Thinks I find along the way
…of my favorites blogs and bloggers to the menu. On that list is a link you can click to add my sources to your Google Reader if you’d like. What? You’re not using Google Reader? Oh, wow! Comment, call or ‘connect’ so we can talk about how this applies to you and your organization…
One of my favorite quotes in working with clients is “A year from now you’ll wish you started today”. Along those lines, Craig Harper writes:
If you’re serious about changing your body, and more importantly, keeping it that way, below you’ll find some relevant, valuable and potentially-transformational questions. They are the type of questions that I ask anyone who comes to me for coaching in this area. Keep in mind that transformation lives in the doing, not just the knowing, so if you’re in need of a physical overhaul, or maybe just a few minor modifications, take some time to answer the following thoughtfully and courageously.
What do you want your body to look, feel and function like one year from today (be specific)?
What do you need to do practically, to make your goal a reality?
What happens once your motivation subsides (it will)?
What happened last time you tried to change your body?
Why and how will it be different this time (if nothing changes, nothing changes)?
What’s your optimal exercise strategy (based on your genetics, age, goals, fitness, injuries, etc.)?
What’s one simple thing (that will make a difference) that you can change today?
What happened over the last 365 days (with your body)? Why?
Are you genuinely prepared to do the work (and to keep doing it), or do you just like ‘the idea’ of a different body?
Do you need to change your relationship with food? If so, how?
Do you have an accountability system? If so, what is it?
When it comes to the practical change-your-body variables (food, lifestyle, exercise, time management), what are your ‘non-negotiables’?
As I’ve said many times before on this site, when we ask better questions and we’re genuinely committed to change, we make better decisions, do better things, produce better results and our reality shifts.
Statistically, we know that, despite their conversations, declarations and intentions, most people won’t improve their health or fitness over the next year. Some will, most won’t. Of course, they can change and they want to change, but sadly, they won’t. Like the majority of our ever-expanding population, some will continue to get on and off the weight-loss merry-go-round, all the while complaining about their genetics, the weather, their sore ankle, their limited time and their exhausting schedule.
And then they’ll wake up and it will be July 2013.
Today, I challenge you to be in the minority.” via Your Body: One Year From Today.
When I read things like this I used to feel guilty — now I’m happy I’m on the right path! I started power walking in March and now walk, run and bike ride; thanks to Endomondo, I know I’ve put in over 500 miles in all three since I started…
I’ve lost over 100 pounds with Atkins in the past 10 years but gained 75 of it back because I don’t believe that Atkins is sustainable or healthy based on my experience. I’m sorry to tell you there is no substitute for eating better and exercising more…
I had some windshield time last night driving across Wisconsin and this podcast came up in Google Listen. I encourage you to follow the link and listen to what Michael Hyatt has to say about what the internet is doing to our brains and what we can do about it. #19: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains (And What We Can Do About It) [Podcast] | Michael Hyatt.
Cross-posted…
This is kind of an interesting article for a social media ‘gooroo’ to curate, but I learned about this article in a Michael Hyatt podcast and wanted to share it with you. In it, Tony Dokoupil writes:
Before he launched the most viral video in Internet history, Jason Russell was a half-hearted Web presence. His YouTube account was dead, and his Facebook and Twitter pages were a trickle of kid pictures and home-garden updates. The Web wasn’t made “to keep track of how much people like us,” he thought, and when his own tech habits made him feel like “a genius, an addict, or a megalomaniac,” he unplugged for days, believing, as the humorist Andy Borowitz put it in a tweet that Russell tagged as a favorite, “it’s important to turn off our computers and do things in the real world.”
But this past March Russell struggled to turn off…
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Craig Harper offers this practical list:
1. Don’t eat anything bigger than your head. Unless it’s a watermelon. Or you have a tiny head.
2. If your meal arrives through a car window via a teenager wearing a headset, don’t eat it.
3. If it comes in an exciting range of fluorescent colours, don’t eat it.
4. Don’t confuse the marketing on the front (of the pack) with the nutritional information in the teeny-tiny box on the back.
5. Nobody accidentally eats cake. Own your choices and your behaviours.
6. Calories consumed in secret count. Your friends might not know but your arse will.
7. If dieting was an effective way to lose weight permanently, nobody would ever diet twice.
8. Don’t confuse ‘what your head wants’ with what your body needs. Your mind is a lying bitch.
9. If the ingredient list is full of weird-sounding numbers and words ending in ‘ose’, throw it away.
10. If you haven’t had a poo since June, maybe cut back on the processed food. And try a little fibre. Just saying.
11. If it comes with orange-coloured cheese, throw it away.
12. Most cereals are shit. Avoid them. Unless you want diabetes by Friday.
13. Amazingly, following a generic eating plan from a magazine is not your best bet.
14. If food is your lover, you need to get out more.
15. If you’re considering taking your kids to McDonalds for a treat, punch yourself in the face.” via Nutrition for Dummies (Craig’s version).
Thanks to David Kanigan for introducing me to Craig’s blog…
Back to back Melody Beattie! Here she writes:
Since I’ve been a child, I’ve been in an antagonistic relationship with an important emotional part of myself: my feelings. I have consistently tried to ignore, repress, or force my feelings away. I have tried to create unnatural feelings or force away feelings that were present.
I’ve denied I was angry, when in fact I was furious. I have told myself there must be something wrong with me for feeling angry, when anger was a reasonable and logical response to the situation.
I have told myself things didn’t hurt, when they hurt very much. I have told myself stories such as “That person didn’t mean to hurt me.” . . . “He or she doesn’t know any better.” . . . “I need to be more understanding.” The problem was that I had already been too understanding of the other person and not understanding and compassionate enough with myself.
It has not just been the large feelings I have been at war with; I have been battling the whole emotional aspect of myself. I have tried to use spiritual energy, mental energy, and even physical exertion to not feel what I need to feel to be healthy and alive.
I didn’t succeed at my attempts to control emotions. Emotional control has been a survival behavior for me. I can thank that behavior for helping me get through many years and situations where I didn’t have any better options. But I have learned a healthier behavior – accepting my feelings.
We are meant to feel. Part of our dysfunction is trying to deny or change that. Part of our recovery means learning to go with the flow of what we’re feeling and what our feelings are trying to tell us.
We are responsible for our behaviors, but we do not have to control our feelings. We can let them happen. We can learn to embrace, enjoy, and experience – feel – the emotional part of ourselves.
Today, I will stop trying to force and control my emotions. Instead, I will give power and freedom to the emotional part of myself.” via Just For Today Meditations » Blog.
Melody Beattie to the rescue!
Don’t you see? We do not have to be so victimized by life, by people, by situations, by work, by our friends, by our love relationships, by our family, by our feelings, our thoughts, our circumstances, and ourselves.
We are not victims. We do not have to be victims. That is the whole point!
Yes, admitting and accepting powerlessness is important. But that is the first step, an introduction to this business of recovery. Later, comes owning our power. Changing what we can. This is as important as admitting and accepting powerlessness. And there is so much we can change.
We can own our power, wherever we are, wherever we go, whomever we are with. We do not have to stand there with our hands tied, groveling helplessly, submitting to whatever comes along. There are things we can do. We can speak up. Solve the problem. Use the problem to motivate ourselves to do something good for ourselves.
We can make ourselves feel good. We can walk away. We can come back on our terms. We can stand up for ourselves. We can refuse to let others control and manipulate us.
We can do what we need to do to take care of our selves. That is the beauty, the reward, the crown of victory we are given in this process called recovery. It is what it is all about!
If we can’t do anything about the circumstance, we can change our attitude. We can do the work within: courageously face our issues so we are not victimized. We have been given a miraculous key to life.
We are victims no more unless we want to be.
Freedom and joy are ours for the taking, for the feeling, for the hard work we have done.
Today, I will remind myself as often as necessary that I am not a victim, and I do not need to be victimized by whatever comes my way. I will work hard to remove myself as a victim, whether that means setting and enforcing a boundary, walking away, dealing with my feelings, or giving myself what I need. God, help me let go of my need to feel victimized.” via Just For Today Meditations » Blog.
Click images to enlarge…
It seems to me that a love of classic airplanes is something that is frequently passed from fathers to sons. These three generations inspecting a row of Curtiss P-40 Warhawks @ EAA made me stop and snap…
This is one of my favorite pictures of one of my favorite aircraft; a P-51 Mustang @ EAA AirVenture 2012…
Bright, shiny objects! 
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