Eating Well: Football Edition

Someone's playing football here today...

Happy football season everyone!

I admit it. I’m crazy about college (and NFL) football. Growing up in Alabama you don’t really have much of a choice. As I developed my passion for wellness however, I discovered that being a football fiend and fitness fanatic often presented its own set of challenges.

I can still hear the voices as I was fighting to lose.

“I guess you just can’t eat with everyone.”

“Why don’t you just eat a little before.”

“I guess I just can’t enjoy those parties anymore.”

…and then some.

Trust  me, I’ve been all over the board emotionally with food. As you train your body, and mind to deal with your new lifestyle you also should look to discover moderation in all you do! I have clients who, with all good intentions, come to me completely worried about not getting a certain amount of protein grams in a day, or how to hit a caloric goal. I’m proud of them for thinking about it, and that’s the point, however, especially on a day like today we all would do well to sit back and see the big picture!

Here are some ways to do a self-check and see if your fitness lifestyle is working on what could be a very challenging day:

1. Do you think before you eat? — THIS is the key. Are you taking time to consider what you’re eating and making a rational decision? Notice I didn’t say you shouldn’t eat a few of those baked potato cheese and bacon bombs today, but thinking about it first well help you not to eat ALL of them!

2. Do you eat with purpose or feelings? — Remember, food is a-moral. That is, it shouldn’t make you feel one way or another emotionally. If you eat those bacon bombs after making all considerations, don’t feel guilty! You’ve got to purposefully choose to detach food from emotions, good and bad!

3. Remember the wagon is there in the morning! — that is, after you have your fun and relax, being moderate also means getting back on your routine! Tomorrow presents the same choices of today, and YOU are EMPOWERED to make the right ones.

I hope this helps as you enjoy the kickoff to the season.

Oh yeah, and Roll Tide Roll!

NM

Deep Fried Butter? Seriously?

Ok, so I’m a State Fair killjoy I guess…but I just don’t get it.

No I understand rides and games…a burger with your friends. No big deal. I get that. But Texas, here’s what I don’t get…

Deep fried butter? Reeeeeeeally?

“He brought us deep-fried peanut butter and jelly, then deep-fried Coke last year at the State Fair of Texas.  This year,deep-fried butter. Abel Gonzales says he developed an obsession for toast and butter a couple of months ago and came upon the idea of fried butter.
He takes a ball of butter, either plain or injected with cherry, grape or garlic flavor, wraps it in dough, then into the grease it goes. Abel says it come out like a biscuit or croissant oozing with melted butter. Some of the other contestants for the Big Tex Choice Award are country-fried pork chips, jalapeno corn dog shrimp and a deep-fried peanut butter cup macaroon.”

Maybe I am just a killjoy, but I don’t get it. It doesn’t even sound appetizing. When does a fun game turn to recklessness with our bodies? Take it from someone who survived this junk. It’s not fun, nor is it humorous. This stuff is life and death and we’re selling it to our kids wrapped in tinfoil with carnival music and a smile.

There’s having an off day, splurging, and then just plain stupid. You make the call.

“I’m a food-FAIL.”

I laughed when I heard that one today…

When you start a new program, especially on the food-intake side of things it can get pretty frustrating. I fully believe in the power of nutritional tracking, and right now I prefer my trainees to use FitDay.com’s free nutritional tracking (check out the link on the right). As you’re getting started, if you’re anything like me it’s too easy to become obsessed with hitting a certain number, or percentage, and while it’s important to work toward your goal it’s even more important to not get caught up in math.

That’s right, this just in…nutrition is not about math!

The whole point of nutritional tracking…taking inventory, if you will, is to make you think about what you eat! If you’ve taken any steps to track what you eat you know what I’m talking about. You automatically begin to consider what you’re eating before you eat it. Your mind is taking control of your stomach, and that’s always a good thing…initial frustration and all.

Take note of a few important things as you begin to live your new plan:

1. Inventory foods before, or at the time of eating them– so you’ll see your day unfold as you do it. If you try to remember your day, you’ll forget, or worse…be too forgiving of yourself.

2. Supplement…Supplement…SUPPLEMENT! — Be sure to take a good multivitamin WITH iron, and perhaps even a glucosamine/chondroitin hit for those of you over thirty. This will ensure proper use of all your nutrients by your body, and also protect your joints.

3. Go all the WHEY– Whey protein with a good amino acid complex will get you well on your way to proper protein intake and recovery. It’s  simply a must for good training. I believe in it. Do, however, make sure your protein is real whey isolate and not soy. Soy products have been linked to estrogen production, which is negative to a proper  training effect.

Hope this helps! Enjoy your day, and live it!

Kicking off a new season

Session one of Corekick started this morning and honestly, it was awesome! We’ve got a good group of five people rocking and rolling (well, hobbling a little right now) toward their goals. It raises the question…”where do you want to be?”

It seems pretty simple at first glance, but it’s tough in application. Where do you want to be?

Next week?

Next month?

Next year?

We set goals professionally, or make to-do lists at home to get things done, and yet we wake up one day magically 40 pounds heavier, and wonder how we got here? So many people are now finding themselves stuck in a ditch wondering why they are lost, having never bothered to grab a map and even see where they are!

It goes beyond your waist. This is a life question — where do you want to be? What’s it going to take to get there? What are you willing to do?

Ask yourself!

It’s Certifiable…

Pardon the lack of updates, but after much work over the last year I’m proud to announce that I have obtained my CFT Certifcation from the ISSA!

Drop by BeneVidaConcepts.com to get more info about my upcoming classes in the Brentwood, TN area!

Now that this has been taken care of, updates should be coming soon. Thanks!

A Work in Progress

Yup, that’s what we all are, and so is the site. Please pardon my lack of recent updates, as I’m in the middle of some pretty important work towards some certifications, etc. I’ll have the blog back up and running soon.

Stay tuned!

NM

A quick update

Hi friends,

I’m in Irvine, CA this week for a conference, and will be back soon. Just a quick FYI!

Oh, and let me just say that smoked salmon, fresh fruit, and eggs for breakfast every morning is pretty tough to beat.

Have a great one!

NM

Being Moderately Moderate

Eeeeeeeeew. Just eeeeeeew.

Moderation is a word highly spoken of, but rarely lived in America. We are an addicted society, and often times these addictions are born out of a complete lack of self-control! I’m reminded of one quasi-recent diet fad that resulted in incredibly unhealthy living, and thinking.

Atkins.

The Atkins diet was the epitome of a bad idea. While yes, people lost weight, they were building weaker bodies and weaker minds. This was because while pumping their bodies full of fats and draining good carbohydrates, adherents were being conditioned to think that there was an “easy way out” in terms of weight loss, and it included long walks on “eat-all-the-bacon-you-want” boulevard.

A hard fact of life is that there are no easy roads, and discovering moderation is one of the harder tasks in an all or nothing society. Here are a few tips to help you maintain moderation in your eating, and living.

*Listen to your body: If you are feeling weak, then that’s not normal. Make sure you intake a balance of good proteins, fats, and carbohydrates. The ISSA recommends a 3-2-1 Carbs-Protein-Fats ratio for people with active lifestyles, although this is adjustable according to level of activity and body type.

**Remember that food is amoral: That is, it’s not evil or inherently damning. There are healthy foods and unhealthy foods. Remember, “all is permissable, but not all is beneficial!”

***Remember that there are things you control, and things outside your sphere of influence. Focus on the things you can control, and give the rest to God. This includes things  such as your day to day fluxuations in weight, your overly critical mother-in-law, and the stock market.

Doing these things will go a long way to see that you stay far away from a leap into any deep end.

What’s Eating You?

Sometimes feel like this?

We’ve all seen them. The person in the buffet line going back for trip after trip. Desperately loading their plate as if their preparing for nuclear winter. Eat themselves to a slow waddle, and moan in pain at the discomfort of the distended abdomen before them. Many of us, including myself, have been that person at one point or another in our lives.

Some of you are now.

One of the greatest steps I took at the beginning of my transformation was speaking with a counselor on a semi-regular basis. Doing so helps you to unpack the scripting that each one of us contains deep inside. Those scripts are like grooves on a record…while we sit across the room listening to the song not actually seeing what’s going on, there are tiny grooves directing each and every note!

I discovered why I overate to the extent that I did, cleaning every plate in sight. I overate because I grew up knowing nothing else, so choosing to do so was easy. So the environment was such that it made a bad choice less difficult. That being said, I’d love to share this site’s four types of overeaters, and maybe share a few thoughts as well.

1. Stress Overeater: You overeat and oversnack at any time of the day in direct response to the stresses of everyday life.

2. Fatigue Overeater: In a futile effort to overcome stress and fatigue, you snack almost continuously after 3:00 or 4:00 P.M., even after a full meal, until bedtime.

3. Addictive Overeater: You are a cyclic overeater or drinker who regularly consumes addictive substances, such as caffeine (coffee, tea, chocolate, soda) or alcohol. You may also use sugary foods for their mood altering effects to stave off depression.

4. Escapist Overeater: You often eat alone in an effort to escape unpleasant realities that you don’t know how to cope with.

Overall, these are good thoughts but I boil each down into one larger category. The Choice Overeater. You see, to seek out a label gives you a camp in which to sit, and after a while it goes from simple organization, to comfort, to home. These labels unintentionally give the adherent a crutch upon which to lean, and a safe haven from the reality that we each choose our actions, each and every day. They take an individual from personal responsibility to a reactive positioning that relinquishes each one of us of our own free-will. From men (and women), to Pavlov’s dog salivating at the ringing of a bell.

These categories are merely trigger indicators. Here are a few simple tidbits that might help you while dealing with over eating.

1. Ask yourself the reason for your eating something. You might find that you’re not really hungry, or that the food you’re about to eat serves no nutritional purpose. Remember, choosing food is about finding things that serve your purpose, which you so happen to also enjoy — NOT enjoyment first! Kinda puts a new spin on a cupcake doesn’t it?

2. Keep smaller plates in your home. There’s only so much you can fit on a plate. Keeping more reasonably sized dishes in the house helps to keep your eyes stay in line with your stomach.

3. If you clean your plate, wait. It often times takes the body several minutes to feel the true effects of “fullness.” Most people do not wait to really see if they’ve had enough, and next thing you know they are taking the march of the penguins, waddling out the door. Allow time for your body to tell you whether or not you are truly in need of more to eat!

Remember, no matter what the trigger you over overeat because you choose to overeat. Food has never jumped off the plate into my mouth. It hasn’t for you either (not even at the your favorite sushi place!). Remember these simple bits of advice next time you are tempted to go too far! Remember, he who did, chose.

Looking to cut your business bottom line?

"Clearance 9ft:" That means your car...not you.

I’m looking to switch to new health insurance, and honestly, being the freedom-loving minimalist that I am I despise the deep dark depths that insurance companies pry in determining your rate. I understand it, but simply don’t like it. Cest la vie.

We’ve all seen the cost of health care rise over the years as the cost of research, plus increased regulation and government drive cost up. It also doesn’t help that we live in an overweight culture with a McDonald’s on every corner. It seems we’re raising a society of addicts, all induced into the lifestyle by our lack of personal discipline. I mean seriously…just calm down and leave five minutes earlier! Is the drive through breakfast really an American icon?

Business owners small and large are also feeling the pinch as the cost of providing health care increases. Some are introducing regulations on their employees, such as health checkups and smoking tests. While that seems a bit draconian, perhaps instead of punishing bad behaviors, business should adopt a more positive model.

How about rewarding good behavior?

I admit I watch one reality show. I love the Biggest Loser, as it reminds me weekly about my roots, and the distance I’ve traveled. The competition format includes all the aspects of proper weightloss, such as diet, exercise, and counseling, and while the path is often rushed you can’t argue with the results. There are many companies now adopting a similar model to help their employees get healthy and it’s fantastic.

I was blessed with an employer who saw the value in wellness and provided an avenue through which personal transformation could begin. Here are a few guidelines I’ve discovered as I’m leading my fourth “Biggest Loser” program.

1. Put your money where your mouth is: It may not be the highest of motivators, but a cash prize will motivate more people than idealistic goals.

2. Make it public: There’s nothing more motivating than weighing in front of your peers weekly..

3. Clearly define goals: In my case, women work to lose 8% and men lose 10% of their body weight in 13 weeks. This is clearly defined structure that you will be thankful for later.

4. Have one, ONE leader of the competition: This person conducts weigh-ins and tracks progress. No compromises. No re-dos. Have a strong leader at this position.

These guidelines will get you well on your way to hosting a weight loss program at your office or home. Want more info? Feel free to hit me up on my contact tab above. You’ll be helping to cut your company’s bottom line, and the boss man will always like that idea!