My week, and blog, fell off the rails last week. I had a Psychology midterm dished up by a disrespectful professor, a frozen pipe attached to my sump pump, a furnace that had to be serviced by ATCO (which is free by the way!), a note from the bylaw officer about the dogs, and battle with Bell Mobility over a lost cell phone! It left me entering a new week in a poor state of mind with out my normal positive, the cup is always half full approach to life!
Today, this was completely turned around!! Today I was inspired by the beauty of nature and women. It started this morning when I went out for my morning run with Mackenzie. It was beautiful outside this morning, fresh, energizing, invigorating. The signs of spring were all around me, the beauty of opportunity and new life surrounded me!
Then I went to work and met with a ton of great women! One women inparticular was inspiring today. As a stay at home Mother she was doing something for herself for the first time in approximatley two years!! For two years she focused on everyone else, and it is a challenge for he to be able to come to the gym and train with me for two hours a week. Can you imagine, being so selfless as to struggle to give yourself two hours a week!! What a beautiful women!!
This inspiring women sent a HUGE message home to me though! Why in the world do we, as women, feel that is acceptable to give up our entire selves, with absolutley no love for me? And if we can't prioritize ourselves high enough to give ourselves "me" time then who will?
Today my clients were all about talking about the pressure's of spring. To these women Spring comes with the expectation of entertaining with a perfect house, a perfect yard, perfect barbeque and perfect patio. Spring brings the need to get a beach body for summer, and while most women do state they want this body to feel confidence in themselves, our media portrayal makes the image they describe to be the perfect beach body extremely difficult, and possibly unhealthy to maintain. Spring means soccer practice, yard sales, camping trips, government tests at school, a need to figure out how to get time off work for the family in summer....spring means beauty...but spring means stress!!
So today I challenge each of you to be a beautiful spring women. Spring is a time for new life, and each women out there is a beautiful life. So here is the spring challenge;
1. Reach out and say "I can be me, and I am worth it". Pick something that is important to you and make time to do it every day!!
(For example: my dream is to run, so I have made the resolution that as it is spring I am going to make time to go to bed earlier so I can add in a second morning workout each day).
2. Spring Cleaning. Use spring cleaning not as a competition to see who can have the most fantastic, magazine style, house. Instead use it as an opportunity to de-clutter. Clutter takes away from our ability to accomplish tasks in a timely manner and feel organize. So organize your house to fit your routine and help you survive the day with success! Then put 10 minutes a day away to do a "spot clean' that keeps the little things from getting to big things, and assures continued success.
3. The patio and the party. Your freinds are human and so are you!! When they go home they probably don't gossip about if the green cushions were the right colour, or if you have the best patio furniture!! They do talk about your hospitality and the great time they had with freinds! And for them to talk about this you need to be rested and relaxed enough to enjoy socializing. So stop sweating the small stuff, a normal backyard my have a few dandylions, it may have tired yard work, but it comes with a great friend to listen to you! A great BBQ dinner is full of laughs and health, so yes it's okay if you bought the premade vegetable platter.
4. Your body!! Embrace yourself, for you!! Your beautiful!! Then work your body into your me time. Do something to keep it healthy, buy healthy snack option even if it costs an extra dollar at the store, and embrace images of real world beautiful women!! A great place to start is with the Dove Natural Women Beauty Campaign website!! In the past two weeks I have had several people tell me I look spectacular, yes I am working out like crazy, yes I am toned and fit, but no I don't have a six pack!! I'm a women! And I'm proud of it!!
5. Respond to my blog! Let's keep a big list of all the great things that Women are doing to celebrate women!!
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
Thursday, March 31, 2011
I'm just not a fitness nut
Excuses, reasons, statements, explanations of why you can not workout, or why you can not commit to purchasing that training you know you desperatley need to make it to your fitness goal! I have heard them all!! But most of them boil down to one big assumption: Meagan it's easy for you to workout because your a fitness nut and you love it! For me it's just not something I am passionate about.
While you may never be passionate, in the same crazy way I am, about putting your body through a grueling workout and reaping the personal rewards of running around a track 2 tenths of a second faster than you did the last time; I assure you that given the chance to enjoy the positive endorphines, increased energy, increased sleep quality, increase self confidence and time away from your busy life to focus just on you, you will come to understand the many benefits a fitnesss lifestyle can offer your busy life. As women we tend over support others and fail to take care of ourselves. While, in theory, this seems like a positive quality we are forgetting a keypoint, we are best equipped to help others when we are happy and healthy ourselves.
Think about it this way, if you have a positive self image of yourselve and you are taking 3-4 hours a week to do something to improve your own health, fitness and energy levels, how much happier, easier to get a long with and more productive will you be in the time you do have to help others? A LOT! So this is not a reason or an excuse not to work out, but rather just another reason why should be doing it!! And remember personal training is just that, personal, you may have no desire to sweat until you feel like you are gonna die, or to prove to the world that you can indeed do 10 push ups from your toes. That's okay! If you have a good trainer they will work within your comfort zone, and give you the push your looking for. That's right it's ALL about you!
While you may never be passionate, in the same crazy way I am, about putting your body through a grueling workout and reaping the personal rewards of running around a track 2 tenths of a second faster than you did the last time; I assure you that given the chance to enjoy the positive endorphines, increased energy, increased sleep quality, increase self confidence and time away from your busy life to focus just on you, you will come to understand the many benefits a fitnesss lifestyle can offer your busy life. As women we tend over support others and fail to take care of ourselves. While, in theory, this seems like a positive quality we are forgetting a keypoint, we are best equipped to help others when we are happy and healthy ourselves.
Think about it this way, if you have a positive self image of yourselve and you are taking 3-4 hours a week to do something to improve your own health, fitness and energy levels, how much happier, easier to get a long with and more productive will you be in the time you do have to help others? A LOT! So this is not a reason or an excuse not to work out, but rather just another reason why should be doing it!! And remember personal training is just that, personal, you may have no desire to sweat until you feel like you are gonna die, or to prove to the world that you can indeed do 10 push ups from your toes. That's okay! If you have a good trainer they will work within your comfort zone, and give you the push your looking for. That's right it's ALL about you!
Saturday, March 19, 2011
The Beginings of Fitness Blog
Life is a journey, it is beautiful journey full of both sunshine and rain. Sometimes the sunshine is so bright we are overwhelmed with joy, and sometimes the clouds are so dark we feel imobilized by sadness and fear. While I have been so very blessed in my life to have a wonderful family and the most loyal, loving freinds I have had a few pretty rainy seasons in life. These rainy seasons have taught me several things; they have taught to me to always be proud of myself, to cling closely to my fitness lifestyle as the benefits will always keep you going and that no matter what anyone says being a women in Canada today is hard stuff!! You are constantly challenged to be a women with a successful career, a perfect home, a magazine style body, a wonderful sense of human, unending patience, and continual smile. Indeed many women today find themselves consumed by trying to be the perfect stay at home style Mother and house wife while balancing a full time job!! This leave little to know time for these wonderful women to celebrate themselves, take care of themselves and rejuniate their mind body and spirt, so that they can do each of these wonderful tasks with the enthusiasm, love and joy they truly deserve.
Throughout my many successes and failures in life I have learnt a few very important lessons, all of which have inspired me as a personal trainer, and women. So I have begun a fitness blog to share workout ideas, nutritional advice and support to women, in hopes to open the opportunity to these women to enjoy the many benefits of a fitness lifestyle integrated into the busy and demanding lives they lead today.
So stay tuned for many great posts that will discuss fitness, health and the way in which we as women can use these tools to empower us throughout life.
Throughout my many successes and failures in life I have learnt a few very important lessons, all of which have inspired me as a personal trainer, and women. So I have begun a fitness blog to share workout ideas, nutritional advice and support to women, in hopes to open the opportunity to these women to enjoy the many benefits of a fitness lifestyle integrated into the busy and demanding lives they lead today.
So stay tuned for many great posts that will discuss fitness, health and the way in which we as women can use these tools to empower us throughout life.
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