Tag Archives: routine

Thriving Thursday: Magic Water

Every morning I wake up and have a warm glass of this Magic Water. It boosts my immune system, detoxifies my digestive tract, balances my alkaline, and starts me on the track towards a hydrated day. It was recommended to me by my naturopath last year and I didn’t bring it into my normal routine until last month.

Ok, ok, I know you’re itching to hear it what it is … LEMON WATER! Believe it or not, lemon water provides all of the following benefits:

1. Balances your pH. Most modern humans are horribly acidic. They absorb all the toxins in the air and food and it provides the perfect environment for diseases and other problems to grow. An acidic body is ripe breeding ground for inflammation, allergies, arthritis, skin problems, depression, digestive problems, stress, and chronic disease. Although the lemon is acidic, when metabolized by your body, it has an alkaline effect. For more info on the value of an alkaline body, check this site.

2. Detoxifies your digestive tract. Lemon is a natural diurectic meaning it make you pee! More urination clears toxins and unwanted material from your body. Warm water stimulates your digestive muscles and helps the solids flow more freely (if you know what I mean).

3. Detoxifies your blood (and skin). Lemon juice promotes the function of your liver, the organ that cleans your body. In the long run, this means cleaner blood. Happy, clean blood makes it harder for diseases to spread and helps the skin and hair stay healthier and clearer.

4. Boosts your immune system and other intangibles. Lemons are full of Vitamin C (anti-oxidant, anti-bacterial, immune system booster), potassium (stimulates brain and nerve function), Vitamin B (energy production, tissue repair, growth, and development) and important minerals that help build strong bones and teeth. STOP. wait. read this paragraph again…

5. Keeps your mouth busy. Lemon juice is full of pectin fiber and will keep you full for a few hours. This means I can start my day off with lemon water and Grainless Granola and don’t get hungry until about 5 hours later. Pretty incredible. Also, as mentioned above, the lemon juice stimulates your liver. A slow running liver makes for slow metabolism but a quick and healthy liver means move over Beyonce, I’m slimming down!

6. Keeps you off the bad stuff. Throughout the morning many of us need a pick-me-up. When I drink the Magic Water, I no longer need a coffee or even a cup of tea. For those of us drinking coffee (or energy drinks) laden with sugar and dairy, Magic Water can be a great option.

There’s no way you’re not convinced by now, so here’s what you do.

Instructions

Fill an 8oz glass with warm water. I do 1/2 cold water then 1/2 boiling water because the water in Peoria is no good.
Squeeze 1/2 a (real) lemon into the water. Fake lemon can have sulfites.
Stir and drink up!

You can bring it to work, you can drink it while you’re getting ready, just factor it into your routine!

Sources
My Naturopath – Dr. Kelly Austin of California Natural Health
http://factslist.net/2013/01/why-you-should-drink-lemon-water-in-the-morning/
http://www.livestrong.com/article/215380-drinking-hot-water-lemon-in-the-morning/
http://lajollamom.com/2011/01/drink-warm-lemon-water-in-the-morning/

Thirsty Thursday: Drink More Water.

7 Replies

You don’t drink enough water. Yes, I am accusing you. But have you ever questioned yourself? Most people aim for the 8 x 8 ounces glasses of water a day. THAT IS NOT ENOUGH. It’s enough to stave off dehydration and keep your body functioning but water can do so much more!

– Drinking water flushes your body of excess toxins, encourages digestion, and keeps you awake and energized.

– Sometimes people think they’re hungry when they’re actually just thirsty; so before you reach for the cookies, drink a tall glass of water.

– When you’re sick, water helps your system flush the bacteria and viruses from your body.

– If you’re trying to lose weight, water will help rinse out your digestive tract and other overloaded organs.

– You can drink it with tea, with mint leaves, with lemon or even cucumber!

– Carry a reusable bottle (BPA free) everywhere with you so that it becomes habit to drink whenever you have a free 30 seconds.

If you’re still questioning whether you drink enough, check out this awesome calculator I found:

http://nutrition.about.com/library/blwatercalculator.htm *

*At the very end the site mentions that soft drinks are a source of water. They are, but the amount of bad stuff they put in your body overrides the amount of good.

Disclaimer: The situation is different for infants and people with kidney or adrenal problems. If you are one of those people, please consult your doctor before taking my advice. Also, you CAN drink too much water. It’s very tough but doable so please don’t do it. Also, DO NOT drink your entire daily water intake at one time.

Wednesday Workouts: What Does Your Week Look Like?

4 Replies

How much do you work out? I was prepping for the fitness class I teach on Tuesday nights and I realized that, for some of my “students”, it may be the only time they workout that week. While I applaud their effort to make it a weekly habit, that amount of exercise really WON’T DO ANYTHING. So seriously, how much do you workout?

I was raised by a mom that had intense dedication to her mental and physical health. She manages to make time to workout for an hour 6 days a week. What?! That’s a lot of working out. When I lived at home, I used to get super stressed about making enough time for that. Since I’ve moved away, I’ve discovered my own rhythm and it’s working awesomely.

Some basic rules for getting results and staying healthy:

1. SET UP A ROUTINE – determine what is manageable for your schedule and energy levels and slowly work that into your daily life. I know a lot of people who write down their weekly or monthly routine, put it on the fridge so everyone can see, and then cross off the days. Then everyone knows when you’re not sticking to it.

2. INCLUDE VARIATION – I know people who can do the same workout everyday but most people need some variation. So pick a few activities like walking/running, riding your bike, swimming, weight training, etc, and give yourself options for which workout you will do.

3. HOLD YOURSELF ACCOUNTABLE – find a way to punish yourself if you don’t stick to you routine. My punishment is no dessert the night that I fail to stick to my guns. Works for me and my sweet tooth!

4. MAKE IT MANAGEABLE – don’t push your limits so hard that you burn out, make sure your routine is relatively easy to stick to and that you don’t feel like you’re spending your whole life working out.

5. did I say MAKE IT MANAGEABLE? – working out hard and often is really difficult. Ease your way into it and make sure you can sustain it.

For the past 3 months my workouts have looked like this:

3x a week – 12 to 20 minutes of the bodyweight/circuit workouts that I post here

2x a week – 20 to 40 minutes strength yoga to calm my mind, strengthen my muscles, and detox my organs.

I was resting after bike season. Now the pre-season winter training begins and I will be trading 1 yoga and 1 strength training for an hour of intervals on my bike trainer. Combine this with a healthy diet and I’m in the best shape of my life.

The Wednesday Workout for this week:

– 20 seconds on/20 seconds rest

– each exercise 3 times

– total of 12 minutes

– this workout requires you to push yourself. hard.

1. ^ butt kicks (standing in place or running)

2. ^ hip raise (if you can, lift one leg up to the sky or put your legs straight out on a fitness ball)

3. ^ pike pushup (if you can, do it with your legs elevated on a step or fitness ball)

4. ^ 45° Lunge – one direction then the other (just adding some variation to tone those small twitch muscles)

5. ^ plank (if you can, do it on hands and/or with little kicks)

SQUAT AND HOLD YOUR HAND OUT IN FRONT. quads parallel to the ground.

6. ^ sit & pray

Back to the subject: How much do you workout?

Workout Wednesday: 12 minutes and done! I swear.

Thirsty Thursday: Pick Me Up Green Machine Smoothie

Workout Wednesday: Passive Exercise

6 Replies

So this morning I was awake by 6:15am and have to be out the door by 6:45. Usually I budget at least an hour and half to wake up, workout out, shower, write this lovely little blog, then eat. This morning, no way! So I will be coming home at lunch for a quick workout and shower, but for those of you who have had the workout time squeezed out of your schedule on any given day, here are a few passive workout tips.

These should never be substituted for a real workout but should be daily rules to live by so that you don’t feel so bad when you just literally don’t have the time.

1) Always take the stairs. Always. When you get off the train and see that massive, daunting set of 12,000 stairs, look at it as your mini goal for the next 5 minutes and go for it!

2) Park far from the store entrance. If you’re in a hurry, even better, that mean’s you’ll power walk to and from your car.

3) Carry your groceries rather than bringing the cart out. There have been days when I have so many groceries in my arms that people think I’m insane, BUT I also have very sore arm muscles by the time I get to my car.

4) Do calf raises while standing in line. Again, you may look kind of weird bouncing up and down but after a few reps, people stop looking and after a few minutes, your calves are workin’ hard.

5) And this is less workout and more just something to live by, stand up straight! Always! This not only tightens your core and makes you more stable in your real workouts but it’s so good for your current and future spine health to have great posture.

Ok time to brush my teeth and head out! I hope you’re all having fantastic days.

Smile 🙂

Workout Tuesday: Dance Like No One’s Watching

7 Replies

Yes, you should dance like no one’s watching. To encourage you, I’ve decided to make a complete fool of myself and dance while everyone’s watching.

For the last several years there has been a long and arduous debate about warming up before a workout. Some studies show it’s good, some show you’re fine without it. Whatever the case, I know that my body needs to warm up to a workout otherwise I will twist or strain something. But traditional warm ups suck! So I dance!

Dancing at 7am is not only incredibly energizing but it puts you in a great mood for the rest of the day. So just put on a great song (see below) and loosen up. Dancing alone means you can do whatever weirdo moves you want.

I find that this is great dancing AND workout music:

And this was the workout I did with Zuzka today:

And finally, the piece de resistance, my ridiculous dance moves, published and open for laughs. Now you have NO EXCUSE not to dance!

You also now have no excuse not to smile. Have a happy day!

Braving a World of Junk Food: Packing a Lunch

Produce: Where and How…

4 Replies

Happy Saturday! Holy Bajolies this week has been crazy. I seriously can’t believe it’s Saturday already. Saturday morning is my grocery shopping time and I have a full day of work this afternoon so I woke up bright and early (and not too happily), did a quick spot of yoga to loosen up my stiff joints, and headed across the street to Peoria’s best farmer’s market.

A few awesome things about farmer’s markets:

1. You know exactly where everything comes from.

2. It’s all fresh.

3. It’s mostly organic too, although you have to check on this one.

4. You’re supporting the local farmers and keeping out the unhealthy, mass farms.

5. You get outside and interact with your community.

6. The food is SO much tastier than the grocery store produce.

7. You’re eating seasonal which varies your diet and provides inspiration in the kitchen.

Some things to be cautious of:

– Keep an eye on pricing, sometimes one or two items can be very expensive.

– Don’t over buy. It can be tempting with all the beautiful colors in front of you. But here’s a tip, go with a certain amount of cash (I take $25) and leave once you’ve spent it.

– Scan the whole spread of vendors before choosing the stands you will buy from, you may get to the end and realize one was much better than another.

Other than that, enjoy! I buy 50% of our fridge stock from our market and it’s made our diet so much better. I’ve come to look forward to it every week.

Check this site out for almost all the markets in the US: http://www.localharvest.org/farmers-markets/

For those outside the US, just google “Farmer market [name of your town].”

^ pretty!

don’t forget —> 🙂

Riddle Me This

2 Replies

As I’ve mentioned before, I work for a health center; our health center is based on chiropractic and we build from there. We help strengthen your nerve system (the spine/center of all that goes on in your body) and then help our patients with nutrition, exercise, and a healthy mind. We have helped so many people in just the few months that I’ve been there and it just gets me more and more excited about my job. A huge part of my day-to-day is getting out in the community and finding people that want help getting healthy but don’t know step one. Easy right? WRONG.

^ (Sweet T-shirt huh? Thank you Martha Stewart Pintrest.)

Riddle me this: why do people who know they need help resist it in every way possible? Granted, there are people who come along, tell us they have one or two annoying symptoms and then conclude that they don’t have the time or money to get them fixed, fair enough. But there are others, so many others, who come into our little booth with daily headaches, crippling back pain, and joint pain so bad that they can’t work. We talk to them, prove that there’s something going wrong by giving them an inflammation scan, and then offer them care at a very low cost, very. They look at me with pain in their face and say, “can I take a business card, maybe I’ll call you later,” then they never do. WTF mate?? I just don’t get it.

Why do some people not get help when an obvious solution is shown right to their face? I understand, some people are looking for “the catch.” But what would it hurt to just come and see what we can do? If you don’t give anything a chance then you’ll never get fixed! This applies not only to our little booth but to every person out there who reads this blog or another blog multiple times and thinks, “hmmm, nope that’s still too hard.” Or the people that make the step to get gym memberships but then never hire a trainer or establish a routine for themselves. Or the people that know fast food is terribly terribly terrible for you and they continue to stop at McDonald’s instead of swinging by the grocery store. It’s intimidating and maybe a little expensive at first but so are heart attacks and kidney transplants. Stop living in pain and discomfort and do something about it!! Your body is designed to heal itself as long as you take care.

Ok, that is my Friday rant. To all those that read this and nod their head and then put on their gym clothes and get in that workout that they SO don’t want to do this morning, NICE WORK. Go get ’em! Keep that body and mind fit so that you can do all those other wonderful things in your life.

So today, I will head to Morton Pumpkinfest and smile my warmest smile. I will try to help people that are scared and clueless to start the first step. I will smile my warmest smile.

A Happy Lass

One woman's journey to her healthiest body and mind.