Thanksgiving Week: I will survive...

"Inside some of us is a thin person struggling to get out, but they can usually be sedated with a few pieces of chocolate cake."
~Author Unknown

I am going into this week with a positive outlook. I don't want to use Thursday as an excuse to overeat. So I am planning but don't want to get obsessive.

I am on plan this week and back at the gym. I am going to do a bit of yoga this week as well. I won't be working out on Thursday as we are traveling for Thanksgiving day.

I am bringing a few side dishes to the dinner to be sure that I will have some healthy options. I'm bringing a brussel sprouts dish, plain baked sweet potatoes, and homemade cranberry sauce. I'm also going to make a really yummy low cal veggie dip and bring some fresh cut up veggies to go on the appetizer table so that I'm not tempted to pig out on the high cal apps. I'm planning to eat a good healthy breakfast to keep me from feeling starved by the time we get there.

I am taking a bottle of champagne and a chess pie! So my plan on both of these? Moderation. I don't want to feel like I can't have a couple glasses of sparkling wine and a small piece of pie. So, I'm planning to share the champagne and am just going to have a small sliver of my favorite pie. I'd be lying if I didn't say that these two things are kind of freaking me out. This is the hole that I always seem to fall in! But I know there must be a way around it. I should be able to enjoy both of these things without falling into that hole and getting stuck there.

Basically, I think it comes down to this...I don't want this week to become an excuse for falling off the wagon. I do want to pay attention to my body and give myself what I need. I want to get some rest, some exercise and eat good foods.

Hope everyone has a happy Thanksgiving!

The Rainbow Bridge...

"From Celtic myth, the pot of gold at the rainbow's end represents a kind of Holy Grail - the lost vessel of spiritual renewal and fulfillment. Carl Jung referred to gold as the symbolic end product of inner alchemical transformation. Passage through the chakras is an alchemical process of increasing refinement that unites light and shadow, male and female, spirit and matter, all in the crucible of the body and psyche. The pot of gold is indeed the elusive philosopher's stone that lures us into the heroic journey of transformation."

~Eastern Body, Western Mind: Psychology and the Chakra System as a Path to the Self

So it's a hero's journey, eh? Heh. I didn't think that was really the case when I started down this path. Oh, it's a difficult one, to be sure...but heroic?

This past week has been very interesting. Taking a week off to rest and do yoga instead of hopping on the treadmill every morning has really brought to light some of my shadows. It's so easy to get down on myself when I'm not going by the book. But, I've learned a lot. And I keep getting these messages that yoga is the right thing for me. Everywhere I look lately I've been seeing the word, Jivamukti.

Maybe I'll see if there's a Jivamukti teacher in my area. Or maybe I'll just practice on my own. I don't know yet.

I do know that I will get back on the treadmill tomorrow. I was thinking about this yesterday and realized that I do miss it and, I think, that if I take a half hour out for cardio and then another, at least, half hour out for yoga...maybe that is the balance I need for now?

I know this is a short post...just musing here....

Oh and as a fantastic validation for listening to what my body needs...at my weigh in this morning, I was pleasantly surprised to find that I lost a pound! Whoot! Another pound gone!!!

A Shifting Perspective...

"The saying goes, 'The sage rests, truly rests and is at ease.' This manifests itself in calmness and detachment, so that worries and distress cannot affect him, nothing unpleasant can disturb him, his Virtue is complete and his spirit is not stirred up."

-Chuang Tzu

I have been on a quest for rest this week. Yesterday, I read through all of the blog posts I've written here and the one thing that really stood out to me was my need for rest.

It seems, since I turned 40, that I am constantly tired. It doesn't seem to matter if I'm working out everyday or if I'm going to bed early...I just seem to be tired all the time.

And since I'm paying more attention to my body...since I'm trying to learn to trust what it is my body really needs...this week, I have forgone my intense exercise regimen for rest. I've been doing some yoga poses instead of climbing on the treadmill every morning.

One pose I've come across is the Viparita Karani pose. You can find out more information for this pose here, at Yoga Journal.

I have been searching for a yoga practice for months now. I've tried Ashtanga and Vinyasa Flow, but those practices are not giving me what I'm really craving right now. What I want is a bunch of restorative poses that will help me get the rest that my body is craving.

I'm trying not to panic about this shift in perspective...because, really, how much weight am I going to be able to lose in a week if I'm not working out?? I'm about to find out. I'm still counting calories and staying within my calorie range, so I am sure that I won't see a gain. But making this shift in perspective has been scary because I wonder if I'm sabotaging myself...sabotaging my weight-loss goals? But then I think...the journey I'm really on is about finding better health for myself. And right now...this week...I want to rest and restore. Maybe next week I'll get back on the treadmill...

As I was driving into work this morning, I was thinking about how, just a few months ago, I would get so frustrated if I only saw a half pound loss on the scale (per week) and now, I'm thinking that losing a half pound would be fantastic! It means progress...

But there are other ways of progressing on this path...quitting smoking (I did this about 5 years ago), quitting drinking diet sodas (going on 3 years!), and since this summer, quitting eating fake/processed foods...beginning to eat a mostly organic, health positive menu...drinking mostly water on a daily basis and cutting my consumption of caffiene and alcohol...these are all amazing steps on my journey to complete health!

These little shifts in perspective add up to such huge changes...

How to get back on the wagon...

"If you keep on going the way you're going you'll end up where you're heading - which direction are you aiming for?"


I've had a mini-setback...but as Jillian says, you can't let that stop you. If you got a flat tire would you ditch the whole car? No, you'd fix the flat and drive on.

So I'm fixing the flat. I've been doing so great...last Friday morning I told Cathy that I was feeling so good and feeling so good about myself. And then I completely just stopped what I was doing.

Don't get me wrong...I didn't go buy a cake and eat it. What didn't I do? I didn't count my calories and I didn't exercise. What did I do? I got a massage, got my hair done, got a body scrub, and got some rest.

And yet, I've been beating myself up about this since Sunday. I've been so mad at myself for not working out and for not being the perfect dieting robot that I have almost pushed myself back into that hole.

This morning, as I was driving to work I had a radical thought. If I am feeling resistant to going to the gym to workout...then maybe what I really want is to do something a little different. So what about yoga this week??? Or what about taking a class? Maybe I need to change up the program a bit...shake things up...make it fresh.

It's certainly no reason to get so down on myself that I abandon my good eating plan.

I have traveled such a long road over this past year. Trying to figure out what works and trying to find my way. When I look back to this time last year, I can see that I've made some measure of progress. I've lost 14 pounds. But more importantly, I've started treating myself better.

One thing I'm really proud of...I've quit eating those awful Lean Cuisine's and Weight Watchers meals. Ugh. To think how much money I've spent on that crap for all those years. And did they help me lose weight??? NO. Not one pound. And when I look at the ingredients list and nutrition information on the package, I'm grossed out. And the best side benefit from giving up that little box of crap disguised as food? I stop adding all that packaging to the landfills.

I am so glad that I've found my way to clean eating. Whole foods are really the way to go when you want to feel better. I am so glad that I'm eating more locally grown, organic foods. I feel better about not contributing to the massive industrial food giants (who turn pesticides and petroleum into foods that poison us and makes us fatter).

Something else I've recently come to...I gave up eating pork a few years ago though I still ate a piece of bacon here and there...so not quite a non-pork eater...but even eating a piece of bacon 3-4 times a year...it wasn't sitting well. I've been reading Omnivore's Dilemma and Pollan pointed out something...it wasn't even a paragraph but this little fact about how the industrial animal farms treat pigs (something I knew and is what spurred me to give up pork in the first place)...it broke my heart and made me renew my vow not to be a consumer of pork. So, no more. Not even a tiny piece once in a while. Done. I'm not contributing to the misery of one more pig.

And honestly, I don't want to contribute to the misery of the cows/steers and chickens either. So I'm going for grassfed beef and organic dairy products. No more industrial beef for me. It makes me sick to think of eating one more bite of that kind of beef.

Not to turn my blog into a political treatise on becoming a vegetarian (because I'm not...at least right now). Though, I will say, I so wish I lived near Polyface Farms (or one like it!!!).

Last night I found my way back onto the wagon...it was a struggle, to be sure! But I'm back...these little bumps on the road that knock me off are getting fewer and far between. And I'm getting stronger...the program I've developed is working. Looking to my spiritual practice to sustain me and help me to shapeshift has been the difference. Magic really works!