Tag: health coach

color colour fitness health
September 21, 2021
Blog

5 Tips to Help You Start Exercising

To start exercising regularly when you aren’t used to it can be a challenge. Where should I start? What should I do? What if I’m not motivated? Depending on the day of the week, there is a new headline out touting the superior benefits of one style of exercise over another. But here’s the thing, it’s not supposed to be that complicated. Very simply, our bodies are made to move. Here are a few tips to help you start exercising.

1. Start simply

Start by just trying to move more each day. Increasing your daily movement can boost your energy levels as well as your motivation and confidence. Plus, it’s good for you! This can look like choosing the stairs over the elevator or taking a short walk on your lunch break. While fitness trackers can be problematic if you live and die by them, aiming for that 10,000 steps per day, can be a simple way to make sure you’re moving more.

2. Go with what you like

What happens if you try to force yourself to do something you hate? Chances are you will find every excuse in the book not to do that thing. One of the best ways to ensure your success when you start exercising is to start with something you think or know you will enjoy. For example, if you know you like to dance, try a Zumba class or barre. If you know you hate cardio, start with strength training. If you like it, you are more likely to do it.

3. Don’t rely on motivation to start exercising

woman stretching on ground
Photo by Jonathan Borba on Pexels.com

One of the most common pitfalls I see is when folks assume that motivation is a force that just materializes out of nowhere or it doesn’t. Waiting for motivation to spontaneously strike is a recipe for failure because it just doesn’t work that way. Very often, a little bit of action must precede motivation. For example, have you ever noticed how sometimes getting yourself to the gym is the hardest part but then once you’re there and moving, you’re fine? That’s a great example of how pushing yourself through a little action (getting yourself to the gym and starting) helps create motivation to continue. Not sure if you’re up for a run? Trying lacing up those sneakers and walking for a bit. Not feeling the idea of lifting today? Try doing some stretches or yoga first.

4. Accountability

Peer pressure can be a very effective tool! Well, maybe it’s not peer pressure. But having the accountability of a gym buddy or workout partner can be very helpful when you start exercising.

5. Don’t go crazy

The quickest way to sabotage your fitness goals is to do too much too soon. This could mean setting overly ambitious goals so that you become discouraged when you can’t meet them. Or it could look like pushing too hard and getting injured. As the saying goes, Rome wasn’t built in a day and muscles aren’t either! Take your time, listen to your body, and go easy on yourself.

August 26, 2020
Blog

Dieting is the problem

Why do 90% of dieters regain the weight yet we keep turning to diets over and over again? The answer doesn’t lie in willpower or in sugar addiction or in the irresistibility of food additives. It lies in the nature of diets themselves.

First off, the diet industry thrives off promoting unrealistic (and often unhealthy) physical ideals. It makes a whole lot of promises about those ideals it knows it can’t keep. Regardless of whether they involve calorie counting, carb cutting, or fasting, essentially all diets drastically reduce the amount of calories that you eat so that you are consuming fewer calories than you burn. This is the weight loss equation: calories in < calories out.

The thing is that diets cut your calories to an unsustainable low to make sure you lose weight faster. However, you cannot sustain at those levels long-term. The adult body is not made to run off of 1200 calories – in fact, that amount is more suitable for a toddler. What happens in response to such low calorie intake over time? Cravings, obsessing over food, binging. Plus, your body slows down your metabolism in response to those reduced calories so that you must eat less and less in order to maintain (check out this great breakdown of your body’s adaptation to calorie restriction by Precision Nutrition).

When you deprive your body of energy (calories), nutrients, and the foods you enjoy, it’s not a matter of willpower. It’s basic human biology that makes you gain that weight back. It’s not a personal failing. Diets are made for weight loss, not maintenance, not keeping it off.

So, why do dieters regain the weight they lost? Because that’s what diets are designed for. So, please, keep that in mind before you sign up for your next weight loss challenge or before you start to beat yourself up for “falling off” your diet.

Want to learn more: check out my post on the difference between dieting and healthy eating.

August 14, 2020
Blog

It’s Not You; It’s Your Workout

Have you ever found it really hard to stay motivated to work out? If you find you have to drag yourself to the gym and you’re miserable the whole time, checking the clock constantly, it might not be an issue with motivation.

Our bodies need movement, yes, but our minds do, too. And our workouts shouldn’t be something that elicit dread or misery. Often, when this is the case, we blame ourselves, thinking we struggle to stay motivated to work out because we are lazy or out of shape or need more willpower. Unfortunately, we’ve been conditioned to blame ourselves like this because we’ve grown up surrounded by toxic diet culture. None of these self-critical things we think are true.

Here’s the thing, there is no one workout that is best for everyone. You and I could do the exact same workouts every single day and we would still look and feel completely different. You don’t have to do HIIT or pilates or run 5 miles.

The best type of exercise is the one you’ll do.

Let me say that again: the best type of exercise is the one you’ll do. Some maybe the problem isn’t motivated; maybe it’s that your workout just isn’t right for you.

Our bodies need movement but they don’t need Zumba specifically or step aerobics specifically. If you are struggling with your motivation to work out, tune in to your body and your mind. How do you feel physically and emotionally while you’re doing your workout? After your workout? Is there anything you enjoy about it (other than when it’s over)? What do you dislike most about it? What would your ideal workout look and feel like?

Use your answers to these questions to try new ways to exercise. What kind of movement you’re doing isn’t as important as whether or not you’re moving. If you’re skipping more workouts than you’re doing or you’re stressing out about them, then they’re not really very helpful. Just getting yourself moving will help improve your mood, relieve stress, improve your confidence, increase your energy levels, and have a number of physical benefits.

“But if I give up my current workout, isn’t that quitting?” No, it’s not. You’re making a proactive decision to seek out something that’s a better fit for you. “But if I keep pushing, won’t my workout get easier?” Technically yes, but you must be consistent for that to happen and easier does not necessarily mean less miserable.

There is no shame in trading in a workout routine that isn’t working for you.

There is no point in sabotaging yourself with something that doesn’t work. You owe it to yourself to find a workout routine that suits you. So search for online classes, try out a new studio, pick up some weights – whatever works for you!

Click here to learn about the different types of exercise to start your exploration.

August 7, 2020
Blog

Should You Use a Protein Powder?

Protein supplements are pretty much all the rage right now, but should you be using protein powder? Great question! I’m so glad you asked.

Do You *NEED* a Protein Powder?

Before you decide to add a protein supplement to your routine, there are a number of things to consider, the first one being, do you even need it?

In the strictest sense, supplements fill in your nutritional need gaps as a supplement your regular diet. Protein deficiency is extremely rare here in the US, even amongst plant-based eaters. So, chances are, if you’re an average person who is able to consume a balanced diet, you probably don’t *need* a protein powder.

That being said, some circumstances can increase your protein needs. For example, if you are not able to get adequate protein from your diet, whether due to lack of access to protein rich foods, lack of time, or issues with digesting protein. Another reason could be that you need more protein to support physical activity. Our bodies use protein to repair and rebuild, so if you engage in a lot of very strenuous exercise, then you will have greater protein needs than your next door neighbor with a desk job who walks his dog twice a day. And on that note about protein being used to rebuild and repair, if you are recovering from illness or injury, that could also increase your protein needs. Finally, we must consider the convenience factor. It’s definitely easier to toss a protein shake into your gym bag than a steak. So occasionally adding in a protein shake can help on those on-the-go days.

If you’re in doubt about your protein needs, speak with your physician, trainer, or dietician. (Note: I do not work with athletes)

Protein Quality

It’s important to note that the supplement industry in the US is notorious unregulated. This means that there could be issues with quality, ingredients, formulations or health claims and we, as consumers, may never know. So you need to be very cautious and informed when choosing your protein powder. Fortunately, third party resources, such as Labdoor.com and Consumerlab.com, independently test supplements for purity. You won’t find every protein powder available on there, but you will find many.

One thing to watch out for are supplements (almost always in the MLM category) that loudly brag about large numbers of scientific studies that back up their purity or efficacy. Those studies very often are either conducted by or funded by the company that makes the supplements and, therefore, cannot be assumed reliable. If you cannot obtain the actual study documentation and findings or cannot determine who conducted the study, it’s a red flag.

What Type of Protein?

So you’ve read this far. You’ve decided that you would like to use a protein powder. Now what?

Protein powders come in all sorts of varieties – whey protein, pea protein, soy protein, rice protein, even cranberry protein (WTF, right?)! Which one you choose is really up to you – your dietary preferences or allergies, price point, etc. In terms of athletic performance, studies really haven’t found any huge difference between protein types, but you will still see a preference for whey among many body builders.

Whether or not you were already a protein user, I hope this was informative. If you have questions about adding a dietary supplement to your routine, you should consult a qualified professional.

blue tape measuring on clear glass square weighing scale
July 27, 2020
Blog

What’s the difference between healthy eating and dieting?

How can you be a nutrition coach and be anti-diet? What’s the difference between healthy eating and dieting?

Dieting and healthy eating are actually very different, mutually exclusive things. In fact, dieting is NOT at all healthy eating.

Dieting

Dieting means drastically restricting what you eat, either by counting calories or outright eliminating foods, with the goal of weight loss. Diets are not meant to be sustainable in the long-term. Rather, they are designed to get you to your goal weight quickly, but not to keep you there. The proof of this is in the pudding: with all of the scientific evidence we have that shows that slashing calories will slow your metabolism and that these approaches almost always result in weight regain (plus more), the diet industry continues with the same fundamental approach. This is because the industry makes money off of dieters coming back for more.

Another hallmark that all diets have in common is the diet mentality. Diets promote deprivation and moralization of foods into “good” and “bad” categories. They entail black-and-white thinking – you’re either on a diet or off, being good or being bad. And, regardless of the specifics of the diet, they are too often a slippery slope into disordered eating. Dieting does not promote a healthy relationship with food. Think about the last time you were on a diet. How much time did you spend thinking about the foods you weren’t allowed to have? Wishing you could eat like everyone else? And how much time did you spend stressing out about how much of what you could eat? You shouldn’t be wasting so much time and energy stressing about fulfilling one of our most basic human needs. Food is not meant to be a source of stress, but the diet mentality makes it so by convincing us that we need to monitor our every bite.

The sneaky thing is, diet companies will convince you that it’s YOUR fault for not maintaining. The truth is that it’s NOT your fault if you struggle to stick to your diet’s strict rules and it’s NOT your fault if you gain your weight back. Our human bodies and minds are simply not compatible with the diet structure. Our bodies are not meant to run on just 1200 calories a day and we are programmed not to respond well to deprivation. If you would like a really eye-opening illustration of this, read about the Minnesota Starvation Experiment (and pay attention to how many calories they were consuming a day).

Healthy Eating

Healthy eating does not require counting calories or cutting out foods. In fact, there is room for all of your favorite treats! Instead of focusing on rules and numbers, you re-learn to tune into and trust your body so that you can securely give yourself permission to indulge. Healthy eating is about finding the right balance for you and for your body. By getting to the factors behind your cravings, eating mindfully, and tuning into your hunger and satiety cues, you are able to balance your diet and release that food stress.

The “healthy” in healthy eating isn’t just about the types of food you eat; it’s also about your relationship with food.

Healthy eating requires you to flip the script on that old diet mentality that we all carry with us. It requires recognizing that what works for me might not work for you. We could eat the same way and exercise the same and our bodies would look completely different – and that’s OK. It requires recognizing that there are no “bad” foods and that eating ice cream is not going to have negative consequences.

One final point: the goal of healthy eating doesn’t have to be weight loss. For example, you can focus on healthy eating to feel better, improve your health, manage certain conditions, or just to care for yourself. Our culture would certainly prefer to have us believe otherwise, but our bodies are supposed to come in different shapes and sizes and they are supposed to change as we get older. At 33, I don’t fit into the clothes I was wearing at 21 and I shouldn’t – my hormones are different, my metabolism is different, my eating and movement are different. Learning what your unique body needs is also an important part of healthy eating.

I write this post not to put down anyone else’s thing, but to give you some important information to consider before you embark on a diet program. If you have questions about this post or how I approach nutrition coaching, please don’t hesitate to send me an email.

April 28, 2020
Blog

Meal Planning Success Tips

Meal planning and prep is an important pillar of healthy eating because it gives you complete control over the ingredients and portions that you and your family eat. In fact, research has shown that eating home cooked meals frequently is associated with healthier diet quality. That’s not to say that meal planning and prepping is easy. It takes time, thought, and energy. So how can you make meal prepping work for you? First off, there’s no wrong way to meal prep. Here are some meal planning success tips to get you started: 

Meal Prep Success Tips

Work with your schedule 

Some people like to do a lot of meal prep all in one day. Others will split it up over 2-3 days during the week. Another way to do it, is to cook larger meals and save leftovers for a couple days (helloooo crock pots and one-pan meals!). Look at your schedule but also consider your energy and stress levels as well when deciding which system works best for you. Create your schedule around that. 

Plan before you shop

Your meal prep plan needs to take into consideration not just your time, but also your budget and your inventory. Planning before you shop will cut your time in the grocery store and also allow you to modify your plan if you discover you need to purchase too many items for certain recipes. You also will have the opportunity to modify recipes by planning ahead as well. 

Try to reuse ingredients

It will save you time and money if you are able to use the same ingredients in several different dishes. For example, you could use quinoa to make a batch of stuffed peppers, a quinoa salad side dish, and vegetarian taco filling. Just make a large pot of quinoa at the beginning of the week and then work it into those dishes. Likewise, see if you can find ways to repurpose your leftovers into new meals.  For example, leftover chicken can be used to make chicken fajitas, leftover salmon can be made into salmon burgers – you get the idea.

Use your freezer

Some foods freeze better than others and taking advantage of that can save you time and money. Some ingredients that freeze well are:

  • Fruits such as peeled bananas, chunked mangos, and berries
  • Raw or blanched vegetables such as peppers, peas, cauliflower, broccoli, carrots, and kale
  • Cooked vegetables such as sweet potato and squash (stock up on these when they’re in season and cheap, roast them up, then freeze them)
  • Firm tofu
  • Raw meats

Some prepared foods that also freeze well:

  • Soups
  • Sauces
  • Stir fry
  • Cauliflower fried rice
  • Pasta dishes
  • Black bean burritos

Spice it up!

Don’t be afraid of flavor. Spices and herbs are your best friend when cooking healthy foods. They allow you to reuse the same ingredients in many different ways. If you are uncomfortable improvising with your flavors, follow recipes. Tired of the same old grilled chicken breast? Try adding garlic and paprika for Mexican-style or go with lemon and rosemary. You can play around with different combinations once you get comfortable with the flavors that you enjoy. 

Get your family/friends involved

Cooking together is a good time to connect and it’s a great learning experience for kids! Research has shown that if you encourage your kids to meal prepare throughout their young adult life, they are more likely to eat healthier later and are less likely to develop picky eating habits. 

Only prepare foods that you enjoy eating

You may feel really motivated to cook only quinoa and asparagus for your lunch the next day, because you think that will be the healthiest. But if you don’t actually like quinoa and asparagus, you probably won’t end up eating it later. What’s the point of forcing yourself to eat things that you don’t find tasty? Food can be delicious and healthy; you sometimes just have to be creative. This is why when you work with Well & Simple, we offer thousands of new recipes that are easy to prepare yourself, and are tailored according to your taste preference.

Theme nights make things easier

These can be fun and give the whole family something to look forward to, as well as take away some of the thought you have to put into a meal. Some examples of fun theme days are: 

  • Meatless Monday
  • Taco Tuesday
  • Fishy Friday

Plan the dine out days

Meal planning also means planning nights when you don’t have to cook! If you know you will end up dining out once a week, you may as well put it on the schedule so you can always stick to your plan, and avoid wasting extra ingredients.

There are many other perks to cooking your own food besides it being healthier. It can be less expensive, and can be even tastier than takeout. It’s also a fun opportunity to teach your kids an important life skill, or just to spend time together on a busy work day. Following these meal planning success tips will help you get on your way.

Our intern, Nicki, actually conducted her senior thesis research on meal prep amongst college students and found that they eat more fruits and vegetables if they prep their own meals as well. So there you have it: meal prep is an important and even college students are getting in on it!

How about you? Do you meal prep regularly? What does it look like in your house?

April 15, 2020
Blog

Some Advice on Motivation

Motivation can be a struggle on a good day, let alone living under quarantine. It’s OK not to feel motivated right now but there are ways to help you find your motivation again.

Picture this: you had a long day at home, doing paperwork, jumping on Zoom calls, trying to school your kids, managing your finances, cleaning the house, and, before you know it, it’s time for your at-home workout. Or maybe it’s time to prepare that new dinner recipe you had planned on making. (Maybe this WAS your day and you don’t have to try to picture it at all!) After a mentally & physically exhausting day, you just don’t feel like doing any of it. You want to throw in some Easy Mac and relax and watch Tiger King. We’ve all been there, and we’ve all felt ashamed for feeling this way.

We feel pressured to get certain things accomplished, to learn something new, to get on those home workouts because suddenly we supposedly “have nothing but time.” But time isn’t all we have. Time is still a finite resource and on top of that we still have responsibilities and stress and the emotionally taxing task of processing what is happening to us as a society under quarantine.

And yet, a quick scroll through your social media feed will turn up some message that if you don’t learn a new skill, start a new side hustle, or pick up a new hobby at this time, then you are somehow inferior and lazy. This mentality not only ignores the reality before us, it’s also harmful to our mental , emotional, and physical health. No one—and I mean NO ONE—is always motivated and that is OK and it is NORMAL.

So first and foremost, as the article linked above explains, we are processing a lot of big emotions right now, so be gentle with yourself and take what you need at this time. Instead of feeling down on yourself, please remember that not being motivated is okay. Likewise, feeling overly motivated is OK, too. We all process these things differently. Before anything else, you need to listen to your intuition and follow what feels right for you here and now.

If you do feel that you are ready to get moving on some goals now, there are things that you can do to get you started.

4 Ways to Find Motivation

  1. Reevaluate your goals 

If motivation has been a long-time struggle for you, it may be a good time to reevaluate your goals. Make sure you have solid goals, and, if not, change them. But how do I know if my goals are “solid”? Ask yourself the following questions: Is this goal feasible for me to accomplish? How will I know I have accomplished it? Does this goal still resonate with me? What will accomplishing this goal do for me/for my life?

  1. Ask yourself if you are happy with the way you are tackling your goals.

I often remind my clients to take into account their personal preference when it comes to working towards goals. If you don’t enjoy the process, you won’t adhere to it. I take a more agnostic approach to diet and exercise, because the best option is the one you’ll do. You do not exist simply to suffer now in order to be happy later. Choose a form of exercise that you enjoy enough that you don’t dread doing it every day.  Cook recipes that you find tasty as well as healthy. Allow yourself treats from time to time. Whatever you choose, it has to work for you or it won’t work at all.

  1. Look back at how far you have come and celebrate the goals you have already smashed.

We all love to look at how far we have yet to go to reach our goals, but how often do you look back at what you have already accomplished? Don’t be afraid to give yourself a pat on the back. You are doing amazing! Recognize that. When you feel good about what you are doing, you are more likely to see it through.  No matter what stage of change you are in, there’s always something positive to look back upon. If you are still at the very start of changing your lifestyle habits, realize that coming to that decision to make change is often the hardest part for people – so that’s a huge accomplishment in itself! Focus on working towards small goals and build on them over time. Then you can look back and remember that you never used to take time for self care. Or you never used to drink enough water. Or you just started enjoying veggies with every meal. Those are all HUGE wins to celebrate! Don’t deny yourself these victories.

  1. Remember the definitive reason “why” you started

Perhaps most importantly, remember your big “why”. If you don’t already have a definitive “why”, take some time to determine yours. Your “why” should be the deepest and most important reason for changing your habits. It goes beyond things like getting abs or fitting into an old outfit.  It must be specific and have an end result that is meaningful to you. Ask yourself why you want to accomplish your goal? Why does it matter? What impact will accomplishing that goal have on your life? Why is that impact important to you?

Understand that your definitive why should be specific to you. Some examples of powerful whys include: “I want to begin exercising and eating healthier so I can keep up with my kids”, “I want to improve my eating habits so I can help my daughter develop a healthier relationship with food than I had”, or “I’m tired of the way my chronic pain has impeded my daily life and I want to change that.”

When it comes down to it, motivation is a deeply personal force and it requires a lot of introspection to develop it. It also is important to recognize where it’s coming from and why it’s not happening. Listen to your inner voice to do what is best for you.

April 2, 2020
Blog

The Trouble with the Diet Mentality

More than any of the junk food on the market, I think the biggest obstacle to having healthy balanced eating habits, a good relationship with our body, and a healthy relationship with food is the diet mentality. In order to start truly making lasting changes to your eating habits, you have to start working on curbing that mentality from the outset.

What is the Diet Mentality

The diet mentality is a deeply ingrained way of thinking in our culture that emphasizes black-and-white thinking about eating habits. You hear it in the on-the-wagon-off-the-wagon notion and the idea of “good” foods versus “bad” foods. You hear it in the way we talk about our eating behaviors: “I was bad today because I had chips and dessert.” And it’s behind our negative self-talk when we pick apart our physical appearance, berate ourselves for not following our diet, and say cruel things about our bodies.

The diet mentality is critical for the survival of the commercial diet industry because it supports their unsustainable programs which focus solely on the food, counting calories, carbs, and points, and the number on the scale and ignore balance, the reasons behind our eating habits, and food quality.

Why the Diet Mentality is a Problem

The diet mentality is a big problem for a whole number of reasons. First and foremost, all of that negative self-talk and those unrealistic goals that it emphasizes throw us into a self-defeating, self-berating spiral.

Let me explain. Commercial diets rely on one common ingredient for all of their programs: self-control. Here’s the thing about self-control, it’s a finite resource for every single human being out there. It erodes throughout the course of the day, with stress, with lack of sleep, and the longer we rely on it. However, we are conditioned to believe that when we run out of the ability to exercise self-control, it’s a failure on our part. We are simply not good enough, not strong enough, not cut out for this. Have you ever had those thoughts about yourself?

Pretty much anyone who has withstood the diet cycle has had those thoughts. And what those thoughts ultimately lead to are beliefs that we are simply not good enough so why bother even trying. “Well, I already blew it today, so why not just go all in for dinner, dessert, and wine?” “I just can’t do it. What’s the point in even trying?” “I didn’t have the self control for no carbs….but maybe if I’m counting points instead that’ll be easier”.

This is the diet mentality at work. It make you feel bad about yourself, warps your self-image, and keeps you coming back for more and more diets.

Here’s the thing…

The diet mentality does not reflect reality. There are no good foods and bad foods – just food. There are foods you shouldn’t eat as often because they aren’t as nutritious, true. But eating those foods certainly doesn’t make you bad any more than eating a carrot would make Charles Manson good. See what I’m saying?

The goal that we all need to be working towards is BALANCE so that we can enjoy those treats that we like but also eat plenty of the more nutritious foods that our bodies need. The goal is BALANCE so that we can enjoy food without equating it with our worth, so that we can stop berating ourselves and heal our relationships with food and with our bodies.

Releasing the Diet Mentality

Only by working on quelling those diet mentality thoughts and beliefs can we focus on achieving that balance that we need. But it takes time because that mentality is so deeply ingrained not only in ourselves but also in our society. It’s all around us and we don’t even notice it most of the time. So it takes practice noticing those patterns and then flipping the script on them.

So here’s a homework assignment if you’re willing: grab a journal and write down the diet mentality thoughts and feelings you have today on one side of the page. On the other side of the page, flip the script on them, turn them into something constructive or more observational and not judgmental. For example “I was bad today because I ate a whole bag of chips” could be flipped to “I ate a bag of chips today and they tasted really good.” “I can’t eat bread because carbs are bad” could be flipped to “bread isn’t falling in line with the nutritional goals I have today but I can have it if I want it.”

To get you started: your worth is not dictated by the foods you eat. Your body is beautiful and amazing. You are not defective or weak.

April 1, 2020
Blog

Tips for Working Out at Home

Since the COVID-19 social distancing policy has taken effect, many, many of us have taken our workouts into our home. This is a great move since exercise can serve as valuable stress relief and it also helps support a healthy immune system. At Well & Simple, we’re lucky that our intern, Nicki, is a personal trainer and she wants to offer some valuable advice to those of you bringing your fitness routines home.

Mindset

First and foremost, we need to address the mental and emotional components here. Be gentle with yourself during this time. It’s important that you not put excess pressure on yourself and set reasonable goals and expectations, especially during this difficult period. There are going to be days when you just can’t bring yourself to workout. That’s OK. There are going to be times when you feel like you’re not performing the way you want to or used to. That’s OK too. And there will be days when you’re feeling awesome and nailing your goals. That’s great! Your worth as an individual is not tied to how much you work out or how well you stick to your diet plan. You’re also not required to lose weight or hit a new PR while in quarantine. 

In terms of athletic performance, most people can’t get the same workout at home that they can at the gym. That’s just a fact and that’s totally fine. It doesn’t mean you can’t get a lot of benefits from it though. Set new goals for yourself and be open to trying new exercises. 

Form

Safety first! When you’re working out alone in the comfort and privacy of your home, you’ll naturally feel more comfortable since no one is watching you. This can be a good thing as you may feel more confident and more bold when it comes to trying new exercises. However, this comes with a risk when it comes to form. Having good form isn’t just about getting the most out of your workout, it’s also about protecting your body from injury. Without an instructor or someone else there to check your form, it can be easy to let it slip. If you can, do your workouts in front of a mirror in order to keep an eye on your form and take your time through each exercise so you can take stock of your body positioning. 

Equipment

Want to do some at-home workouts but worried you don’t have the equipment you need?Not a problem! There are plenty of things that you can still do with just your body or with ordinary objects.

  • Towels and a smooth surface
    • This can act as a homemade “slider” and you can do many things with it! Knee tucks, mountain climbers, lateral lunges, etc. These are used in all kinds of fitness classes and workout videos.
  • Water jugs/laundry detergent
    • If you don’t have any weights, you can improvise with heavier objects with handles. Save your water gallons, milk jugs, laundry detergent bottles, or similar containers to fill with water. You can do lots of weighted exercises with these such as rows, lunges, squats, farmers carries, etc. What’s great is you get to adjust how heavy they are!
  • Stable furniture as a bench or otherwise elevated surface
    • Having a stable elevated surface adds more depth to bodyweight exercises. You can do step ups, incline or decline pushups, elevated bridges, etc. These are also great if balance is not your strongest skill or if you’re doing a workout class, like barre. 
  • Stairs
    • Stairs can act as your elevated surface, or you can do things like stair runs, or even create a whole leg workout on them. The possibilities are endless.
  • Canned goods
    • If you’re looking for lighter hand weights, using canned goods or 16-oz water bottles are a great option. They fit easily into your hand and offer some added resistance to your movements.
  • Old panty hose or leggings
    • If you’re looking to workout with resistance bands but don’t have any, old panty hose or leggings will work in a pinch. You can use these as a regular resistance band or you can tie them together to create a loop band to add resistance to your legs exercises.

Focus on Endurance and Basics

When in doubt, just keep it simple! Now may be a good time to work on your muscle endurance by doing high reps of low weights. This will improve your strength down the line. Working out at home is also a great time to work on “the basics” like core strength and functional fitness to keep you moving better and getting stronger. 

 

Remember, we are all just doing the best we can with what we have. Just getting moving in general is awesome. So, please, do what you can, listen to your needs, and hang in there.

March 19, 2020
Blog

Sleep tips for health & wellness

It’s a fact that most of us don’t get enough sleep and we know that insufficient sleep can have a variety of negative impacts on our health. So now, with the threat of a novel coronavirus and the stress caused by the pandemic situation, getting enough sleep is even more important. Sleep is essential to the proper functioning of our immune systems and helps mitigate the effects of stress on our body and mind. We’re here to provide you with some of our best tips to help you get enough sleep to support your mind and body.

1. Limit screen time

There is no shortage of scientific evidence showing that the blue light generated by electronics like tablets, smart phones, laptops, and TVs disrupts our sleep even for a while after we’ve turned them off. The best ways to eliminate that threat to our sleep is to keep all screens out of the bedroom and limit the time you spend on them before bed time. Ideally, it’s best to turn those screens off at least 30 minutes before bed – an hour is even better.

2. Create a bedtime routine

Try to create a bedtime routine for yourself. Start it at the same time each night and repeat the same steps. It doesn’t have to be complicated but you need to do it consistently. Having a consistent bedtime routine over time primes your body and mind for sleep. Your body and mind know sleep is coming when you start this routine and they’re ready for it. This makes it easier for you to fall asleep at night.

3. Practice good sleep hygiene

Removing the screens is part of this but there is more to good sleep hygiene, which essentially refers to keeping an appropriate sleep environment. For example, our bodies are programmed to sleep best in the dark. So getting your bedroom as dark as you are able to is important. The climate in your room also makes a difference. Our bodies prefer cooler ambient temperatures for sleeping – between 60 & 67 degrees F. That doesn’t mean that you can’t snuggle up under some fluffy blankets, it just means that you shouldn’t have your room super warm as well. Keeping an appropriate room temperature makes it less likely that you will wake up because you are uncomfortable.

4. Practice gratitude

One of the exercises that I give my clients who often struggle to get to sleep at night is writing a nightly gratitude list. Each night before bed, simply write down 5-10 things you are grateful for that day. The practice of doing this takes your mind out of the muck and mire of stress and puts you in a more relaxed place so it’s easier to get to sleep.

5. Get all the junk out of your head

Another exercise I give my clients who struggle with sleep is a to-do list brain dump. If you are the type who lies down and finds their mind racing or wakes up at 2 am worrying about forgetting to do something tomorrow, this is a great trick for you. Before you head to bed for the night, write down everything you need to do the next day – even down to the little stuff like washing the dishes. This will take all of those things out of your head and will remove that anxiety around forgetting to do something. You could also keep that list nearby on the off-chance that you do wake up in the middle of the night remembering something else you need to do.

Following these tips should help you get a better night’s sleep, leaving you feeling more energized, your immune system working better, and your body and mind more resilient.

- Theme by Grace Themes

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