Biggest Loser Family Challenge Again

hahahahaha! That is correct. The family is doing another challenge like the one last year with weekly weigh-ins. This time we are going to do it for 12 weeks and I am going to rock and win this time. We just weighed in - there are five of us doing it this time - $250 at stake, plus weekly prizes of gift cards to the biggest weekly loser. I think to do this I will have to give up one of my favorite things for 12 weeks - wine. I know you have heard that before - this time I will do it for sure - I think that is the only way I can win. So, we shall see.

What I learned about spirituality and weight loss in 2010

Well, in a nutshell – I learned three major things. The power of thoughts – our thoughts become our reality, the power of gratitude and to always be in a state of joy. So, that is it.

The power of our thoughts - Over the last year, like I said, I have read many, many books and attended numerous seminars of spiritual subject everything from Atlantean Healing, to the book Infinite Possibilities – many are in my links. And, after all is said at the end of the day or shall I say the end of the year. I believe it comes down to the fact that our thoughts become things - our life becomes what we think about. What I mean by that is I really believe what we think will happen is what happens. Our thoughts are so much more powerful than we think. With all the talk about the Secret and manifesting our desires, I have learned that we need to watch our thoughts, craft our thoughts, think about what we want - not what we don’t want. We all know the person who is always getting into a car accident or losing things. Of course they always say this will happen to them and guess what it does. I believe these things happen to them because that is what they think will happen to them. The willed it to happened – they manifested it to happened because they thought it would happen. I know that is pretty simplistic statement, but I believe is to be true. You say why then have you not lost all your weight yet? And I can say this is one of the reasons, I don’t always think that I can do it. I don’t always see myself in the future thin and shopping for a size 10 dress. I am guilty of manifesting what I have in my life – the good and the bad -what I have I brought into my life. This year I am focusing on thinking about what I want to have happen in my life, not what I don’t. So, that means to worrying and a lot of positive thinking and talking.And, that little drunk monkey is so gone!! If I do think an unwanted thought I say to myself “cancel, clear, delete” to get it out of my mind.

Gratitude - The second thing is so awesome. Yes. Gratitude. Be grateful for all you have in your life. There are always things to be grateful for in one’s life. I started a gratitude journal last year and in it I write (it is best if done every day, another reason I have not yet reached my goal) at least ten things I am grateful for in my life. Then I write a list of how I want to feel during that day. I write “today I intend to: be happy, be calm, be kind, be outgoing, etc. I write whatever I what the day to look like. I vary the intentions based on what I have going that day –setting the tone for the day. Then lastly - here is where it gets fun -I write delegations. Delegations of thanks to God for what I have before I have it. So, something like “I am so thankful to God for the 20 closed escrows I had in 2011.” Or “I am so thankful to God that I am in a beautiful size 10 sun dress on my trip to France in September 2011 or something better.” You are probably thinking again then why are you not at goal yet? Again, I believe the key is to do this every day. And, I am sorry to say that I did not do it every day in 2010, I actually began doing it in June when I learned the technique at one of the Prosperity Princesses meetings.

Being Joyous - And, what I believe is the most important thing is having all that you want out of life, including being at an ideal weight – is to be in a state of joy. To be joyous. Now what does that mean? A year ago I would have said I have no idea, but now I know exactly what it means. It is that feeling when you feel at peace, happy, calm, relaxed, and in awe – your description might be a little different than mine, but you get the idea. I know that oftentimes I feel this way for only a moment or an hour or a day and then it fades. It goes away – poof my joyous feeling is gone. And, then I am like crap -come back, come back! Some of the times I can remember vividly having this feeling are when I was gardening in my garden - even though it was hard work and I was sweating (LOL) - I would have this feeling of AWE –maybe something about digging in the dirt? Other times I could just sit in my backyard listening to the fountain and the birds chirping and go to that place. When I was in Hawaii I felt this way often. The sunshine makes me feel this way. Now I know why I used to be such a sun worshiper when I was younger! While taking Cleo for a walk I would have moments of this feeling if I would let myself and I wasn’t in a hurry to get back to the house. What I found is that if I would just be present with what I was doing and observe my surroundings I would go to this place. Sometimes it would happen when I was listening to a friend talk or looking at a child smile. But, the key is to stay in this state as much as possible, then I believe all things are possible because God, the creator, whatever you want to call him/her, is in the things I am talking about, is in each one of us. We just need to be in this state of joy and all will be manifested as we want. It sounds so simple. I have spent about six months observing my states – observing when I am joyous and when I am sad or angry or any other emotion other than joyous and I am getting better at being joyous. At least now I know what to strive for – catch me on January 1, 2012 – then I will really know if I am correct about being a state of joy and manifesting what we want out of life.

So, those are my insights into how spirituality works into releasing weight and getting anything you want in life. Try it! It can work - if you do it consistently - which is what I am going to do in 2011!

Part 2 Tomorrow

I am still formulating my thoughts regarding what I have learned about spirituality in weight loss. I will post my thoughts tomorrow. Sorry for the delay. It'll be better - promise. Oh dear - now I feel more pressure to make it a good read!

What I learned about the mind/body connection and spirituality in losing weight in 2010 (Part I)

This is the area that I believe is the biggest challenge for most people in their weight loss efforts – it sure is for me anyway.

PART ONE – THE MIND/BODY CONNECTION
Today I am going to talk about the mind/body connection, as I call it. Or I should say the lack of connection – for me anyway. You probably know what I am talking about. You are sitting in front of the television eating popcorn and next thing you know you ate the whole bowl and you have a stomach ache. Or better yet you are sitting on the couch and you just finished eating what you think was a bowl of your favorite ice cream, bag of chips (and you don’t even like chips), and a glass or two of wine. You aren’t even quite sure what happened. There is just an empty bowl, an empty bag and an empty glass. Pick your poison – whatever your favorite binge food or drink is. Yes. We are talking about binging and emotional eating today.

Emotional eating - I learned that emotional eating can ruin a week of eating healthy and hours of exercise in a few minutes. I learned this because I did it numerous times throughout the last year. As I looked back on my blog, I can see exactly what set me off into what I oftentimes called a funk. It wasn’t always the same thing, but the key here is how you deal with it. Which, obviously, I am not expert at this yet or I’d be at my ideal weight already. LOL! I found that I eat when I am sad, frustrated, hurt, anxious, and the list goes on and on. I found that I needed to be aware of my triggers and realize I was eating or drinking because I was feeling some uncomfortable emotion. I found that once I could recognize the emotions, as emotions not hunger then I could choose to deal with them. It took me awhile to get to this point – a year to be exact! LOL! Seriously, I think I just got it!

Be Aware - What I learned during the last year is that it is a matter of recognizing why you are eating. Are you hungry? If yes, then eat (something healthy) by all means. But, what if you are in front of the refrigerator looking for food, and you ask yourself “Am I hungry?” and the answer is “I don’t feel hungry PHYSICALLY,” then you are probably emotionally eating. This is putting it very simply. For me it is a matter of catching myself before I eat. Stopping and taking a moment to have my mind connect with my body. Which is sometimes easier said than done! Sometimes I would just say “Okay fine I am emotionally eating, but ($*#)%_% it I am going to eat anyway.” But, that was the first step for me in realizing that I was eating because I was mad, or frustrated or hurt or…whatever. The next step is stopping to figure out what the emotion is and why you are feeling it. A lot of the times it was just something simple and once I thought it through I was over it - other times like I said I’d just say “$^&&*^ it I’m eating and drinking anyway!” Not the best response. I am improving on this every day, but it has been a process for me.

Self Respect/Self Love/Self Esteem – Whatever you call it. You have to get it! You have to have it! Or that is what I have found. Your mind has to love your body! During my journey, I learned that the more I am feeling good about myself the better I eat – the number of times I emotionally eat diminishes. So, I think the key is to love yourself as you are today – a hard thing to do when you want to lose weight, right? I think getting to this point, is when the weight will begin to literally fall off. And, thank goodness - I think I am finally there – after a year of learning, searching, and growing.

So, that is it in a nutshell - these are the mind/body connection things that I learned on my journey. I’m sure I will think of more to share, but these are the main ones. Tomorrow I will talk about what I think is the key to success in releasing weight and in everything in life. WOW! That sounds pretty lofty, doesn’t it?

Gratefulness for what is there is one of the most powerful tools for creating what is not yet there. What does gratefulness mean? It means you appreciate what is. You value, you give attention to, you honor whatever is here at this moment. ~ Eckhart Tolle

Exactly what I have been talking and writing about!!!

What I learned about healthy eating in 2010

A lot! This is still my problem area though, but it is a problem because of emotional eating – not because I don’t know what to eat. I will go more into that tomorrow. But, what did I learn about eating healthy this year?

Planning - Probably the biggest thing I learned is that planning is key – if you don’t plan you will probably fail. Not really fail, but you will probably not eat as healthy as you could. I know on the weeks that I planned I did much better with my healthy eating than I did on the weeks that I didn’t. I know we all get busy and it is easy to not plan, but that is a big mistake! What I found works best is to plan a menu for the week on Saturday or Sunday and go to the grocery store to buy all the items you need for your plan. Another thing that I know works is preparing some meals in advance on the weekend for the week – that way if you get home late from work one night you will still have something healthy to eat instead of stopping at a fast food place or ordering pizza. I never do that! Hahahahaha!!!

Calories in Calories out - From all the research I have done and all the books I have read I have pretty much decided that to lose weight it really is just calories in calories out – just as simple as that. But, and a big but – you can do it the healthy way and you can do it the unhealthy way! You can count calories and eat all processed foods and you will lose weight, but you won’t be as well nourished and you will have more craving and possible binges. I found for me it was best to keep my calories anywhere from 1400-1600, but that of course depends on how much you weigh. If I would go much below 1400 I would be starving and then inevitable eat everything in sight or at least the first thing that I see. LOL! And, then burn more calories than you eat and you WILL lose weight.

Only Healthy Food in the House - Another thing that I found helpful, - but not always easy when you live with other people- is to not have unhealthy foods in the house. Don’t have it in the house and then you can’t eat it, right? Easier said than done unless you live alone! I don’t know how many times I “cleaned” out my pantry and refrigerator this year purging of the unhealthy foods that have a tendency to sneak in my cupboard. Hahahaha! One thing I think can help a little is to put the unhealthy foods in the garage refrigerator, if you have one – out of sight out of mind concept.

Eat Fresh Vegetables and Fruits, etc. not Processed Foods - I really try to eat organic and do eat many vegetables from my garden – which I love. I realize I forgot to say yesterday that gardening is exercise. It really is – believe me! But, even if you don’t have a garden you can buy organic veggies and fruits and even if you don’t want to pay extra for organic you can still buy fresh fruits and vegetables. I think it the long run it is cheaper than buying processed food, if you can manage not to waste them. I try to have at least one fruit or vegetable with each meal, and with my two snacks. That is my plan every day anyway!!

Super Foods – I have learned a lot about Super Foods, see my post on the subject, and I really do think that they really can aid in weight loss. I think it is probably because they are so nutrient dense that when I eat them I have fewer cravings. My husband thinks I am crazy making all these shakes and concoctions with these un-pronounceable foods. But, hey, just my opinion.
Eat Healthy Snacks – I found that when I at healthy snacks I do much better sticking to my plan - snacks an apple and peanut butter, Greek yogurt and fruit, or a handful of nuts. When I didn’t eat snacks then I would be ravenous at my next meal and inevitably overeat.

Try New Healthy Recipes - I tried many, many, many new recipes last year – all of them delicious. You need to make your food interesting or you might be tempted to revert to your old ways. I have my favorites, but I plan try some more this year too. I posted many of them throughout the year, but some good sources for healthy recipes are Biggest Loser cookbooks, Precision Nutrition (on my links), Cooking Light on-line or the magazine. Plus, there are a wide variety of recipes on-line with any ingredient or spice you can think of.

Give Yourself a Treat Every Once in awhile – I mean every once in awhile, not all the time. Hahahaha! I think you have to live, so if you go out to dinner for your birthday have dessert, if you really like frozen yogurt have one every now and then. The danger here though is how often to allow yourself. I’d say once a week would be good. But, that doesn’t have frozen yogurt several times a week – it means have it one time!

That is what I learned about eating healthy. If I would have done everything I have outlined above I would have reached my goal without a problem. I know all these things inside and out, now if I can just follow the guidelines all the time! Tomorrow I will talk about why I didn’t follow my own guidelines all the time. That sounds terrible, but hey if it was that easy everyone would be at their ideal weight, right? Tomorrow I will talk about, in my opinion, the tough stuff.

What I learned about exercise in 2010

In 2010 I certainly exercised A LOT, and tried numerous types and forms of exercise. I'm going to recap what I learned during the last 365 days, and describe what types of exercise I did. The biggest thing I learned is very simple, and very obvious, but sometimes we seem to forget this and make exercise a chore. Move. Yes, that's it - Move. You just have to Move, in any way that you like and to a degree that sometimes challenges you a lot and sometimes just a little. Make sense? I used to think that if I didn't do 60 minutes of intense exercise I wasn't exercising enough. And, that if I didn't have 60 minutes to devote to a hard core exercise that I couldn't, shouldn't and wouldn't exercise. But, this year I learned differently. I learned to just get out there and move. Of course certain exercises have more benefit and burn more calories, but I learned not to obsess on that and just move. My GoWearFit monitor was instrumental in showing me how many calories each exercise burns. I quickly learned that just getting out there and moving burns calories with the monitor.  As I said I exercised many hours this year. I should count them up. On second thought, NO - that would take too long. LOL! Here is a list of all the types of exercise I did this year in no particular order:

Dancing - Yes dancing is exercise - believe me it is! And, fun with your hubby! When you are sweating up a storm you know it is, plus the good old GoFitWear monitor said it burned a lot of calories.

Mini Trampoline - Much harder than it seems. It really gets your heart rate up and is good for your lymphatic system and detoxification. About Rebounding

Boot Camp - What can I say? Only for the brave. The first couple of days were super hard, but my body got used to it. Always and intense high calorie burning hour of fun!

Walking - I can't even imagine how many miles I walked in 2010. If I had to guess I would say more than 600. I thinking walking is one of the best exercises and it is so awesome to be outside in the sunshine and nature. The treadmill is good too, but I enjoy walking outside in a beautiful setting more. Many of my walking miles were logged taking Cleo, my adorable dog, for two walks a day (most days, but not all) - just 10-20 minutes each, but it all adds up!!

Kettle Balls - These things are great for strength training and cardio. You really work up a sweat fast using these. If you don't know what they are check it out.  About Kettle Balls

Golf - I love golfing! And, it burns a ton of calories and it is outside. Can you see a theme? I really like any kind of outside exercise best. Of course if you walk you burn more calories than if you take a cart, but in my case even if I take a cart I burn a lot of calories chasing after my ball. LOL!

Pilates - Great for flexibility and it works the smaller muscles that you don't work doing many other exercises, an excellent complement to weight training.

Weight Training - I have done weight training on and off for many years, and I am familiar with many different exercising with both free weights and machines. Excellent for building muscles which burn more calories, and we all want to burn more calories, right?

Wii Fit - I know this doesn't seem like exercise, but you try doing the exercises on that and see if you sweat. I know I did! And, it is fun too.

Mud Run - Only for the brave. I can't even believe that I did this. I did walk the whole way, but hey I made it. It was very inspirational to be around all the really fit people. I am debating whether or not to do this again when I am leaner. The experience of a lifetime!

IntenSati - This class is awesome! I did this at the Biggest Loser Resort in Malibu. I wish they had these classes somewhere near my home. IntenSati is a revolutionary high-energy cardio workout created by Patricia Moreno. This method of training is based on the teachings of mindfulness, positive psychology and the law of attraction. The practice radically combined aerobics, martial arts and endurance principles with positive affirmations. Check it out on the link.

Hiking - Oh boy! Hiking is great, and burns a ton of calories, plus you are out in nature. I went on many amazing hikes in Utah, Malibu and right in my own backyard - well not really in my backyard, but you know what I mean. You know you are exercising because at times it is very intense, but since you are in nature and it doesn't seem to be that hard.

Biggest Loser Resort - Great place. I learned a lot there about eating and exercising. Main thing is calories in calories out - just like your check book. That was an epiphany for me!

Water Aerobics - Who would think moving around in a pool would be so rigorous? But, it really is a great workout. I used to think it was just for old ladies and people who aren't very fit, but noooooo it is a fantastic calorie burner.

Kickboxing - One of my favorites. I just love kicking things. What is that all about? LOL! Burns a ton of calories and lots of fun!

Stretch - I didn't realize I had become so un-limber. I used to be so limber, but not anymore. This is a great thing to do and I need to do more of it. You really realize which muscles you need work on when you start to stretch, and after all the concentrated exercising it is a must. I need to more of this.

Boxing - Another one of my favorites. I just love punching things. My poor trainer Marc! Tons of fun and burns a ton of calories.

I'm sure I forgot something. But, that is quite a list as I look at it. So, I couldn't have done it without my trainer Marc, my Pilates instructor Janice and Jason the Boot Camp leader. And, there are links about most of the above in my links section you can check out too!

In 2011 I want to incorporate some new fitness encounters (My new name for exercise. Sounds better doesn’t it?)  into my life this year including: Zumba, Yoga, 5K and 10K races, Spinning, and Cycling. And, I want to play a lot more golf this year and hike more too. Basically, make sure you do some cardio exercises to strengthen your heart and burn calories, some strength training exercises that help build muscle, and some stretching exercising to keep up your flexibility. There are many other types of fitness encounters you could try too like tennis, racquetball, swimming, surfing, skiing, snowboarding, paddle boarding, team sports like softball, basketball etc. to name a few. For me exercise is the easy part. Tomorrow more on eating and food – that is a whole other issue for me! So, that is the exercise recap for 2010. 2011 here I come to enjoy many more fitness encounters. How about you?