Thich Nhat Hanh

Get good at living®,
Maryanne

Maryanne O’Brien is the founder of Live Dynamite, a life skills program that inspires, empowers and supports people to bring the best of who they are to everything they do.

3 Surprising Reasons You Can’t Maintain Weight Loss After a Diet

By Sheila Viers (@sheilaviers) / August 2, 2012

If you’ve ever gone on a diet and succeeded in achieving your weight loss goals, then I am willing to bet you can relate to what I am about to say. Maybe you can even guess what I am going to say because you’ve experienced one or even all three of these for yourself.

You’d think that after showing your body who’s boss and getting to the number on the scale you’ve been dreaming about, you’d be flying high and feeling like a million bucks, right?

But that’s not how it typically goes. You get there, celebrate for at least 30 minutes, and then you think, “Okay, now how do I not screw this up?”

You see, there’s a huge gap between what most people expect to happen after they get to their weight loss goal versus what really happens.

Today, I’m going to share 3 of the most surprising (and common) reasons why you can’t maintain your weight loss after a diet.

1. Your body feels deprived.

Near the end of most diet programs, calories are low and things like carbs, sodium, fruit, and dairy have been drastically reduced or removed from the plan. It’s common to feel tired (ahem… exhausted) and to find yourself daydreaming about your favorite non-diet-plan foods.

You think this is just because your body is detoxing from old habits, sugar, and whatever non-healthy things you’ve pinpointed as the culprit, but it’s not.

This is your body saying, “Hey, I deserve to feel pleasure from food and you are denying me of that.”

Eating is like sex. It’s supposed to be enjoyable. If it wasn’t, we wouldn’t do it and mankind would not go on. So, it’s natural and good for us to get pleasure from food.

At the end of a restrictive diet, your body is screaming to be taken care of. It wants comfort and pleasure and it can only go on feeling deprived for so long before you are so worn down that you “fall off the wagon” and binge.

Most people don’t know how to start re-introducing the off-limits-while-on-the-diet foods back in. Which leads us to #2…

2. You develop an unhealthy relationship with food.

If you’ve been on many diets, I’m betting you know this feeling well. FEAR.

Fear of not just cookies and ice cream, fear of everything! Everything you’ve heard somewhere, somehow is bad for you or is going to make you fat or bloated.

Fruit
Carbs
Dairy
Sodium
Gluten
Eggs
Sugar…

The list goes on and on.

I went through this when I got to my weight loss goal and I’ve worked with women that have felt this way in the past too (whether they reached their weight loss goal or not).

So afraid to eat the wrong thing that they end up eating nothing at all. Standing at the refrigerator, staring at their options feeling confused and afraid of choosing the wrong thing and screwing up all that they have worked for.

Being so scared of facing the temptation when going out to dinner for a night of fun with friends, that they make up a silly excuse and stay home with their chicken and steamed broccoli instead because it feels safer.

Or worse, saying screw it and overeating everything in sight because they don’t know how to manage the fear any other way.

3. Underestimating normal fluctuations.

Here’s the thing, when you are eating normal healthy portions of carbohydrates, your body naturally fluctuates in weight because carbs hold more water. This is not a bad thing—it’s just the way it is.

It’s not a reason to avoid them forever, but for many people that don’t realize this, it can send them into a real freak out. They want to eat the foods they’ve been missing, so they start adding carbs back in, see the numbers on the scale going up, and go into mega-panic mode.

Sure, short-term diets can produce speedy results, but the real question is: Do they produce lasting results?

More times than not, the answer is no because you never learn how to build the overarching habits and lifestyle that supports long-term weight loss maintenance.

Can you relate?

I bet you’ve got a great example from your own life. Share your thoughts in the comment section below.

Sheila Viers is an Emotional Eating Expert, Holistic Life Coach and co-founder of Live Well 360.

Contributor's Corner

Monthly Archives: August 2012

Forgiving Ourselves Just As We Are

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Bribery and the Fit Family

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A Powerful Change of Mind

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3 Surprising Reasons You Can’t Maintain Weight Loss After a Diet

1. Your body feels deprived.

2. You develop an unhealthy relationship with food.

3. Underestimating normal fluctuations.

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