What I Ate - Nov. 9, 2011

7:30am

- 1 whole egg + 1/4 cup egg whites with cheese & salsa

- small whole wheat tortilla

11am

- broccoli

- 1/2 cup cottage cheese dip

3pm

- 1 white cheddar rice cake

1 pkg. deli Turkey meat

5pm

- a whole lotta popcorn! (Zak& I shared, but he's only a little boy and I definitely ate more than him!)

- large bag of peanut butter M & M's

- 1/2 a small cheeseburger (not shown)

Yes, that's right - I told you I would record EVERYTHING I eat - good, bad, and ugly... today is not such an inspirational post due to my movie theatre incident, but I believe in one cheat meal/week, so I guess, by default, this was it for this week!  The great thing about this splurge is that I didn't fly off the handle like I usually do when I eat one bad meal.  Usually this would have turned into an evening of eating anything and everything and racking up a whole lotta calories!  But, once we left the movie theatre, I stopped with the junk... well, I stopped with everything because I felt so ill after all that popcorn - lol! And today, I'm not letting the cheat change anything in my brain - super-clean eats today and about to go for my early a.m. workout to sweat some of that popcorn and chocolate off!

What I Eat - November 8, 2011

Slept in and missed my early a.m. workout... really hate when this happens as there's usually never another opportunity to get to the gym if I miss this :< Feeling super-good with my clean eating already - it's amazing to me how huge a difference eating the right foods makes and it always make me wonder how or why I ever stray from this type of eating!  Here's what I ate yesterday:

7:30am

- 1 whole egg + 1/2 cup egg whites with a bit of shredded cheddar

- slow cooked oatmeal with cinnamon & raisins

- green tea with fresh mint

 

11am

- extre lean ground chicken with tomato sauce, veggies, and a dab of cottage cheese

2:15pm (eaten on-the-run!)

- 2 pieces of fake crab (made from pollock)

- avocado/tomato/cucumber/feta salad 

4pm

- Apple with almond butter

- caramel rice cake with almond butter & honey

(craving something fun and definitely ate a bit too much almond butter, but figured it was better than eating the cheesecake that was in my fridge!) 

6 - 9:30pm

teach 3 bellydance classes

9:45pm (eaten on-the-run)

- 1/2 cup no fat Greek yogurt with 1/2 cup cheerios mixed in

- 1/2 package almonds

So, after seeing my day here, I notice there was more fat in there than I'd usually consume in a day (lots of almond butter, avocado - ate the full thing, not just half as I usually do, almonds...) so guess my body was craving more fat.  I'm not at all scared of eating fat as long as it's the good, healthy type, I just need to make sure I don't O.D. on almond butter (which I'm known to do when eating healthy!)  I think on days like this I tend to feel I need to get in a lot of energy-giving foods like carbs and fats right before leaving to teach for the night as I know I won't be able to eat again for hours and I need the energy to be a good teacher.  I might start bringing protein shakes to the studio again as I can drink them throughout teaching and don't feel so cut-off from food all night that way. 

WHAT I EAT - Monday, Nov. 7, 2011

Hi Guys!

I have been pretty sloppy with my clean eating for the past few weeks, but I just turned 33 this Saturday and decided to be the best I can possibly be this year!  I truly believe that you can never be your best eating unhealthy foods, so... I am back onto awesomely healthy eating.  When I say healthy, I don't mean crazy competition prep clean, I'm really trying to be consistent and generally healthy (ie: no crazy sugar binges which I am prone to every few days if I don't make a point not to).  Just good fairly healthy foods, no sweating the small stuff (I will write a blog post about this soon).  Soooooo... I always write down what I eat in a journal, I sometimes even input it all to fitday.com to check calories, etc., but this time I thought I would start off by taking a picture of everything I eat throughout the day and blog about it.  A lot of my students and clients are often looking for new ideas for meals and snacks and how to fit in 5 - 6 meals a day (and a lot of mine are easy grab-n-go ideas!) so I thought this blog could be a great tool for them and anyone else interested in ideas for healthy eating as well as a means to hold me accountable in a big way as I promise to record EVERYTHING I put in my mouth and make it public here!  I'd also love to see others try this out even just for a day or so!  Enjoy...

6:00am

- 20 minute run to gym + heavy leg/butt workout

7:30am

- 1/2 cup egg whites with salsa & a bit of shredded chedder cheese

- small whole wheat tortilla

 

11am

- package of deli turkey meat

- 1/2 cucumber

12 - 1pm

teach boot camp class

3:30pm

lunch out at Swiss Chalet:

- chicken breast (skin removed)

- plain baked potato (no butter or sour cream - yay me!)

- I put the bun off my plate so I wouldn't eat it, but then I ended up eating 1/2 of it with a tiny bit of butter (oops!)

then finished off my son's dessert (a few mandarin orange slices)

6 - 7pm

Teach Pure Sweat Workout Class

8:30pm

- broccoli (my son ate the cauliflower)

- 3/4 cup 2% cottage cheese

(I puree it into a dip with dill, garlic, and other spices, then love dipping the veg in it!)

 Then I had a cup of sleepytime tea to avoid wanting large amounts of yogurt and honey or popcorn!

Today went very well in my eyes... I let too many hours pass before eating a few times, but it was ok.  I would usually eat 5 meals on a good day and I only really ate 4 today, but I ate out for one of them so that makes up the difference I think!  I am feeling super-awesome after just my first day of being back on track!  YAY!

STOP JUST HOPING!

Too often I hear people saying "hopefully I'll be able to stick to my clean eating", or "I really hope to make it to the gym today"... Well, to quote Dionne Warwick: "wishing and hoping and thinking and praying, planning and dreaming each night of his charms, that won't get you into his arms"... She goes on to say that you've gotta actually take action to get that man ("All you got to do is hold him and kiss him and love him and show him that you care") in other words - JUST DO IT girl!!!

Ok, now that we have our love-lives sorted out, let's think about how this can help us with our fitness and health goals...

Whenever a student, friend, family member, or even when I hear myself say they hope to do something (usually challenging), I really do want to believe them (or me), but that hope word often makes me leery! Hope to me often means no action. If you walk into a pub just HOPING not to order the nachos and beer or you only HOPE to make it out to that boot camp class, it's often not gonna happen! I don't mean to be negative, but I really believe you need to be more proactive than just hoping if you want awesome results! You need to take charge and make things happen, not just hope for them! If you really want to stay clean at that pub, you make up your mind before you walk in there that you will order a grilled chicken breast with veggies, not nachos - no options! Or, you wanna get a workout in - don't think I hope I have time for that sometime today - schedule it in like you would an important business meeting and don't let yourself down by postponing that workout for another time when you think you're gonna have more time, energy, etc. - do not give yourself the option to wimp out!  Change I hope to I WILL!

NO REGRETS!

I have decided to take the next 30 days and commit to consistent clean eating - no ifs, ands, or buts about it!  I have been on a path of clean eating over the past month or so, but have, at times, been a little sloppy (ie: too much almond butter, too much dressing on my salad, still eating low fat cheeses, and of course I was still having a cheat meal that usually turned into a whole cheat day or two every week), I managed to make some progress and lose some fat this way, but feel I could be getting much more dramatic results if I really committed to consistent strict clean eating for a period of time.  Of course, once I reach my goal, I will loosen up a little bit and not be sooo strict, but I really want to get to my goal for the summer!  Even in all my competition preps I realized I have never gone as long as a whole month totally clean (and most importantly no sugar - which I am addicted to!) - I always ended up having an ice cream here or a butter tart there, still making gains (or losses), but I feel I don't yet know my true potential!  It's not that I think one month of eating clean will show me my true potential, but I feel it will give me the momentum to follow through on my healthy eating and show me and everyone else what just one month of eating totally right can do for your physique, skin, confidence, and energy!  

I LOVE to workout so that is not my usual challenge when trying to get ripped (nutrition is!), but lately I have been hitting the snooze button a little too much and ending up missing a few too many of my own personal early-morning workouts.  I find I'm just not right when I miss working out first thing in the morning... the a.m. workout really sets me up for an awesome day full of positivity and healthy feelings!  I like to workout in the morning for so many more reasons than just the aesthetic ones (which are great bonuses too) - it makes me feel alive and awake, it encourages me to follow through and eat healthy all day (don't usually feel like eating a donut for breakfast if I just finished a grueling workout), gets those feel-good endorphins flowing, boosts my metabolism, etc. etc!  So, I was thinking to myself "Why would I ever want to miss a morning workout? I really regret sleeping in and missing out on all that greatness that comes from a workout." And now I have turned this into the mantra I say when I wake up - "I WILL NEVER REGRET A WORKOUT!" Think about it... have you ever regretted working out? probably not.  Have you regretted sleeping in and missing a workout? Working late and missing a workout? Being lazy and watching TV instead of a workout? YES, of course!  The same goes for eating clean... Really I have never thought to myself "Really wish I hadn't eaten so well this week", yet we pretty much always regret eating cake and ice cream in the end, right? It may taste good, but when the pounds start piling on from too many bad foods or even when we feel low-energy after eating something like that it's not a good feeling.   So, join me in living regret free and healthy!!!  Next time you're tempted to sleep in and miss your workout or you're debating whether or not you should have that chocolate bar, think about living your life regret-free! 

YAY, I'm gonna record my weight and measurements today as my starting point and I will keep you posted on how I'm doing!  Lemme know how you are doing on your healthy journeys! No option but health!!!!

POSITIVITY BREEDS POSITIVITY - PART 1

If you know me, you know I believe strongly in the power of positive thinking for all aspects of your life!  I believe the more positive thoughts you are having about situations, events, and goals, the more positive results you will see! On the flip side, negative thoughts lead to more negative things including negative outcomes (if you keep saying "I'm so fat, I'm so fat" you are telling your brain and the universe that that is what you are so that is what you'll be!)  This is a magical theory and applies to every facet of your life, but today I'm gonna be talking about how it can help you pick yourself up out of a rut of bad health, bad eating, and feeling fat and out-of-shape.  This is a huge topic and I will try to cover it with some different ideas in a few blog posts here.

I know personally how you can know that you need to be positive about things, but when you're down in the dumps it's sometimes hard to really genuinely put out a positive feeling and really believe you are going to achieve all your goals, right?  When people gain weight or stop working out and eating healthy they also often stop doing all the things that go along with feeling beautiful and enriched... shopping for new clothes sucks if you don't fit in anything, I don't need a spray tan - no one's gonna see my unfit body, I'm not gonna take that sexy bellydance class until I lose 10 pounds, etc.  You have to think backwards here... Go do all the things that will make you feel beautiful and believe that you can do anything!  No matter where you're at in your fitness goals, don't you feel a bit more like superwoman after a great haircut and blow-out?  Then the magic happens in your brain... you feel great because of the hairstyle and that leads to other great things like enriching your body with whole healthy foods and working out and believing in yourself!  You need to keep that positivity flowing around you and love who you are at that very moment!  Loving yourself the way you are doesn't mean you don't want to make improvements, it just means you love every stage you go through and you learn from the different stages!  Perhaps you want more muscle, less fat, more energy, whatever it is - know that you WILL reach your goal with work, positive thoughts, and persistence! Every little step in the right direction is bringing you closer to your goal... and it's always better to be moving closer and closer rather than staying where you're at or going the other direction.  Celebrate progress with these ideas:

- Go for a spa day and get beautiful, or do one yourself at home alone or with a bunch of friends (mani/pedi, masks, scrubs, etc.)
- Shave/wax those legs!  Why not?
- get a new haircut, dye your hair a different colour, or just get a blow-out!
- Get a spray tan or apply some self-tanner  Everyone looks better with a little colour (my faves are Clarins and Biotherm self-tanners on the high end (around $50) or L'oreal Sublime Bronze Tinted Self-Tanner Gel for a little less ($17)
- Buy a new rockin' outfit or piece of clothing!  So many people who want to lose weight don't want to buy clothes until they lose the weight so they continue on negatively in old clothes they don't feel excited by forever - it's an endless cycle - you feel yucky so you don't take the steps to feel great.  You need to make yourself feel great first and the rest of the good stuff with follow!  So, buy a kick-ass pair of jeans that fit you NOW!  Don't worry - it's a pretty fun golden worry when you have to go shopping again soon for smaller-sized clothing!

- Try bellydancing! It is all about loving your body and showing off those curves and also helps you feel more of a connect to your femininity! If you're in Toronto area check out my classes www.mayada.ca
- Make a habit of not going out of the house without looking your best! Putting make-up, doing your hair, wearing awesome outfits, or whatever makes you feel great about yourself!  This was one of my new year's resolutions - I ask myself "would I love to bump into someone I hadn't seen for ages or have my picture taken looking like this?" before leaving! The answer needs to be YES!
- Get a workout in first-thing in the morning (even if it's mini!) I find it really sets the tone for the whole day and makes you feel unstoppable!

Try these tips, and let me know how it helps you on your journey.  Also, post any other ideasyou have here!

Coming soon: 
POSITIVITY BREEDS POSITIVITY PART 2!

Friday, April 29, 2011

Lots to update on... I have been waffling about what fitness competitions to do and didn't really have my heart in my prep for all these various spring comps I was thinking about, plus I had a whole lot of dance and studio events conflicting with competitons I wanted to do.  But now I feel it with all that I am - my next competition will be the Toronto Pro Supershow - http://www.torontoprosupershow.com/ on June 17 & 18!!! 

Today I am exactly 7 weeks out - which is sooooo close!  I like this amount of weeks to prep... it's not so far off that you lose sight (yes, I always procrastinate), yet it's not a few weeks away where you feel like you have to take desperate/drastic measures to lean out!  I'm quite far from where I want to be for this competition at this point (about 20 pounds!) but I feel as long as I am consistent with my clean eating I can lose 3 pounds/week which will end up being 21 pounds!  I have been totally great with my eating for 2 weeks straight now (except for a little Easter mess-up day).  Time and time again it shocks and amazes me what is possible if you just eat right!  So I'm in the honeymoon stage with the clean eats right now, and what a great place that is to be (it will get tougher I'm sure as I get closer and closer to my goal).  But I am determined to bring my very best package to the stage in June.  I don't want to wonder "what if?" or "I could have done better" this time!

My workouts have been great as well, although I just LOVE working out so much that I never really struggle with this component - the eating is where I need to focus! Stay tuned!