Adina’s Cute & Perky Blog!

I have come to the realization that those of us who try our hardest to be healthy and fit have something the general public does not: mystery minutes.

You see, people approach me all the time for help.  But when I tell them what I do, I am often told: “I don’t have time to do what you do.”

Maybe, just maybe, they haven’t tapped into their mystery minutes?  Maybe they have not unlocked the power of the unused minutes in their own day?  Maybe they don’t know that sometimes you CREATE minutes by getting up at the butt crack of dawn?  Or that you can use minutes in double time?  I can watch TV and pack my cooler at the same time, y’all.  That doubles my minutes!

I also use my lunch hour.  I don’t need an hour to eat.  More mystery minutes.

I am known for jogging around football and soccer fields while my kids are practicing.  While others are holding their seats down to keep them from floating away, I created more mystery minutes!  I have literally jogged up to other parents telling me they just can’t seem to find the time to exercise.  They killed hours just sitting in their car…waiting.  Those were their mystery minutes.  They just don’t know it yet!

I keep just enough dumbbells at home to be able to do biceps or triceps while packing my cooler and watching TV.  That makes TRIPLE minutes y’all!

Time is not the factor here.  We all have the same allotted minutes in our day.  Some of us choose to use them to stay fit and healthy and some of us do not.  When you look at someone who looks the way you want to look, stop yourself from saying they have more time.  They don’t.  They just make sacrifices and better use of the same 24 hours we are all given.

But the next time someone asks for my help and tells me they don’t have time, I know exactly what I’m going to say…

“I know you don’t.  Very few of us choose to harness the power of the mystery minutes.”

And then I’ll walk on.  I could stand there and listen to them tell me why they don’t have time to exercise or pack a cooler, but my mystery minutes are ticking away. 

It’s funny to watch someone squirm when they are trying to explain to you why they didn’t eat right or go to the gym.

Sometimes, I just stand there in their uncomfortable silence for my own, personal enjoyment!  Hey!  Squirming burns calories, ya’ll.  If you think about it, I’m helping them!  There are numerous places I go that people feel compelled to tell me the second I walk in why they didn’t exercise.  Faces turn red.  Junk food gets quickly stashed.  Some days I swear I’m the fitness police!  And there are citations I could give daily!

But one thing rings true wherever I go.  There are always excuses.  ALWAYS.  They’re just never good ones!

“I’m eating this pie, because I didn’t have breakfast this morning.”

“I didn’t have time to go to the gym this morning, because I have to go to the dentist at lunch.”

So, when offered up these excuses, I feel compelled to offer excuses as to why I DO eat healthy.  Why I do exercise.  I WANT to say….

“I’m eating this tuna and rice, because I like looking hot.”

“I did my cardio at 5:30AM this morning, because it was my only free hour of the entire day.  And getting up that early was worth it to me.”

“I lift these weights, because I wanted to be a goddess at my 20 year reunion.”

But who really does like excuses?  Good or bad no one wants to hear them.

So listen! 

If you feel compelled to offer excuses for your daily actions, you are not at where you need to be.  If you get to the end of yet another day and feel the need to confess to someone about what you ate, or your lack of exercise, you are not at the right place.

I could go into a dissertation every time someone offers me their list of excuses.  I could say, “Look.  I get up at 4:19 in the morning to do an hour of cardio.  The last thing I do every night is pack my cooler for the next day.  I schedule my cheats.  The next one is August 16^th.  I use and enjoy every second of my day, because I have a body, mind, and soul that I worked hard to transform.”

But…I don’t. 

I say nothing. 

Because when you think about it, the reason they are offering excuses is because they know that I did what they chose not to do.

They chose to sleep while I was doing cardio.  They chose to watch TV while I was packing my cooler.  They visited with friends while I was lifting.

The goal is this: live your life in such a way that you don’t feel the need to offer an excuse for anything you did or did not do at the end of the day.  Life is just better this way. 

Make it your mission today to have an excuse free day!

So I got stuck at my desk yesterday as meal number three was quickly approaching.  Meal number three being 1 ½ scoops of ISS Whey Power and 1 slice of Ezekiel Bread.

No matter what, I could not seem to break away from my desk.

Now, I know you all think I am Ms. Susie Sunshine, and, well, OK, I am…but there are some things I can get down right fanatical about.  One of those things being my diet.  Unless it has been designated as a cheat day far in advance by me, I don’t cheat.  I simply don’t allow it.  You see, I keep a running list of things I have to look my best for.  I always keep looking to the next big thing.  It keeps me clean!

While waiting for an answer yesterday, I come to the realization that I am going to be on hold for quite some time. And that this will push me past my three hour max.  I always start the next meal within three hours of the last.  But, all is not lost as I spy my DRY whey powder in the corner.

Being as I am tough as nails in the diet department (slash anal retentive), I think to myself, “What can it hurt?”

I take a small spoonful of the dry powder.  And you may not know this, but you take one small spoonful of ISS Chocolate Whey, and it makes a tootsie roll in your very mouth!  On the spot, y’all.  I made a Tootsie Roll!

So I say to myself while still on hold, “That was fun!”  And shouldn’t my food be fun?  People ask me that ALL the time, and I was thinking, “Herein lies the answer!”

So, STILL on hold, I decide to make another Tootsie Roll in one of those “Yea for me” moments I have so many of throughout my day!  I love this creativity thing I’ve got going on.  It’s kind of like making those recipes with Jelly Belly Jelly Beans.  Like Banana with Chocolate would make a chocolate covered banana…

But tragedy strikes.  Failing to account for the chocolaty remnants of goodness in my mouth from the first bite, the second bite didn’t make so much a Tootsie Roll as a small wad of gelatinous goo.

And at this point my thoughts become, “I hope nobody comes by.”  Because if I were to smile, each individual tooth is now coated in the chocolate concoction I have created in my mouth.  So, essentially I have created Whey Bubba Teeth.

And you would think that I wouldn’t try again…unless you REALLY know me, then you’re not surprised one bit that I go back for round three!  Tootsie Roll.  Bubba Teeth.  What was next?!

By the third bite, the remnants of the tootsie roll and the gelatinous goo join forces with the fresh powder I had thrown in the mix…and created a, well, let’s call it cement, so strong that not even the jaws of life could extract my bottom jaw from my top.

And, of course, at precisely this moment, the hold music that had been mindlessly drumming in my head stops, and I hear the voice I had been awaiting utter the magic phrase, “Can I help you?”

To which I reply, “Yeaoh alkt toiuer thoei.”

Which of course, she doesn’t understand.  She doesn’t speak stupid.  “Please speak up, I’m having trouble understanding you.”

Speak up?  Now there’s a phrase I don’t hear very often, I can assure you!  She didn’t know I WAS speaking up.  I was just speaking inside my mouth!

And in the end, I hung up.  Even if she does have Caller ID, she won’t know my extension!

But cheating on a diet is like this.  If I had stopped at one bite, I would have been left with the deliriously happy thought that one small bite of ISS Chocolate Whey = Tootsie Roll!  And that would have been enough.  I would eventually get to the break room.  And it would indeed have been enough to tide me over.

Just like that one bite of the cake you eat to “keep you from craving it all day” becomes a half slice.  Which becomes a whole slice.  When in reality, one bite would have killed the craving.

Stop at one bite, tootsie roll.  Keep going, cement.

Stop at one bite of what you are craving, or keep going and let it get out of control.

I choose the tootsie roll!

“Lord, if you can’t make me skinny, please make all my friends fat.”

That was at the bottom of an E-mail someone sent me yesterday.  Kind of funny, but kind of true of me in my former life.

I used to scan every room I was in looking for someone bigger than myself.  Sometimes I found one, and sometimes I didn’t.  I tended to surround myself with people who made me feel OK about being larger. 

Large and in charge. 

Only, I was in charge of nothing.

And I always thought that one day we would all work together toward a common goal.  I knew we all needed to lose weight.  I figured we all knew this.  How could we not know?

I mean, I was 256 pounds.  How many times did I see a 75 year old woman with this girth?  So, something evidently happens in there.  You either get healthy, or you die.  Hmmm….which will I choose?

So…I became the weird one of our group. 

I was the one who showed up with a cooler.  I was the one who was late to dinner, because I had to go to the gym.  And when I got to dinner, my food was different from the others.  And I didn’t order dessert anymore.

And when I got stuck or struggled, they encouraged me to eat.  Drink.  Be merry. 

Only, I wasn’t merry.  Especially not when I was off plan.

And as painful as it seems, in your journey to health and fitness, you lose friends.  But you gain them too.

I was telling someone at work the other day that he needed to surround himself with friends who wanted him to succeed.  Not friends who wanted him to stay as he was.

And it’s hard advice to hear.  But if you think about it, it would be like a recovering alcoholic spending time with someone with a drinking problem.  You would never encourage an alcoholic to stay with someone who was going to offer him alcohol on a regular basis.  Yes, from time to time he will be around alcohol.  But there is that time where he is too weak to knowingly put himself where it is served.  Not if he truly wants to recover.

While you are battling your way into health and fitness, there will be times you have to stay away from the people who would drag you down.  Even if they don’t know they are doing this to you.

But thank goodness the sacrifices come with reward.

At the end of my struggles was a life worth living.  And joy I didn’t know I had.  Ten years ago, I didn’t know I would go to my 20 year reunion and be unrecognizable.  I didn’t know I would laugh so long and so hard it would feel like I had just done an hour of cardio!

And somewhere along the line, for me, the prayer changed to, “Lord, since you DID make me thin, help me bring my friends along for this wonderful ride.”

Whatever shape you are in today is based on a series of choices you have made over time.  If you have chosen to overeat over an extended period, you are more than likely overweight, if not down right obese.  On the other hand, if you have chosen to eat healthfully and exercise over an extended period, you are more than likely reaping the benefits of having a healthy, fit body.  (Or one that is on the way to being so!)

But sometime we arrive at the place we don’t want to be because we made no choices at all.

I was at IHOP the other day.  And I’m not going to dog it, because I love me some Harvest Nut and Grain Pancakes with Promise margarine and sugar free syrup!!! (and so does my fellow Blogger, Miss Maddi!)  But my heart sank a little when I saw the new pancake menu.  Strawberry CHEESECAKE pancakes.  Now, I’m sure theses are God’s gift to pancakes.  But just the fact that it took the word “cake” in the name TWICE to describe them should be a GIANT red flag with icing on top!

The choice here was pancakes or dessert.  Apparently, someone couldn’t decide.  So, they mixed them.  No one would put an actual pancake on top of a slice of cheesecake, but it’s OK to mix them together?  And slather them with butter and syrup?  Oh, and the Strawberry Sauce too.  Can’t forget that!!!

Then one day I’m on the treadmill watching Paula Deen.   And, OK, yes I watch FOOD TV on the treadmill from time to time!  But she was making a hamburger.  With a fried egg.  AND TWO DONUTS FOR THE BUN.

Now the choice should have been: donuts, eggs, OR a hamburger.  And essentially aren’t buffets this way?  You can’t decide what you want.  Rather than making a decision and getting one plate of food, we get the buffet so we can try a little of everything.  Only, it’s rarely a little.

Or you get to the end of the day and didn’t eat healthy or go to the gym, because you didn’t CHOOSE to pack your lunch or get up early.  You just wait for the day to fall in place and hope there is some gym time in there somewhere. And wish you end up at a restaurant that serves healthy food.

Every day you need to make choices.  If you don’t, someone else will make them for you.

If you don’t choose to pack a cooler, you will be unprepared when someone wants to have lunch with you at a place you have no business going.

If you don’t choose to have a firm gym time today, things will happen all day long that will push your gym time aside.

To make it to goal I had to choose not to cheat, choose to exercise, choose to lift, and choose to surround myself and immerse myself with what I needed to be successful.

Make some choices you will be proud of today.  Make the choice to life a healthy lifestyle.  Make those same choices so often that it becomes who you are inside and out.

Well, I certainly had a great time at my reunion!  It’s so good to reconnect with people after that many years.

When the official reunion was over, we branched off into small groups at various places.  I ended sitting by the pool at my classmate Stacie’s house talking another classmate, Helper. (Yeah, that’s a nick name.  But it’s a nickname that stuck tight!)

We were discussing the fact that he was celebrating 12 years of sobriety and being free from his addictions.  And we were actually comparing what he had gone through to my battle to lose the weight and keep it off.

When I expressed my total amazement at TWELVE YEARS of being clean and on track, he shrugged his shoulders and nonchalantly said, “I think what you did was harder.”

To which I said, “No way.  What you did was TOTALLY harder.  I never had to give up what I was addicted to.  I still have food.  Every day I get to have some.  While you never get to have what you were addicted to again.”

That’s when he stops me and says, “No.  You don’t understand.  What you did is harder because you DO get to have it.”

Then we compared the 12 Steps he had gone through to the process I had gone through to lose weight and get in shape, and yeah, they were very similar.  Conquering an addiction of any kind goes back to some very basic steps, no matter what your addition.  And Helper and I both view admitting you have a problem as a big obstacle keeping so many people from making it through to the other side.

But it struck me as we were sitting there by the pool that both of us believing the other has done something far harder than ourselves was also key to our success too.  Because if you think that what you are going through is the hardest thing ever done by anybody and that nobody has it harder, you are dooming yourself for failure. 

So I am in the middle of my 20^th High School Reunion!  Hard to believe, y’all! 

Not so long ago I crossed paths in the kitchen at work with someone struggling on their diet.  I say struggling, because he was getting a piece of cake and looking at me with “lecture me now” eyes!  I was up to meal number three at this point, which meant I was fixing 1 ½ scoops of ISS Whey Power and a slice of toasted Ezekiel Bread.  There is nothing like this combination to make people think I am THE queen of dieting!    So, just as I expected, I get THE look, followed by, “Wow.  You’ve got major willpower.”

(And, I do.  But that’s beside the point!)

I say to him, “The first time I dieted, I would never have been able to eat like this.”  And I was ready to go into my dissertation on why I eat the way I eat, and how I gave up one thing at a time.  But something else I said had caught his attention.

“The FIRST time?  You mean, you tried and failed?”  He was really perplexed by this.

“Sure I did.  A BUNCH of times.  I started a diet every Monday of my life from age 18 through 29!!”  And, I did, y’all.  I really did!  I was always starting a diet! 

BUT my success came in learning to give up on perfection in my dieting efforts.  I had spent over a decade of my life starting a diet on Monday.  Cheating by Tuesday or Wednesday.  Only to give up by Friday.  And start the whole cycle again on Monday.  Which meant I was free to binge eat all weekend, since I WAS going to be starting my diet….

But it’s like this….

If your child fails a test, you don’t tell them to blow off the rest of the year and wait for the next school year.  You tell them to start studying now.

If you miss a turn 20 miles into your journey, you don’t drive around aimlessly only to go back to your house to get back on track.  You figure out where you are and how to get where you need to be.

If you miss your flight, you don’t cancel your trip.  You get on the next plane.

If you miss leg day, you don’t skip all other body parts till another week rolls around.

Conquering a food addiction, or any addiction for that matter, is this way.  If an alcoholic takes his first drink in years would you want him to wait a week to stop?  Someone addicted to drugs slips.  Would you tell him to have a free-for-all till Monday?

Yet, so many attempts at dieting fail because you think it has to be perfect.  The sun must align with the moon, and the stars must spell out your name! 

So I told my red-faced coworker with the cake in his hand, “You can choose to get right back on track for your very next meal IF you want to.  But you have to be able to forgive yourself, and you have to want it badly enough.”

For me, a big factor in my making it to goal came with learning to forgive myself and get right back on track when I chose not to eat on plan.  Notice I didn’t say “when I fell off the wagon.”  That implies it was an accident.  Something out of my control.  Since I am in control of the choices I make, I had to learn to choose to get back on my plan every time I had chosen to get off my plan.

Let go of the idea that you will find perfection.  I guarantee you I had a lot of imperfect days on my way to goal, but I did make it!  And I didn’t even start it on a Monday!

I had some funny reactions to my blog entry, “Negative Comments”, the other day.  Friends called.  People E-mailed.  I got puppy faces at the gym from people saying they were sorry.  I actually had people seeking me out, because they thought I was sad.

People, people, people!  Listen here!  Adina doesn’t do sad!  Not for trivial reasons like that anyway!

And let me remind you why:  no one has permission to make me feel anything other than FABULOUS!  Remember?  I don’t have time to be any other way, y’all!!  I really don’t.

You’ve got to put it all in perspective.  Millions of people, and I do mean MILLIONS, watch that show.  I heard roughly five negative comments.  I say roughly, because I can’t remember.  My mind is too busy thinking my next happy thought to dwell on anything that isn’t, well, FABULOUS! 

So…in the grand scheme of things, we’re looking at not even close to 1% of the remarks I heard being negative.  That’s like not even 1% of 1%!!  I don’t care where you’re gambling, those are some good odds!

How many times has your diet gotten derailed from listening to the one negative voice amidst the many positives?  How many times have you hid the fact that you were starting a diet for fear of the negative comments?  How many times have you skipped going to the gym because you didn’t want to hear comments from your friends when you were late to meet them?  Ate from a greasy spoon instead of your cooler?  Had a drink?  Gave less than your best?

Train yourself to distinguish the good negative comments from the bad.  And, yes there are certainly good negatives….just like in lifting, utilize that negative! 

Some of your best gains can be made when you listen to that negative comment from the judge at your last competition…but not the man with the beer gut at the EZ Mart.

You can take weight loss to the next level if you listen to your gym buddy, but not to your overweight coworker.

I have a mental filter I apply to each and every situation where heath and fitness are concerned.

My hot ISS friend Kevin is the only voice I will listen to where my diet is concerned.

I have a group of about five people that I will listen to at the gym in regard to lifting.  No one else.

I have two others allowed to give cardio advice. 

The Today Show….that filter would go to the producers, the hosts, or anyone else who has been on the show.

In any of these areas….no other comments are allowed through my mental filter, and it’s as simple as that!

When I am faced with a negative, before I react, I consider the source. 

If an overweight, out of shape person criticizes what I eat, how much I exercise, or how much I lift, my filter kicks into gear.  I go through my mental flow chart!  And I loop back to the same response every time… “This person is not allowed to make a judgment.”

And I smile to myself and keep doing what I’m doing…keep having my good day. 

You see, I was once a big girl.  I used to judge healthy people too!  I know where it’s coming from, and I know it’s unfounded. 

Remember this today when faced with a negative: no one is allowed to make you feel anything other than FABULOUS without your permission. 

Find your filter and use it!!!