Hills, Fitness Friends, and Protein Shakes

So today marks a turn in my blogging! One, I'm starting up again. Two, I've changed my outlook a good bit when it comes to the fitness and nutritional lifestyle I'm living and I'm super proud of how far I've come and I really want all of you to join me on my journey so I can inspire and bring you along with me!

Hills ...
The other week a new fitness friend of mine (Sarah!!) and I did hill sprints at a local "hill" ... more like MOUNTAIN!!


Like my fitness friend said, it's a whole lot MORE steep than it looks!

HIIT is some of the BEST cardio you can do for fat loss!

Fitness Friends ...
It's SO nice to have people in your life that understand your goals and have the camaraderie with those who know exactly what we do and exactly why we do it. I feel it's very important to have people in your life you care about regardless of whether their lifestyle is similar to yours or not. It is nice though to also have people in your life that do understand all the little things that make this lifestyle part of what it truly is. (Sarah - this means you! If anyone else heard our chats over tea they'd think we're nuts but it's so nice that you totally get it!) Pics to come of me and the fitness friends working our butts off together!!

AND DRUMROLL!!!!!!!!
Protein Shakes ...
I have become the ultimate connoisseur of blended protein shakes/smoothies. FANCY SHMANCY SHAKES! Frozen hot chocolate, vanilla bean, french vanilla, cocoa. All with chia seeds, without chia seeds, with cacao nibs, without cacao nibs.

And I mainly eat these fancy blended protein shakes out of bowls with spoons.

And sometimes I even add spinach =O!!

Fancy Shmancy Protein Shakes are a blast to make. And they're delectable! TONS of recipes and protein shake pictures coming right up ... Can't wait to share them all with you!!

This blog is about to change, are you all ready!?!?

Let me know what you'd like to hear and read about! Workouts? Recipes? Motivation?

Winter Wonderland!

WOW! I have to admit, I was somewhat of a skeptic, thinking everyone was freaking out about nothing. Everyone worries about snow all the time, what's the big deal? Pick up milk and bread from the store just in case? Talk of purchasing back-up generators? What for!?!

Well I was wrong! And I'm so glad I was!! It's a winter wonderland here! I worked 3p-11p in the ER last night. Luckily, I have the best boyfriend in the world who happens to have a fantastic Jeep that he can lift and has 4x4. WOO! He drove me to work, and while I was there, he and my brother spent the 8 hours helping people get unstuck from the main roads - mercedes, jaguars, even SEMI trucks! They came to get me at 11pm, and by then, the doc and a bunch of nurses had to sleep at the hospital. YUCK! We drove one of my co-workers home, and then helped a few other people un-stick themselves from main roads FILLED with snow. The winds were upwards of 60mph and by then we had already gotten a good foot of snow. We DEFINITELY got the two feet they predicted! We have had 6-8ft snow drifts all over the place! After I did a home workout - not easy btw ... high intensity cardio & strength training ... I LOVE Bodyrock.tv!! we went outside b/c my boyfriend and I were going to go dig ourselves out and go to the gym. Four hours later ... here I am =P. We spent 4 hours shoveling and snowblowing and helping out neighbors.


The cars were buried!

It's SO incredible to see the ENTIRE neighborhood come together and help eachother out! We all helped eachother get everyones' cars dug out, get their sidewalks and driveways cleared, and helped a few of the older peoples' houses do everything since they weren't even able to open the door to get outside! What a wonderful feeling. Sometimes I want to move to a small town and sometimes I feel like I was born in the wrong decade because I love that home town feel where everyone really cares about one another and does everything they can to help eachother out, and today ... our neighborhood was like that. People bringing hot cocoa out for one another, helping eachother dig out 6+ feet of snow. What wonderful people! I LOVED it. And a bonus ... burned a TON of calories out there =].


My boyfriend, me, and my brother with our neighbor and his son!

Now my boyfriend and brother are helping dig out one more of our elderly neighbors' driveways, cars, and sidewalks, and I'm cooking them "breakfast" at 330pm! Toasted bagels with egg, cheese, and bacon. Egg white omelet for me! DELICIOUS! I'll make some hot cocoa too. I love these days, all warm inside with the fireplace and hot cocoa and beautiful outside with the snowdrifts ... literally my own winter wonderland! I need to move to alaska =P!


Pretty snow covered trees!

I hope you enjoy some of the pictures from the winter wonderland!


My snow angel =]

Stay warm and enjoy the time with the ones you love!

Relax

Who isn't stressed out now-a-days? Who doesn't have anxiety here and there? If you read my last blog post, you know I do!

I have been lucky enough to be able to try and review Top Secret Nutition's Product "Relax". How perfect huh? I normally have very little faith in supplements claiming to alter mood, but surprisingly enough, this works! I do notice I feel more calm once taking it, and I notice absolutely nothing negative. No weird feelings, nada. Just calm and focused. Funny enough, but just like the bottle says. It calls for 2 pills, but I usually only take one (since I literally never take anything - only advil every blue moon for a headache - so I'm pretty darn sensitive to things), and only if I am feeling stressed, or if I might be seeing someone that usually increases my stress level. It has really helped me to take a step back and not get so wrapped up in everything. It's fantastic. If you get stressed out, or even if you'd just like better mental focus, I would ABSOLUTELY recommend "Relax." This product has PharmaGABA and other natural ingredients (no medications!) to help naturally relieve stress and sharpen your mental focus. Here's the link for the product: Relax!


Top Secret Nutrition Relax

I have my boyfriend, working out, and the little things, like Top Secret's "Relax" to thank for helping me get to where I want to be.

Keep rockin' and training hard!!

What is your Kryptonite?

"Superman has kryptonite. Martian Manhunter has fire. Me? ..." -The Secret of Barry Allen.

What do you have? What is your kryptonite?

"Everyone who achieves success in a great venture, solves each problem as they came to it. They helped themselves. And they were helped through powers known and unknown to them at the time they set out on their voyage. They keep going regardless of the obstacles they met." -Clement Stone

There are always going to be bumps in the road, mountains to climb, and puddles to jump over. Everyone has their "kryptonite." As long as you keep focused on the road, your goals, and the beauty that lies ahead, these puddles, bumps, and even the mountains, won't seem so big, and once you've conquered each one of them, they seem even smaller in retrospect.

I've always been hard on myself, always held myself to a high standard, and always been very "high-strung" in regards to my expectations for myself. I have learned over the years that I literally have what could be deemed panic attacks when I feel I've disappointed myself or someone I love, or if I feel I haven't been able to control my thoughts, emotions, or actions exactly how I'd have liked to. I hold myself to extremely high standards ... almost too high. I hold myself to standards of perfection. My boyfriend told me a while back that perfection is unatainable. He said that excellence is attainable, and even harder than perfection, because excellence can be reached, and needs to be worked at daily to keep oneself at such a high standard. Gosh, am I lucky or what?! =] *SMILES thinking about my wonderful man* I digress... I've learned that perfection is an illusion. You can't be perfect, and really, who the heck wants to be perfect, right? We all have our flaws and each of us have our own "kryptonite," and this is why life is so interesting. How I handle myself and my perfectionist standard for myself in life is my kryptonite. I've started to learn to calm myself when I'm disappointed in myself or when I feel out of control of myself (when I realize actions I've done, things I have thought, or emotions I have felt have been subconsciously influenced in a negative way). I feel that everyone can control themselves emotionally, mentally, and physically. I feel the world would be a better place if everyone consciously made the effort to be the good person they want to be, and if I feel I haven't been controlling something I've been thinking or doing, it stressed me out and I have what I deem my panic attack. Sometimes these disappointments are absolutely unwarranted (like food-guilt and such), but other times I feel they're very valid.

Working out, training, eating right, and all of the knowledge I keep striving to learn in relation to all of this, have all led to more self-awareness and have helped me to feel in control of myself and my mind. Knowing where your "weaknesses" lie help you to focus on them and work on them. I know I get stressed and feel panic if I don't feel in control of myself or my situation, or if I feel disappointed in myself or if I feel in some way I disappointed someone I love. When upset, I would get to the point where I couldn't think straight, couldn't keep tears from falling down my face, and basically hyperventilate myself. Not that this has ever happened daily, but it has clearly happened less frequently once I've learned to really take control of my thoughts, learned to relax myself, and learned to take some deep breaths. I owe more than I can imagine to working out. The structure it adds to my life help keeps me focused, preventing my mind from stressing myself out.

Funny enough, after reading all this, you probably won't believe I work in an Emergency Room, and have for almost the past four years. The other day when I was getting a woman settled in and irrigating her laceration, which was extremely deep and jagged, she told me that she couldn't believe how mellow and calm I was while I was triaging her and for working in the ER. I can handle blood, guts, gore, insides falling out, bones broken through the skin, doing CPR compressions on a patient who has overdosed or tried to commit suicide and landed on his face after jumping off a building so each compression squirts blood out of what is left of his face, but what really gets me?? If I feel I haven't lived up to my own expectations of myself. We all have our "kryptonite," don't we? =]

Just keep plugging along. I've made immense leaps and bounds and don't plan on stopping any time soon. I have my boyfriend, working out, and eating clean to thank for helping me help myself get to where I want to be.

Keep pushing yourself ladies, and gents. It's so worth it, you'll get where you want to be, and the journey itself is fantastic! I'd love to hear about each and everyone one of your kryptonite...

Who do you look up to?

"This life is what you make it ... and always, always, always believe in yourself ... and most importantly, keep smiling, because life's a beautiful thing and there's so much to smile about." Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe. She was BEAUTIFUL! Inside and out. She was truly an icon. TRULY. There are a lot of people I look up to and I think lived a phenomenal, positive life. She is one. There are a few particular figure or bikini girls and fitness models I look up to. There are a couple people in my personal life I look up to as well, one being my cousin. Gosh, she's amazing. She is really living her dreams and goals. She's doing wonderful things to help others, she's traveled and had amazing adventures, she's married the man she adores and who absolutely adores her, she makes time to keep in touch with everyone important to her, she's hilarious, she's positive, she's so darn strong, and most of all, she's happy. TRULY happy. I admire her in most every sense of the word. (Thank you B!) Everyone has people they look up to and people that help motivate them to believe that they really can make their hopes, dreams, goals, and ideas become their reality. Feed off of these positive people in your life, let them help you be that positive person in someone else's life.

"I don't understand why people aren't a litte more generous with each other." Marilyn Monroe

Let's be a little kinder to each other. Believe it or not, we're actually all in this together, regardless of your passion and the way you live your life. Be the glass-is-half-full person. It'll really make your life a happy one.

Who do you look up to? Who is that positive person in your life? Who's life do you effect in that positive way? I'd love to hear!

Food-Guilt

Food-Guilt.

One word.

Something most physique competitors, and realistically, most people in general can relate to. Ever didn't eat a piece of cake because you felt fat? Ever didn't participate in a social function because of what they're serving to eat there? Ever eat something and right away once you're finished feel upset with yourself that you let yourself eat that??

ALL. THE. TIME.

Physique competitors take this food-guilt to the extreme. Most of the time, subconsciously. I am a perfectionist by nature, hold myself to very high standards, and am very hard on myself. This creates the PERFECT environment for food-guilt to harbor.

Luckily, I have found a wonderful "treatment" for this food-guilt. Your own mind, your own thoughts, and the positive things you say to yourself. Not until I started listening to my own body and controlling my own thoughts to positively reflect my future and current food choices, rather than negatively reflect my food choices through hindsite (when I could do nothing about what I already ate). Start eating what your body is made for. REAL food. Vegetables, fruits, lean meat, nuts (many people have to be careful with this ... nut butters are known in the physique world to be many peoples' weak spots), fat free greek yogurt/cottage cheese. Eat only when you're somewhat hungry. Eat slow. How many of you have ACTUALLY ENJOYED your food today? This week? Enjoy your food. Take your time to feel when you start to get full. Be done eating for the time being. Enjoy feeling light and satisfied, not stuffed and full of guilt. That guilt is your body and mind telling you that you didn't take the time to understand yourself. To live in the moment and enjoy each bite, while knowing you're putting yourself one step closer to achieving what you have set out for yourself to accomplish.

Everyone is looking for the "PERFECT" diet. Well folks, there isn't one. Listening to your body and learning what your body prefers is truly the magic "plan" for you. After LOTS of turtle steps, and finally some wonderful leaps and bounds, I'm really learning what my body likes, what it needs, and how it responds. If you need help finding out how your body responds, I'm MORE than happy to help. I'd love to get you started on your way to enjoying what you eat, feeling healthy and finally ... freeing yourself from FOOD-GUILT! You can do it, believe in your own strength - not enough people do!

I'm Back! Listen to your body...

Talk about MIA. Talk about busy. I don't think there's anyone out there that can't relate to making time to work out, making time to prepare meals for yourself, having a family to cook for and spend time with, being a student, working, and last but most CERTAINLY not least ... having your mind to deal with.

Being so aware and conscientiously making calculated decisions about your nutrition and lifestyle, plus the dreaded food-guilt (I will come back to this word I use in my next post) that we all try to avoid, can become a burden. It took me a good couple months after my first two figure competitions to come around a bit on my self-imposed food-guilt. It took me a good 7 mths to really start to have normal thoughts again in relation to my body and my nutrition. Surprisingly, such discipline and the mental game involved with competing can leave you utterly shaken-up post competition.

Luckily enough I've stumbled upon a few WONDERFUL people, blogs, and sites with wonderful stories and inspiration, all dealing with similar issues that I was able to draw off of. I have fortunately been able to get myself in an absolutely better place than I was in about 7 months ago. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE this lifestyle, and my worst enemy is certainly still my own mind, but I'm quite more relaxed (without being un-disciplined) and have actually been able to enjoy my life more, without the constant guilt I continued to place on myself in regards to food.

Very few people in America have a HEALTHY relationship with food, which is unfortunate ... but that's another topic for another day. I have visited South America and Europe, and the many cultures that come out of both have multitudes of differences, although one similarity is that their portion sizes are smaller and there isn't the same need and craving to eat GOBS AND GOBS AND GOBS AND SOME MORE FREAKIN' GOBS of fake food, like we do here in North America. I was raised in a family that forced food down your face, and in order to be polite, you ate it all. You weren't excused from the dinner table until you ate all your food. You didn't get desert until you ate all your food. You get it. I've always been insanely active, playing sports my entire life, and I've always been thin, and even at my "heaviest" I was probably only 10ish lbs heavier than a "normal" me, and 15 lbs heavier than the way I feel comfortable in my own skin.

I have gone from one extreme to the other in my mind. As a kid, I was S-K-I-N-N-Y. I'm talking knobby knees and sharp elbows. I wanted so bad to not be the "skinny kid" so I ate and ate and tried so hard to gain weight. I guess the insanely active person I am prevented that from occuring, until I stopped playing sports or being active for about a year after high school ... that of which I talked about in my first blog on here. Down the road a bit, I did modeling ... down the road a bit more, I started competing in physique competitions. And today, my mind is where it always feels I have too much body fat on myself, unless around a competition. I'm fit and healthy and no one would call me fat or overweight in any stretch of the word. That doesn't mean I don't want to have less body fat on me, and it SURELY doesn't mean I don't feel uncomfortable with the extra 3-6 lbs on me.

As I digress ... I have come upon, through more research than I care to admit, wonderful resources and wonderful people, those of which have helped me change my guilty-about-food mindset to a positive, listen-to-my-body and only eat when I'm somewhat hungry, and only until I'm decently full. Never until I'm stuffed, and don't eat if I'm not hungry. Sounds easy enough. And surprisingly, I'm getting pretty darn close to being able to say I can listen to my body and not keep eating even if it tastes SO-DARN-GOOD! Not 100% there yet ... but I feel that 95% is probably more realistic. 100% during prep, 95-98% during the rest of the year that I don't call an off-season since I don't "bulk" and I try to stay pretty much as low body fat as I want all year round.

Why only be happy and comfortable in your skin for a few competitions and weekends every year? I used to think that's what I wanted. It's definitely, absolutely not. I want to be as lean as I'm happy year round. Regardless. And I'm pretty close to achieving that. I'm those last 3 lbs away. And that extra scoop of almond butter or that extra slice of cheese away.

Once you learn to TRULY listen to your body, you'll be amazed at what you can achieve. It sincerely does feel better both inside and out not to feel bloated and stuffed and full of guilt. Eat when you're hungry until you're not completely full. Eat slower. Drink more water. Listen to the signals your body is sending you. We're all powerful beings, in our minds and in our bodies. If we'd only listen...

... we'd see what phenomenal things we can accomplish. I challenge you to start to listen to your body. Tell me what happens, tell me how you feel, tell me what changes, I'd love to hear!