My Flat/Bulky Issue

Somebody, please tell me that I am not alone! I have this issue that’s been present since I lost weight last year: my bubble butt seems to have lost a great deal of helium. My once “juicy” booty (a title given to me by the creepy stranger in my senior English class, not by my ego) has flattened out. 

I see some progress when I do a lot of squats and lunges, but the thing is, my quadriceps bulk up twice as fast as my tush, and in no time, I look like the She-Hulk!!! So in order to fit my man thighs into my regular jeans, I cut back on the squats, and two days later my thighs are still bulky and my butt is flatter than ever.

Honestly, what’s a girl to do?

The only  thing I could do: butt implants.

I’m lying… I Googled it. After many hours of dedicated research (aka Pinterest), this is what I discovered:

• Avoid the stair stepper and intense workout on the stationary bike, as these machines are designed to target the muscles in your thighs.
• Keep the weights low and the reps high. Instead of adding weight to intensify your workouts, make them longer so that you build up lean muscle instead of bulk muscle. This also keeps your body in fat-burning mode longer, so you burn more fat in the thigh area which will make them leaner.
• Stay loyal to cardio, because that’s going to help you keep the fat off, and keep your heart rate up!
• Stay away from traditional squats and get hooked on Plie Squats, second position in ballet. Turn your toes out and keep your feet closer together. This activates the inner thighs and butt more than the outer and upper thighs.
• To activate your glutes and not your quads, you need to get deep into your squats. Get your hips at least an inch below your knees, if not more.
• Realize that most traditional squats are performed incorrectly. The common execution causes a majority of the work to be done by the quads, not the glutes and hamstrings like squats were meant to work. When you do a squat, keep your feet wider than your shoulders, like 3 -4 feet apart, with your toes slightly turned out. Glue your shoulder blades to your spine and keep your chest open. When you “sit” into your squat, stick your butt out  as far as you can and lead with it, like you are sitting down into a chair, and always keep your knees behind your toes. Keep your weight in your heels; you should be able to wiggle your toes without ruining your balance. Get your hips below your knees and when you feel a stretch in your glutes and hammies, bounce back up, leading with your hips. Don’t let your knees buckle when you stand, keep them apart, and squeeze your butt when you are fully standing, then go right back down for another squat.
• Get on pinterest and check out some bridges, and their modifications, like toe bridges and unbalanced bridges. Keep your butt and abs engaged the entire time.

I’ll make a follow up to this post as I learn more. Check out the video I made about this post on my Youtube channel: http://youtu.be/PvusbHO7PoE

Are You Drowning in Life?

Have you ever felt that you are being completely smothered by your life? Like you have slipped under the current and now you can’t catch your footing? Like you just can’t seem to catch a break?

Well trust me, I know exactly how you feel. In fact, it seems that a lot of people that I have spoken to recently are having a difficult time with life in general right now. It is easy to get swept up in the urgency of things; the meetings, lectures, due dates, planners, assignments, responsabilities, etc… Life moves quickly, and if you cannot learn to juggle all of the demands that you have placed upon yourself or allowed to be placed upon you, then you will most certainly drown. 

So are we all doomed to a miserable, hectic fate? I am happy to say NO! Absolutely not. There is not reason that we should spend our lives been swallowed by stress and pressure. That’s no way to live. There is no enjoyment in that. 

Tell me this, which group of words sounds better?

A. Chaos, busy schedules, deadlines, appointments, assignments, tasks, to-do lists, meetings, projects, chores, requests, bills, letters, phone calls, alarms, text messages, e-mails, memos, reminders, jobs, expectations, rushing, demands…..

B. Beauty, awareness, relaxation, appreciation, gratitude, acknowledgement, vitality, energy, tranquility, free time, hobbies, peace, simplicity, bliss, joy, improvement, opportunity, possibility, dreams, passion, pleasure, fulfillment, adventure, nature, travel…

Honestly…which life would you chose?

Well, with the help of Elaine St. James, I am choosing option B.! Elaine St. James is the author of the books “Simplify Your Life”, “”Living the Simple Life”, and “Inner Simplicity”, and she is an expert on simplifying your life and making room for the things we truly enjoy. I adore her books, and over the next several weeks as I read them all, I am going to share some of the best tips with you, so that you can benefit from her amazing amounts of wisdom and make some space for yourself in your own life.

How Am I Showering My April?

We’ve all heard that beat-to-death saying “April showers bring May flowers”, well, I am actually going to put that pointless one-liner to good use. I am going to use this April to set up the foundation for the rest of my amazing year. I will use the month of April to “shower” every corner of my house, car, storage spaces, and if I had them, my office and garage. I will clean out all of the clutter, chaos, mess, and garbage from my life in order to create enough space to live and grow.

I don’t know if any of you have ever owned a snake or a lizard, but I have, and one of the first things that you learn is that a snake or lizard will only grow as large as their habitat will allow. Unless you get them a bigger cage, they won’t grow. When you don’t have enough space in your life to grow, then you simply don’t grow. You are at a frozen stand-still. Your life is on pause, and when you do that, you stop living, and when you stop living then you die. Nobody wants to be dead, but how many people around you right now look like zombies? I see at least five other students in my class either drooling on themselves or sleeping. As you can tell, I prefer to blog during my lectures. Well, I guess some people may enjoy being a member of the walking dead, but not me. I can’t even stand the show! (I find it painfully predictable). It’s time to open your eyes, clean yourself up, and start creating enough space in your life to actually live.

This is the best way to start: buy a journal or notebook, and a planner or large calendar. Sit down with your journal and make a list of every room in your house and all of the things that you need to do to get that room clean. Start with the back of your house and move toward the front, like you are pushing all of the trash and crap out of your home. Now make combine that list with your calendar for the month of April. Break it up however you’d like, one day a week or a couple hours twice a week, whatever you want. Plan it out so that it is possible, and so that it works with your schedule.

Now you have an action plan for the entire month!!! Look how ahead-of-schedule you are! Good job! Make sure you get all of the cleaning supplies that you need, but since you have already made a list of all the things you do, figuring out what supplies you need should be a piece of cake! Make it happen! Donate or sell the clothes you don’t wear anymore (and be honest with yourself), and try on everything and get rid of the things that do not fit you. Put any unseasonal clothing items into storage bins and store them in your storage space (which should be on your cleaning list too!). Donate or sell any books that you have already read and don’t really need to keep, or the books that have made their way into your house that you know you won’t ever read. Get rid of the appliances that clutter your home. Do you really need a microwave (WHICH NOBODY SHOULD EVER HAVE!), a toaster, a toaster oven, and an oven? Can’t the oven basically take care of everything that the other appliances are needed for? Do you need a coffee maker, French press, espresso machine, and a cappuccino maker? No, you need the number of an addiction specialist (*ahem* Mom). Be serious about how many pairs of shoes you need, and consider transferring all of your DVDs to a large CD case, and throwing out the empty cases, or storing them if you can’t part with them. This will save you a great deal of space in your living or entertainment room. Do you really need to have a 4:1 ratio of coffee mugs to people in your house? Do whatever you can to free your life of clutter, even if it’s a bit difficult at first. Trust me, it is such a liberating process that you’ll never miss anything you get rid of!

Where Did I Go Wrong?

Sometimes when I feel like my life is running away from me, I spend a little time wondering about where I went wrong. I actively try and pinpoint certain things that I did to sabotage my progress. During my recent weight gain and mini-eating disorder relapse, I made a list of some of the things I did that I noticed create stress or bigger issues for myself. I found it to be extremely helpful, and it helped me locate all the places where I was going wrong. Try it out, it can be very informative.

Where I went wrong:

• not drinking enough water
• not drinking enough green juices
• not getting enough sleep
• eating too late at night
• not working out in the morning
• not sticking to goals
• not sticking to meal plans
• over-eating at one time, not spacing out meals
• doing the same workout repeatedly
• snacking while cooking
• not spending enough time outside
• not reading the Bible daily
• not stretching after every workout
• not recording every meal
• snacking on too many meal bars (Clif, Lara, Luna, etc…)
• not eating enough vegetables
• skipping yoga classes
• skipping school classes
• not cleaning up after myself
• not doing enough core work
• ignoring strength training
• skipping derby practice
• not walking my dog every day
• not spending my money wisely

Fruit: Nothing But Sugar and Carbs?

So, another huge myths out there is that you need to limit the amount of fruit you consume, because fruit is really high in sugar and carbohydrates. True? HEEELLS NO!

That’s complete crap. Fruit is the food of life. Literally, fruit provided life in the garden of Eden. (EDEN WAS VEGAN!) Anyways…. fruit is full of water, which hydrates our bodies. It is low in fat, and provides us with complex carbohydrates which fuel our bodies and are rarely ever stored as fat. The glucose in fruit is transformed into instant energy. I eat fruit before my workouts, and I can definitely feel the energy boost! The fiber in fruit helps to keep our digestive system moving, flushing waste from our bodies, removing toxins. It is stuffed full of minerals and vitamins that provide essential nutrients to us, as well as amino acids, cancer fighting enzymes, flavanoids, and tannins. It is easily digested by the body. Fruit is amazing, your body needs it.

Fruit offers vitamins, minerals, water, carbohydrates, phytonutrients, and fiber that aid every bodily function!

Let’s Talk About Carbs

EEK! SHE SAID IT! THE SCARY, FORBIDDEN WORD!!! CARBS!!!

Carbs get a bad wrap, a really bad wrap. Somehow, carbohydrates have developed this hideous reputation as being the enemy of weight-loss. It is modern propaganda that is telling us that carbs = the devil.

BULLSH*T!

I often wonder what started this myth. There are so many other myths out there about health, diet, weight loss, and fitness, and I am flabbergasted at the fact that so many people believe them!

Think about THIS: Why would I follow the popular beliefs about health in a country where 2/3 of the population are overweight or obese? MENTAL BRAIN FIREWORKS EXPLOSION!!!!!!!

So let’s have a little chat about carbs, and you can let me tell you the truth about them. It may involve you trying to scrub your brains clean of all the propaganda you’ve been brainwashed with, but I promise you, it will be worth it to learn the truth.

What are carbs made of?

Carbs are made up of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. Think about that, and think about how important each of these things are to our bodies. We need oxygen to survive, and we need water, which comes from mixing oxygen and hydrogen, so right there carbs deliver us with two of our most basic necessities.

What types of carbs are there?

There are 2 types of carbohydrates: simple and complex.

Aren’t carbs bad for you? Won’t carbs make me gain weight?

Time to absorb fresh knowledge, so listen up everybody! Some carbs are bad. Some carbs are good. Natural carbs are the essence of life. Refined, processed carbs = the devil.

Simple (Refined) Carbs: These guys are the bad guys. They are made up primarily of sugar, which releases much too quickly into our bodies, causing a sugar high, then crash. They leave you very hungry, so you eat more, taking in more calories. Simple carbs include: white flour, white pasta, white rice, white sugar, cakes and cookies, sugary snacks, chips, breads, candy, and crackers, and other things like that. The refining process strips all of the minerals, vitamins, and nutrients from the food, so the companies that produce them fortify synthetic vitamins to inject back into the food. Since these are not natural nutrients, our bodies struggle to absorb them.

Complex carbs: These guys rock!! Enjoy them! They are made up of fiber and starch, which release gradually in order to provide a steady flow of energy to the body without a big crash. Complex carbs include: fruit, vegetables, yams, sweet potatoes, corn, barley, brown rice, quinoa, lentils, beans, whole wheat pasta, millet, buckwheat, hummus, etc…

So now you know that the body requires complex carbs in order to function, so they are ESSENTIAL to life! However, simple carbs are synthetic and unnatural, and all they do is damage the body’s ability to function properly and be it’s best.

See my next post about the myths of fruit being too high in sugar and carbs. I’ll blow your mind!

Weight Loss Myths

This overweight world is chalked full of diet and weight loss myths that have been manufactured by drug companies to sell their pills and products. We get new fad diets every year, and nobody really loses any weight, so why do we insist upon believing in the weight loss principles of a nation that is primarily overweight? It makes absolutely no sense!

The world was designed to provide for our every need, but we have become so industrialized that everything we take is synthetic, chemical, manufactured, processed, or pre-packaged. We ignore our basic knowledge, simple logic, and natural instincts, and we sell our souls to media campaigns and agendas.

Well, once I started realizing the truth, I couldn’t ignore it anymore, and I didn’t want to. There is obvious proof that natural methods can do everything from help you easily maintain a healthy weight to curing cancer! It’s been done, google it.

I’m going to be discussing all of the diet, health, fitness, and weight loss myths in my posts over the next few weeks, and I just thought that I might as well give you a little heads up on what to expect!

• The Myths About Carbohydrates
• The Myths About Fruit
• The Myths About Sugar
• The HUGE Myths About Protein
• The Myths About Veganism
• The Myths About Illness and Disease
• The Myths About “Diet” Soda Pop
• The Myths About Dairy

Also be on the lookout for my “Truth” series, where I address the truths about certain lies given to us by the mainstream idea of weight loss and health.

• The Truths About High Fructose Corn Syrup
• The Truths About Factory Farms
• The Truths About the Environmental Costs of Factory Farming
• The Truths About How to Lose Weight
• and much more!

Tips to Bump Up Your Workout

1. Make it intense- bump up the intensity at least once a week. Add intervals when you’re cycling, or add a yoga class to your run day.

2. Take it outside- getting off of the treadmill can add fresh air and new scenery to your workout. Also, the terrain change will challenge your body and make it work harder.

3. NEVER skip a warm-up or cool-down- these help you avoid injury and minimize muscle soreness. Mixing stretching with light cardio helps you warm up your muscles as you stretch them to avoid muscle injury.

4. Always keep your gym bag nearby- store your gym bag in your trunk, complete with clothes, shoes, headphones, and a water bottle. That way, you always have the gear you need to squeeze in a workout. 

5. Get 8 hours of sleep EVERY night, no matter what.

6. Practice good form- perfecting your form not only helps you avoid injury, but it will allow you to get the desired results from each exercise. Keep your shoulders back, chest out, and core engaged. 

7. Make a schedule- schedule your workouts so you cannot skip them.

8. Include yoga- yoga compliments nearly every other type of physical activity- horseback riding, ballet, running, body building, swimming, cycling, weight lifting, skateboarding, gymnastics, etc… It challenges the body’s core and balance while giving you a full-body stretch and toning your muscles. 

9. Hydrate- drink at least 2 liters of water per day.

10. Join a class or grab a buddy- socializing while you work out can help keep things interesting, and adding a little friendly competition can give you the motivational boost you need! 

11. Make a session with a trainer- scheduling an appointment with a personal trainer will help you make sure you are getting your form right, and it’s always good to get tips, ideas, and suggestions from a pro!

12. Workout in the morning- getting your body going in the morning sparks calorie burn throughout the day!

13. A short workout is better than no workout- Even a dynamic 15-20 minute session or a 1 mile jog can bump up your daily calorie burn, and will help you maintain focus on living a healthy lifestyle.

14. Sign up for a race- give yourself a goal to work toward, and motivation to succeed.

15. Try something new- add a fresh workout to your routine, or take a class that you’ve never taken before. It will shake up your metabolism and keep things interesting.