by Lucy | Mar 10, 2017 | Motivational Mondays
Monday, March 13, 2017
How much sleep you get, how you wind down at the end of the day, the quality of your sleep, and how you wake up in the morning has A LOT to do with your weight and general well-being.
Don’t take it from me! Here is more information from Health Ambition on how our sleep patterns affect our weight and wellness.
-Our sleeping patterns affect our hormones, such as ghrelin and leptin, regulating hunger cues which control our appetite.
-Studies show sleep deprivation leads people to choose higher-calorie foods and an increased caloric intake for the day.
Improving sleep hygiene:
There are plenty of external factors affecting sleep patterns, and some that you can control.
- Get in a routine – Yes, I know it sounds boring, but I tried to get in bed and on my way to sleepy town by 10:30 PM every night. Preferably earlier! Each time you disrupt your routine – a.k.a. weekends – it can cause a jet lag like effect on your circadian rhythm.
- Remove the blinking, glowing, distracting, and other light disturbances. I’m looking at you Wi-Fi router, digital alarm clocks, TVs, and glowing A/C adaptors. These subtle yet bright lights in the bedroom can affect our sleepy hormone levels and circadian rhythm. If you absolutely cannot move them I highly recommend adopting an eye pillow (or childhood “blanky,” like me!) to block out the light disturbances.
- You don’t really need to know the time. If you must get up at a particular hour, set an alarm on the phone, and don’t bother looking at the time if you wake up unexpectedly in the middle of the night. Each time we look at the clock it starts a story in our minds about how “I didn’t get enough sleep, I must fall back asleep to get ‘enough’ sleep!”
- Consider meditation. Meditation is a powerful tool for living a well-balanced life. It’s less about emptying your mind of all thoughts because that is unrealistic. Meditation is the practice of focusing your mind on one calming thought. I find it useful to focus on my breath or start counting backward from 1000. Yep, that can be considered meditation. So go ahead and count the sheep and let yourself enjoy a restful night, waking up feeling refreshed. No matter how many hours of sleep you got.
Food for thought:
Did you notice I didn’t include a specific number of hours to sleep each night? That’s because it’s different for all of us! I need at least 7 hours to feel great, but my hyperactive business lawyer can function normally with 5 hours of sleep.
Try an experiment next weekend: Go to bed when you’re tired, and wake up when your body wants to wake up.
- How many hours did you sleep?
- How can you improve your sleep hygiene this week?
Let us know how you’re sleeping in the comments below 🙂
by Lucy | Jan 5, 2017 | Well Balanced Wisdom
One of the easiest things you can do for weight loss is simply to step on the scale every day. I know, I know… you would rather eat a frog than see that number on the scale but hear me out. Once you own a scale it’s free to use, it takes just a second to complete, anyone can do it and research has shown that it is an effective weight loss tool.
In one study, participants were asked to weigh daily on a smart scale. The weight was sent automatically to researchers and the participants received weekly feedback by email. Participants were not told to change any other behaviors. On average, the intervention group weighed 6 days a week and consumed fewer calories/day (approx 300 calories less!) compared to the control group who weighed sporadically. That led to an average 13.5-pound weight loss in the intervention group and all they had to do was weigh themselves! Other studies that included daily weighing for weight control had similar results.
But what if the number you see on the scale makes you fret? Doesn’t it have negative effects on how you feel? Contrary to what you might expect, intervention participants in the study mentioned above, perceived daily weighing positively. And results of another study indicate that daily self-weighing does not cause adverse psychological outcomes such as depression, binge eating or other signs of disordered eating.*
While it may seem scary at first, the scale is not your enemy. The magic is all in the way you use it.
Here are some rules for daily self-weighing.
- Expect some fluctuation. Your weight will fluctuate 1-3 pounds every day regardless of your behaviors. Any fluctuation within that range is normal and to be expected. This is your grace period. Weight gain beyond 3lbs should serve as a warning sign to change your behaviors.
- Use your weight as feedback that lets you know what’s working and what is not. When you see a significant change on the scale think back to what you’ve been doing the past day or two that may be affecting your weight. If your weight is going up, use the opportunity to make tweaks to your eating and exercise habits now before it creeps up even higher and becomes harder to get off.
- Weigh at the same time every day on the same scale. Your weight not only fluctuates from day to day but also hour to hour. For example, you will likely weigh more in the evening than you will in the morning. Sticking to the same time every day gives you the most accurate comparison.
- Be consistent. Research shows those who way every day lose more weight than those who weigh 4 or 5 times a week. Think of it as a morning ritual just like brushing your teeth.
- Remember that your weight is only part of your health picture. It shouldn’t be the ONLY tool you use to monitor your eating and exercise behavior. Use it in combination with how you are sleeping, how much energy you have, how your clothes fit and so on. Weighing every day does not mean you shouldn’t look for those other non-scale victories.
So there you have it. While it may not sound fun to face that number every day, daily weighing is a simple tool that can influence your lifestyle habits and help you lose weight.
Were you shocked to hear that weighing every day can help you lose weight?
What fears, hesitations or thoughts do you have about weighing regularly?
What’s the worst thing and the best thing that could happen if you started weighing every day?
Will you give it a try? Let me know in the comments!
*An important caveat: These studies have screened out people with a history of eating disorders — who might obsess about weight and respond to falling or rising numbers with extreme dieting or binging.
by Lucy | Jan 1, 2017 | Motivational Mondays
Monday, Jan 2, 2017
We are all story tellers. I used to say I’m a terrible story teller, mostly because of my tendency to get off track and ruin the punch line (I call it my “shiny object syndrome”).
Now I see the story my mind is telling me on almost a daily basis. If I’m tired or run down the story is not all sunshine and butterflies but instead my thoughts are focused on what it difficult or “wrong.” Most days I choose a better story. I am healthy. I love my job. I enjoy helping people. I am blessed. I am grateful.
As the New Year began I asked a few healthy people – like yourself – about their own wellness story that separated them from the pack. After listening to many stories I noticed a trend. For most successful well-balanced people their lifestyle choices are simple, mindful, and fun/delicious.
It’s simple
A hair stylist and friend of mine was telling me his own 20 pound weight loss story of 2016. He said it was “almost so simple it’s silly,” but he stopped buying the trigger foods that were preventing
him from reaching his goal weight. When he cut out fast food, stopped buying Oreos, and included breakfast daily the weight easily came off (and that was without exercise!). Instead of going out for fast food he bought pita bread and alternated between hummus, peanut butter, or deli meat with cheese as an easy lunch or dinner option. He consistently eats boiled eggs with fruit for breakfast and occasionally treats himself to fried eggs, bacon and hash browns.
It’s mindful
A client of mine, who we will call Janice, was mostly on-track when we started to meet last Summer, but she struggled with her snack habit. Janice knew the candy, granola bars, and other munchies at the office were preventing her from reaching her goals. She worked in a high stress environment and often turned to snacks as a stress reliever. Janice put the DATA system into action and practiced mindful eating consistently for three weeks. In that time she lost 6 pounds! Each time she thought about reaching for a snack she paused, described the situation to herself, acknowledged it was just a temporary craving, and turned to a different activity such as deep breathing or a walk around the office. Janice soon discovered she didn’t need to force herself to eat salads for lunch every day and instead she cut the mindless snacks out and remains on-track today.
It’s fun or delicious
I met a gal, Carla, last week who loves cheesecake. She is a diabetic and knows how carbohydrates and simple sugars affect her glucose (sugar in the blood). In the last 4 years, she has progressively changed her diet to primarily eating fruits, vegetables, protein, and some complex carbs – such as whole wheat bread or pasta, quinoa, and oats. However, she still hears the call of the cheesecake when she goes grocery shopping. Carla will occasionally give into the call and buys a small cake with the intention of eating one slice a day for a week. She admits the cake is usually gone within 24 hours. While we talked, I suggested a delicious alternative to the cheesecake. Now, Carla mitigates her cheesecake cravings with 1 graham cracker, a bit of all fruit spread, and whipped cream cheese. She reports this offers a sweet and creamy alternative without guilt or running the risk of high blood sugars!
Another example, when Mama Cathy decided to get more active she knew weight training and walking on the treadmill at the gym was not her idea of a good time. Instead, she tapped into her love of group fitness classes and religiously signs up for the 10-week water aerobics sessions every quarter. She looks forward to playing in the water and getting a great workout every Monday and Wednesday evening. Having a fun exercise also stops her from making less healthy food choices so as to not “undo” all of the work in the pool.
Food for thought:
New Year’s resolutions aside, when thinking about your own wellness goals and initiatives are they simple, mindful, or fun?
If not, how can you simplify your good habits?
How can you make them more mindful?
And where’s the fun?!
If you’re looking for more guidance in 2017, we hope you’ll check out Restart, Rebalance to get you the personalized support you need!
by Lucy | Dec 9, 2016 | Motivational Mondays
Monday, December 12, 2016
I have a client, we will call her Clare, and last week she told me how she is such a procrastinator after not implementing the evening exercise routine we discussed at her previous appointment. Clare works a desk job in Durham from 7:30 AM to 4:30 PM Monday-Friday. After work, she has a 30 minute commute home, a puppy to take outside, and dinner to fix for her elderly father. When finished with dinner, cleaning up, and getting ready for the next workday, Clare enjoys lounging on the sofa watching TV or visiting with her father. This is not the time of day she feels motivated to get up and start exercising!
Clare spent 4 weeks between appointments feeling guilty about not getting into the exercise routine we had planned. She continued to work hard monitoring her eating and portion sizes; however, all of that work was overshadowed in her mind by her lack of physical activity.
What went wrong?
We can see the exercise strategy we put together was not conducive to Clare’s lifestyle. The other underlying issue, that’s less obvious, is the story that played in her mind over those 4 weeks. Clare was convinced the only way she could be successful at exercise was to walk or do another activity that raised her heart rate for 30 consecutive minutes. In this scenario, Clare demonstrates a fixed mindset, meaning when she was not successful she could not think of other options that would work better for her. In our conversation, I gave Clare a gift – the gift of a growth mindset! Now she can use these barriers or “problems” as learning opportunities instead of brick walls that stop her from achieving her goals.
Food for thought
Have you been hitting your head against a brick wall?
Most of us have a personal or professional improvement goal, and sometimes all we see are the barriers keeping us from reaching that goal.
Today, take a moment to think of your barriers as learning opportunities instead of problems. What can you learn and do differently?
by Lucy | Nov 30, 2016 | Well Balanced Wisdom
The other day I was listening to a play back of a message I left for someone. It is so strange to hear your own voice, right? The first thing I noticed was that I took really long pauses in between my words. Maybe it is something that only I notice or maybe it is something other people pick up on too. Either way, I am a bit self conscience about it but here is why it happens.
I have grown incredibly aware of how important our words can be. Words, the things that fly out of our mouths, sometimes all willy-nilly like, can leave a lasting impact. You might remember a specific moment when someone’s words made a lasting impression on you – for better or for worse. Maybe it was a motivational speaker or something that was said during an argument. Those are big moments.
Even in the small, everyday mundane moments, our words matter. We can really be in the habit of saying the same words over and over without realizing it. A simple example is how many times we go around saying something like… “How are you?” “Fine, and you?” “Have a good day!”
Now dig a little deeper and think about all the other things we just automatically say. As a parent, I say “See?! Now that’s what you get for doing XYZ.” Or, “That’s why we don’t stand up in the chair.” Ugh… it just comes out like word vomit. I cringe when I hear myself saying that because no one needs to be reminded of a mistake they made in the midst of the pain. Chances are they’ve learned the lesson and they just need a little empathy and understanding.
We can say similar things to ourselves, often without noticing. I ask my clients to weigh themselves daily if they are trying to lose weight, but I tell them to be careful of their words and thoughts as they are doing it.
“I’m so fat.” “I can’t believe I ate all that.” “I’ll never lose this weight.”
These are the kinds of words and thoughts that can really sabotage our best efforts. When we see or hear negative words our bodies send out stress signals. Even worse, when we do it over and over again we can really start to believe those words. The more we hear, read, or speak a word or phrase, the more power it has over us. This is because the brain is always searching for patterns and repetitions in order to make sense of the world around us.
Instead of letting words get the best of us, we can use the power of words our advantage. We first have to gain awareness and then control over that which we are exposing ourselves to daily. Our natural tendency is to focus on the negative, and it takes work to turn that around. So when I speak slowly, it’s because I am consciously making an effort to catch and cancel out those negative words. It’s definitely a work in progress.
Food for thought:
What words do you speak, read or think repeatedly?
Try this today:
Go on a negativity diet.
- First, notice and be aware of your negative words and thoughts.
- When they pop up, you can say, “cancel, cancel, cancel!”
- Replace negative words with positive ones. Try saying challenge instead of problem or yes, later instead of no, not right now.
- Replace judgments and criticisms with words of kindness. We are all doing the best we can so be kind to yourself and others. Or if you must give negative feedback try sandwiching it between two positive statements/thoughts.
Boost the Power of Positivity. The next key is feeding your brain more good thoughts than bad.
- For every one negative thought you have, generate 3 to 5 positive thoughts. Your positive thoughts don’t have to be perfect, sound good or even make sense.
Feed your brain a hefty portion of positive words at least 3 times a day.
- Start your day by reading or saying positive affirmations, quotes or scripture.
- End your emails with a happy message.
- Drink from a cup with an uplifting message on it.
- Plaster sticky notes with positivity on your mirror, computer, phone, etc.
Tell us..
What ideas or thoughts do you have on the power of words?
