Monday, August 30, 2010
Events | Bob Harper from The Biggest Loser
Events | Bob Harper from The Biggest Loser Feel free to invite Bob harper to area code 22204!
Saturday, August 21, 2010
The Finish Line
Life lessons learned today through marathon training TRUST - Trust that people can and do have your best interest in mind. Learn to recognize who those people are and surround yourself with them. Its ok to trust the people around me- no matter how many times I've slowed them down, made them stop and told them to just go ahead without you, they've never left me or ever made me feel bad for it. Its a good reminder of what healthy relationships look like and the value of being able to trust people on and off a running trail.
Know you are deserving of being cared for. I have amazing people who's priority is for me meeting my goals, manage my expectations for myself and value my health. Accepting care is a new thing for me and even though I may still fight it at first, I'm learning to be patient with it which brings me to the next lesson.
Patience - I have all the patience in the world with other people and NONE for myself. I injured my hip a few weeks ago and as soon as I got the all clear to start running again, I wanted to hit it full force... I counted the two weeks of waiting to hear back from the MRI as " recovery weeks" which to me was plenty of time... when in reality those two weeks I was still injured and not in recovery but still in injury mode. Being patient with myself as I recover has not been easy for me, in fact I think of all the running and training we've done - being patient has been by far the most difficult challenge for me!
Its not what I want - its what I need. Having to work harder to rebuild strength and having setbacks now and again when my body seems to fail from my expectations has been frustrating. Its only been today that I realized that its not my body failing me, its my expectations that were failing me. I didn't stretch enough before the run - because I was being impatient- and ended up getting an awful foot cramp which slowed me down towards the end. It hurt and I knew I had to be patient with my body until I felt like I could run again or finish. Its not what I wanted - to walk the rest of the way and end up half a mile short, but its what I needed.
Lastly - The finish line is not the goal! Everyone asks me what my goal is - in weight loss and in marathon training. As for running I always say " To finish" While I know that crossing the end will be a really great moment for me, its no longer my singular goal - i have many and they change from day to day, run to run and most of them I don't even realize are goals until I've reached them. Like today for instance: I ran the fastest mile I've ever done in my life... EVER. GOAL MET I recognized my physical limitations during the run and was patient with my body - even if it meant slowing down GOAL MET I learned to trust the people around me - GOAL MET I learned to be a good recipient of care from others GOAL MET. I thought the ultimate goal was to finish the race but training for me has been so much bigger than that - it is training me to succeed in life, it is preparing me to continue my fight against fat, it has taught me to value my choices to live a healthy life because not everyone is given a choice to be healthy. Its not about crossing the finish line - its not about being a certain weight - its about the journey that gets you there - that's the goal! ... but crossing the finish line on race day isn't a bad goal to keep too.
Know you are deserving of being cared for. I have amazing people who's priority is for me meeting my goals, manage my expectations for myself and value my health. Accepting care is a new thing for me and even though I may still fight it at first, I'm learning to be patient with it which brings me to the next lesson.
Patience - I have all the patience in the world with other people and NONE for myself. I injured my hip a few weeks ago and as soon as I got the all clear to start running again, I wanted to hit it full force... I counted the two weeks of waiting to hear back from the MRI as " recovery weeks" which to me was plenty of time... when in reality those two weeks I was still injured and not in recovery but still in injury mode. Being patient with myself as I recover has not been easy for me, in fact I think of all the running and training we've done - being patient has been by far the most difficult challenge for me!
Its not what I want - its what I need. Having to work harder to rebuild strength and having setbacks now and again when my body seems to fail from my expectations has been frustrating. Its only been today that I realized that its not my body failing me, its my expectations that were failing me. I didn't stretch enough before the run - because I was being impatient- and ended up getting an awful foot cramp which slowed me down towards the end. It hurt and I knew I had to be patient with my body until I felt like I could run again or finish. Its not what I wanted - to walk the rest of the way and end up half a mile short, but its what I needed.
Lastly - The finish line is not the goal! Everyone asks me what my goal is - in weight loss and in marathon training. As for running I always say " To finish" While I know that crossing the end will be a really great moment for me, its no longer my singular goal - i have many and they change from day to day, run to run and most of them I don't even realize are goals until I've reached them. Like today for instance: I ran the fastest mile I've ever done in my life... EVER. GOAL MET I recognized my physical limitations during the run and was patient with my body - even if it meant slowing down GOAL MET I learned to trust the people around me - GOAL MET I learned to be a good recipient of care from others GOAL MET. I thought the ultimate goal was to finish the race but training for me has been so much bigger than that - it is training me to succeed in life, it is preparing me to continue my fight against fat, it has taught me to value my choices to live a healthy life because not everyone is given a choice to be healthy. Its not about crossing the finish line - its not about being a certain weight - its about the journey that gets you there - that's the goal! ... but crossing the finish line on race day isn't a bad goal to keep too.
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Redemption Run- making it happen.
i couldn't wait to come home and write this blog!
I DID IT!!!!!! Let me tell you first of all, I was totally tricked! haha well maybe not tricked but uninformed that when the coaches said " this week we'll be running the Marine Corps Marathon Hill" what they forgot to mention is that we would be running the Marine Corps Marathon Hill.. and then turning around and running it again... and then turning around and running it again. No I didn't stutter! Before we hit the trail we were left with this little gem to ponder. After coach said we'd be running the hill 3 times he said "The good news is that on race day you'll think hey, this is easy, we only have to do it once!" and like so many other times throughout the season, my inexperienced brain doubted the masters and thought YEAH RIGHT! Well we started the trail that was riddled with steep hills to start with thinking each time, is this the hill? nope what about this one? nope. Time was flying by and I was feeling so good. We were making really great time and chatting it up about some pretty deep stuff - life, love and nexflix.
We crossed the street and my running buddy/ friend/ mentor/ all around goddess turns and says this is it. I looked and it didn't seem too bad, a little steep. So we started running up the hill and when I thought we were at the top, we turned the corner only to find and even steeper and twice as long part of the hill. I was praying to make it up the once... three times?! I was convinced that the coaches had misspoke and meant that doing the hill once would FEEL like we had ran it three times... but unfortunately I had heard them right! Up the hill, down the hill up another "smaller" hill down that hill and we're back at the water stop... really? Wow that wasn't so bad but now I had to do it two more times.
I refilled my belt, ate some gels and back on the trail we went for round two. This time the 1.5 miles to the start of the hill seemed a bit easier - maybe because I had just ran up Mt Olympus and now these other hills seemed insignificant. We attacked the hill at the start but quickly found ourselves walking up the hill but we were in good company because even the fastest runners were walking on round two. Then as if the hill got magically shorter, we were back at the water stop and I was feeling FANTASTIC.
We set off for the last and final trip and everything was great until i found myself at the bottom of that damn hill again and I thought to myself " God I can't wait till race day when I only have to do this once!" hmm... funny because unless exhaustion is setting in, I was pretty sure that 2 hours ago I had thought to myself that I'd never be saying something like that and yet here I was, saying it. ( Side note, pretty much this whole season i hear what the coaches say, think " no way!" and then quickly am shown that they've never been wrong! I'm not just saying that to flatter them although I think they all rock, but its so true. They anticipate things that I can't even fathom and prepare me for things that I would never have thought would occur physically and mentally and its pretty amazing to have a team who's sole purpose is to make sure I'm prepared and today I was reminded of that as I said " God I can't wait till race day when I only have to do this once!")
Our last round up the hill was a little rough and I was feeling tired, we had been running for 2 and a half hours and had about another half hour to finish. Standing at the bottom was like having a bad nightmare over and over again. There was a sense of bitterness that this was the 3rd time I'd have to revisit the worst part of the run but we rounded the top, came down to the water stop and thanked god for not having to run that hill one more time. The last quarter mile was rough for me, my hip was starting to hurt, I was tired and hungry and ready to be finished and even though I walked it, I never gave up or let the trail of tears make me a victim and I finished with my head held so high. I did it, I completed one of the hardest trails we'll run on. I came home sore and tired but with the biggest sense of accomplishment I've felt in a long time. I fought the trail of tears and today, I won! If your reading this and thinking you'd really like to feel that same sense of accomplishment, you can start today by donating to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and be a part of the solution for millions battling blood cancers! http://pages.teamintraining.org/nca/corps10/amundis
I DID IT!!!!!! Let me tell you first of all, I was totally tricked! haha well maybe not tricked but uninformed that when the coaches said " this week we'll be running the Marine Corps Marathon Hill" what they forgot to mention is that we would be running the Marine Corps Marathon Hill.. and then turning around and running it again... and then turning around and running it again. No I didn't stutter! Before we hit the trail we were left with this little gem to ponder. After coach said we'd be running the hill 3 times he said "The good news is that on race day you'll think hey, this is easy, we only have to do it once!" and like so many other times throughout the season, my inexperienced brain doubted the masters and thought YEAH RIGHT! Well we started the trail that was riddled with steep hills to start with thinking each time, is this the hill? nope what about this one? nope. Time was flying by and I was feeling so good. We were making really great time and chatting it up about some pretty deep stuff - life, love and nexflix.
We crossed the street and my running buddy/ friend/ mentor/ all around goddess turns and says this is it. I looked and it didn't seem too bad, a little steep. So we started running up the hill and when I thought we were at the top, we turned the corner only to find and even steeper and twice as long part of the hill. I was praying to make it up the once... three times?! I was convinced that the coaches had misspoke and meant that doing the hill once would FEEL like we had ran it three times... but unfortunately I had heard them right! Up the hill, down the hill up another "smaller" hill down that hill and we're back at the water stop... really? Wow that wasn't so bad but now I had to do it two more times.
I refilled my belt, ate some gels and back on the trail we went for round two. This time the 1.5 miles to the start of the hill seemed a bit easier - maybe because I had just ran up Mt Olympus and now these other hills seemed insignificant. We attacked the hill at the start but quickly found ourselves walking up the hill but we were in good company because even the fastest runners were walking on round two. Then as if the hill got magically shorter, we were back at the water stop and I was feeling FANTASTIC.
We set off for the last and final trip and everything was great until i found myself at the bottom of that damn hill again and I thought to myself " God I can't wait till race day when I only have to do this once!" hmm... funny because unless exhaustion is setting in, I was pretty sure that 2 hours ago I had thought to myself that I'd never be saying something like that and yet here I was, saying it. ( Side note, pretty much this whole season i hear what the coaches say, think " no way!" and then quickly am shown that they've never been wrong! I'm not just saying that to flatter them although I think they all rock, but its so true. They anticipate things that I can't even fathom and prepare me for things that I would never have thought would occur physically and mentally and its pretty amazing to have a team who's sole purpose is to make sure I'm prepared and today I was reminded of that as I said " God I can't wait till race day when I only have to do this once!")
Our last round up the hill was a little rough and I was feeling tired, we had been running for 2 and a half hours and had about another half hour to finish. Standing at the bottom was like having a bad nightmare over and over again. There was a sense of bitterness that this was the 3rd time I'd have to revisit the worst part of the run but we rounded the top, came down to the water stop and thanked god for not having to run that hill one more time. The last quarter mile was rough for me, my hip was starting to hurt, I was tired and hungry and ready to be finished and even though I walked it, I never gave up or let the trail of tears make me a victim and I finished with my head held so high. I did it, I completed one of the hardest trails we'll run on. I came home sore and tired but with the biggest sense of accomplishment I've felt in a long time. I fought the trail of tears and today, I won! If your reading this and thinking you'd really like to feel that same sense of accomplishment, you can start today by donating to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and be a part of the solution for millions battling blood cancers! http://pages.teamintraining.org/nca/corps10/amundis
Friday, August 13, 2010
An Ode to Fall
On my walk home from work today, I was struck by a cold snap of the wind as the trees swayed against a clouded backdrop and I realized fall was on its way! People are often surprised when I tell them Fall is my favorite season ( With my undying love for Hawaii, most people guess summer) Fall was the one time I missed the mainland and after not seeing it last year, you can imagine the excitement I felt when I heard Fall whispering in the wind today.
From the time that first gust of cool crisp wind whispers in the hot late summer nights to the very first snowflake, I am in heaven. What is there not to love when nature provides us with a spectacular color show as bright greens fade into a thousand shades of yellows and oranges and reds and browns. The clouded skies provide the perfect screen in which to witness the glorious show and seems to add to the vividness of the jeweled leaves. I love watching the leaves drift slowly from the branches and dance in the wind with more grace then I will ever poses. The wind, oh the wind! There is something magical about the winds of fall, the still crispness of the chilled air that seems so clear and clean and the crack of the wind that encourages you to spend just a few seconds longer tucked in your bed in the morning. Its not just the weather, its everything that fall brings... the sounds and smells and memories. Fall reminds me of camping with my family, wandering around the falling leaves searching for bobtwitches ( don't ask)in the same woods that my mother visited when she was growing up and snuggling into a warm sleeping bag with the smell of the campfire lingering on my clothing.
Fall reminds me of my grandfather who lives in a place where fall is a 7 month season. When I went to visit, He'd take me to the canyon covered with green trees and we'd look for the one tree who's leaves were starting to change color and then he'd tell me I was the first to see fall coming. I still like to believe that I'm the first to see fall each year.
The whole country is transformed by this season. While I hate watching football, I love that people wait all year for fall to come around so that they can dress themselves in their team's colors, gather together Sunday afternoons and bond with complete strangers over a game. It reminds people to take pride in something and to bond with a community be it around a TV, in the high school bleachers or in the nose bleed section of a stadium. For a few brief moments we forget our differences and come together for the love of a common good. Somehow it becomes the perfect time for families to just play together tossing a football back and forth in their front yard, coworkers and neighbors playing impromptu games in empty fields on the weekends - football season reminds us to take time to play.
Lets not forget the holidays that fall brings. I still get excited getting dressed up on Halloween. Chocolate bars and candy apples and late night parties where children are wide eyed with all the goods they snatched up from strangers who generously dole out treats. Halloween always marked the time when my family ( aunts uncles and all) would get together and spend an hour being scared ( or scaring each other) at a haunted house and then spend the next 11 months teasing the person that screamed the most until the next year when it became someone else's turn to be scared.
Thanksgiving is the only holiday in which being thankful is enough reason to celebrate in grand proportions. Families and friends gather to honor traditions that have been passed down a long lineage of Americans - special recipes, heirloom blessings, and the right of passage of cooking your first turkey dinner. My job as a kid was to tear up the bread for the stuffing and to this day, I can't tear a piece of bread without it reminding me of me at my grandmothers side tearing the pieces just right for her stuffing wearing an apron shes made herself and feeling honored to be a real chef just like her. Fall brings us crisp sweet apples, ruby red pears of cranberries, voluptuous pumpkins and gourds and the most heart warming bouquet of spices and herbs - cinnamon, cloves, sage, thyme, bay!
There is something about Fall that draws us closer to our friends and families, closer to our communities and our neighbors. The cool weather draws us in to warm fires and hearty meals shared with the ones we love. From the first whisper of fall to the very first snow flake, Fall is a reminder of everything I love in life!
From the time that first gust of cool crisp wind whispers in the hot late summer nights to the very first snowflake, I am in heaven. What is there not to love when nature provides us with a spectacular color show as bright greens fade into a thousand shades of yellows and oranges and reds and browns. The clouded skies provide the perfect screen in which to witness the glorious show and seems to add to the vividness of the jeweled leaves. I love watching the leaves drift slowly from the branches and dance in the wind with more grace then I will ever poses. The wind, oh the wind! There is something magical about the winds of fall, the still crispness of the chilled air that seems so clear and clean and the crack of the wind that encourages you to spend just a few seconds longer tucked in your bed in the morning. Its not just the weather, its everything that fall brings... the sounds and smells and memories. Fall reminds me of camping with my family, wandering around the falling leaves searching for bobtwitches ( don't ask)in the same woods that my mother visited when she was growing up and snuggling into a warm sleeping bag with the smell of the campfire lingering on my clothing.
Fall reminds me of my grandfather who lives in a place where fall is a 7 month season. When I went to visit, He'd take me to the canyon covered with green trees and we'd look for the one tree who's leaves were starting to change color and then he'd tell me I was the first to see fall coming. I still like to believe that I'm the first to see fall each year.
The whole country is transformed by this season. While I hate watching football, I love that people wait all year for fall to come around so that they can dress themselves in their team's colors, gather together Sunday afternoons and bond with complete strangers over a game. It reminds people to take pride in something and to bond with a community be it around a TV, in the high school bleachers or in the nose bleed section of a stadium. For a few brief moments we forget our differences and come together for the love of a common good. Somehow it becomes the perfect time for families to just play together tossing a football back and forth in their front yard, coworkers and neighbors playing impromptu games in empty fields on the weekends - football season reminds us to take time to play.
Lets not forget the holidays that fall brings. I still get excited getting dressed up on Halloween. Chocolate bars and candy apples and late night parties where children are wide eyed with all the goods they snatched up from strangers who generously dole out treats. Halloween always marked the time when my family ( aunts uncles and all) would get together and spend an hour being scared ( or scaring each other) at a haunted house and then spend the next 11 months teasing the person that screamed the most until the next year when it became someone else's turn to be scared.
Thanksgiving is the only holiday in which being thankful is enough reason to celebrate in grand proportions. Families and friends gather to honor traditions that have been passed down a long lineage of Americans - special recipes, heirloom blessings, and the right of passage of cooking your first turkey dinner. My job as a kid was to tear up the bread for the stuffing and to this day, I can't tear a piece of bread without it reminding me of me at my grandmothers side tearing the pieces just right for her stuffing wearing an apron shes made herself and feeling honored to be a real chef just like her. Fall brings us crisp sweet apples, ruby red pears of cranberries, voluptuous pumpkins and gourds and the most heart warming bouquet of spices and herbs - cinnamon, cloves, sage, thyme, bay!
There is something about Fall that draws us closer to our friends and families, closer to our communities and our neighbors. The cool weather draws us in to warm fires and hearty meals shared with the ones we love. From the first whisper of fall to the very first snow flake, Fall is a reminder of everything I love in life!
Redemption Run on The Trail of Tears!
Today is a rest day - so much so that I didn't even wear my bodybugg so that I wouldn't be tempted to try and hit my daily target. Why? Because every Sat. is our long training days and its SOO important in training that you give your body a day of rest before hitting a long run after training all week. Its also really important to "carb up" I'm going to be running for 2 and a half hours straight and its really important to have lots of glycogen stored in your muscles. Tonight dinner will be a big bowl of whole wheat pasta and some veggies ( no cream sauces or cheese - even veggie cheese) and I've been munching on carbs all day.
While I'm usually good about gearing up for long runs, I've been paying extra special attention this Friday because this run is a BIG DEAL for me. First of all, its the first time I've run this long since my knee injury 8 months ago. But mostly its a big deal because of what happened last time i was on the trail. I don't know the actual trail name, we refer to it at Team in Training as "the Washington and lee high school trail" because we meet at the Washington and Lee high school to connect to the trail.
The trail itself is a part of the Marine Corps Marathon... not just a part of but is arguably the most difficult part - the HILL. So why is this a redemption run for me? To understand you have to go back a few weeks to when we were all gathered in the parking lot of the Washington and Lee High school stretching and getting ready for our run. I was paying extra attention to my stretching since I had had a bad run in the middle of the week that week that left me with hip pain. As we stretched, one of the mentors shares with us this little bit of knowledge that shaped that day's run for me. She said " you know we call this the Trail of Tears because every year this trail breaks someone and they cry" I thought to myself how silly! Surly not EVERY year someone cries.
So we head out onto the trail and there were issues right away, I had to stop and go to the bathroom at mile 2 and told my pace group to go head without me. So they went on their way and I stopped to pee and hit the trail again but now that pain in my hip had returned. With each step it got worse and worse but I was making up ground and had almost caught up to my group but once I hit the turn around, the pain was unbearable and I had stopped running and was now hardly even walking. Along comes coach Charlie and he asks whats up and I burst into tears... TEARS! I knew I had to stop running and get my hip checked out and he confirmed that for me but I kept saying " I've never not finished a run" and at mile 6, I only had 4 more miles to go but I knew i needed to stop. On my ride back, now unsure if my running season was going to be over for me or not, I kept thinking DAMN YOU TRAIL OF TEARS!
Well the good news is that it wasn't a stress fracture like everyone- including my Orthopedic surgeon first thought it was and after physical therapy, I was cleared to go back to running again. Flash forward to this week, my first full week of training after two weeks of modified training and I'm feeling great so why am I taking all these extra precautions this Friday? Because like every Saturday of my life, tomorrow is a long run and its on none other than the Trail of Tears! I've been telling myself ever since I got the OK to run that this run was going to be my redemption run, the run that I refuse to be the victim of the Trail of Tears. I'd be lying if I didn't say a small part of me is nervous, I mean it DID beat me once but I know that this time around, nothing stands in my way. This time around there won't be tears, only sweat!
While I'm usually good about gearing up for long runs, I've been paying extra special attention this Friday because this run is a BIG DEAL for me. First of all, its the first time I've run this long since my knee injury 8 months ago. But mostly its a big deal because of what happened last time i was on the trail. I don't know the actual trail name, we refer to it at Team in Training as "the Washington and lee high school trail" because we meet at the Washington and Lee high school to connect to the trail.
The trail itself is a part of the Marine Corps Marathon... not just a part of but is arguably the most difficult part - the HILL. So why is this a redemption run for me? To understand you have to go back a few weeks to when we were all gathered in the parking lot of the Washington and Lee High school stretching and getting ready for our run. I was paying extra attention to my stretching since I had had a bad run in the middle of the week that week that left me with hip pain. As we stretched, one of the mentors shares with us this little bit of knowledge that shaped that day's run for me. She said " you know we call this the Trail of Tears because every year this trail breaks someone and they cry" I thought to myself how silly! Surly not EVERY year someone cries.
So we head out onto the trail and there were issues right away, I had to stop and go to the bathroom at mile 2 and told my pace group to go head without me. So they went on their way and I stopped to pee and hit the trail again but now that pain in my hip had returned. With each step it got worse and worse but I was making up ground and had almost caught up to my group but once I hit the turn around, the pain was unbearable and I had stopped running and was now hardly even walking. Along comes coach Charlie and he asks whats up and I burst into tears... TEARS! I knew I had to stop running and get my hip checked out and he confirmed that for me but I kept saying " I've never not finished a run" and at mile 6, I only had 4 more miles to go but I knew i needed to stop. On my ride back, now unsure if my running season was going to be over for me or not, I kept thinking DAMN YOU TRAIL OF TEARS!
Well the good news is that it wasn't a stress fracture like everyone- including my Orthopedic surgeon first thought it was and after physical therapy, I was cleared to go back to running again. Flash forward to this week, my first full week of training after two weeks of modified training and I'm feeling great so why am I taking all these extra precautions this Friday? Because like every Saturday of my life, tomorrow is a long run and its on none other than the Trail of Tears! I've been telling myself ever since I got the OK to run that this run was going to be my redemption run, the run that I refuse to be the victim of the Trail of Tears. I'd be lying if I didn't say a small part of me is nervous, I mean it DID beat me once but I know that this time around, nothing stands in my way. This time around there won't be tears, only sweat!
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Sometimes Failing is What You Need!
After what seemed like months of just not putting in the effort I finally got my groove back. Back to eating the way I need to, back to working out the way I need to. I feel like my fire's been lit again and its all because I failed! Yep I failed! A few weeks ago I ordered Bob Harper's new workout DVDs. I've been dying to try them and couldn't wait for them to come, Like a kid waiting for Santa. I haven't consistently put in the workouts in months ( besides marathon training), here and there I would hit a streak of swimming or the occasionally dusting off of the BL bootcamp DVD. I went for weeks of not counting or tracking my calories and even went for days eating the "Phelps Diet" haha and it never occurred to me that there was a problem because I wasn't gaining weight. Well I'd gain 2 lbs and then lose them and then gain a few more and then lose them right away. It was a comfortable lifestyle eating whatever I wanted, doing whatever I wanted. In case if your wondering- this is not the failure part!
Flash forward to 3 weeks ago when I was sidelined at training because of a hip injury. I had a conversation with one of my team mates who's lost 65lbs but was finding herself much in the same spot I was and she told me she's decided to go back to the nutritionist because she " realized that she is no longer comfortable at that weight and it was time to change that" I thought to myself good for her and that was the end of that conversation.
That brings me back to my Bob DVD's... after so much anticipation, they finally arrived and I could not wait to try them out. ( For those of you who do not know, I am an avid supporter in Bob Harper, not because of The Biggest Loser but because his book " ARE YOU READY" is what started me on my journey and his emphasis on health as a whole -mind body and spirit is what has made me the person I am today) Any who, I stretched, tore open the packages and popped in a DVD called simply enough STRENGTH... "your going to die-with weights" would have been a more fitting title.
In the beginning Bob looks straight into the camera with his steel eyes and says " Its no longer about what you want, its about what you need" That phrase hit my heart like a lightning bolt. I was so stunned by it that I stood there unable to press play, puzzled by why what he said stopped me dead in my tracks. When I finally did start the DVD I lasted an entire 15 min. in the hour long workout. At the end of 15 min. I couldn't go anymore and I quit. I knew quitting was failing but it was very clear to me that my choices to not workout has left me weak, it has left my core weak, my upper body weak and most importantly it has left my mind weak. I sat on the floor and I kept hearing what my teammate said about her own weight loss journey " I'm no longer comfortable where I'm at and it was time to change it"
I quickly realized that I was no longer comfortable in this lifestyle I've adopted of counting calories when I wanted to, eating healthy if I wanted to, working out if I wanted to. And that's when I realized why I was so shocked at Bob's intro to the DVD. For months I've been doing what I want to do. A part of it has come from cockiness, knowing that if I WANTED to lose more weight, I could. Part of it came from being in an unstructured environment and the rest, simply just laziness.
That moment sitting on the floor, failing to even make the half way point on a workout DVD I knew it was no longer about what I wanted, it was what I needed. I am happy so say that I have been giving myself everything I NEED this week and it feels so great! Its like you forget how great you can feel when everything is in balance with each other. And when I felt temptation creeping up on me in at the bakery with all the fresh bread, I find it so much easier to keep on walking when I tell myself " Its not about what I want, its about what I need!" When you listen to yourself and give yourself what you need, everything else falls into place. Trust the process and remember that its no longer about what you want, its about what you need... even if what you need is to fail!
Flash forward to 3 weeks ago when I was sidelined at training because of a hip injury. I had a conversation with one of my team mates who's lost 65lbs but was finding herself much in the same spot I was and she told me she's decided to go back to the nutritionist because she " realized that she is no longer comfortable at that weight and it was time to change that" I thought to myself good for her and that was the end of that conversation.
That brings me back to my Bob DVD's... after so much anticipation, they finally arrived and I could not wait to try them out. ( For those of you who do not know, I am an avid supporter in Bob Harper, not because of The Biggest Loser but because his book " ARE YOU READY" is what started me on my journey and his emphasis on health as a whole -mind body and spirit is what has made me the person I am today) Any who, I stretched, tore open the packages and popped in a DVD called simply enough STRENGTH... "your going to die-with weights" would have been a more fitting title.
In the beginning Bob looks straight into the camera with his steel eyes and says " Its no longer about what you want, its about what you need" That phrase hit my heart like a lightning bolt. I was so stunned by it that I stood there unable to press play, puzzled by why what he said stopped me dead in my tracks. When I finally did start the DVD I lasted an entire 15 min. in the hour long workout. At the end of 15 min. I couldn't go anymore and I quit. I knew quitting was failing but it was very clear to me that my choices to not workout has left me weak, it has left my core weak, my upper body weak and most importantly it has left my mind weak. I sat on the floor and I kept hearing what my teammate said about her own weight loss journey " I'm no longer comfortable where I'm at and it was time to change it"
I quickly realized that I was no longer comfortable in this lifestyle I've adopted of counting calories when I wanted to, eating healthy if I wanted to, working out if I wanted to. And that's when I realized why I was so shocked at Bob's intro to the DVD. For months I've been doing what I want to do. A part of it has come from cockiness, knowing that if I WANTED to lose more weight, I could. Part of it came from being in an unstructured environment and the rest, simply just laziness.
That moment sitting on the floor, failing to even make the half way point on a workout DVD I knew it was no longer about what I wanted, it was what I needed. I am happy so say that I have been giving myself everything I NEED this week and it feels so great! Its like you forget how great you can feel when everything is in balance with each other. And when I felt temptation creeping up on me in at the bakery with all the fresh bread, I find it so much easier to keep on walking when I tell myself " Its not about what I want, its about what I need!" When you listen to yourself and give yourself what you need, everything else falls into place. Trust the process and remember that its no longer about what you want, its about what you need... even if what you need is to fail!
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Not Afraid
Say what you want, love him or hate him but this song is nothing more than a battle cry for anyone who's ever had to wake up every day and fight for something. It doesn't matter if your just starting out or are close to a goal weight, we all wake up with the odds stacked against us and its really up to us to decide if today we are going to fight back.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5-yKhDd64s&feature=av2e
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5-yKhDd64s&feature=av2e
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Loving My Village
I haven't gone away! Things have been CRAZY on my end, to catch everyone up, in a matter of what seemed like seconds - marathon training took off, I got a new job and I moved into my own place and I just got internet YAY! Marathon training has had a few hiccups. I had a stress fracture scare with my hip but an MRI revealed it was Bursitis and a lot of muscular weaknesses on top of a really bad over pronation in my gate! Thats a lot of stuff to work out but I'm glad I found out now and not a month before race day! I've been waking up at 4am to put in an hour and a half of physical therapy before work and its been working wonders. Today is my first day using the corrective inserts in my running shoes to correct the over pronating and so far so good. I spent two weeks not running and am having a little bit of a difficult time getting back on track. Last night was supposed to be a 4mile run and I was just too tired to do it so I cooked some healthy meals and went to bed early instead... not a bad choice if you ask me! As for my job, I LOVE it. I'm the membership and continuing education coordinator for the National Cancer Registrars Association. In a matter of days I got signed up to train with the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and I landed a job at NCRA so I guess you can say fate took me into the business of kicking Cancer's ass. For awhile, a long while, my food choices were CRAZY, it was like I totally forgot how to eat normally. I think a lot of it was the stress of being unemployed for what seemed like years ( but wasn't really that long in the grand scheme of things) and then all the sudden have everything explode in my life - in a good way but an explosion none the less. I am so happy to say that after weeks of bad choices, I'm finally back on track. Beyond being on track with food, I'm on track mentally which is where the food issues start to begin with. I haven't done a progress pic in awhile so its on this week's list of things to do. Saturday's long run is only 8 miles but next weekend it goes up to 14... that means I'm over half way there! Its crazy to think that I could just wake up and go finish a half marathon no problem... that's pretty mind blowing!! What really kills me is that I'm getting FASTER! I've cut off 2 min. on my pace time which is just crazy since I'm running twice the distance... I can't say enough how much Team in Training has helped me from the coaches to the mentors and my beloved pace group that ignores me when I start to bitch and pushed me when I wanna slow down. They say it takes a village to raise a child, well I believe it also takes a village to train for a marathon and I LOVE MY VILLAGE!
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Everyone wins!
Looking to start your own weight loss journey? Have questions about how I lost 220lbs or got started training for a marathon? Need some tips on getting past plateaus or just need some encouragement? Here's your chance!
I'm offering a 30 min. private session where you can ask and receive healthy lifestyle and weight loss advice via phone or web to anyone who donates $30 or more to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Help yourself while helping others, everyone wins! Go to the link below and after you donate, I will contact you to set up a time!
http://pages.teamintraining.org/nca/corps10/amundis
I'm offering a 30 min. private session where you can ask and receive healthy lifestyle and weight loss advice via phone or web to anyone who donates $30 or more to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Help yourself while helping others, everyone wins! Go to the link below and after you donate, I will contact you to set up a time!
http://pages.teamintraining.org/nca/corps10/amundis
