Have the last few weeks been crazy weeks?

Have you missed most of your scheduled exercise due to family in town?

Been traveling yourself and off your normal routine? 

I am sensing many of us are dealing with these kinds of challenges, is that right?

As a result, we might be sleeping less and are otherwise off schedule. Our eating might be off the charts: more sugar, more starch, more alcohol.  Our exercise pattern may sporadic or non-existent. 

And on top of it, the relationships and emotions around family members together make it more challenging. 

Don't get us wrong. We looove holidays and the holiday spirit. We love family all together and around us. We love spending time around holidays.

And what if some of us are not with families at all? What if some us are alone? What if holiday time brings memories of sadness? This is an emotional challenge of itself. 

The question is

What makes our own self-care so hard and difficult to stick...

Happy Holidays! 

PREFER TO LISTEN?

How are you taking December?

Which one out of three are you today?

Are you just like me: Christmas shopping, working, family, and building your plans to finish 2022 and jump-start 2023 and feeling overloaded with tasks to do?

Or you might be not even into holidays, not thinking, no prepping, no holiday shopping. Just taking one day at a time. 

Or maybe you are jumping into important New Year solutions and starting now? Why wait, right?

A Message of Compassion

Whatever situation you find yourself in, I feel I want to bring our intention to compassion.  First of all, for ourselves. In the last few years, we have been going through a rough patch that has been challenging us on many levels: emotional, financial, and relationship. It's been hard.

Let's allow to be easy on ourselves. 

Compassion Exercise 

Step 1.

So take a deep breath in and a deep long breath out. 

Breathe in self-compassion. Breathe out...

I am thankful for my life's journey;
For the years I have lived.
I am thankful for the spirit
I choose in a moment.

I am thankful for the sunrise
To remind me to breathe and smile.

I am thankful for the fresh air
To swallow life and space.

I am thankful for the first sip of morning coffee
That helps me be present in the moment.
I close my eyes and feel... life.

I am thankful for the morning workout sweat
With tired but laughter with all at the end.

I am thankful for the energy produced
To live my day with the power I choose.

I am thankful for the people I meet along the way
All to grow
Communication and love.

I am thankful for struggles and toughness
All to build
Tenacity and strength.

I am thankful for afternoon tea
To stop and be present
To good for me.

I am thankful for lunch and a movie
To feel the love with my child.

I am thankful for evening glory
To slow down my speed
And be here to receive.

As I close my eyes in the dark
I count my blessings.
With each...

Are you feeling a little anxious around the holidays because you don't want to break your healthy habits? You have been working so hard on establishing them.  Asking ahead and seeing that maybe you won't work out as much and you might overeat? Is that about right? If that is you, please keep reading.

Prefer to listen? Click here. 

I know the family comes and cooks. They may not be aware that you have been sticking so well to your healthy routine. Maybe they know and yet it doesn't feel good to ask them to change family food traditions. You may even feel guilty about expressing your needs. And it certainly doesn't feel good to deprive yourself from holiday foods. After all, it's family tradition..

How do we keep the spirit of the holidays and enjoy family traditions while still sticking to healthy habits? 

About guilt

Before I show you this tool, let's get one thing out of the way. Guilt.

Why do we feel guilty even before the occasion?

...

Is it just me feeling anxious right now or you are feeling that too?

Holidays? Midterm elections? Financial tightness and holiday expenses are coming? Schedule will be so messed up with holidays? Not looking forward to overeating and missing exercise?

How can we turn around the anxiousness? Let's talk about a plan. Actually,  today I want to share just one step. It's actually a tool that I learned many years ago and in my recent coaches training I heard it again. I also taught it during the recent Stress to Success Challenge. You can listen to the video by opting in here.

"WHAT'S THE GIFT?" TOOL 

This tool involves taking any situation in your life, no matter how bad it is, can be turned into a gift or opportunity.

That requires some explanation, because clearly many things happen that are initially perceived as negative, from annoying to catastrophically life changing.

To employ this tool, we can look at any unwanted event from three...

In this message I want to focus on 3 Steps to Thrive Through The Holidays: pick up on movement, mindful eating, and joining the community. 

Do you know that the average American gains 9 lbs during holidays (pre-COVID)? Do you know the average weight gain during COVID is 20+ lbs? Add it up and we are in obesity trouble.

Let's team up and tackle the obesity epidemic so we can fully enjoy our holidays and their special meaning?!

BTW, this guide is for you if you are committed to staying healthy. This guide is NOT for New Year Resolutioners.

Let's jump into 3 Healthy Holidays tips!

3 Steps to Thrive Through Holidays

Step 1. Pick up on our physical activity.

Why? Eat more = need to move more. Calories in/calories out.

If you know you ate more than your body could burn with normal activity, pick up on movement. Keep implementing your regular physical activity and add extra movement to burn those extra calories consumed. Btw, for...

 

Decisions. Decisions.  All day long! Depleted and drained. On the way home grab some fast food and settle in front of the TV. Seems familiar?

In this message,  I want to share the silence, power, and hope that sits beyond Decision Fatigue. 

On my journey to my Weight Loss Specialist Certification by NASM (National Academy of Sports Nutrition), I came upon this material that I'd like to share with you. 

It has been estimated that the average individual makes as many as 35,000 decisions per day (Sahakian & Labuzetta, 2013), of which about 226 are on food (Wansink & Sobal, 2007). The increasing number of decisions an individual is required to make over the course of the day is mentally exhausting and depletes one’s cognitive abilities to exert self-control, especially in the face of temptations. The mental drain due to the demands of making multiple, complex decisions is referred to as decision fatigue (Baumeister &...

Have you ever felt like you should be able to handle emotions that come up, but just don't seem to be able to?

May I let you know that it even happens to coaches?

The difference for me now is that I have tools to help me though tough times so I may temporarily feel stress, but I don't take it in and make it a part of my emotional landscape.

Why is that important? Because chronic stress has such a profound effect on our health, and not a good one!

Read on and you'll see why it is so important to have strategies to deal with stress.

In fact, if you want to know more, just click here to set a time for us to talk.

Here is information that will help you understand the widespread impact of stress on the body and how you can start to manage it more effectively.

The Effects of Stress on The Body

Increased cortisol production: Associated with weight gain (especially in the belly), inability to lose weight or gain muscle, and premature aging.

Decreased nutrient...

Life is busy. Business and household demands. Maybe even babysitting grandchildren.  Too much on our plates. I know we feel we can't put anything else on top.

And here is the deal … we cannot run on stress and cortisol and be healthy for a long time. 

The good thing is we gotta breathe, move, think, and use other senses anyway, right? It's not conditional and not voluntary; the body does it automatically. 

What I am inviting you is to tap into what you are already doing anyway and use 2 minutes of intentionality. 

• Intentionally noticing breathing 
• Intentionally noticing your sences 
• Intentional movement to energize and cut through negative energy 
• Intentional positive thinking 

Each of these tools takes 2 min. These are some of the most effective tools I learned that help me relax on demand and be effective as possible. They teach us to be mindful of every moment and use these moments to help ourselves. 

If you want to...

Want to look forward to exercising? Listen to this message or keep reading.

"I don't like exercising" is the comment I get A LOT.

And we obviously understand we have to exercise to keep our bodies healthy.

The question is

how do we change our minds so that we can look forward to exercising and actually enjoy it?

Allow me to offer you the Tool. It works for most but here is the disclaimer: I don't know if it will work for you. To check it out,  give it an honest effort for a week.

Ready for the tool?

SMILE

When we smile, we trick our brain to enjoy the current activity. The same goes with exercise. The brain is gonna say: ah, she is smiling so we must be enjoying exercising; let me release happy hormones for her. You will naturally start feeling good; emotionally,  physically, and  mentally. 

Let's dive deeper: choose joy. 

Here are three strategies to choose joy in exercise:

Before.

Before you...