Indulge Over Labor Day Weekend & Stay On Track

Labor Day Weekend is upon us. It's time to enjoy friends, family and food but sometimes that can be a recipe for disaster towards your healthy diet. Don't fret here's a few mindul tips from Bob Wright, Hilton Head Health Director of Education.

• “Control the controllables." Concentrate on what you’re personally accountable for to set yourself up for success.


• Have a good balanced breakfast and maybe a healthy snack before the Labor Day buffet, this will help rein in hunger and empower you to make better food choices.


• When you indulge, consume conscientiously. Eat treats mindfully. If you are going to have one, eat it slowly and savor every bite.


• Have no say in what Auntie May whips up for the annual Labor Day feast? Don’t sweat it. If you don’t have as much control over the food choices, be sure to get a good workout in in the morning, and look for ways to stay more active during the weekend.

Find these tips and other tips to stay mindful while you indulge for the Labor Day Weekend on Eat This Not That.

4 Healthy Tips to Simplify your Life

Staying on track with a healthy lifestyle is one of the most difficult tasks while trying to lose weight and maintain weight loss. Between trying to keep yourself motivated, find the best food to eat and manage your time; it can feel like you'll never be able to get it all together.



Thankfully, we're sharing some of the healthy tips Andie Mitchell shared with our Guests during her Hilton Head Health visit. Andie, the bestselling author of It Was Me All Along, recently stayed with us and held 2 amazing lectures where she shared lessons from her own 135-pound weight loss journey.  These are 4 tips straight from Andie that will help you simplify your daily, healthy routine:

1. Replace the word motivate with discipline.

Kudos to those that can "motivate" themselves day after day to eat right and workout. But for most people motivation can become a pitfall. Replace motivation with discipline. With consistency & repetition, you can discipline yourself and get into a groove of working out, eating healthy and start feeling better about a healthier you.

2. Know yourself.

What type of workout(s) do you enjoy? Are you more likely to work out in the morning before work, at lunch or in the evening? Knowing your trigger foods and whether you can cut out things from your diet or if you're better at eating in moderation are important. Knowing your personality, having a daily/weekly routine and sticking to it are monumental to creating you own healthy lifestyle.

3. Automate your meals. 

Delete all the little decisions so you can focus on more important details in your life. By having go-to meals and snacks each week (like 3-4 different breakfasts, lunches and dinners) you eliminate having to test your will power all day. You'll be able to make better decisions without worrying about where to eat lunch, or if you should get an unhealthy snack out of a vending machine because you're hungry.

4. Eat like clockwork.

Schedule yourself to eat your meals and snacks around the same time each day. (This falls into discplining yourself.) Have each meal and your snacks within the same time frame to keep yourself fueled throughout your day. Have a backup plan ready if for some reason you can't have lunch at your regular time because of a meeting or another event. Most importantly, don't beat yourself if you don't eat during at the time you planned. Just continue with the rest of your eating schedule as closly as you can so you don't continue off your set track.

What is one lesson you've learned during your weight loss or healthy lifestyle journey? We'd love to know!

Nurture Your Relationships

With the hustle and bustle of life, it can be hard to slow down and reflect on what’s actually going on around you—sometimes we even have to pencil in a break or bedtime on our schedules. Just as Amber talked about yesterday in her post “15 Rules to Live by,” at times we need to just take a breather and respect our own needs. Many of our posts focus on finding time for yourself but today I’d like to discuss spending quality time with others. Part of tending to our own needs, is connecting with others. Your social environment can have a large affect on your mood, behavior and even values. If we nurture our environment, we'll get back in return.

Living about 5 hours away from my hometown, I know I’m guilty of neglecting friends and family I don’t see every day. I’ll even admit that sometimes I just don’t feel like picking up when I’m trying to wind down and all of a sudden I see a friend is calling that I haven’t spoken to in awhile. I know this conversation will last awhile so I decide to just call them back later—but of course later we’re too busy.

What we need to remember is that no matter how busy life gets, we need to be sure we’re actually living it and sharing it with others. Simple things like Skyping for a few minutes, re-connecting on Facebook or sending an e-card can remind you of how much love and support surrounds you. I don’t know about you, but I feel a rush of motivation and comfort after a nice phone call with a friend. Simply knowing that my friend “has my back” makes me reach higher and challenge myself even more.

Although distance may be keeping you away from some friendships, we need to be sure we’re reaching out to loved ones we see every day as well. Catch up during a 30 minute walk, meet up at the basketball court, make a healthy dinner together or take a 3-day vacation. Get out of that routine of just saying “hi” and “bye.” We all know time is precious so show all your loved ones you care by taking that extra 10 minutes to devote specially to them.

I Am An Iron Man

I just couldn’t help myself, Jeff shared this video with me several weeks ago and I thought it appropriate to share with all of you H3 blog readers. At first, the video may trigger a few LOL’s (laughs out loud according to techno lingo), but in addition to the chuckles there resides a huge subliminal message.

Please note (DISCLAIMER): I apologize as the video itself contains profanity; therefore if you may be offended, please decline viewing.

If you are to view the video, I feel it speaks volumes to all individuals who are engaging in any type of training. Whether training for an iron man or better health, the revelation is balance.



So, what does balance mean to you? Are you so strictly driven in your regiments that you have no time to enjoy life? Are you eliminating your social life in efforts to become fit? Is the lack of social life and or social interaction contributing positively or negatively to your overall happiness? Is the lack of overall happiness harmful to your health? These are all questions we as fitness coinsures should be asking ourselves. Are we allowing a balance between work, fitness, family and friends? Even deeper, are we allowing room for balance within our own fitness regiments? (i.e. are we switching up our regiments by adding variety or are we simply staying rigid and blasé?). Remember, too much of anything is not good. As Bob would say “everything in moderation.” Let this video be a simple reminder to balance your wellbeing.

“Be moderate in order to taste the joys of life in abundance.”  ~Epicurus

Practicing What I Preach

I am writing this, my last H3 blog post, with a mixture of sadness and excitement.  For years I have preached the importance of work/life balance, while my own life has lacked that balance.  I have loved helping Hilton Head Health guests change their behavior and lives, and I derived great satisfaction during my 15 months as Rescue Coordinator for Darlington County Humane Society.  However, my personal life has suffered. 

Hilton Head Island, with its 34,000 residents, has extremely limited social options for single women of a certain age—my age, as I soon discovered.  I tried to tell myself that having a great job and living in a beautiful place were enough; I would be satisfied if I were alone for the rest of my life.  Some days, that seemed like a reasonable decision.  Yet other times, like recently when I was sitting at an outdoor restaurant enjoying a gorgeous, sunset ocean view by myself, I realized I was missing out on companionship. 

Therefore, I recently decided to return to Dallas, where I will have more social and recreational opportunities.  I will be the Employee Health Coach for two hospitals in the Methodist Health System.  I’m looking forward to the big-city culture I enjoyed while living in Dallas for 10 years:  Jazz Under the Stars, offbeat plays (Great American Trailer Park Musical), the North Texas Jazz Festival, Shakespeare in the Park, and of course the Texas State Fair.  My dogs will have a blast at two upcoming water-park events:  K-9 Kerplunk and Wags and Waves.  And hopefully, I will renew old friendships and form new ones.    

Thank you, to all of the Hilton Head Health guests who have touched my heart during the past 3 ½ years.  Thank you for your honesty, openness, courage, and willingness to take a risk.  You have inspired me more than you know.  I will miss you.  Best wishes for a life filled with health, happiness, and balance.  You deserve it!

How to make work-life balance work

I’ve been meaning to write this blog for months, but to be completely honest “work has gotten in the way.”  In February I watched this TED video by Nigel Marsh author of “Fat, Forty and Fired” and “Overworked and Underlaid.”



 

I meet individually each week with about half a dozen new guests who describe to me the obstacles they’ll face when they return home.  Empirically speaking, I’d figure that nine out of ten attribute their health problems to the long unbalanced hours they spend in the workplace.  Most assert that their lives are totally dominated by work.  Yet many believe the solution is simply to find time outside of work hours to exercise.  As Nigel describes, “being a fit ten hour a day office rat isn’t being more balanced.  It’s being more fit.”  Work-Life balance is a healthy combination of intellectual, emotional, spiritual, social and physical wellbeing.