Tales From the Chair – Enjoy!

Food, Diet, Booze, Weight-loss, Medication, Stress, the list goes on and on….in our society these are words used everyday in our vocabulary and in many ways they all relate back to each of our own individual perceptions of ourselves..  I have been asked on a few separate occasions what the key is to staying so fit (and thank you to those beautiful ladies who said this!!! XOXO). Funny thing is that “I” like everyone else am constantly trying to “take better care of myself” and I wish I had the “perfect” answer, and since I don’t I am going to give you my honest opinion on diet and weight loss.  Now remember, I am in no way certified as anything other then if you need me to pump start your heart, so this is strictly my opinion. But I will still give it to you exactly how I feel….I know that is no surprise to most of you! J

First, Food is Fun AND Food sucks at the same time.  I mean my entire day I am thinking about what I am going to eat next!  I have tried many diets in my lifetime….Adkins, Paleo, Weight Watchers and my first thought on these is this….I think any diet where you completely cut something fully from your food intake is CRAP…here is why…you know the day is going to come where most of you are going to have that scoop of ice cream or that glass of wine…what fun is living if you can’t enjoy yourself and unfortunately food and drink make us happy (and good friends and true love, DB).  Here lies the problem…we want to eat what we want and stay fit…ugh…I truly believe that everything is ok in moderation.  I also believe that ANY form of exercise is needed as well.  Even if it’s just a 20-minute walk, it does a body good.  Trying to lose weight is one of the hardest and most frustrating tasks we put ourselves through…. but you have to believe in yourself and stay strong MENTALLY to get through it.  Honestly I don’t even like the word diet…but (and some people I used to train with would totally disagree with me here), I had the most long time success when I did Weight Watchers because I COULD eat anything I wanted in MODERATION.  For me personally, Yes, I have lost almost 30 pounds over the last year.  I’m fortunate that being tall I hid a lot of that, but for me the weight loss was a combination of things, some you could do, some you don’t want too (stress)….I stopped heavy lifting and stuck to pure cardio (running  is my choice),  I cleaned my system of any medications I was taking (yes I was a member of the “What pill do you take?” club….and I must say, through difficult times in my life anti’s are the bomb and I am not afraid to say it!), I stopped eating a bowl of ice cream EVERY night…mostly I started loving MYSELF….and I truly truly believe with all my heart THAT is the first step. Being confident in who you are and accepting the beautiful person you are inside and out HAS to come first…we tend to look to others to make us happy, we look to food to make us happy and honestly in a lot of cases THEY do…but it has to start with yourself….you are always going to be stuck with YOU…so love YOU, accept YOU, wake up, place your feet on the ground and work on what makes YOU happy.

OK, so I tend to start on one topic and end with my happiness stuff but it just flows out of me and it brings me such great peace that I can’t express enough that before you do anything, diet, exercise, life change, etc…you need to mentally teach yourself to think positive.  Once you do this, everything else will fall into place, and I will be your biggest cheerleader!!!!

~Colby