Motivation For Getting Fit.

So lately, I've been binge watching The Biggest Loser. I feel like it's more productive than watching Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives. Besides, I haven't quiet reached that level of self control yet. I used to watch it while I worked out, but now, if I did, I'm afraid I'd eat the entire kitchen. Literally, counter tops and all. 
Anyway, in the Biggest Loser, they talk a lot about what their motivation is. For a lot of them it's their kids. Some of them it's health reasons. And some just don't like where they are in life and want to go some where else. (I think the $250,000 prize helps a little bit too.)
Anyway, it got me thinking why am I doing this?  Mostly, because I can't fit into my pants anymore, and I've been relegated to my skirts. Another thing is, I didn't like what I saw in my videos. I know other people may not notice things, but we're our own worst critic. I would watch my make up videos and just have this entire dissatisfaction with how I looked. The same for a lot of pictures. 
Another reason, I want to feel good about myself. I know people freak out when people are down on themselves. It's not always that. Sometimes, we're not satisfied with how we are. It's never a bad thing to get healthy. 
At work, my co-workers are all trying to loose weight. Some of them are doing crazy diets. (I commend them for staying with them. I can't diet. I get mean and then I binge eat--everything.) Others joined gyms. Again, not my shtick. I count my calories, loosely albeit, but I try none the less. I've found I enjoy getting up and working out in the morning before work. Mostly because it wakes me up in the morning, and encourages me to be more ready for the day. 
So I figured, I'd remind everyone to look at their motivation. On those days when you say no I don't want to. It's too hard, just remember your motivation.  It doesn't have to be the most important thing in the world either. For example, I used to work out because I wanted to be hot enough to be in a PitBull video. Noble motivation. Not really, but a motivation none the less. 

Just remember, when you want to quit, what made you start in the first place. 

  

Eating Habits

Oh man. I hate talking about eating habits, because then I have to examine my own, which aren't too pretty.  Unfortunately, for my life examining your eating habits is crucial to weight loss.  Now, I don't know if any of you remember the Jenny Craig commercial.  If you're happy and you know it, eat a snack.  If you're sad and you know it, eat a snack. Yeah. That's me.  Or if you're bored and you know it eat a snack.  So examining my eat habits is terrifying. I can sit down and literally eat like two boxes of Cheeze-its and then eat dinner, and then have a snack. Yeah, I'm that person. 

That's me. 

But, honestly, you need to look at what you eat. That is a major part of loosing weight, and just in general being more healthy. 

Here are a few things I've found help me be aware of what I'm eating. 

Asking myself, am I hungry? 

I'm a bored, emotional, social eater. Basically, if you can use it as an excuse to eat, I use it. A lot of the time, I'm bored. Mindlessly watching tv, eating food, which is the worse, but because I feel like I need to eat something simply because I've trained myself that tv is the place to eat. 

Ok, one way to remedy this... don't watch as much tv. 

But on days I end up at my dad's house and there's junk food and tv galore I usually ramp up my snack intake. The thing I've started doing is drinking water., simply so I have the sensation of putting something in my mouth. Sure, it's substitution method, but it works for me. If I drink the water I don't eat the food. 

Another thing I do is count my calories. I use the my fitness pal app and count the calories. It really makes me aware of what I'm putting in my body. I don't believe in denying myself, but seeing something and then knowing I have so many calories left it makes me wonder if I want to waste my calories on it. 

Sometimes, the simple fact of being aware amps up what I do and don't eat. Along with this don't drink your calories. 

Have you ever thought about how many calories are in a soda. My two sodas a week thing hasn't worked as well this month. It's been a long month. But honestly, drinks count. 

Last thing is know your week points. That will help you avoid them. Where I work, there's a plethora of food, and most if it's fatty and sweet. At first, I had a problem with grazing at the food all day. And I still do, but not as much. I knew it was a problem area, so I took what control I did have and had the food choices be more healthy. Or I learned to say no to it. 

Now the problem is home. When I get home, I eat food non-stop. I get really horrible fast food cravings too. I know that on certain nights, I'm going eat out.  Those are the hard nights. 

 Those are the hard nights. But I overcome them some how, and some times I don’t. Personalty, food guilt is the worse guilt of all. 

I know we all struggle with it. I hope this helps you in some way. 

Here's a few more motivational posters for you to look at. 

Finding Time To Workout

If you've been around this blog any length of time, you'll know I talk about loosing weight regularly. It's kind of an obsession? But do I stick to it. Not really. No.  I'm actually proud of myself for having come this far. Once upon a time, I worked out every day and tried to stay under 1200 calories. I got down to 123 back then, but obviously, now that I'm clocking in at 155+ those days are behind me.  We all have an ideal weight. For me, that's an athletic 123. I look good at 105, but I'm almost too thin at that point.  Now, on to my actual point. When I was 123, I'm not kidding I came home worked out, got up at 5 am every day packed my lunch. I felt and looked great, so what's the difference between then and now?  Motivation.  Self-control.  What's the most common excuse? I don't have time. 

I've used this one a million times before. I just don't have time to exercise. I wait too long, and it's 11 PM and I think it's rude to pound on the ceiling of my downstairs neighbors. 

I take a nap, doodle around, do nothing for hours on end. Or sit in front of the evil TV allowing my brain to rot out. 

There are genuine times when I am too busy and it does get too late, but usually it's just me not making the time. 

What I've found works best is scheduling it, but knowing my schedule. So for example, my job exhausts me so I don't work out every day. (If I did, I'd probably lose weight faster.) I alternate days of working out with days of writing. Sometimes, I'm just not focused enough to write; other days I'm too tired to work out. 

Like I say, you have find what works for you. but you have to do it. You have the amount of time you make. 

As always,

Yoga VS Aerobic Exercise

Now, I'm not a personal trainer. I can only speak to the research I've found, personally. Also, the things I've experienced for myself. 

 I'll get this out of the way. On a personal level, I enjoy yoga, but I have to team it up with aerobics to see any true changes in my body. I do know that when I did yoga I did build a lot of strength. I went from not being able to do the back bend at all to being able to hold it for a ten count. 

So despite the meditation aspect of yoga that some people employ, exercise in general improves your outlook. Elle said it best.

Now into the comparison. 

  

So calories burned? Aerobics does it best. Yoga does burn calories, but you're most likely going to burn more doing a hard aerobic exercise. Now, if any of you care, there are hot yoga and Vinyasa that burn a lot of calories, but still Aerobics is going to burn more in general. That goes with fat as well. Aerobics vs Yoga in calories and fat burned

Point to Aerobics. 

Just because aerobics burns more calories doesn't mean it's better for your muscles. Sure if you're doing weight lifting, you'll gain muscle, but aerobics and yoga. Yoga trains your muscles better. 

  Aerobics can't help you do that. 

Aerobics vs Yoga in strength

Point to Yoga

So cardiac benefits do go to aerobics. It hasn't been proven that yoga has cardiac benefits. Now the stretching of yoga is better for realigning and relaxing muscles.

Again, I like a mix of both. 

If you've got problems, like a bad knee I would recommend starting with yoga until you get strength built up. I mean if doing things like Brazilian Butt Lift are too intense, yoga is a great place. Like I said, I actually enjoy a mix of both. Yoga feels great on my tight muscles and sometimes I'm too tired to do hard core exercise  

Natural Summer Makeup Look

Here's a natural make up look for summer. 

Makeup Forever Color Corrector pallette.  Sephora Make Up foundation Nyx Wonder Stick  Sephora pressed powder.  Ulta Eye shadow Pallete Base: Nude Crease: Milk Chocolate Outer Corner: Baroque  Under Eye/Crease: Topaz Eyeliner: Mr. Write (Now) Jac with Topaz on top Jelly Pong Pong Fairy Curl Mascara E.L.F Golden Bronzer quad:  Lightest shade inner corner highlight Bronzer Starlook lip liner: Sangria NARS Velvet Matte Lip Pencil Mally High Shine Liquid Lipstick  NYX Setting Spray

Protein Shakes

So, one thing I’ve found that I enjoy are protein shakes. I’m not  a vegan—I require protein. A lot of it. I’m actually probably anemic. So I like to take protein shakes as meal replacements to get protein.

As a side note, you shouldn’t really try protein shakes or muscles milk if you’re not working out. It will make you fat—I’m speaking from personal experience.

At first I was trying the SlimFast protein shakes. It was supposed to suppress your appetite for up to four hours. I’ve noticed that anything that’s supposed to make me not eat usually makes me ravenous. No clue, maybe it’s all in my head. So I started shopping around for something that was in price range and I liked.

I stumbled upon TrueSource and the thing that compelled me to buy it was the coupon attached to the top. The SlimFast stuff is in Chocolate, but I’m not really a Chocolate fan. Sometimes I’ll use it still just because it’s there. The TrueSource is in vanilla. It has 20g of protein, and is gluten free.

So with protein shakes you need the shake mix, a liquid base, and you can other things if you want. Personally, I like mine to be a frappe/smoothie consistency so I add ice cubes and blend.

Here are a few of the recipes I personally like.

Coffee Shake

• Ice cubes
• Vanilla Protein Shake
• Coconut Milk
• Cold coffee
• Combine. Blend. Enjoy

Pina Colada

• Coconut Milk
• Coconut shavings
• Pineapple chuncks
• Ice
• Vanilla Protein
• Combine. Blend. Enjoy.

Fruit Frenzy

• All the excess fruit you can find chopped up. 
• Ice
• Vanilla Protein
• Combine Blend.Enjoy.

Carrot Cake Protein Shake

This one is not original to me. I found it on Crazy Adventures in Parenting and adapted it.

• ½ cup of grated carrots
• 5 to 10 Ice Cubes
• 1/2 to 1 cup of coconut milk
• Vanilla Protein Powder
• Nutmeg, pumpkin pie spice, and cinnamon.
• Combine. Blend. Enjoy.

Gingersnap Protein Shake

Here's another adapted protien shake from My Recipe Magic 

•  ice cubes 
• 1/2 cup Coconut Milk
• 1 Scoop Vanilla Protein powder 
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger 
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon 
• 1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg 
• Combine. Blend. Enjoy.

I hope you all enjoy some of these as we pretend to get fit together. Although, sometimes these are just good to eat. 

Sorry no pictures of my own shakes. They're kind of anticlimactic. I don't get all fancy with them. 

Budget Check In

All right sooo… you know how I had that budget page back in January.  It was really great right? I thought it was.  I haven’t stuck to filing it out on a monthly basis, but I’ve stayed pretty close to it. For the most part. Life likes to through curve balls, every once in a while. 

As far as the money envelopes, I need to find a better system. I like having the money with me, but then that makes me worry about my purse and keeping track of the change is always a fun adventure. Also, I try to keep track of the spending, but then I just have a bunch of receipts, and for some reason, they irritate me.

But, I have done a lot of tracking my spending on my online spending tracker. It has categories for everything and a pie chart that shows how much money I’m spending on different things. That makes it pretty easy for me. I either need a longer wallet or smaller envelopes. I have an idea to make my own, but that requires effort and time and pretty paper. All of which are beyond me at the present moment.

I can say that I have started throwing any extra money either into my cash savings spot or into my savings account. Also, the pie chart and the categorizing has helped me reign in my unnecessary spending—to a degree. 

(We won’t talk about the 30$ I dropped on books. In my defense that was extra money.)

So, this is a yes and no sort of response. Yes, I have controlled my spending. No, I haven’t stuck to it the way I had hoped.

I’m debating going back to the cash envelopes. I mean, I take out the cash immediately for my large cost things, like rent, Israel, and the car, but my petty cash not so much. I may do a DIY next month on how to make your own envelopes and go back to it then. I know I’ve got some major changes coming up soon.

30 Day Plank Challenge

So. trying to get fit, I've decided to take the 30 Day Plank Challenge. Why? I don't know. Just kidding. Goals. So this is the challenge. 

So far, I'm day 5, although, I had to switch dates for the Rest Day. I was sick last night and so yeah. No planking. The goal is get to 5 minutes by the end of the month. 

I can hold it for a whole 40 seconds. lol. 

Here's some funny stuff to make you laugh and revel in my pain with me. 

Anyway, 

As Always,

April Goals

Welcome Back to my blog. Getting started again with life it feels like. Nothing says I'm back like a new blog background. Ok, so this month will be check in for savings and weight loss (haha)

But we're gonna get back on it. 

1. Limit myself to two sodas a week.

2. Work out two times a week. 

3. Write for 30 minutes 3 times a week. 

4. Save up $100 in cash from end of month savings.

Small list. You know me. Never to ambitious. 

However, if I get to 125, I'm going to buy myself the Keyvn Aucoin Makeup. I saw Zabrena do a review of this and the gossamer powder and I wants. 

So once I loose enough weight I'll buy it for myself.