Emotional Infidelity...The Signs

Beware of the dangerous crossroads.  Check out my article on emotional infidelity.

Top 7 Steps to Wellness

These are my top wellness steps borrowed from what the books say and what I’ve learned from my clients. If you want to improve your wellness, you may have to eat differently, change your exercise program, or develop a new sleep plan.  You have to be focused. There may be other behaviors you have to look at, like how much time you work, relax and spend with friends.  You can use these steps with any goal you’re working on.

1. Keep a journal of the behaviors you’re working on. For example, note what you eat and what type of exercise you’re doing. Writing things down help shine a light on the good, the bad and the ugly, and keeps you focused on same.

2. Set clear goals for target behaviors. Ask “what,” “when,” and “how much,” for your goals. Keep them SMART (specific, measureable, achievable, realistic, time-limited). This makes it easier to track your progress.

3. Review your goals every 90 days or so. Once you get going with a program, what’s working and what’s not become clearer. Revise your goals as needed. Nothing is written in stone. You’re looking for strategies that move you forward.

4. Remember, it’s a marathon, not a sprint. You don’t want to diet so you lose weight quickly. Everyone knows that you’ll put it back on because it’s not sustainable. Sensible, healthy strategies will result in slower progress, but you’ll be able to go the distance.

5. Enjoy the journey, e.g., find foods you like to eat and activities you enjoy. Select things that feel authentically yours. Change it up if you do better with variety. Again, you’re looking for things that are sustainable, not an activity you dislike and will not continue for the long haul. Make it fun.

6. Routine, routine, routine. Routines reduce opportunities for mistakes. If you know what you’re eating and when you’re meditating, there are fewer bad choices. You can view routines as boring, or you can see them as good practice. The latter is more useful if not always exciting.

7. Celebrate success. Note it in your journal, share it with friends and do something for yourself when you meet goals. Even small successes deserve rewards. Bigger successes warrant larger rewards.

It’s not that difficult if you keep it simple and use the steps. Wellness is an ongoing process in which you want to be fully engaged. You are always working on your wellness plan, tweaking it and changing it up to push yourself to the next level. And the next.  And the next.

For inspiration:  Beyonce’s Move Your Body

Authentic Wellness…More or Less

When people tell me about their current wellness plan, they often tell me about what they should be doing.  I should… run more, sit at the computer less, eat more fiber, eat less junk, get out with friends more, sleep less, sleep more, stress less, get to church more, complain less, meditate more…and so forth.  I’m sure you can, more or less, fill in your own shoulds.  I started wondering how authenticity, as in, being who you are, could help us with wellness behaviors.

We know that repressing how you feel is not good for your health.  Similarly, trying to do things that you really don’t want to do is probably not going to be great for your health.  It may also be why some things you put in your wellness plan are so difficult to achieve.

I’m not suggesting that you embrace your inner couch potato if you don’t exercise enough, or eat whatever feels right to you if you have a weight problem.  I am suggesting that you look at what you’re trying to do and ask yourself if it feels authentic to you.  I know, to some exercise never feels authentic.  To others passing up the dessert never feels authentic.  This leaves us in a bind unless we re-think authenticity.

I’m suggesting a different way to view authenticity.  If you love to run, run.  If you don’t love to run, find something else aerobic.  If you don’t love to lift weights, don’t do it.  But  maybe you’d love lifting you own weight.  You could try yoga.  These are decisions you must make about your wellness plan based on your true feelings.  Ask yourself what decisions you might make to honor your feelings, or truths.

Some people love to sleep more.  Some love to sleep less.  Some prefer staying up and reading or watching movies.  But sleep is necessary and it’s good to honor the amount of sleep you need to function well the next day.  So you may need a rule about reading before sleeping that involves keeping an eye on the clock.  It would honor your truth about your need for sleep, and perhaps compromise on your reading and movie truths.  You can go through the truth or compromise exercise on everything that’s tough in your wellness plan.

Your wellness plan must have rules or routines about eating, exercise, sleep, stress management, socializing, spirituality and work.  You have to ask yourself what your truths are about your needs in these areas.  You have to think about what behaviors would meet those needs in an authentic way.  You’ll find that trying wellness behaviors that meet your needs, and are also authentically you, is going to be a lot easier, more or less, than following the shoulds.

Be For Real. Leonard Cohen

Build Up Your Willpower Muscle

Starting an exercise plan, diet, or other self-improvement or work project?

Check out my newsletter on willpower at:

http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs049/1101851326486/archive/1109803063833.html

Say No to Nightmare Parenting

We’ve all been on the sidelines, whether it be a soccer field or theater, anxiously watching our offspring do their thing.  When I recently read about how to be a well-behaved parent of an athlete, I realized it’s not just soccer moms that can be awful.  Parents of all spectating ilks can be awful.  Don’t let it be you.

Breaking it down…

1.  Be the parent, not the coach/director/teacher.  You don’t get to tell the adult in charge what role your child plays, be it a position on the field, Hamlet or first violin.

2.  You don’t have to fix things.  Whether it’s a problem on an exam, an admonishment by a teacher, or, perish the thought, something your child’s done to someone: have them fix it.  How else will they learn?

3.  Be the supportive cheerleader.  No matter how flat your kid’s Hamlet was, high five them for getting it done and for the good effort (assuming there was good effort).  Ditto the shot they missed (remember, it happens even in the pros), or the note they flubbed.

4.  The success is theirs, and the failure.  There’s no need to take credit where none is due.  There’s no need to rescue.  We all experience failure; just be with them as witness.  Offer comfort as needed.

5.  Compare notes.  Do they want to have a good time while you want them to become the next Garbo?  Talk about it.

6.  You will be noticed.  Give credit to all and put on your party face.  Be a model of good audience behavior and good parenting.

My stupid mouth (has got me in trouble again)…John Mayer

Can Wellness be Fun?

Ask yourself: Can wellness be Fun, with a capital F?

When people hear I’ve run a half-marathon (and I try to tell as many people as possible), they groan sympathetically.  Then they usually ask what my time was.  They don’t ask me if it was Fun.

I do yoga stretches before I run.  When people comment on it, they tell me how agonizing it looks, or how painful it would be if they tried it.  They don’t ask me if I Enjoy it.

When people talk with me about losing weight, they tell me I look like I’ve never had a weight problem.  They tell me how hard it is for them to lose weight.  They don’t ask me if it feels Great to be at a healthy weight.

My point:  wellness can be Fun, with a capital F.  How, you ask?  Just a few thoughts.

I really enjoyed training for my half.  I liked pushing myself and feeling the gains.  I liked meeting people who were shooting for the same goals.  I felt Empowered, and that’s with a capital E.

I love yoga.  I like learning new poses and practices.  I like meeting new people who are also learning and seeking.  Yoga is Empowering.

I work at maintaining my weight.  I like the satisfaction I feel when I know I’ve worked hard at exercising and not overeating.  I like hanging out with people who take diet and exercise seriously.  Maintaining a healthy weight is Empowering.

The point is not to run, do yoga or eat a particular way.  You can walk, Zumba, meditate, rock climb, bike, swim, tennis, read, macrobioticize, veganize, guitar it, sing it, belly dance or pick your own Pleasure, with a capital P.  The point is to figure out how to Enjoy your wellness plan, and have your own unique kind of Fun.  Feel Empowered.

 I Got a Feeling, Black Eyed Peas

A Nerd with an Edge: Lao Tzu Meets Hollywood

For a quick, fun read that combines Lao Tzu, the Kabbalah and Hollywood, check out Ken Goldstein’s Way of the Nerd.  He’s got pithy insights:

* If things are coming your way, you’re on the right path. If things aren’t, you are probably toxic.

* If you don’t like the ‘movie’ of your life, walk out.

* Why think you have to be committed to any part of you that isn’t working for you?

* Go for things you want. You’ll either get lucky or end up wiser.

And it’s a neat story about his own successes, and how he navigated the bumps on the road thereto.  Not to mention a cool Bon Jovi story.

Hell, he’s even got a workshop coming up next week, The Day of the Nerd.  I’m thinking that if I had the time and was in CA, I’d check it out.  It sounds like a lot of fun and a painless day of introspection and growth.

It’s now or never…

It’s My Life, Bon Jovi