Stop doing what doesn't work.

For 16 years you've walked the same walking route at the same time every morning, usually with the very same person. 6 kilometres, every morning, yet still you're overweight... What does that tell you?

It's not working. 

Your body has got used to that amount of exercise and has made the adjustments internally to accommodate the same amount of energy you burn each morning. 

From where I am standing, you have two options. Continue to do the same, and continue to get the same results or change to something else that works. 

Ride a bike, buy some hand weights, skip, jog a little, walk another route in the evening instead, visit a gym, see a PT who really does have your best interests at heart, go for a swim. Anything that gives your body something else to think about. It does not have to be difficult nor cost a lot of money. 

Same results or different?

You choose. 

Food Focus.. Mindless eating

More flights, more airline food, more Qantas club coffee and treats.... I'm up to my eyes in poor food choices, in free licorice all sorts and snack packs of corn nuts hard enough to break diamonds. Having racked up more frequent flyer points this month than in the first 6 months of last year, I have come to a number of conclusions, airline hostesses are not dieticians,  the 'healthy treat' served on QF 2410 is not actually a healthy treat, the bizarre combination of chicken, pimento and risone gives me bad chest pain, and Qantas clubs should have a separate section for beer swilling, thong wearing shutdown workers flying home on days off. 

These days, I spend a lot of time in airport lounges, supposedly writing speeches and creating presentations on healthy lifestyle choices. But instead I find  myself studying people. To pass the time, I makeup stories to match what I see, like the little girls catching a flight today to visit an absent Dad, or the elderly couple heading off to a great grandchild's christening. 

I also study body language, demeanour, habits. And if people choose to sit near me and speak overly loudly in pompous voices on their mobile phones, I will listen in. Sometimes I have to stop myself from responding, but only sometimes. 

So here I sit amongst thousands of people, most of whom are mindlessly eating and drinking  their time away, all waiting for flights. I've  just watched whilst a fellow, who's comfortably perched on two velour cubes pushed together, munch his way through three bowls of crunchy snacks, two large handfuls of jelly beans, 6 Venetian biscuits and 6 beers, all without taking his eyes off his computer screen. His travelling partner, PA, wife, long suffering girlfriend, whomever, has hopped up and filled the bowls, or beers as required, without one word being uttered.

I wonder if he actually tasted any of that food? If he could describe to me the crunch of the first bite of Ventian Pastry, recall the tang of the sweet passionfruit icing? I wondered if he could remember the tasty spice flavouring of the crunchy pappadum type of cracker he devoured? I thought about if he looked at the colour of each sweet sugary jellybean that he threw into his cavernous mouth? I wonder if he realised the bowl was actually empty as his hand searched for more?

How many of us are guilty of that? Of being so busy focusing on something else that we eat only because we are bored, or we are in a hurry, or we throw our food down quickly before our babies start to cry. We eat almost out of habit rather than necessity or for enjoyment. 

When my twins were very small and Will was just 10 months older, and  the beautiful Cate 12 months younger, I remember taking up drinking hot water, because at least when it went invariably cold, I could still drink it when I had time, unlike my coffee. 

Life was busy, and I learned to make our own versions of fast food. I created one pot wonders, to minimise washing up, I fed all three babies with one bowl and one spoon, usually whilst breast feeding the other. I was the Queen of Fast, home prepared but easy to cook, probably not extremely nutritious food, out of sheer necessity. I cooked fast, I ate fast. Everything was frantic! 

No longer.

I have learned the hard way, that mindless eating and eating quickly has an unwelcome effect. I try now to eat slowly, to taste the food, to cook with finest ingredients that my budget allows, to use fresh produce and minimise the preservatives I use every day.

I still eat at Qantas Club, I still eat the odd Counter lunch at the Star, I still have my trusty favourite foods that I can create at home in a wink of an eye, but the difference is, I'm now mindful about what I eat and how I eat. And that, I'm sure makes the difference.

One trick I've started to use is mentally describe my first mouthful of food... Is is salty, sweet, hot cold, flavoured? It makes me focus on what I'm eating and has helped me slow down, to relax and enjoy the food. And I've now stopped eating food that is boring or bland. A trip to Paris has made me realise the beauty in food, and in slowing down to enjoy the moments. It taught me to eat well. To eat fresh food, to shop daily and stop buying processed food. it taught me To laugh a lot, to love my family and the appreciate the beauty in my surroundings. 

I can't wait to go back. One day, I will spend 6 months in the French countryside. 

Until then, Bon appetit. 

Negativity and the effects of..

Howdy,

First blog in a while, because I've been depressed and hiding in my room. Seriously, I have.. 

I've recently been unwell, having caught one of those 36 hour bugs which I don't usually get. It actually knocked me rotten. I have struggled to get back to where I was fitness wise since then, but I've listened to my body and taken it slowly. Been gentle with myself for probably the first time ever. 

During this period, I also volunteered to be the guinea pig for a friend who is completing an assessment in her fitness course. I was just starting to feel better, and I was just getting back into walking. Life was returning to normal. I arrived for my first session to be weighed and measured..  I was pretty upbeat and happy that I could help.

After I left that session, I collapsed into a state of deep depression. According to an electronic device sold in chemists, that measures an electrical current and the resistance your body has to it, my body fat percentage was 40%. 

40% WTF?

 All I could think of was almost half of my remaining body weight is fat? I'm a size 12 and I have 40% body fat? How much did I have before I lost 70kgs? 160%?

This figure rocked me to the core. I eat Paleo, I do not eat chocolate, or lollies, or drink alcohol etc. I exercise every day of the week. And most of that exercise is high energy, hard work exercise. I run 4 times a week. All these things were spinning through my head at a million miles an hour. I went to my local gym to see what the machine there said, but no one knew how to use it. Probably a good thing.

That number has spent the last week rattling around in my head. I've spent hours web searching how to make a difference, other than exercise every day and eat well. That number has consumed me, my waking thoughts, my dreams at night. I have not been in a good place. 

Over the weekend, I gave myself a bit of a pep talk - I couldn't believe that I had let something as silly as a digital number in a screen have such a negative effect on my head. I got up this morning with a renewed zest for exercise and headed off to Boot Camp. I huffed and puffed my way through 50 minutes of hard work, of weights and burpees and push-ups... And I feel fantastic.

I've drank more water today than I probably did for the whole of last week, and I feel more energetic, more alive and much happier than at any stage in the last fortnight. 

Today I found out that the machine was not reading right, and according the the good old calliper pinch test, my results are nowhere near that. But, even if they were, it's a number. Just like the reading on the scales, it does not define you. You are not your weight. You are a beautiful, alive, happy, healthy woman that does her best to get where she wants to go, every day.

In the last fortnight, I have not blogged because I have felt like a fraud, a fake, all because of that one bloody number.  But really, Why should it matter? 

If, as a person, you know in your heart that you are doing the best you can every day, to reach your goal, that should be all that matters. You against you. Your personal best of yesterday against your personal best of today. Your goals, your life, your way.

That's what matters. Not the scales, not the body fat percentage, not the callipers.. 

You matter, your health matters, and your happiness matters. Do what you can do to make a difference to those. 

I'm glad I crawled out from my cave of sadness this morning... Hope you are too. It's a much nicer world out here.