Becoming a Champion

Becoming a Champion

I had two experiences this weekend that made me reevaluate the effort I put in to my workout. I was talking with a co-worker the other day about fitness and nutrition the other day. Not only is he very fit, he helps motivate me. Several times we will do our workout together or at least at the same time.

I was describing how during some of my sprinting runs I would get to the point where it felt like I was running in honey. He asked, “What do you do when your legs feel like that?” I responded, “I slow down.” That was when he very enthusiastically said, “YOU HAVE TO PUSH THROUGH THAT! If you don’t you’re cheating yourself.” I realized he was right. I could have run as fast as I could even though it was slower than my sprint, but I didn’t I settled for something less than I could have done, and therefore for something less that I could have been.

The other experience was my wife sent me an email and I hope she doesn’t mind me using the main points of it. She went to a women’s conference where she was inspired to reach for her dreams. She told me the speech was on natural vision versus vision of the mind. As we age our natural vision takes control of our lives and we lose the child like ambition for the future. I don’t know why this happens but it does for most people. We end up moving slower and falling into what we believe our place in life is but, overweight and sitting on a couch is not our place in life. If you are in that place right now it’s time to change. You are meant to be a participant in life and not watch it go by.  If you allow your vision to be muddled with what everyone else thinks you will fall into the trap of “IF" not "WHEN.”

You have to start thinking in terms of when because that shows your optimism, your resolve, your determination, and strength of purpose. As you do this you will stop settling for a mediocre workout. You will stop settling for just good enough. And you will start being the Champion that you are supposed to be. I will be honest. I may never win a marathon but I will sure try my best, and put forth a championship effort. Effort is the key here. The better the effort you put forth the better you feel about the workout and yourself. When you combine consistency and effort you will become a champion.

“Champions are made one day at a time with Hallmark attitudes, “When you care enough to give your very best”

 

Effectively Changing your Cravings

The Changing of the Buds

When I was a kid, like many children, my favorite food was peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I loved opening a new bag of white bread and then spreading liberal amounts of both peanut butter and jelly of jam on either side. While I still love eating peanut butter and jelly I no longer like the white bread. I have heard it said that as a person grow older their taste buds change. I think there is some merit to that idea, but I also think that we have more power of the how our taste buds change than we think.

Until I recognized the truth of the story above in my own life I couldn’t understand how and why people could eat and love some foods.  My wife and I have raised our kids, almost exclusively on whole wheat bread, and when given a choice they choose wheat. 2 years ago I started using spinach on my sandwiches as subway instead of lettuce. Now, I didn’t particularly like spinach, but I knew it was more nutritious for me so I made the switch. I prefer the spinach now.

You can do the same thing, but don’t overdo things. Select a few foods that you know would be good to replace, like maybe soda. Changing that one thing in your life will change how you feel and look faster than any other thing. In fact if you simply started drinking water in place of anything else, you will start to feel better and lose weight. Another idea is start eating carrots instead of chips. Making small changes like this will help you in your quest for a fitter body.

I was recently talking to a friend and he was talking about some of the foods he eats, which are very healthy, and he said that he doesn’t enjoy a lot of foods that mainstream America eats. He has effectively changed his taste buds to the point that he craves healthy foods. This is the goal, but it requires consistently making good decisions until they are a habit. It requires a support system that is willing to change with you. But you can do it. I know you can.

“Leopards don’t change their spots, so it’s a good thing we are humans because they change every day.”

A Perfectly Tuned Instrument

Hello, Its my turn finally :). This Is Tyra (I'm the wife), its nice to finally meet you. Brig asked if I would write a little today.

As I pondered what I should say I thought of how my morning was going. Poorly! Sunday mornings are stressful more than they should be. Trying to get 5 kids feed, washed and ready for church is no easy task. Not to mention getting yourself ready as well. Its not for the faint of heart! All I could think was "I'm so tired and hungry!" There's an unspoken rule that something has to happen every time mom sits down to eat. I'm ashamed to say I was grouchy and had already yelled at a few kids, and literally almost cried over spilled milk. "I should be feeling the spirit and preparing for the Sabbath, not being like this." I was a little frustrated. Then I realized why I was feeling like "this" and not spiritual and pleasant. My body was out of tune.

The body is an instrument. We are highly religious (we belong to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints aka the Mormons) so we believe the body is a gift and that we can communicate with our heavenly Father through personal revelation.  We often explain revelation using the analogy of a radio. The body is the radio and revelation being the radio waves.

My problem is my radio is slightly broken, because I have not been taking care of it. I get nowhere near the necessary amount of sleep (haven't for YEARS!). I  rush through meals and have been known to skip them entirely. Thanks to AdvoCare I've lost some weight and have energy enough to keep up with things but just barely. Most importantly my life is full of stress, I've let in too much noise. Its like a radio with broken speakers and bent antenna. I can find the right channel but while those things are out of whack, I will continue to get a lot of static.

Lack of sleep and stress take a major toll on the body, physically and emotionally. They drain energy making us cranky, irrational, and forgetful. Too much will make you anger. So as much as you eat right and work out, if you aren't getting the sleep your body needs and you have too much noise in your life, you won't see or feel the results you would like. So take a moment today to check your radio. Are you in tune? Or is your antenna bent? Ask yourself what do you need to do to fix your radio?

Trouble sleeping? Try Sleep Works and a warm bath.
Too much Stress? Try Oasis and learn to say no.
Not enough nutrition? Try Coreplex and meal planning.
Not enough energy? Try Spark or V16 and do some exercise.

But most importantly, eliminate the noise from your life. Find some quiet time, and put the basics in place first. If you can't be in tune with the spirit, what you do with your body will be of little consequence.

Day 24 Max Phase (This is just the Beginning)

Day 24

Well here I am at the end of my 24 day challenge. It’s been reveling. I have learned a lot of things about how I should feel. Before starting I felt like work outs were drudgery. I think I felt that way because that is the way I felt. I noticed that as I progressed through this process I felt better. Before when I had tried different style cleanses, I never felt much different, besides the feeling of an empty stomach, because sure, my body was clean and ready for nutrition but the nutrients weren’t put back in. With this challenge my body was receiving the correct nutrition immediately after being cleaned and prepped for it.

I recommend this to everyone. In fact after about 2 weeks I felt so strongly about the power of the program I bought one for my dad, because I knew that his strength and energy levels would receive a boost from the challenge. I have decided that I will be doing an herbal cleanse every few months because it makes we feel so good.

For all of you that have been faithful in reading, I thank you and promise you this is not the end. In fact this is only the beginning. I used the 24 day challenge to relaunch this blog. My vision for the future is to sue this blog to review work outs and products for y’all. My posts next month will not be as often but I plan on 2 to 3 a week. I will continue posting every day for the rest of this month.

In fact if you have any topics that you particularly want to read about let me know and I will do my best to research, test, and post. I am also trying to come up with some contests and giveaways for upcoming posts as well so keep coming baio.

My goal is not to tell you what to do but give you options and ideas so that you don’t get bored with doing. Exercise can get boring if you don’t throw in a few things that are different. The other day I saw the local high school cross country playing ultimate Frisbee for practice. That is the kind of change of pace we all need from time to time. 

Day 23 Max Phase (Nutrition Wars Something Funny)

Day 23

I saw this on TV and I had to show you all. Please don’t make nutrition a competition with other people. Find something that works for you and your goals and go with it. Tweak it as needed but don’t go overboard. This video illustrates what not to do.

“Live your life like you trying to impress yourself.”

Day 22 Max Phase (The Power of Music)

Day 22

What a day. As most of you know I work nights and to be frank it really stinks. There always seems to be some kind of crisis, or commitment during the day when I am sleeping that I have to wake up and deal with. And if by chance I go through a day without someone calling in the middle of my REM cycle, I can’t seem to sleep past 4:00 pm. Today was a call at 12:30 pm day. I can never get back to sleep after that.

After the call I naturally tried to regain my slumber to no avail. I was also a bit stressed about some other things in my life with which I will not bore you. So, I proceeded to stomp around the house and be cranky for the rest of the afternoon. Finally I decided that when I took my son to his scout meeting I was going to run around the parking lot while he was in scouts.

I started my run using my Zombies, run! App. There is nothing better than listening to the troubles of post zombie apocalypse survivors to make all your stresses seem small and insignificant. Anyways as I ran I started to “go numb” but I still wasn’t very happy, even with the woes of the zombie fighters playing in my ears, interspersed with some of my favorite tunes.

Then about half way through my run, it happened. A song came on that brightened my whole mood. If you have young children you may recognize the kids show “The Backyardigans.” Well last year my wife bought one of their episode sound tracks that we both really enjoyed and it started to place. You can hear it on the video in this post. For some reason that 1 minute and 20 second song changed my demeanor. I started to smile and my pace quickened.

There are so many things that bring us down don’t let fitness be one of those things. Select music that inspires you, or that make you happy. You deserve to have your stress melt into smiles and music can do that. I believe that music is one of those things that are underestimated.

Be careful in you selection because it can work the other way as well. For example, I listen to a group called “They Might Be Giants.” They are an alternative education rack genre. It’s kind of weird I know but, in one of the songs that I had on my playlist for a while, there was a phrase, “You can’t run away. Your feet won’t help you run.” I notice that throughout that whole song my pace dropped and it literally felt like I was running in honey. It’s not a bad song, just a bad song to listen to while running.

I feel like I say this a lot but, you are different from everyone else. You have to do what works for you. The music that one person finds inspiring might make you fall, flat when it comes to your work out.

“I accept 100% responsibility for all my data entries.”

Day 21 Max Phase (Using Workouts the Battle Stress)

Day 21

Stress is bad, very bad. That is what we have all heard for pretty much our whole life, and some in our society have bought into this false notion so deeply that we try at every turn to calm ourselves with pills or boos, or whatever. In don’t know where this idea of stress being inherently evil comes from but today we are going to turn stress into our ally much like a kite uses the opposition and stress the wind places on it to fly. Now, I’m not advocating that we go on a quest seeking for the fountain of eternal stress because that would be evil, and our kite would be ripped to shreds. All I am suggesting is that you take the stress that naturally comes to you and use it to your benefit.

In my life I have identified that when I get overly stressed I eat. This obviously doesn’t help my fitness, or my waistline. Like the other day when I was woken up early and couldn’t get back to sleep, and the house was crazy with toys and kids and fruit flies. By the way fruit flies are just about the most annoying thing ever, because they never go away. If you have the silver bullet against them let me know in the comments. Anyways that day my wife taught me something as I went to the fridge to find something to eat, and she probably had no idea she was teaching me. All she said was, “Why don’t you go for a run?”

I took her advice and when I came back I felt so much better and I’m sure I was much nicer to be around. My wife can verify that in the comments if she likes. The point is once we find out what our unhealthy stress reliever is we can use fitness to fight it. This way you can avoid yelling at your kids or the dog or life in general and you can channel that frustration in a way that will better you. Next time you feel like you are about to lose your mind, try it.  If possible excuse yourself from the situation, get ready for a workout and go.  If you can’t get away do some push-ups or sit-ups.

Fitness is all about feeling good and balanced. When we are overly stressed it is usually because that balance is off, and I believe you will find that exercise will clear your head and when finished the stress will be gone, smaller and more manageable, or you will have had time to sort out the problem while working out. This is have we turn negatives into positives.

Day 20 Max Phase (Weekly Binge Day)

Day 20

I want you to picture the classic visual of a knight’s sword. Straight blade that measures about 3 ½ feet in length and has a groove or depression that runs the almost the full length of the blade on the flat between the two edges.  Or if you don’t want to think about it just look at the picture. Now focus on the tip of the sword. It has 2 edges. Those 2 edges are what people mean when they talk about a 2 edged sword.

I am sure some of you have already stopped reading because you thought this post was about fitness and nutrition, but for you faithful few our topic is a double edged sword. This means is can help you or destroy you. The topic as you can read in the heading is “The Binge Day!”  The announcement of this day is either accompanied by cheers or boos.

First the concept behind the binge day is fairly simple. Once a week a person that is keeping close tabs on their nutrition can eat whatever they what and as much as they want. The rationale behind this concept is fairly simple as well. By eating an increased amount of calories one day a week your body will keep a higher metabolism throughout the week because once a week you trick it in to thinking that it needs to burn a lot more energy. On the mental side of things it gives you the ability to sustain will power throughout the rest of the week because you know that anything you crave can be eaten on the binge day.

The dangerous side of this sword is that it really doesn’t help to create good eating habits. The reasons that I gave previously are very valid I have used this technique and lost weight this way but I have to say that like I said I slipped back into my bad eating habits. I believe there are other ways to keep you metabolism high like exercise, and certain types of foods that I will let you research.

One tip that I would give you if you are going to use the binge day is that you should start your day by eating a grapefruit. The grapefruit acts as a sugar inhibitor and will help your body push the sugar through without storing a lot as fat. Another product that I use is from Advocare, it’s called CarbEase™ Plus. This product acts like a grapefruit but you take it immediately before you eat a large carb based meal. Now it won’t block all carbs that you eat so it’s not the silver bullet. The silver bullet is proper nutrition and moderation.

Whichever side of the sword you use, just know both can and will work. It’s time you decide for yourself which works best for you. Once you find something that works stick with it. Go an take the day.

“The better I think about myself the better I act the better I preform.”

Day 19 Max Phase (The Scale is not my Friend)

Day 19

While at my parents house today I stepped on the scale and to my dismay I was a few pound heavier than I was the last time I weighed myself. I was a little upset because that is obviously the wrong direction for me.

Sometimes we have to stop looking at the scale and start focusing on feeling healthy. if you have never gone through this you have to realize that in the process of getting fit you will put on a certain amount of muscle weight which isn't bad. Just keep a close eye on things.

There are other ways to track you progress like taking measurements around your biceps, thighs, belly and neck. If you are tracking all of these things then you will be able to gauge your progress even if the scale is giving you fits, because your muscle gain is giving you false positives.

Day 18 Max Phase (When you Need Help enough to Give Help)

Day 18

I can’t say that today was a day of particularly good choices. I didn’t sleep at all between yesterday and today which, as anyone who works graveyard shift will tell you, is pretty normal, when going into a weekend, or at least it is for me. So as I arrived at the house this morning I was tired. That was strike one. Upon entering the house the most delicious aroma, of cinnamon rolls, assaulted my good judgment and will power. That was strike two. As I surveyed the house I noticed that everyone was gone. Strike three.

A few days ago I wrote on how to bring things from the subconscious mind to the conscious mind to fight against a bad habit. As I struggled with the above strikes, I told myself, “I feel like eat those cinnamon rolls.” I was using the plan. I walked in the other room, but through the course of time I ate the three remaining cinnamon rolls.

There will be times when you do everything right and you still aren’t strong enough to stay away from bad habits. That doesn’t make it alright. While my eating cinnamon rolls is fairly pedestrian, we all deal with different things in the realm of fitness and nutrition, that no amount of Jedi mind tricks can conquer especially when you are, say dragged into Krispy Kreme by your wife later that day. By the way thanks for that sweetheart.

In these times you need to have someone to lean on. This person should be someone that is willing to talk you off the food cliff and into a pair of running shoes, and then go running with you. I would also recommend having someone to serve as well. I just felt most everyone’s eyebrows raise, and the voice inside your head say, “Where the Heck did that come from?”

I hope you don’t get turned off about me talking about my addiction, because her it goes. In general addictions or habits are selfish in nature. We indulge because it feels good, or it makes us not feel anything because we hurt. Many times we see on the nightly news, how someone has dulled their own pains, and through that process has hurt a friend or family member. We need to move our thought outside of ourselves and focus in someone else for a change. Try it. As you do this more and more you will see week things become strong. Relationships will be strengthened, people will be helped and Habits will be broken. It’s a win, win, win for everyone involved.

Today’s goal is to find that friend that you can trust and lean on in a time of need, and once you have found that person, you task is to find someone you can serve. Maybe you could even be that person for someone else. If you truly feel like you can’t find anyone to serve, then pick someone and pray for them, every time you are faced with challenges. Pray that they will receive the help that they need.

“Be active. Be Kind. Be a friend to those in need.”

Day 17 Max Phase (Carpe Diem)

Day 17

Have you ever watched a little kid fight sleep? Well if you haven’t watch this video it’s hilarious and inspiring in a way (if you’re not trying to go to sleep and the kid is yours. Then it’s just frustrating.) Most kids are power houses of energy that can’t wait to start the day. I don’t know when we lose that wonder about what the day will bring but we do. It’s probably when we are teenagers and we think we have everything figured out.

I find this so inspiring because they want to get out there and make their day extraordinary. Every action they take screams CARPE DIEM! If you have kids you also know that sometimes they do scream and it can hurt the ears more than just about anything. But rarely do they scream in Latin.

This morning I was fighting the procrastination monster, asking questions like, “Should I work out on my break at work?” “When should I work out?” “Should I use the treadmill, or wait until I get home and run outside?” If you ever have these questions the answer is, YES! We need to be like those little kids. They can’t wait until they get out of school so that they can go play on a playground or reach a new definition of speed on their bicycle, or play ball. Sometimes we make our work outs too boring. We can do other things. When was the last time you played tag? Ok, other adults might laugh at you, but who really cares. Seize the Day! Don’t wait. Waiting will only put you in a congressional situation, and no one likes congress for that reason.

The best advice I can give you is start your work out as early as you can. If you have time in the morning and afternoon choose the morning. Get it done early and you will feel better. My other advice is make your work outs fun.

You may have noticed that I run a lot as my cardio work out. There is a reason for that. I use the Zombies, Run! App on my phone. The app does an excellent job at involving you in a story through your work out. I don’t want to give it away but it’s a great way to distract yourself from the work out, as you work out. If you take one thing away from reading this, it is try to capture that childlike wonder about life. If you don’t want to work out, fake it. The popular saying is, “Fake it ‘til you make it.” It’s a fact that if you smile long enough you can’t help but feel better.

“Choose to discover the kid within. If you have to play tag.”

Day 16 Max Phase (When Life Happens)

Day 16

We can’t stop the march of time. It ticks life away whether we like it or not. Life also happens sometimes whether we like it or not. Sometimes we have the best intention in the world to work out and it just doesn’t happen. That was how things went for me today.

I woke up this afternoon and realized that my daughter that is running with me in my next run had a friend over and wasn’t going to be training today. So I thought no worries my son is running in it too, he can run with me. That was a no go. He was at a friend’s house. So it was just me again. I was kind of depressed to say the least. It seemed life was determined to keep me from doing the things that I knew I should do, or at least it was giving me all the excuses I could use. Not to mention if I was going to work out I was going to have to do it fast because I had people coming over for dinner at 5 pm and then I had to be at a church activity at 6:15 pm. It was 4 pm when I woke up. ARGHH… LIFE GET OUT OF MY WAY AN LET ME GET FIT!!!!

When life happens you have to make fitness happen. For me it’s the schedule that gets in the way. For you it might be traveling for work, or working a lot, or having kids that are always asking for…something. Whatever your brand of life is, it makes it hard to get your workout in. Buckle down and do something quick if needs be. On days like today the most important thing is the habit.

So instead of a long run I took a short one. Instead of cooling down on the bike for 20 minutes I took 8 minutes. When life happens we must be flexible, and creative. The other lesson we can learn is do your work out as early as you can. I had time before I fell asleep to do a work out. I’ve done it in the past, but today I didn’t. I put it off and almost got burned.

Even though I didn’t use it today I like to use a little app called Sworkit. This app allows you to modify the time, and intensity of the work out as well as the area to be worked. It only consists of calisthenics and body weight exercises so it is the perfect app for the anywhere work out.

Life is hard. It gets in the way of life sometimes, even though that doesn’t seem possible. But you can make this work.

“I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything but still I can do something. I will nor refuse to do the something I can do.”

Day 15 Max Phase (Working out=Feeling good)

Day 15

I don’t work out because I have unlimited time, or because when I start my work out, I think to myself, “I love felling my muscles burn and ache. I don’t think many people operate that way. If you do please contact me so that you can be a guest writer and let us all know how you do it. With that opening the title of this post might confuse you.

Working out = Feeling good

I rarely feel great and happy to start a work out. In fact when I start running, and pushing myself, I feel pretty crappy for the first mile to mile and a half. At that point my legs and body go a little numb and I can no longer feel the pain like at the start. “Going Numb” as I like to call it is what I love about working out. It feels good. I will caution you, “Going Numb” doesn’t always happen while you are running. When I run I am always looking for that point but there have been time that I arrive at mile 3 and I’m still feeling muscles protest with every step. Many times at that point I get really frustrated and decide it’s time to finish my workout with something else. But I always feel the endorphins kick in afterwards that is almost a guarantee.

I will not sugar coat it for all you that are getting back into a fitness routine. You are going to be a little or a lot sore for the first week or so, but it does get better, I promise. Read on and you will find some tips to avoid extreme soreness.

For you that are returning, don’t think that you can just start where you left off, especially the longer your sabbatical has been. Start small please. If you are over ambitious you will flame out in the first week to week and a half.

Runners/Walkers/Fitness Videos

If you are a runner that hasn’t been running in a long time, you need to start with one to one and a half miles a day for the first week. It will be hard, especially if you were a distance runner. If you have never really run distance this is where you should start. Each week you can typically add a mile. Once you get to 3 to 4 miles a work out then you can start working on time. This is how I started a few years ago. I ran 1.5 miles a day for 10 days. At that time I weighed 270 lbs. That was a lot of weigh to be moving around. If you don’t feel like you can do that, it’s ok. Start with walking.

It is so important to start this way. The reason is with such a low distance and no time constraint you will avoid extreme soreness and pain that will quickly kill the strongest of wills. Between the time I was married (2003) and when I finally started getting back into shape (2009) I must have tried an exercise routine at least every year, and they all failed because I thought I was the same person that I was in high school. Once I realized my body was not the same as it once was, that was when I made real change.

Fitness videos are the same way. Stop before you look like this guy. This was me when I tried to jump right in to P90X without a little prep.

Weightlifters

Your advice is similar to the runners. Start Small. There is no shame in starting small. I say this mainly to men because we feel that somehow if we aren’t throwing weights around the room like they are t-shirts we aren’t working hard. I know this. I’m a man. But I will be honest with you lifting small weights is better than lifting no weights. You will get to where you once were if you keep at it and that is what starting small is all about, keeping you going back for more. Plus you will probably be sore enough lifting small weight anyways.

Friends I know a new year is coming up and all kinds of resolutions will be made. If you want to be like the rest of the world and make a resolution and flame out in a few days or weeks go ahead but give yourself a fighting chance and start small. You will feel better for achieving small goals that lead to big goal. Start you resolutions now and be ready to make those big goals for the New Year when it comes.

“If one has done it you can be two. If none has done it the one can be you.”

Day 14 Max Phase (Listen to your Body)

Day 14

Listen to your body! Our bodies are amazing things. They pretty much tell us everything we need to know. As most of you know from my earlier posts I am taking a lot of different supplements from Advocare®, for which I am a distributor. In fact that is the reason for the days on my posts and the different phases. I am doing what is called a 24 Day Challenge, and it’s going pretty well. The reason for this post is that today I don’t feel well. I have noticed that when I take all the supplements all at once it’s like overload.

Everyone, who has done something because a fitness expert told them to, please raise your hand. If you could see me I would be raising both hands. Now, who has followed that advice and it didn’t quit work out. Again I’m raising both hands. Sometimes it was my fault and sometimes it just didn’t work for me.

We are all different. Different things will work for different people. What works for me may not work for you. Now I’m not sure if that is what is going on with the supplements I’m taking. I’m trying to narrow it down to a certain pill that is giving me problems, if that’s it at all.

My point today is, listen to your body. There are a few ways you can accomplish this.

First: Listen to your stomach. Your body will tell you when it is full. LISTEN TO IT! I don’t profess to be the best at this but we have to make this a rule that we live by. If you are full stop eating. I don’t like to think my mom was wrong about anything but if you are full and your plate still has food on it. SAVE IT! YOU DON’T HAVE TO EAT IT! Sometimes I think we feel like we are force to eat something like Bruce Bogtrotter in the movie Matilda. You have choices. You don’t have a Miss Trunchbull standing over us making us eat. Sometimes our brain wants to eat but our stomach is saying you are full. This happens to me late at night before I go to work. Listen to your stomach. Your tongue wants taste that is it. Chew some gum, or have a mint.

Second: Listen to your body while working out. I know you want to work hard I’m not advocating against that, but your body knows the difference between working hard and injuring yourself. You will set your fitness back if you get injured. All I can really say is be wise, and listen your body. Also, let your body recover. YOU’RE NOT A MACHINE! You can’t work out all day long, nor is that good for you. Do your work out and then let your body recover. You will see better results if you allow time for recovery.

Third: Listen to your body when taking supplements. Fitness is all about feeling better physically, and mentally. If you are taking something that makes you feel bad, STOP! Find out what is making you feel bad. Maybe you’re getting sick. Right know I’m testing if it’s a supplement or other considerations that are making me feel a little off.

These are the areas that we need to listen to our bodies.  The more we listen in these areas the better result we will have.

“Oh, be wise what can I say more.”

Day 13 Max Phase (Don't Linger in Relapse)

Day 13

After a few weeks of change you might have a day or two when you eat things that aren’t healthy or maybe one day you just don’t feel like working out. This is going to happen. If you are reading this and you are having a day like this, “Don’t give up. Keep the habit of activity.” Change isn’t easy especially if you are like me and have an addiction to food, or you have been inactive for long time like I was just two years ago. You will have a ton of excuses to break your routine, but I will tell you from experience it is easier to be vigilant 100% of the time than to just cheat once. The reason is that when you cheat you set a precedence in your mind that will allow you to justify future cheats.

If you have already cheated don’t give up it’s not the end of the world but the best thing for you to do is to get back on track immediately. If you didn’t work out yesterday stop reading right now and get into workout clothes and do your work out. If it’s only 5 minutes I don’t care. You need to keep the habit alive. If you have had a binge day or eaten a few things you shouldn't have, like I did today, don’t justify the next meal saying that you have already messed up the day. You mess up the day when you give up and revert to old habits. Fight the impulse to give up. You are no longer a quitter. You get up when you fall down. You must develop a positive mental attitude.

Many of you who read this blog may not have an addiction to food like I do, but in general the cycle of addiction is as follows:

Step 1) Strong Feelings: Feelings of loneliness, boredom, anger, tiredness, stress, or any combination of these feelings. You have to be aware of these feelings/triggers. Most of the time these five triggers are at the root of our addictions. We use our addiction to cope with these feelings or to fill time

Step 2) Isolation: We isolate ourselves from others either through our addiction or because we are ashamed of what we do, and we don’t want others to know we have a problem, because our society looks down on weakness, even though if everyone was honest with themselves we would all see this cycle in our lives.

Step 3) Relapse: We know what this is. We indulge in our addiction. (I eat food when I’m not hungry.)

Step 4) Self Hate: Here we beat ourselves up for relapsing, which usually leads to feelings of anger, and stress. Which takes us right back to Step 1, which leads us to Step 2 and so on. At this point I feel like I’m at the bottom of huge hole.

You may be reading this and saying but I don’t do that. I don’t have an addiction. I would say ok maybe fitness or nutrition related subjects are not your vice, but I guarantee if you look at your life you will find this cycle at work somewhere else.

The good news is that the quicker you return to your plan, and the less time you spend in that hole, the easier it will be to get back on track. As you recognize these triggers you can break this cycle before the relapse. The easiest place to break the cycle is at Step 2. When you feel isolated or when we physically are isolated and you recognize the triggers call a friend or family member, or visit someone. Tell them why you are calling, or visiting. If inactivity is your particular vice, ask someone to go work out with you. Make it easy for them to say yes. If they are not into working out pick something active like walking that they can do.

If you relapsed today, or you are thinking of it, I want you to know, you are not alone, and always remember,

“You are Beautiful and unique just the way you are, God makes no junk, sponsors no flops.”

Go out there and break the cycle.