5 WAYS A PERSONAL TRAINER CAN HELP YOU SUCCEED

You’ve tried over and over to maintain a healthy lifestyle. You want to stay strong and active, keep up and play with your grandchildren or take your fitness to the next level. Your dream keeps getting farther away as you get older. Stop the internal fight by teaming up with a personal trainer who can support and teach you the tools you need to succeed. Here are 5 ways a personal trainer can help:

1. Accountability – It tough changing your day to day rituals. We get used to doing the same things day in and day out and it tough figuring out how to fit in workouts, food planning, and life balance. This is why a program with accountability helps. Checking in with your trainer for regular measurement, body fat and pictures is usually enough to keep you on track and motivated to keep going and skip that pizza or dessert.

2. Debunking all those old myths about nutrition – It’s tough to keep up on all the new information out there about nutrition. What works and what doesn’t work. Why low fat, low carb diets do’t work. Why limiting your calories can actually create chaos with your hormones and metabolism.

3. Gives you confidents and knowledge to exercise property – Learning how to properly weigh-train can be intimating, especially for beginners. A personal trainer will teach proper progression to insure there are no injuries, while building strength and function within the kinetic chain.  Have you been training for a while but you’ve plateaued? Learning new exercises and combinations can give you more effective results and take you to that next fitness level you’ve been working so hard to reach.

4. Teaches proper nutrition for life not a quick fix – Are you always wondering what proper mix of micronutrients will help your transformation. What to eat and how much? What might work for someone might not work for the next person, we are all unique individuals. Throughout your program a personal training can dial in what works for you, so you are successful for life.

5. Teaches life changes that stick – How many times have you tried to incorporate more healthy habits into your life? Then a week later your not doing it at all? Having that accountability with someone who teaches life changing sustainable habits through small daily steps is essential.

It’s a team effort to move past life changing fears and uncertainty to one of desire, excitement and change. Make your life feel significant, valuable and happy!

5 Top Tips to Avoid Holiday Weight Gain

Oh, the weather outside will soon be frightful, and those holiday cookies look so delightful… but don’t give in to those tasty temptations this holiday season! You don’t want to enter the New Year with a few extra turkeys around your waistline, right? That’s why I’ve put together my top 5 tips to help you avoid holiday weight gain this winter.  

1.   Be true to yourself.

Don’t just believe in Santa this holiday season – believe in yourself! Ok, maybe that’s a little cheesy, but you should absolutely believe that you deserve to feel good (and look good, too!).  

Know your own importance and make a commitment to yourself. After all, you’ll never know what you’re capable of until you trust yourself enough to go all in. So truly commit for the holiday season, and then don’t let anything get in the way of your exercise regimen.

2.   Avoid indulging the whole season.

Photo by picjumbo.com from Pexels

It seems like the holiday season starts earlier every year. We haven’t even put away our Halloween decorations and already pumpkin spice everything is out on the store shelves!  

But that doesn’t mean your holiday indulgences should start early, too. Don’t start the food festivities now, or you’ll add extra pounds before the real holidays even arrive. Save your planned free meal and dessert for a big holiday party or dinner.

3.   Don’t skip meals.

Every now and then, a holiday treat will be too tempting to resist – but don’t try to “make up” for those little indulgences by skipping meals. This can negatively affect your metabolism and even cause you to gain weight. Yes, gain weight!

Plus, you’re much more likely to make bad food choices and overeat if you’re starving.

4.   Get your rest to avoid crashes and cravings.

https://pixabay.com/en/relaxing-lounging-saturday-cozy-1979674/ 

Sleep is one of the best holiday gifts you can give yourself. If you’re not getting enough rest, you may find yourself hungrier than normal during the day, which can easily lead to mindless snacking on those holiday treats.

And nobody wants to hit the gym if they’re feeling too tired either. So prioritize your sleep to see better results from both your diet and your exercise.  

5.   Stay focused and write down your vision.

Do you have your eye on a sexy black dress for a New Year’s Eve party? Write down your vision of what you want to achieve by the start of the new year. This will help you remember that you’ve got goals so you can stay focused.

Photo by Chase Clark on Unsplash

Follow these easy tips, and you’ll start off 2019 with confidence! If you need a little extra motivation this holiday season, I’d love to chat with you about how I can help you reach your goals and get a jumpstart on a healthy new year.

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Why Autophagy is Important and Why You Need to Stimulate It

Good news there's a little-known approach your body does to clean itself from damage and free radicals. It's a process you can tap into that accelerates self-eating.

Wait What?...

Yes, you could truly train your body to eat itself - and believe it or not, you should want and need it.

It's a natural process called Autophagy meaning “self-eating”, the body’s system of cleaning house. Explained in easier terms, it a cellular cleansing process that removes toxins within the cells and repairs dead, infected, damaged cells left behind; swallowing up the weaker parts of the body, to make it stronger. This could also be called survival of the fittest. 

Autophagy makes us more efficient by getting rid of flawed parts, protecting us from many different cancers, as well as excessive weight gain, and diabetes. Autophagy is can also slow the aging process.  

When we’re younger our cells are vibrant and more efficient, and duplicating like crazy, but as we age our cells aren't duplicating as much and eventually we die. Now, since we are aging and starting to lose cells, we do need to make sure we become a lot more efficient at making the stronger cells even stronger and begin to increase, and we can do that with Autophagy. The benefits of enhancing this process is so the cells are stronger, which slows down the aging process, so we can live longer and feel more youthful without sickness. 

Another benefit is when Autophagy is working at an accelerated pace, we have high levels of Nero protection that’s occurring. Which means, intermittent fasting helps enhance cognitive function, which may help the brain to learn more easily. As brain cells become more powerful, it protects us from dementia and Alzheimer's. 

Now, I know you're asking yourself “how do I eat myself?” Well, I’m about to tell you. First, autophagy is a response to stress, but we want to utilize “good stressors” not bad ones. The good stressors are things like exercise and intermittent fasting. Let’s take a look at these:

1.    Exercise

Exercise puts stress on the body, however, this is the good stress. Exercise damages your muscle tissue, and it creates little microscopic tears that the body then rushes to heal, this creates more muscle mass and resistant to any more damage you might place it through.

Regular exercise is a natural way you can help your body to cleanse. That must be why we feel so refreshed and stress free after a good hard workout.

2.    Intermittent Fast

Ironically for people who "cleanse" by drinking juice (which can be high in sugar), the act of eating actually works against autophagy. Skipping meals can lead to another stressful act that the body may not immediately love but ultimately take advantage of.

Intermittent fasting is a term that involves time-restricted eating. There are many different ways to do this but if you’re a woman you’ll have to consider hormones will play into what you can do. Start with a 12 hour fast and see how your body feels, and build up from there. Autophagy starts at 16 hours and becomes more powerful between 24-48 hours for the best effects. You might consider trying your first fast starting at 7 pm and then fast until 7 am the next morning. 

3.    Reduce Your Intake of Carbs

Reducing the amount of carbs in your diet will induce autophagy. It may be hard to make drastic changes to your diet all at once, so slowly work yourself into it. Try one of these ideas to start with, and then implement more of them as you are able.

Simply cutting carbs on odd days, or two days with carbs and two days without carbs has been shown to increase autophagy. Bodybuilders have been doing this to manipulate fat loss for years. However, there’s another way to get similar benefits without giving up your favorite rib eye, but you will need to stop eating sugar either way.

It is called a ketogenic diet, and it's an ever more preferred diet for anybody looking for a much longer lifespan and to help prevent health-related disease. The idea is to reduce carbs to 10% of overall calories so that the body has no choice but to use fat as a fuel source instead of glucose from carbs. This puts you in a ketosis, which induces autophagy. 

So, here's my own conclusion… Regular workout, as well as occasional carbohydrate restriction, carry mountains of advantages in addition to their likely impact on autophagy. The very best that may happen is a stronger, leaner, as well as cleaner body. That's our type of cleansing.

References

1) 10-5-16 How autophagy could lead to a cure for cancer and spell the end of diabetes:
https://www.wired.co.uk/article/autophagy-cells-explained
2) 5-24-15 Autophagy https://theartofmed.wordpress.com/2015/05/24/autophagy/
3) 8-16-10 Fasting increases circulating levels of several neurotrophic factors
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.4161/auto.6.6.12376
4) Exercise induces autophagy in peripheral tissues and in the brain
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3463459/

Do Emotional Eaters Have BusyBody Problems?

Something to think about, busybodies are commonly driven by excellent intentions yet they're driven by subconscious reasons.

Are you wondering if you're a BusyBody or have BusyBody patterns?

Let’s explore the following 3 scenarios below:

The Caretaker

You are very in harmony with people in demand. You really feel good being mama duck, seeing to your little ducklings are done in a row, right where you desire them, where their more than happy and secure.

Have you ever tried to change a person to the way you think they should be? Have you ever felt aggravated that people didn't do exactly what you asked, as well as resisted you and challenge you?

The Rescuer

You really feel you must step in, save the day, take control of the circumstance. Have you ever felt pain because the person you're aiming to aid, kindly or not-so-kindly informed you to butt out? Do you consistently do your kids' homework, and/or make the last-minute drive to school if they have forgotten their homework at home? Then to end up with youngsters that anticipate you to be the homework fairy?

The Do-Gooder

You volunteer when you should not, then it makes you feel resentful and stressed. Have you ever before seemed like an overloaded and stressed out martyr due to the fact that you realize far too late that you've taken on to much? No one else is raising their hand, and the worry falls on your shoulders.

I don't imply to suggest that aiding is a bad thing. We are hard-wired to help each other and also, it's a natural element of being a person. The problems arise when individuals attempt to aid all the time, further effecting our own quality of life or ability to care for ones health.

Do  scenarios like these lead you right to the refrigerator? You can get out of the busybody trap and get your life back.

Why it's very easy to fall into the busybody trap

Two reasons people become busybodies:

Control or lack thereof. Psychological eaters are usually controlled freaks since we feel out of control ourselves. Going a bit deeper, the ego should be in control; as well as the ego always must be right.

Everyone enjoys the thrill of stepping in and saving the day ... however, ego is hard-headed. Vanity drives to take over so you can be smarter/wiser/stronger and more in control compared to others, however, that commonly backfires when people see you as a hard-headed know-it-all.

Disturbance. Concentrating on other people's problems additionally offers an effective distraction from our own issues, feelings, truth, as well as thoughts. It's uncomfortable to encounter our own stuff as well as easier to hide behind other individuals’ troubles.

Here are 5-steps to stop the BusyBody and take your life back:

1.       Never say yes until you take the time to think about. Tell the person that is asking you will have to get back to them. Give yourself at least one day to consider and think about what you will be sacrificing in your own life. Can you really afford the added time, effort, and stress? Constantly saying "I'll do it" at your own expenditure causes stress that creates emotional eating. Help only when it feels great to assist! Otherwise, say no. There are others that could do it!

2.       Inform on your own, "Not my apes, not my circus!" There are circuses taking place all around you. You have an option whether you enter the ring or otherwise. Dramatization = anxiety. You meddle, feelings get harmed (they probably really did not desire you to butt in but were too respectful to claim so), as well as you pacify with food.

3.       Ask yourself, "What landed me in this situation?" if you're already in a situation that's backfiring. The response is always, "I got myself in this situation." Taking responsibility requires you to be extra familiar with your choice, as well as prevent you from making it again.

4.       Say no more often ... to yourself. Tell yourself, it's fine not to butt in. People are who they are. You cannot change them. If you're doing your children' homework, remind yourself, homework aids children to the discovery of the subject. It additionally shows them self-control, obligation, and most importantly, effects. Real life is an extreme area for any individual that is used to being rescued!

5.       Do not handle other people's problems. Rather than having compassion as well as attempting to take care of the scenario for them, show concern, but urge them to fix their own situations. Empower them, do not be superior to them, and don't drain yourself aiming to help.

Being a busybody is ineffective. It can damage connections, destroy your health, trash your state of mind, and prevent you from enjoying life.

When you start to see when you're stepping into scenarios that have absolutely nothing to do with you, you reduced your anxiety as well as reduced your yearnings.

The biggest obstacle is recognizing when to say no to others as well as to yourself. Push away the discomfort and focus on improving yourself. Making this adjustment may be some work, but it will instantly minimize weight on your mind ... and also your body! I assure!

If you desire different results in your life, you'll have to take different actions. This can be an exciting adventure if you choose. 

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Practicing Self-Care & Fitness Has It's Benefits

Practicing Self-Care & Fitness Has It's Benefits - By Guest Writer Sheila Olson

As we grow up, we pick up the belief that the greater the sacrifice you make, the greater the reward.  While working hard is essential for achieving your goals in life, the big question is when is how much striving too much? For many people, accomplishing their ambitions comes at the cost of their health. Self-care can help you regain balance in your life.

Practicing self-care offers numerous mental, physical, emotional, and psychological benefits including:

•           Boosts your self-esteem and confidence

•           Helps you maintain healthy relationships

•           Relieves stress

•           Promotes focus, creativity, clarity, and productivity.

•           Improves your outlook on life

•           Promotes mental health

•           Builds resilience and problem-solving ability

•           Cultivates peace, calm and happiness in your life

The importance of fitness to your self-care routine?

Fitness helps you build strength and boosts your vitality to enable you to perform your daily tasks optimally. Exercising detoxifies your body and aids in maintaining a healthy weight, lowering your risk of diseases such as cancer, hypertension, diabetes and heart diseases.

People in recovery stand to benefit significantly by including exercise into their lives. Studies show that exercising lowers stress levels while producing feel-good hormones. The feel-good hormones provide a natural high while the reduced stress levels reduce the urge to use drugs. Some people in recovery pursue exercise and sports as a means of self-actualization which keeps their minds occupied, gives them a sense of accomplishment, and boosts their self-esteem.

Incorporate fitness into your life

Identify an exercise you enjoy such as jogging, walking, swimming, cycling, yoga, boxing, hiking, aerobics, dancing, and weight training among others. Start exercising 20 minutes a day for 3-5 days a week and increase frequency, intensity, and length of time as your body becomes stronger. Incorporate self-care in your fitness routine by eating healthy whole foods and hydrating adequately. Also, avoid overtraining, and warm up and cool down for at least 10 minutes per session.

Integrating other self-care practices

Initially, it may feel like self-care is taking up too much time on your already busy schedule, or that it is selfish. Start out with smaller time-frames and build up gradually. The idea is to commit every day to do something that nurtures you, even if it is for five minutes. Self-care takes being deliberate and not making excuses.  Some days it will be easy to get in the flow, other days it may feel like a lot of work. Either way, keep showing up.

Occasionally take time out to just breath and literally smell the roses. Take morning or evening walks in nature. Every so often allocate time for a bubble bath, massage or a facial. Plan and begin saving up for that vacation you have been intending to take.

Create an end of the day ritual whereby 30 minutes before your bedtime, turn off all the electronics, dim the lights, and get in bed. Take a few deep breaths and allow your body to ease tension. Identify at least three things in your life or the day that you are grateful for. You may make a mental note of them or actually note them down in your journal. Allow yourself to lay relaxed, aware of your body until you drift away to sleep.

There will always be a new goal for you to pursue and things to do. Self-care may mean the difference between whether you go through life overloaded with stress, or with ease. Do not wait until the damage of neglecting yourself is done, take charge of your life now and find ways you can nurture your body, mind, and spirit.

Photo credit: Unsplash

BENEFITS OF WEIGHT-LOSS

It's talked about often that losing weight “feels great.” Many assume that this feeling arrives after months of sweat and determination. However, as soon as you start to incorporate a healthy lifestyle of whole foods and exercise you will feel a change. Your energy will start to soar. Your mood will improve and you will find yourself having feelings of happiness and self-worth. You may be able to get off some medications due to weight-loss, you'll spend less on health care, and your risk of cancer and diabetes will be lower. Then one day you will find your skinny jeans fit perfectly. And while, there is an incredible sense of accomplishment when you do reach a milestone goal, there is real happiness on your daily journey. Let me explain.

Your body is incredibly responsive. We heal from sickness. We feel energy from a great workout. Our minds feel the endorphins of exercise and positive thinking. As soon as you begin to give your body what it’s meant to receive, nutrition, hydration, activity, and self-love, it responds almost immediately. You feel light, energy, and power. And, you physically begin to FEEL a change.

If you want weight-loss, to feel energetic and empowered here's a few tips that can help you get started.

Feel Hydrated

Getting plenty of water promotes weight loss, increased energy, relieves fatigue, flushes out toxins, improves complexion and boosts the immune system, just to name a few. Your stomach will feel slimmer since it can digest food easier and staying hydrated helps you avoid headaches. Plus, water doesn't add a single calorie! Aim to drink 3 liters to 1 gallon of water every day.

Feel Energetic

Feeling more energetic only takes a few daily changes. Those changes are sleep, eating enough to fuel your day, and exercising regularly. Eating whole foods throughout the day and keeping sugar intake low gives you immediate energy. By five o’clock you'll either be sluggish from sugar or you’ll be actively engaged in your evening events. Exercise release endorphins, which is a hormone secreted within the brain and nervous system that causes an euphoric effect, making you happy with more energy. Sleep helps weight-loss, memory, problem solving, concentration, and energy. Studies show that the best amount is at least 7 hours.

Feel Empowered

One of the greatest feelings in the world is progressing towards a goal! Each and every day that you follow a diet of whole foods and exercise, you are taking a step (or two or three) forward. Your mind is incredibly powerful. Some of my clients have allowed themselves years of negative self-talk. It’s dark, damaging, and hurtful. However, just a few days of healthy eating and exercise quickly reverses that negativity. If you are mindful you will notice these changes. Light immediately penetrates darkness. You feel hopeful, excited, and CAPABLE of reaching your goals. And, if any thread of discouragement returns, you can quickly replace that fear with positive affirmations and acknowledge that you are on your own path of success.

If you begin enjoying the benefits of healthy nutrition and exercise on a daily basis. You’ll immediately fall in love with the way you FEEL!

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PAPER TOWEL THEORY

I recently read this weight loss analogy that I found so intriguing and motivating I thought I should share. I hope you find this helpful in your weight loss journey! 

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By: Bob White

Let's assume you go out and buy two rolls of paper towels, each with only 84 paper towels on it (one for each day of the challenge). You put one aside, and keep it for future reference (your before picture).

The other one represents you (I'll call your paper towel you Ed). The core represents the lean Ed. The towels represent the fat that is covering the lean Ed. For the sake of argument, let's say that Ed wants to lose 21 pounds of fat, so (84/21) each sheet represents a quarter-pound of fat lost. Let's also assume that Ed loses his fat equally during each day of the challenge.

Each day during the first week, you tear a sheet off of Ed, representing the fat he has lost for the day. Next, you put Ed next to the full roll ('Big Al') for comparison. No noticeable difference!!! Even at the end of the week! This can't be working for me!

But, being a good Ed, you continue to follow Body-for-LIFE. At the end of weeks two and three, you continue to compare Ed to Big Al, and still notice very little difference. That stinkin' Bill Phillips MUST be a liar!

But Ed is determined! He works hard! Hitting his 10's.eating his 6 daily meals. Three more weeks go by, the sheets peeling off day after day before Ed gets up the courage to stand next to Big Al again. Holy Myoplex! Ed is skinny! OK, not skinny, but less huge!!!

By the end of the 12-week Body-for-LIFE program, Ed is down to his lean dream, or somewhere near it. Ed is happy. We are happy. Big Al - well he's not so happy.

The lesson to be learned is that fat, like paper towels, comes off in sheets. When you are heavy, you are big around. And when you are big around,that fat is spread over a MUCH larger area - just like that outside towel sheet. The closer you get to the lean you, the more each lost pound of fat shows, because it is spread over a smaller area.

While the outside sheet may only cover 1 layer of the roll, the inside sheet may go around 4 times. That last sheet looks like it gives you 4 times the results of the first sheet, but in reality, the results are the same - your perception is just different! And you'll never see the inside, if you aren't patient while the outside is coming off!

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If you’re passionate about taking your health and fitness to the next level but aren’t sure where to start, send me a message for a FREE consultation. You can save 10% by mentioning you found me through this article.

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CLIENT OF THE MONTH - BROOKE

Sometime it’s not always about losing weight, and that was the case with Brooke. She was so thin and was always dieting to stay skinny for her modeling career. 

That changed when she wanted to step on stage. I worked to change her whole mindset that the right foods and training will shape and build beautiful toned muscles. She put in the work and the results she got made her look like a fitness model instead of just a skinny runway model. She now has a more overall healthy look.

Her before and after pictures show how thin she was for her first show and then we continued to build and tone with food and training so she could win her bikini competitions. Finally after being dedicated for 2 full years she finally took overall and won her NGA Pro Card.

Brooke has always been such and great client. She was open to learning about her body, learning different ways of training and manipulating her body, but more important being open to learning different food strategies.

I’m so excited about Brooke’s future with competition and more important that she know how important a healthy nutrition and training program really is.

BROOKE’S STORY:

Before I started working with Sandy I never lifted weights.  I thought lifting would make me big, bulky, and masculine. I wanted to be toned, tight, and shapely. Unbeknownst to me, I was going about it totally wrong. That is when Sandy stepped in. She encouraged me to implement lifting into my routine and am so glad that I did. My body got leaner, my legs, and butt filled in in all of the right places and I finally started to see the body I have always dreamed of.

When I started working with Sandy my entire outlook towards nutrition and fitness changed. She taught me that food was my friend, and crucial to achieving my goals. Workouts became fun and no longer a chore, but a chance to challenge myself and change my body. 

I started training with Sandy back in 2013 after signing up for my first fitness competition and I have never looked back. Since then I have competed in 4 more additional shows, earned my NGA Pro card, and completely changed my body for the better. 

Sandy is an excellent trainer. She is attentive, knowledgable, but most importantly just a good person. I am glad to not only call Sandy Hancock my trainer, but also my friend. 

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