New Year's Eve

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Wishing you an abundance of health and love.
Everything else   we can buy.

See you all next year!

Train your Body, Train your Mind, Tame your Tongue.

2010 Challenge

New Body – New World

I’ve been thinking of the people who’ve inspired me on my various paths in life, some are still my teachers, others have moved on. Then I had to look at myself and ask what kind of role I play in the world and what I want for the New Year.

Inspiration is really just holding up a mirror of hope, real possibilities and desire to someone else.  How we live our lives is what’s on our mirror and we never know how much we affect others through our actions and our lives.

So what’s this got to do with health and fitness? Everything. When we’re inspired, endless possibilities can become real. An inspired possibility comes from an energized brain, and an energized brain is the hottest ticket to any life transformation.  

Dumped after 30

A lot of men start to feel old and experience a depressing loss of youth after 30. The media “youth advertising” blitz starts to taper off, hormones change, careers kick into gear, we can’t metabolize the junk food we loved in our 20’s and it’s easy to feel old when we go out to dance on the weekends.

What’s really critical here isn’t the “chronological loss of youth” that implies aging in our culture, it’s the lack of inspiration for, and encouragement of, a healthy life, body and lifestyle. Having ripped abs isn’t a description of having good health or a lack of it; they’re just ripped abs. Put "mind-body" health together with ripped abs and you’ve got something really great. But it’s always your choice of what’s healthy – for you – that is the most important thing.

New World Order 

I noticed that whenever I’ve shifted something in my life, I’ve attracted new people and opportunities. Imagine the magnitude of local and world change that would occur if all of us made ourselves fit (ripped if you want) and healthy from the inside out. Supersized double cheese burgers with fries and diet cokes would disappear, no one would be buying them. Gyms would open in airports, shopping malls and roadside gas stations. Irradiated food would sit unsold on shelves for it’s 100-year extended lifetime and fresh food would be the order of the day.

So for the New Year, make time to take care of yourself at the gym. Eat well. Skip those unfulfilling social events, and go to the ones that are more meaningful. Make a lifestyle plan for yourself. If your friends make fun of your new patterns and eating habits, just love them. No defense necessary. When you’ve taken care of yourself —and really, who else is going to? — You will find your interactions with everyone else to be so much lighter, you’ll have energy for hours and you’ll deep sleep like you used to, regardless of the stress you endure.

Be the Change 

If we want to live in a world full of happy, healthy, kind people then Gandhi’s guidance is perfect:  “be the change you want to see in the world”. Here’s a 2010 challenge, I hope you’ll join me:

Be the happiest that we can be.

Be the healthiest that we can be.

Be the fittest that we we be.

Go ahead and make this list longer, it’s just a start. What do you really want in the New Year? How do you want to look and feel? What kind of world do you want to live in? If we continually step-out being ourselves, being our best, we’ll feel inspired and we'll inspire someone else. That’s how the world will change, one of us at a time.

Happy New Year!

Train Your Body. Train your Mind. Tame your Tongue.

Information on this site is not a substitute for consulting a licensed medial professional. You should never begin an exercise or nutritional regime without consulting your physician.

My First Time

I'm dedicating this blog to the inspirational body builder – Joe Loprenzi who died at the age of 95 on December 16 this year. Joe's brother Sam built the first gym I ever stepped foot into, and it's still there in the same spot in southeast Portland, Oregon.

Until I was 13, my athletic activities were bike riding and playing chess. In the 8th grade, Bobby, the “popular boy” – who I had an innocent teen crush on – asked me to sign up for the Pop Warner football team with him. The team needed a “big guy” in the front line, (translation: heavy kid) and he was the quarterback. Cool, anything to get to hang out with him and get rides home in his dad’s 1950’s  windowless jeep.

Touchdown Hero

The "football thing" was a huge new venture for me. Every part of it was terrifying, and I’d never succeeded at anything in sports before. I was as determined as a 13 year-old could be because I wanted to succeed so badly and I wanted Bobby to like me. The coach realized that I could remember plays and designed a couple of them where I got to break out from the line and have the ball tossed to me. One time, I made a touchdown. Do you have any idea what kind of confidence builder that was? I was the team’s hero for a day.


My junior year in high school, a new kid moved in next door. Greg was tall, lean and ripped. His family had moved to Portland from a farm in Eastern Oregon, so he’d been tossing hay bales for years. I’d never seen abs like his except in the bodybuilding ads in the back of my superhero DC Comic books. Greg had a few years of weight training experience with his dad, and they liked to go watch bodybuilding competitions at the Portland Armory. Greg and his dad started taking me along to the shows, and that summer, Greg asked me to go to a local gym with him. Ask a high school friend with a major crush on you to go to the gym? Yeah!

Loprenzi's Gym

Loprenzi’s gym in southeast Portland was just a 30 minute bike ride from our homes. Sam Loprenzi  was a celebrity bodybuilder who had started the gym in 1948, and he was still there every day. His brother Joe was about 50 at the time and definitely looked like one of my superhero fantasies. Sam's semi-warehouse gym space was big, hot and certainly didn’t have a self explanatory set of circuit training machines. In fact, I really don’t remember any machines, just lots of heavy weight plates, home made gym equipment and really big guys with wide leather belts doing squats.


Intuitively, I knew how to do bicep curls, but that was about it. I didn’t have a clue about how to perform any other exercise. The whole place was a mystery. Greg took me around a little bit and helped me with a few exercises but because I was so intimidated, I never liked being at the gym. What kept me going there was the bike ride over and getting to spend time with Greg.

Even now when I go to a new gym I get the some of the same feelings. Gyms are like new leather work gloves. It takes a little while to get them to fit comfortably. Every gym is different, the layout, the equipment, the music and the vibe of the people. Even if you’re experienced, it’s a whole new place to figure out. If you’ve never worked out before, it’s even more difficult.

Travel Fit

Since the end of the year often involves travel, I’m giving those of you who have some training a portable workout that’s good in just about any hotel gym. The workouts are primarily dumbbell based because most gyms have them. Take this program along with you. It’ll help you knock out a weeks worth of training anyplace so you can get a quick workout in and stay in shape on the road.


For those of you who are just getting started, get some instruction first, and watch this blog for “how to” writings. (even more as soon as I get that video camera working).  Don’t use this caution as an excuse to sidestep exercise though – every gym has some form of cardio equipment and mats for abs and floor exercises.

Workout Notes

Complete 2-3 sets of 8-12 repetitions for each weight exercise. Target 2-3 sets of 25 reps for each abdominal exercise. If you can't do that, set a bench mark that's just above what you think you can do and shoot for that number. Do at least 20 minutes of cardio interval training on your cardio days. If you don't have the endurance or time for a 40 minute stretch, get up, grab some coffee and hit the gym before breakfast for a 20 minute cardio blast, then come back at the end of the day before dinner and give yourself another 20 minute cardio blast. You won't feel guilty when you eat dessert that night.

The 6 Day Hotel Gym Workout

Day 1 – Chest & Triceps

5-10 minute cardio warm-up

Flat bench dumbbell chest press

Incline bench dumbbell chest press

Flat bench dumbell flys  (or pec fly machine)

Decline pushups (toes on bench, hands on floor)

Rope triceps pushdowns

Triceps dumbell kickbacks

Day 2 – Cardio & Abs

Cardio 

Abdominals on a mat: 

Bent knee leg raises

Oblique crunches

Crunches

Day 3 – Back & Biceps

5-10 minute cardio warm-up

Dumbbell row  

Cable lat pulldowns

Pull ups – narrow and wide grips

Dumbbell biceps curl

Dumbbell hammer curl

Day 4 – Cardio & Abs

Cardio 

Stability ball abdominal crunches

Stability ball oblique crunches 

Day 5 – Legs & Shoulders

5-10 minute cardio warm-up

Squats

Lunges

Leg extensions (if a machine is available)

Seated dumbbell shoulder Press

Side deltoid – seated lateral raise

Front deltoid – standing forward raise

Posterior deltoid – seated bent over lateral raise  

Day 6 – Cardio & Abs

Cardio 

Flat bench crunches

Flat bench bicycle

Flat bench Russian twist 

Day 7 – Get out and play

Information on this site is not a substitute for consulting a licensed medial professional. You should never begin an exercise or nutritional regime without consulting your physician.

Comfort Food

Familiar and dependable foods that pretend to make life ok

Food.
My family was all about food. Shopping for it, cooking it, eating it and before any meal was finished, talking about what we’d have for the next meal. Whew.

“Gher” was my father’s favorite word at dinner… it means EAT in Armenian, and yes, I mean that with capital letters. It was usually uttered near the end of a meal when everyone was already full. My ears received “Gher” somewhere between a request and a demand. I was a fat kid.  (Photo:  Me in the 8th grade)

None of us had any idea what the food did to our bodies. Meat, bread, butter, vegetables, cookies… for all the understanding we had they could have all been put into a blender together. Except for the cookies. I always had some hidden in my t-shirt drawer, no blender for them.

Numb and Dumber

Somehow in this mix of “blenderized” foods I picked out the ones that gave me the most comfort and made them my favorites. In case you wanted a description of comfort foods, they’re the ones that numb you to the world and do it by-passing your brain’s satisfaction center finally landing in some dumb spot in your body. You know the place – it doesn’t have an “off” switch. Sometimes comfort foods put you to sleep too, just like potatoes and gravy at Thanksgiving, another numb-you-dumb.

My first experience with changing eating habits was at 18, my freshman year in college. I wanted to row with my University crew team and had to drop 12 pounds. Intuitively I knew that the foods I loved the most I’d have to give up. But I wanted to crew more than eating those Oreos, so I left them along with my big bag of chips with other guys in the dorm.

Otis Redding had just released “Sitting on the dock of the Bay” and since we were rowing on the San Francisco Bay, I made it my theme song. I talked to the food service director who took a liking to me and she came up with some low calorie meals (Jello was the linch-pin to her planning – go figure, what did I know?). I got up and ran the foothills before class every morning, and after classes in the afternoon we sprinted laps up and down the stadium stairs. Plus, we rowed an hour every other day. I got into really good shape, I actually got abs, my self-confidence changed and I got to row. We won our first time out and I thought that I’d died and gone to heaven. But I still didn’t know much in the way of how food really works. I just knew that some foods were only supposed to be sidebars on my eating list. (Photo, Stanford University freshman crew 1968, that's me, fourth back on the right side)

Hot Stuff

Later on in my college career I got to study in Germany for six months. The first three of which I forgot everything about food and lived on what seemed like a Bavarian sugar and carb fest. My body was run down and I ended up with Scarlet Fever. I discovered what I had while in Rome, after trying to escape the fever by laying down on the Sistine Chapel floor to cool off. The guards weren’t happy about me doing that and kicked me out, but it had turned out to be a great place to look at the ceiling. My skin peeled off in big sheets from the heat of the fever, I lost half of my hair and my eyes couldn’t focus to read more than two lines of text at a time, my muscle tone was gone along with my abs. The doctor was concerned that I’d have heart and other organ problems… from all that internal cooking going on. It was a pretty low spot. On top of it all, I ended up quarantined with my two best friends and my German teacher. Now, they weren’t happy.

After recovering and returning to the states I worked myself back to health. My eyes were goofy for quite a while (I re-trained them using a prism) but the worst was my thin hair and now delicate skin. Everything made it break out in a rash, similar to psoriasis. I had a vanity attack. When an allergy test showed that I was allergic to almost all of my art supplies I knew that was not going to fly. I’d have to do a healing that my doctor couldn’t help me with. Getting back to exercising and returning (most of the time) to a healthier version of my freshman eating patterns helped me feel and look better. I moved off campus and got a place for free as a live-in pool boy. I swam every day and biked to school, my diet was pretty simple most of the time. Once again my body started to change and become more healthy. It took at least six years for the outward symptoms to disappear. I still didn’t know much more about how food really worked, I just knew that if I kept working at it, I’d learn. Meanwhile, whenever I felt sad, scared or rejected, I’d head right back to those comfort foods.

All these years later, I get to guide clients on food as part of their training program. I’m still learning. I don’t crave some foods at all any more, and some foods are still real challenges. It takes time to understand food and then to accept and live by really healthy eating habits. If you have someone to help coach you through a progressive diet change, you’re lucky. If you don't, the information and support available now is amazing. The key to modifying our relationship to comfort food is through our commitment to making a change. Sometimes it has to be motivated by an outside source or goal, like getting on the crew team or addressing a major health issue like it was for me.

Everything Changes

Changing any part of our life ­­– whether it is changing our body, changing a relationship, changing our understanding of something specific to our life (like food), or really committing to something you want – changes our relationship to every other part of our life. We just can’t be the same. Like wearing a new pair of glasses, our vision suddenly becomes crystal clear. That’s one reason we re-bound to comfort foods, they’re dependable. They're from the past and they're familiar and unchanging. Leaving comfort foods behind, especially sugary comfort foods, is as tough and emotional as the final scene in “Where the Wild Things Are” where Max leaves Carol on the shore and sails off alone.

So if you want to start planning for a change, train your mind. Learn everything you can about what you put in your mouth. Develop an exercise program and stick to it. Mind, mouth, body. Connect the dots and you win.

Be proactive. Make only one change in your food habits at a time. Be fearless with your changes. Take the time to enjoy life, laugh and be with your family and friends. I invite you to share your comfort food stories with me – not keeping them a secret is the first step to letting them go.

Train your Body. Train your Mind. Tame your Tongue.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Information on this site is not a substitute for consulting a licensed medial professional. You should never begin an exercise or nutritional regime without consulting your physician.

Holiday Parties

The 10 Pound Months

Permission was finally granted. Now I could abandon my belly to the fried appetizers and the dessert table that's been tempting me like a treasure covered altar in an Indiana Jones movie. Who gave me that permission anyway? If it was the Pillsbury dough boy, he's going to have some serious competition. After all, I'm reasoning that it’s just a short holiday season and I’ve been good all year. Anyway, any extra weight can get hidden under my charcoal grey cable knit sweater with its slimming vertical stripes, right?

I woke-up in bed, covered in a sweat, with a half eaten ginger cookie in my hand.

OMG it was all just a dream.

Here I am, slightly terrified. So, I thought I'd share some of my personal survival tips for getting through the holidays – the "Ten Pound Months" – without packing on extra pounds.

Get pushy

You may have less time now but you can still include exercise into your day. Start out with a cat stretch, neck stretch, three sets of push-ups, and an abs workout. If you’re really committed, drop to the floor and do a set of push-ups every three hours. Only have twenty minutes for a gym workout? Get in there and just do it – before you spend those twenty minutes thinking about how there isn’t enough time to do anything.

Don’t party hungry

If you’re going out to dinner or a party, don’t go hungry. Plan the day before so that you’ll have four or five small meals starting with breakfast. Make your last meal before going out a protein shake. You’ll arrive feeling energized – not starving, and the small meals during the day will have fired up your metabolism.

Drink a lot

You thought this was the 'Absolute' solution? No, I didn't mean alcohol. This is a plan for navigating the holiday bar and leaving with with your reputation intact. Other than your reputation, we’re on a mid-section survival mission here. So start your day with a glass of distilled water. It will kick-off an alkaline reaction in your body and hydrate you after fasting all night. Then keep a scorecard at your desk and drink at least eight to ten glasses of spring water during the day. The water will keep you full and keep your brain functioning at its peak. Make sure your first “drink” at the party is sparkling water with a splash of cranberry juice in a martini glass. The glass in your hand will fit right in with the crowd, and you’ll end up having one less alcoholic drink.

See red

When you drink, make it red. Red wine can help raise your HDL levels (good cholesterol) and prevent LDL (the bad guys) from forming. It’s a source of flavonoid pnenolics – and resveratrol, which can help, prevent blod clots and plaque formation in your arteries. Should you make red wine your new best friend? Probably not. It is also a prime source of empty calories and it can increase your triglycerides (fat – the bad blood lipids). So start with that “martini-glass water drink”, and keep your red wine drinking to one or two glasses.

See green

Yellow and all the rainbow vegetables. Choose them at the party buffet table. Instead of nuts and carbohydrate loaded foods, go for cruciferous vegetables. They can help prevent man boobs and cancer (got your attention, didn’t I ?) and because they’ve got a crunch you’ll get the oral satisfaction you're wanting. Just smile at that harmless looking baked Brie appetizer, and if you still want nuts, put 12 on your plate, then eat them one at a time.

See white

White will put 10 pounds on you in a flash, unless it’s that white fruit combo you’re having for breakfast (…apples, pears, bananas, pineapples and a few golden raisins). The international conspiracy of white carbs including Irish potatoes, Indian rice, French baguettes, Italian cannoli, German spaetzle, English bread pudding and Armenian butter cookies will go right to your middle. They'll fill up that spare tire… but you’ll feel flat. So load up your plate with salads, vegetables and protein instead. Skip the white carbs and if you are going to take a dessert, then take just one taste bite and put your plate down. Now walk away from it.

Stand aside

Come to dinner armed with conversation topics and stand on the other side of the room away from the food table. Smile and laugh and everyone will come over to hear your stories. If you’re talking – you’re not eating. If you don't have anything to say, ask questions. People love to talk about themselves and you’ll make new friends doing this. Remember, even if it's on the other side of the room, standing next to the kitchen door doesn’t count.

To Z rescue

Get enough sleep. When you’re tired you eat more, you have less energy to kick your workouts into gear, you’re brain doesn’t work as well and sleepy people are less fun at parties. Need I say more?

Skinny control

Open your calendar and look at the date. January 1st is almost tomorrow. Start writing your goals for the New Year right now. Read or write in your journal every day. You’ll be amazed at how powerful this is. This one, simple action will help keep you focused and in control when you’re watching all your skinny friends wolfing down huge helpings of tiramisu at the end of the evening.

Heavy breathing

Cardio it up. Take the stairs, run to the bus stop, go dancing, do cardio at the gym. Trouble with your knees? Get them checked and don’t put it off because you’ll need them the rest of your life. Use non impact cardio equipment such as elliptical trainers. Alternately, be a duck and go swimming. No gym membership and a tight financial month? Go online and print out free passes to every gym in your neighborhood, or stop by and ask them for a guest pass to check out the gym. Then use them. At the end of December, you’ll know exactly which gym you want to join for your “New-Year’s-New-Body” resolution. There are no excuses – do at least 20 minutes of cardio every day. Do it like your life depends on it. It does.

Sup it up

If you’re doing all of these things, your immune system will be stronger. You'll want to keep it that way. Support it some more by taking a multi-vitamin, an anti-oxidant like ALA and extra vitamin C. On those nights when you’ve had too many drinks, in spite of your good intentions, take a milk thistle supplement and drink at least 10 ounces of water before going to bed. Your liver will thank you for it.

Tips of your own? Share away, I'd love to hear them.

Train Your Body. Train your Mind. Tame your Tongue.

What's Next?

New beginnings...

Or the end of the line?

It doesn’t seem to matter if we’re graduating from high school, college, changing jobs, ending a relationship, moving across country or retiring. We all spend our lives changing, growing and wondering what’s next… and like that gift from a holiday party grab bag...hoping we’ll like what we get.

This blog entry was inspired when one of my high school friends retired. His email to me was “I don’t know what to do with myself.” At 59-60, a man’s life is strangely similar to that of being 29-30. Things get re-evaluated and shifted around. Just like getting a flat tire when you're already late for a meeting, I hit one of those slumps at 59. And even though I loved every minute of my work, I was still demanding of myself to find something new and exciting. Since it didn’t show up when I wanted it to, I decided to find more peace with my life by hitting the gym with a fierce intensity. Something had to change! It worked, my mood lightened up (so did my body), and everything seemed brighter.

Give it to me

But I still wanted something exciting to happen before I turned 60…

So last fall I headed up to the Catskills and started projects on our pre-civil war farmhouse — landscaping, laying stone walks, a new metal roof and painting the whole darn house. The house is always teaching me new lessons about myself, it’s still standing proud with a peaceful face toward every season with its uneven rock foundations, weathered siding, sloping floors and –now – a new silver roof.

Right then, while I was so engaged and happy with simple utilitarian projects and a lot of dirt under my fingernails, the universe granted my request. I received an offer to take my skills as a fitness trainer to the dancers on Madonna’s “Sticky and Sweet” tour in Europe and North America. My partner, Dr. Steven Margolin, was there as Madonna’s chiropractor. Together we made quite the wellness team.

Pre-show abs blast

Really Surreal

One night, before the kick-off of the tour, Steven, Liz Rosenberg (Madonna’s publicist for most of her career) and I sat in three yellow folding chairs in an empty Izod Arena in New Jersey as Madonna and her cast of performers ran through the first dress rehearsal of their “Sticky and Sweet” world tour. Exciting? Yes, and also a little surreal. I had the same feeling every night of the performance thereafter while standing backstage, riding busses between cities I’d never heard of and learning lessons from the Icon of Music who’s lyrics have pulled me onto dance floors most of my life.

At every point in our lives we’re looking for the next thing. This is good. It’s also good to become totally engaged with who we are right now. It allows us to be better, stronger and makes room for something new to show up.

So I was thinking that the best tools for preparing ourselves for the future are really three basic rules for living joyfully in the present:

1. Live with a healthy, fit mind.
2. Keep a healthy, fit body.
3. Enjoy a desire to experience all of life.

It's all good

Most of us get slammed with a realization that we have to look at our lives differently when we’re turning 29 or 30. In astrology, it’s called Saturn return. Physically, our bodies are just starting to change, and we look at our future and past with a new vision. When I was 30, I “came out”. Being married didn’t make it any easier. The only positive thing my dad said about it all came three years later… he thought I should have done it earlier because he’d never seen me happier.

I developed a motto during this time: “It’s all good in the end, if it’s not all good, it’s not the end.”

So wherever you are in life, go for the joy. If it’s one of those uncertain times, take control of the things you can. Get your body as fit as it can be and think good thoughts. If you want some inspiration, just listen and watch the new remix video of Madonna’s “Celebration” with all of her fans strutting their stuff. Find it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZYvXVyUANY

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Tips for “working out” your stuff

• Leave your problems at the gym or yoga studio door. They’ll be there waiting for you, if you want them, when you’re done.
• Wear something that makes you look and feel good. If nothing in your closet works, go out and buy that new tank top.
• Hydrate before, during and after your workout. It’s good for your muscles, and keeps your brain happier and functioning.
• Focus on each movement of each exercise. Be so present in your workout practice that there is no room for other thoughts.
• Before you lift, know how many reps you want to do. Then do them.
• Relax your grip. If you’re doing biceps and your forearms are tight, your mind will think you’re working them instead of your biceps.
• I see so many guys at the gym making horrible faces when they train… if they only knew how unattractive they looked. Be an actor. Put on a stage smile. Stay conscious of your face when you’re working out and you’ll feel more energized. You’ll look better too — and don’t forget, we’re training our face muscles every time we use them!
• Finish your chest, shoulder or leg workout with one or two light back exercise reps. You’ll leave the gym standing taller.
• Do one nice thing for someone at the gym, it might just be a kind word. You’re the one who will feel good when you do it.
• Eat when you’re done. Keep your energy up. You’ll want every bit of it to finish the day.

If none of these work, do what my high school friend does ­­­­— just go fishing.

Train Your Body. Train your Mind. Tame your Tongue.

Super-Energy Drink

Dopamine Tricks

I’m always on the lookout for more information and new ways of supporting my workouts and helping my clients. When hearing about a trainer responsible for “high profile” clients who was rumored to give one client a “super-energy” drink before performing, I had to listen up. What was this potent mixture? Sounds like something we’d all like, doesn’t it? The bad news overshadowed anything good…the client is restless and can’t sleep at night, in spite of extensive exercise, an exhausting performance schedule and a level of fitness even I lust after.

Curious?

Try on 4 shots of espresso and a melted chocolate bar. You’ll buzz right through your training and your boss will wonder how you worked all night. It’s a simple recipe that gets results up front and a jittery crash on the back end.

Even my friends who are big Italian espresso fans wouldn’t down all this at once.

Sugar and caffeine, yum.

My most memorable sugar-crash (sounds like a break-up song, doesn’t it?) was a few years back in San Francisco. I was in the middle of designing an issue of Sierra Club’s Magazine and had that mid-afternoon, middle of winter slump. So I dropped into the deli downstairs and grabbed a double espresso and an “It’s It” ice cream bar, which is similar to Carvel’s “Flying Saucer” on the east coast. A half hour later I was working double speed. My ever critical editor, who had been married to the Pulitzer and Nobel Prize winning writer Saul Bellow and was always trying to be better than he was, came into my crowded corner office and gave me one of her rare smiles of approval. Nice. I was thinking that I’d have this Coffee-Ice Cream combo every day. Then it hit, just like having your in-laws visit unexpectedly. Zapped energy, hello headache, nausea and finally ­– complete exhaustion. I was done for, and that smile left my editors face.

I’ve had a few similar learning experiences since then, but I think I’ve finally made some peace with the sugar demons. It always helps to understand how our body works, so let’s take a look at our chemistry…

All Doped Up

In response to various substances, our brains produce a chemical called dopamine. It could be called our pleasure trigger. Men (and women) developed this chemical response to foods, particularly mother’s milk, as a survival mechanism. So of course, if we eat and nourish our bodies, then we survive.

Our brains function as a super-smart computer and run a tracking device to remember the “triggers” that allow it to release dopamine. From personal experience, the more sugar, refined carbohydrates and comfort foods I eat, the more I crave them. Now I know why, my body just wants to be “doped” up again and again.

Chocolate, sugar, cocaine, cheese, alcohol and nicotine all trigger our “pleasure center”. Yeah, we can reach heights of ecstasy while eating cruciferous vegetables and we can actually learn to crave these foods. But it’s tough given our culture and its social eating habits.

Gandhi was wrong

The trick is in re-programming our brains to feel pleasure from whole, healthy foods and less pleasure from empty calorie foods. It takes time. Gandhi always advised us to take three months to solidify changes we want to make with our habits and bodies. Personally, I think it takes longer than that when it comes to this topic.

So, back to the supposed “super-energy” drink. It creates an instant pleasure rush, a blood sugar rush and follow-up crash, an energy (nervous) rush and a lingering un-calmness when it has finally been processed by the digestive system. It edges our body into dangerous acidic PH levels. Acidic PH levels in our bodies attract and host viruses, yeasts, cancers and parasites.

If you desire more energy or ripped abs (and you can have them at any age) — start by controlling what turns on your inner "dope." Just so you don't feel like everything is against you, remember, — exercise and sex burn calories, they also stimulate dopamine release and the expenditure of energy kicks up the creation of more energy.

(A note on the espresso-chocolate bar trainer… finally fired by the client.)

10 Lifestyle Tips for Energy

1. Eat well the day before.

2. Always eat breakfast.

3. Eat 5 or 6 small meals each day (3 hours apart, if you’re training).

4. Go ahead and have some coffee before your workout — one shot not four…

5. Better than coffee, have green or white tea.

6. Stay off the sugar rollercoaster, you don’t need this amusement park ride.

7. Find a vitamin drink or mix that has an abundance of B vitamins. A niacin rush is a whole lot different than a sugar rush.

8. Get enough sleep. It’s the magic anti-fat weapon.

9. Move everyday. If you’re not, get your tail off the couch and exercise. If you’re not doing anything, just 20 minutes will make a big shift in how you feel.

10. Make sure your trainer knows what they’re talking about.

Train Your Body. Train your Mind. Tame your tongue.

Winter Fit

The Dark Months
Winter always makes my inner bear want to hibernate. It started happening around the first of October since I’ve been living in New York. Then it hits me like a bottle of sleeping pills when daylight savings time ends. (Which was last night) Of course, I don’t hibernate — but my body reacts to the lack of daylight anyway.

This is like a mad marathon, racing with darkness to stay fit. Actually, it’s a race with the darkness and cold. I’ve given in on a few years and by New Year’s Eve my “get fit” resolution seems almost overwhelming to accomplish. At that point, I’m wearing pants several sizes larger. Ugh. Why was it that I left sunny California for New York?

So this year I started plotting against the darkness early.

I wrote myself meal plans, boosted up my cardio, re-affirmed my goals and timelines, wrote a workout schedule for the next months, bought some full spectrum lighting to help with the lack of natural light, and am planning for a photoshoot right in the middle of December to keep me motivated and away from 10 desserts at Thanksgiving. I also met with my doctor for an exam and to do blood work so we could make sure everything inside is running the way it’s supposed to.

I’m also surrendering in ways that suit the season, getting to bed earlier and going with the flow. Introspection in winter is a great tool for creating personal power… that’s the part of winter I do love. And the snow—at least in the country—it calms the mind, and works your body if you hike through it or attack it with a shovel.

Maryanne Travaglone, Doctor of Chinese Medicine, explains snowy winter through the practice of Chinese Medicine; winter — especially the white of winter, corresponds to the dormancy of the inner seeds of life that blossom in the spring. So all the care and nurturing done in winter is really to get us ready for new fabulous bathing suits.

Seasons come around to support life. If we’re growing full blast all year around then we don’t get the chance to rest and live with our new growth. But if you’re like me, you probably don’t want to stop. So use the season to solidify your hard work and prepare for the spring. It’ll be back before we know it.

How are you planning for the darker months? I'm always looking for new ways to make the journey a more successful adventure. Comments, questions and thoughts always welcome, I'd love to hear from you.

Train Your Body. Train your Mind. Tame your tongue.

On the path...

Ten Fit Tips

Being healthy, happy and fit are the greatest gifts of wealth we can create for ourselves. It’s really a form of selfish self-love, a really good one. So here are 10 tips to get or keep you on that path.

1 Train your mind
Ah, it’s your biggest muscle. Put it to work and get it on board to plan your workouts and help you to make healthy choices. If you can visualize yourself as the person you want to be transformed into nothing will stop you from getting there.

2 Use a pen
Write your goals and vision down. You know — your personal business plan. Then condense it to a few words and keep it with you at all times. I keep mine on a card in my wallet so I have to see it every time I pay for something.

3 Figure out what rocks you
I love weight training, I love yoga, I love bicycling and swimming, I love running, I kind of love hauling rocks and landscaping my yard, I love sex. Use what you love to do to get and stay in shape. Make your plan around it and be consistent.

4 Invest in fitness like it’s your 401k
If you’re getting in shape for summer — great. But what happens in the fall? Or next year, or ten years from now. Commit to the long term; make choices that will support you for the rest of your life. It’s called a healthy fitness lifestyle. Invest in it daily.

5 Eat often and well
One meal a day will make you fat. Coffee and a muffin for breakfast will make you soft. Eat enough sugar and you’ll need anti-depressants. Learn about food. Eat five to six small meals during the day and always have some protein on your plate before noon. Power-up with a whey protein drink at 10 and 3.

6 Shop with a list
My shopping list includes—Almonds, oatmeal, brown rice and buckwheat cereals, organic eggs, turkey, chicken and fish, sweet potatoes (especially white sweet potatoes), organically grown fresh vegetables, berries and organic fruit that’s in season, olive oil, goat’s milk yogurt, and super grains like quinoa, amaranth and millet. My “ice cream” of choice is made from coconut milk and is sweetened with agave instead of sugar.

7 Drink up
Your body is like mine, composed of somewhere between 55 and 78 percent water. About 20 percent of our water intake comes from food, so you have to make up the difference with the real thing. Drink spring or filtered water. Save the tap water for your shower.

8 Count the black and white sheep
Get enough sleep. Get enough quality sleep. If you’re working out, this is where your muscles recover and grow. Loose enough hours of sleep and you’ll propel yourself down a path of tired overeating and aging.

9 Think outside of time
Don’t ever blame anything on your age. Pick on something else, something you can change. If you can’t change it, you’re stuck. Think like a warrior, you want your obstacles to be opportunities not blocks.

10 Stay inspired
Find someone to encourage and help inspire you. They’ll hold the transformed image you have of yourself even when you forget. Stay committed, train your body, train your mind and tame your tongue… and soon you’ll be inspiring someone else.

Train your Body. Train your Mind. Tame your Tongue.