OVERWHELMED: 6 steps to getting started with weight loss for beginners (yes, even during girl scout cookie season)

It is a Sunday night and you have ordered a pizza, curled up on your couch with your family and are watching TV. You have told yourself over and over that TOMORROW you will do something about your weight, and your health. Countless Sunday's you have spent saying that Monday begins a new week and you will get on track then. You want to do this because you feel low in energy, are lacking in confidence, maybe your clothes are not fitting the same as they used to. 

Every Monday you wake up with the same determination to do it and stick to it this time! You get up, and make a healthy breakfast and head out the door and are positive this will be the day!!!....and that is where it stops. You get to work and your colleagues invite you to dine with them, or it is girl scout cookie time of year and those adorable girls are looking up at you with puppy dog eyes wanting to feed you endless boxes of thin mints, or someone has a birthday and the office is celebrating with soda and cake. So you feel overwhelmed and you give in. 

Then you get upset with yourself for not being able to commit once again and you come home and order Chinese food and think of every excuse in the book to not continue: "It is ok, I am not that unhealthy. This is a busy time in my life and I'll start again when things calm down. This isn't THAT bad for me. I have had a hard day and I deserve to eat this." So you just binge eat and continue to feel self conscious and out of control.

The problem is probably that you are OVERWHELMED. You decide to commit to a diet and just like most people, you try to change too much all at once. You decide to workout AND cut carbs, fats and eat low calorie foods. You are not going to eat past 7pm, and instead of going out to eat you are going to pack your lunch. 

The key for me, was committing to a new lifestyle and making slow changes that you can STICK to. Here are 5 steps to take to get you started this Monday without the overwhelmed feeling:

1. REASONABLE WORKOUT GOALS Commit to a workout of some sort 3 days a week for 30 minutes. A big mistake that is often made is that we over commit and decide we will go to the gym every day for hours on end. How sustainable is this in the long term? No wonder so many quit after the first week or even the first few days. No one has time for that. Do some research and find an effective workout with a REASONABLE goal. SOOOO many times I have seen people go in full force with nothing but good intentions, but end up stopping all together from not being able to commit so quickly to unrealistic gym goals. So do 30 minutes, 3 days a week for the first month. When this is mastered, move on.

2. CUT OUT SOMETHING. Pick ONE food group to work on. If you are like me and tend to overdo the carbs, dial it in for a month. stick to 3 or 4 healthy carb options in a day. If dessert and junk food is your problem, vow to cut out something for the month.

3. ADD SOMETHING IN. When you cut out something, you must find a replacement. There is nothing worse than cutting out something like soda and not succeeding because you need a replacement drink to help you get through the cravings. So...cutting out soda? Add in more water and drink sparkling water with lemon. Cutting out dessert? Research recipes that are natural ingredients and can satisfy your need for sweets. 

4. WRITE DOWN your goals. You are 80% more likely to achieve them if you write them down. Do not try to go overboard. Make the changes written above, write them down, and just focus on those. Let your body adjust and then continue to make more changes.

5. COMMUNICATE It is important when start your journey to communicate your new goals and reasons to those closest to you and those you spend most of your time with. You cannot expect them to read your mind. Sit down anyone you live with and express that you are going to make some changes and let them know what they are. Ask them to support you in your decision and to help you to stick with it. Do the same with friends, co-workers etc. When you communicate your needs, you can be more successful.

6. ACCOUNTABILITY Find someone you like and trust to hold you accountable in your new journey. This should be someone that you know, but that is not too close to you. An acquaintance or co-worker that you can check in with each day to talk about your progress. DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP!! Accountability is one of the biggest keys to your success.

Most of all, believe in yourself. Tell yourself everyday "I can, I will".  Don't try too much at once. Change your lifestyle and slowly, overtime, a healthy lifestyle will just be automatic.


I believe in you. Reach out to me for help.

Jenny Beauregard
fitoperasinger.blogspot.com
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Success comes from the inside: lessons learned from being forced to lie in bed with just my thoughts

Patience
A recent injury to my intercostal muscles (the muscles in between your ribs) has really been a lesson in patience for me. I have spent nearly 2 months doing the hardest workout program in my entire life. I have pushed, cried, sweat, grunted and had to talk myself through several times of thinking I could not continue. I have broadcast my journey all over facebook so that I could keep myself accountable and finish this program. This injury (though not a big deal) is extremely painful and has caused me to discontinue my workouts for the past 3 days. This frustrates my to no end, especially after all the work I have put in to get myself in amazing shape. Normally, I would be extremely stubborn and continue to workout regardless of the injury and I would not listen to my body. I would not have enough patience to just lie on the couch all day waiting for my body to heal. But I realize that I will only further my injury if I am not patient.

And so I am learning patience.

It's ok to Make Mistakes
I am gonna be real with you. I have accepted that I cannot workout and pushed through that disappointment, however I went off course with my nutrition when I should have been eating even more strictly. I tell the people that I coach, "Nutrition is 80% of your progress. Get that under control first and foremost" and here I am eating a cupcake and way too much sushi. So I've decided to listen to my own advice, because well, it is good advice.

Just because I have a slight setback towards my goals doesn't mean it all has to come crashing down. I let myself off the hook briefly, but I am catching myself before it gets bad. I am on track today with my nutrition, drinking my Shakeology, and eating whole foods in moderate proportions. I open a show tonight in which I am singing the lead, and it is all the more important that I eat foods that will help me heal and give me the energy I need to be my best, even with this injury. I am living proof that what you put in your body can make or break you, and hey, I am far far far from perfect and even though I believe that proper nutrition aided my eventually remission from Ovarian Cancer, I sometimes slip up and forget that powerful effect.

And so, I make mistakes, but I learn from them and grow.

Character Growth Comes from the Inside
So instead of wallowing in self pity over losing all the work I have put into my fitness regime, I have had some down time to reflect and do personal development. I have been able to work on myself from the inside, and really remind myself of the bigger picture. Success in any form means building yourself from the inside AHEAD of your outside so that in times of need, you can withstand the situation with grace and a strong foundation. I have reminded myself in this reflection time that character growth is more important than the physical physique I have goaled myself to reach. In these 3 days I have been able to re-focus my attention.

Vanity: wanting to look good is natural, but it isn't everything
So let me be real with you again. I care about how I look. It is what motivated my journey to weight loss from the beginning. It is what prompted my to buy the 21 Day Fix and get me in shape for my wedding. I am not going to sit here and pretend that I am not motivated by the idea of what I want my body to look like. But everything happens for a reason, and in these days of no exercise and I have had time to really look deep within myself and realize that I am much more than the body I want to have. This 3 days of reflection has reminded me that I need to eat well NOT because I have a fear of weight gain, but because my body needs it to function and because I am worth it. I owe it to the cast of La Femme Boheme, to my husband who has bent over backwards to support me in my health journey, and to the people whom I coach and speak to daily about their goals. This is NOT about my body. It is about my overall health and happiness and about helping as many others as possible to have the same. Though I will always care about my physique, I need to remember what really matters.


So I re-adjust my journey. It happens. I will rest until I feel my body is ready and here is what I will do until then and even when I am back to working out:

1. Drink a ton of water
2. Read personal development and keep my mind fresh, positive and engaged
3. Dive in and really reach out and help more people
4. Eat as clean as possible
5. Re-evaluate my deep down reason "why" for ever aspect of my life
6. Focus on loving my husband and appreciating more openly all that he does for me

In my next entry, I'll let you know of my progress with these goals.

Beachbody Is going Digital!

This past weekend at the Beachbody Super Saturday event, the CEO of Beachbody announced the biggest news since Shakeology: Beachbody is FINALLY going Digital!!

This means if you are a club member, you can stream workouts from a digital link ANYWHERE without those pesky DVD's skipping and scratching. Forgot your dvd's??? No problem, just use your digital version. Apple laptop doesn't have a DVD drive? PROBLEM SOLVED! This ill be a better experience for customers AND coaches. Watch the announcements here!

How to prep for 21 Day Fix in 6 steps

Step 1: Look at your schedule
       Decipher your schedule for the week and decide when you are busiest and going to be out of the house. You need to figure out what meals and snacks you need to have planned and ready to take wth you. Mark those in your calendar.

Step 2: Research recipes on Pinterest. Type in 21 Day Fix and explore the endless amounts of recipes available to you. There are several blogs with great options.

Make sure your look at your schedule and figure out how many simple "go-to" meals you need. Make sure your recipes include simple recipes with minimal ingredients that you can make quickly, as well as a few recipes that are fun, and tasty but would take more time to make. 

TIP: Every meal does not have to be different. Make double to amount to have leftovers for the next day.

Step 3: 
 Look at your Fix booklet and make sure you have a balanced mix of all the containers and food groups.

Step 4: Make a list
   From the recipes you've picked out for each meal, make a grocery list of everything you need. 

Step 5: SHOP

Step 6: Prep what you can.

Make rice, quinoa, etc and dice and wash fruits and veggies. Also prep anything that you can have in advance and store in the freezer until you are ready. Do this as SOON as you are home from the grocery store. Then this will be done and off your mind.

ENJOY! You got this!

BONUS: Here is a video about how much you will actually eat!

Episode 2 "21 Day Fix: Regular VS modified and beginner"

Episode 2 of my 21 Day fix workouts modification series. Anyone can do these workouts and I wanted to show it, so I am not only showing the modifications, but taking it one step further and showing you a even more beginner modifier. The goal is to just get through the 60 seconds doing an activity and it doesn't matter where you start. You have to start at your level and build up.

How to make hard choices

Hard choices. That is what I am struggling with at the moment. It seems the hard choices continue to present themselves, and I spend agonizing hours going back and forth about which option is best or will end up better. Sometimes I just wish I could go into the future and see what would happen to my life based on each individual choice.

A friend recently sent me this video with a talk about hard choices. When he sent it, I thought to myself "oh ok cool. I may listen to that one day." But it is so amazing how the right people just come into your life when you need them. About 3 hours later, I was presented with another hard choice to make. I am so glad I watched it, because even though my friend could not have known the new situation would present itself, he knew that I was struggling with others in my life and I needed to listen to this to once and for all learn how to make a choice.

Your hard choice is hard because in each choice, one is not better than the other, they both have faucets of them that are good and bad. Which is WHY it is hard. For example, in September I struggled with the choice of staying a poor opera singer, or taking a corporate job that would provide a paycheck each week and health insurance. Singing is my passion and my art, but it isn't stable and doesn't pay well. But the corporate job paid a modest income and provided stability, but the work would not be fulfilling. No one answer is BETTER than the other when compared in this way.

Sometimes you will want to take the safest option. When comparing the two side by side, I tended toward the safer option. The paycheck, the steady work, the health insurance. Fear of struggling as a singer for the rest of my life took over.

So how to make this choice? I have always succeeded best when I have clear steps to take to achieve something. Based on this talk I have made of steps to take in order to make these hard choices.


1. Accept. Accept the situation in front of you and learn that this is a great opportunity to learn about yourself, your values and what you really want in life.

2. Reflect. Look at the hard choices, reflect and define what they are. Write down the pros and cons of each, so that they are clear.


3. Define. Now forget the choices for a second. Define WHO you are and what YOUR individual values are. What things make you happy? What does your typical ideal day look like? What things are important to you?

4. Compare. Now take your list from step 3 and step 2 and compare them. Do the pros from each decision match up with the values you've just defined as important? What choice would best represent YOU and what you want from life.

5. Set a date. Take time to do these exercises but not too long. Set a specific date in which you will make your decision. To linger too long is agonizing.

6. Take the plunge. Now you know your answer, so commit and move forward without regret.

In the end I realized the corporate job was not me, I craved the 5 minutes on stage no matter what the cost. I wanted that job because my alternate route was FEAR of the unknown. Fear almost allowed me to take the least risky option.

But in learning to be in tune with, and understand myself has created an unstoppable power in me, and made making hard choices, a bit easier. There is no right answer, and you have to trust that you made the right one for you and not out of fear.

So, reflect and know who you are. Know what you stand for. Make your choice and then become the best version of that choice. Own it and live it.


-Jenny Beauregard

Episode 1*** 21 Day Fix: Regular VS Modified and beginner

Welcome to the first episode of "21 Day Fix: Regular VS modified and beginner"

Several of my challengers and friends are asking me about modifications for the 21 Day Fix. Some are scared to start for fear it will be too hard. FEAR NOT! I'm here to show you that you CAN do it!!

I am spending this month showing you various 21 Day Fix moves and not only how to MODIFY, but how to modify for an absolute beginner! You just need to keep moving! Go as slow as you need to go to get through the minute!