We've all been there: can't wake up so we keep hitting the snooze button. Sometimes it seems like the only way to wake up is to douse yourself with coffee...or just drink it. If its not coffee, it's something else: Vitamin Water, Sobe Energy, or even the Mio Energy. As great as these alternatives are, they all still have one thing in common: Caffeine.
Although the benefits can be increased mental focus and energy, the side effects can range from high blood pressure to bone loss (yikes!). Also, if you're like me and side pass coffee for the soda, soda can make your teeth sensitive and prone to painful cavities. Your local dentist thanks me for adding that once the enamel is gone, it won't grow back! In other words, your body was made to drink water. So ditch the coffee and add Cardio!!!!!
Here are a few ten minute exercises to get your bodies pumped and ready
to go for the day. How do I know they work? Cuz I just tried them and am
writing a blog post at 7:11 in the am.
Here's another! I combined the too and L-O-V-E how awake I feel right now!!!
So after you've finished and are sweaty enough to feel good about yourself, get on with your day. If its the first time with out caffeine, put some head ache meds in the purse on your way out just in case. Last of all, don't succumb around 2pm!! Just to keep you motivated, another unfortunate side effect of drinking caffeine in any form is weight gain which obviously inhibits weight loss. If you're working towards your goal, amp up the cardio and save moola by not buying drinks. Invest in yourself and nothing else!
As always, before ya go, here's some inspiration for your lovely day ahead:
YOU GOTSA LOVE IT 2 LOSE IT! Quit hatin' on yo'self!
Hey all! So I've been testing a lot of recipes out lately and wanted to share the most delicious and flavor filled recipes here. I have very particular taste buds and scoured the internet (mainly Pinterest and Youtube) for delicious recipes that were filled to the brim with nutrients and foods I could feel good about eating. I will include links and pictures that I took from other websites (my stupid charger for my camera has grown legs and ran away).
So the first meal that I have made repeatedly is a meal that unfortunately, I cannot find the original source for. Sooo, whoever made it first SORRY!!!
I call it Spicy Fire Roasted Scrumptiousness!
The ingredients are:
1 can fire roasted tomatoes (I buy the organic kind found at Walmart. Winco doesn't carry it...weird.)
1 can white beans (rinsed to remove that jelly nastiness)
1 cup free range chicken broth
3 diced adobo chiles (you can find these in the ethnic isle in a small can. If you don't want the heat, omit the seeds)
1 cup or half a tub of fresh salsa (I use the refrigerated Baja's or the jar without preservatives, Herdez)
1 cup frozen corn or a can (go with frozen-lasts longer, is cheaper, and has no added salt!)
To top it off, I use green onions (chives), a dollup of greek yogurt, purple onions (when I'm out of chives) and tostadas -best invention to mankind ever! They're low sodium, possibly fried (need to look into that), and are delicious! We buy those now instead of chips!
Just open all the cans and dump (except the beans). Heat til heated through and top with awesomeness. If you want added protein, you can add extra beans, chicken, or lentils. I love this meal because you can come home after a long day at work and open cans and eat! Again, I've made this repeatedly.
My next meal is the Santa Fe Chicken Salad.
I'm typically not a salad-made-at-home-lick-the-bowl type of girl, however, this converted me. Two words: YEEE-UMMMM!!! I seriously was considering hiding my husband's portion so I could devour it later (the angel in me saved it for him). Here is the original recipe, but for your convenience, the ingredients below. Note that I have modified the ingredients to make it a bit healthier and more nutrient dense.
For the salad:
A bag of your favorite lettuce (You can buy organic at Walmart. I don't know the brand, but it has a fox on it)
Organic spinach (I use the Earthbound Farms found at Winco because it's affordable)
Tomatoes, diced (If you're poor like me and can't buy organic, rinse REALLY well)
Purple onions
1/2 can black beans rinsed
1/2 c or 1/2 can corn (if its in the can, rinse it well)
Chopped cilantro (this totally adds a ZING!)
For the Chicken:
1 chicken breast per 2 people (cut it down the middle to make equal, thin halves)
Mix the following spices:
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 teaspoon onion powder
1/4 teaspoon cumin
1/4 teaspoon coriander
1/4 teaspoon oregano
1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
olive oil
Dip the chicken in the spices and put on George Foreman griddle/whatever else you have. Cook til done.
(I cut the chicken thin to make it cook faster and to cut down on the meat used)
For the Amazing lick your spoon dressing :D 1 clove garlic, minced
1 tablespoon diced onion
the juice of 1 lime (To make a lime easier to juice, roll it around in your palm for a few minutes to loosen the juice)
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon coriander
1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
1/4 cup greek yogurt
1 tablespoon honey (I omitted because I don't like small hints of sweetness...gross. It's all or nuthin' baby.)
1/4 cup olive oil (I only used a splash to make the dressing thicker)
Put dressing, chicken and salad in a bowl. Cover with lid and SHAAAAKEEE! (If you want an extra work out, put some music on and salsa while shaking ;})
And you're done. You're welcome for bringing this idea to your table...seriously. You'll thank me later. Thank you Eclectic Recipes!!
My next recipe is for breakfast. This is a Biggest Loser recipe and is MMM-mmmm good! We all adore pancakes, or at least I used to. All the sugar combined with carbs and maple syrup had me dragging by noon if not heading to the bathroom with an upset tummy sooner. Thus, the search began for pancakes that didn't make me cringe while reading the nutritional label.
Enter, Oatmeal Pancakes
These babies are fan-friggin-tastic! They're creamy, delicious, and packed with protein. Here's how you make 'em.
6 egg whites
1 tsp vanilla 2 tsp sugar-I used a single packet of Truvia 1 tsp cinnamon 1 cup low-fat cottage cheese 1 cup rolled oats
Put all the above ingredients in a blender. Blend until smooth and make them like you would any other pancake. To make them sweeter, I put frozen blueberries in and top them with 100% Maple Syrup. Someone else did the following calculations for those of you who don't want to use cottage cheese:
If
you get 12 pancakes out of this, they're 51.8 calories with 5.8g carbs,
0.83g fat and 4.91g protein PER PANCAKE!! Double batch,
use 6 whole eggs instead of whites, sub 1 C of the cottage cheese for 1 C
almond milk, add 2 tbsp baking powder.
If you want to make this recipe even more nutrient dense, add 1 tbs hemp seed, 2 tbs flax seed, and 1 tbs chia seeds. You can't even taste them!
There ya go folks! Original recipe here.
Next recipe is Banana Pancakes. Enter Jack Johnson and his silky smooth jammin'. Wrong Banana Pancakes. This is seriously the easiest breakfast ever and full of protein as well.
Here are the ingredients:
1 Banana
2 Eggs.
You're welcome. Just mash the banana and whip in the eggs and BAM! You got yourself some delicious pancakes without wheat, added sugar (unless you top it with the amazing Maples Syrup-100% all the way), or sodium! I also include blueberries-blueberries have less sugar than Maple Syrup and adds some sweetness that requires less syrup- always a bonus. To make this more nutrient dense, add in the flax, chia seeds, and hemp. Again, you cannot taste the difference.
*Note: make sure you rinse the bowl. you used VERY well. This stuff with the flax/chia/hemp is ridiculously hard to get off when dried.
Next up are Chickpea Tacos. I found this recipe on the fantastic Undressed Skeleton blog. Tara McNitt is a used to be junk fooder turned health nut. She's got some amazing recipes including some vegan items which is where I found this gem.
Ingredients:
1 can rinsed garbanzo beans
Gluten free tortillas (or whichever you want to use)
Homemade Taco Seasoning (recipe found here)
Cilantro
Tomatoes
Chives
Avocado
Olive oil
Using a dash of olive oil, coat the garbanzo beans in the oil and taco seasoning until well coated. Put into a preheated oven of 400* and cook for up to 15 minutes. I don't like the whole crunch these buddies get when in for the full fifteen so I just cook them until they're sizzling. That way, they're soft and delicious! Just put into a tortilla and top with your fav toppings! Mmm!
This is the last I'll post for today so y'all can get on with your lives. I do have sooo many more coming though so stay tuned!! These are Fajita Quesadillas. I found this video on Youtube and absolutely adore the chef. I didn't make them completely vegan so here is the video and below is my recipe.
Ingredients:
Greek Yogurt
Avocado
Cilantro
1 red bell pepper, julienned
1 yellow bell pepper, julienned
1 zucchini, julienned
purple onions cut into strips
Adobo chile sauce (found in the ethnic isle)
olive oil
Combine the vegetables with the olive oil and fry in a pan until the onions are translucent. To make the sauce that is drizzled over the top, combine about a cup or however much you feel like of greek yogurt and a couple spoonfuls of just the red adobo chile sauce. Reserve the chiles for the Spicey Fire Roasted Scrumptiousness above. If you really want a "mayo" flavoring in this but don't want the extra fat and calories, just use a couple tablespoons of mayo and mix it in with the greek yogurt. You'll get the taste you want and feel great about it. Just whip this together and reserve. After the vegetables are done, you can add cheese to them to make the meal a bit more creamy, but I just put a little of the sauce on them instead. Cheese, although delicious, should be used sparingly...always.First of all, it's expensive, and second it is fatty (to make a little go a long way, I use a lemon zester when grating it instead of the GY-normis regular cheese grater. This makes a little go a loooonnnnggg way! I also use sharp cheddar so a little really can bring out the flavor). Put inside a tortilla and toast a little. Top with the rest of the adobo chile sauce, cilantro, and thinly sliced avocado. Then, prepare to be amazed. Something so healthy shouldn't taste so good...then again, I'm so glad it is!!
Alright my friends, before I go, here's an inspiration thought for the day :
Peace out Homies! Don't forget to Love it 2 Lose it!
Hello again, my friends. Yes, i know it's been waaaayyy too long since my last post. To be 100% honest with you, I fell off the health band wagon and went on a junk food rampage for about ...well since my last blog. However, since then, I've done a little soul searching and found something that has truly inspired me. Thus, I am here to share that with you.
My back story is that I grew up with very health conscience parents who did all they could to pave the way to health for me. They showed me, my brother and sisters what dieting did and the results that it could get if we were diligent enough. They also proved how healthy and disease fighting exercising can be. I say the following with the utmost respect: I am grateful for the dieting and health guidelines they gave me, but I think the first thing I needed to know was that I was alright just being me, whatever package I came in.
In high school, I was a competitive dancer. I ate what I wanted, when I wanted and then the calories would burn off when I went to the three hour long practices that happened sometimes three times a week. Duh. Well, when I stopped dancing, that's when I began to take the first few steps into real life. Weight gain happened. I became over critical with myself, forever striving for the perfection I believed would grant me happiness. I mean, it's plastered all over my dear television set, all over the magazines at the dentist, and smeared from heck to breakfast in between. We see size (I wouldn't even call what size they are a size. Our bodies clearly were never meant to look that way) zero and beyond strutting the latest fashions or showing off their fabulous skin in steamy shower commercials and suddenly, all I wanted was to appeal to others the way that those pictures appealed to me. I wanted beauty. I wanted what was only skin deep and I wanted approval from others.
After a few semesters in college, I began to pack on the weight. My dear mother always made us delicious meals and typically I was too lazy saying "Gimme more" than to learn how to cook, so I just didn't. I deemed that the food I had in my pantry wasn't good enough and went out in search of something better, something easier like Subway, Wendy's, McDonalds, and other cheap, easy and "healthy" boxed dinners.
I began searching for the "one" and was devastated when a lot of the boys I liked declined my invitations to like me too. I began to worry more and more about what others thought of me and bent over backwards to please them. In the midst of all of the drama that was my life, I worried and worried and worried some more about the weight I was putting on. I lost some a few months after I stopped attending college, but the results were not permanent. After I met my soul mate and love of my life, things were great...until he had to get back to school and life. So, to drown out the voice of sorrow, loneliness, and boredom in my head, I kept her occupied with cookies, cakes, fast food, and soda. I entertained her with Netflix, Youtube, and Hulu. I lived vicariously through those characters I watched and didn't enjoy the amazing life I had in front of me. Then, disgusted, I'd look in the mirror and wish with all my might that I had someone else's life.
I turned to food because I thought I was fat. I really, truly believed that I was worth punishing, not worth appreciating. Why, you ask. Why was I so willing to punish myself? Because of those extra fifteen, twenty, twenty five and now forty pounds I've put on since high school. I told myself that those pounds made me hideous, that they made me less of a person and as a result, those pounds became a part of me. Each now houses a symbolic scar of the person I thought I would never become or never amount to. It was not until I realized what I was saying to myself that I was able to take those first steps out of the darkness I put myself in and see the light. I am not what I weight. I am not how I look. I am who I am and that's soooo many things that run deeper than skin.
After therapy, much research, and soul searching mingled with prayer, fasting, and many, many tears, I can honestly say that I am leaving that person behind.
The past few months, I've been reading, researching, and scouring the Internet for information. I wanted to learn what food does to me and take myself out of the ignorant bliss I fed myself to cope with my issues. I wanted to stop making excuses and to make a change that was life long.
On the edge of making this blog much too personal, I will share with any one who reads this post that I am beyond terrified to raise children in this society. I hate walking down the halls of schools and seeing the walls littered with vending machines housing poisonous snacks that are void of nutrients. Most of all however, I am afraid that I will be that house for my children. We all know where babies are created-in us! So in my mind, my body is where their health begins. If I want to be at peace when I am pregnant and not constantly have to worry about the health issues I could be handing down to my future kids, I have to act now so that my bad health is not their future health. The first thing that needed to change, was my lack of love of self. The last thing I want is for my little girl to see me hating myself and because she sees her mommy do it, she thinks she needs to do it too.
To me, good foods help me see all the good things about myself. It's like they help me put on my rose colored glasses. There is something inside those vitamin rich, nutrient dense fruits and vegetables that connect me directly with peace with myself. I've been listening extremely hard for the first time to what my body is saying to me. The past couple of weeks (yes, it's only been a couple weeks since my revelation) I have felt better about myself than I have ever felt in my life. I can see the stretch marks and the bubble butt and see beyond them. I can shut the Negatory Nancy (as I call her) up permanently informing her that I am beautiful and that no matter how negative she gets, I am more positive because I am actively pursuing a lifelong dream: my health. But those veggies and fruits are only a stepping stone. The next step, comes from within, not what you put in. How often do we walk in the bathroom and truly smile at our reflection? I can tell you that the old me didn't smile at myself....at all!
On a documentary called Hungry for Change (found on Netflix), Joe Cross, the juicing fanatic from Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead, talks about that negative person in our minds. He says if he knew someone who was as negative to us as that person in our head is, that he would stay as far away from them as possible. "So," he asks, "Why do we let them live in our minds? Why do we permit them to say the things they say?" I know that in my case, it was because of a lack of love.
Now, in the morning and sometimes in the evening, I lean over the counter and
look into my beautiful eyes and I tell myself, "You are
beautiful and I love you unconditionally right now." The first time I said that, I was expecting to feel cheesy or dumb, but I felt great. I felt free of the oppression I'd chained myself to. You see, when you hate yourself, there's always a reason. Mine was weight. I was punishing myself for gaining weight, but by punishing myself, I wasn't making my world right. I was tipping it upside down. Our loving Heavenly Father didn't create us and send us here to live in misery. He sent us to find joy and to find love and happiness. I was abusing myself for years and my outward appearance was proof of that. So, I'm here to give my blog's name a boost and reiterate that you HAVE to LOVE IT if you ever want to lose what you've been carrying around inside, be it sorrow, pain, regret or weight.
This week's challenge, tell yourself you love yourself unconditionally right now every day twice a day. Make eye contact and then smile. Then exhale and let the bitterness of life seep out of you. Don't let your Negatory Nancy or Fireball Throwing Fred enter your thoughts anymore. EVICT THEM! It's about friggin' time they get their own lives! Take back yours and love it to lose it. Peace out y'all! My next blog post (I figured this was too long to add on) I'll be sharing meals that are FANTASTIC and ways I've made over my lifestyle. See you then! Don't forget to leave comments below. If I've inspired you, please inspire me! Also, keep in mind that I'm not a professional and I don't claim to be. I'm new at this so teach me if you can!! Have a great, lovin' yourself day!
