Shannan’s Journey

Success Mountain

Don’t we all want to achieve success and are just trying our best to get there? We spend many hours and lots of money seeking success. It may be our search for more money, career advancement, fame, losing weight, finding love, competing for the first time, stepping on stage again, or many other desires, but we are searching for our success.

Is there a right way to go to get there easier?

Success is like a mountain, the only way to get to the top is to climb. Many things in life try to stray us from climbing or try to tell us there is an easier way. In reality, there are no elevators, escalators or even stairs.

Look at climbing that mountain as a learning experience. Some days there will be bumbs on that mountain and you may fall or other days you may walk to a higher elevation but you have to keep learning and enjoy the climb.

Here are a few steps to help in your climb:

Attitude: Climbing Success Mountain starts with your attitude. Start by giving up your instant gratification needs and dedicate yourself to working towards the results you want.

Be Present: Stop focusing on the top of the mountain. Sure we all want to be there, but when climbing you have to pay attention to where you are and understand what your immediate next steps are going to be.

Can Do: Believe and have confidence in yourself. Have a "Can Do" attitude because you Can Do It, promise.

Deal: When climbing you will slip back at times, you will encounter obstacles and it will not always be easy. Deal with it and keep finding solutions and ways to get back on track.

Effort: Climbing takes effort. Climbing to the top demands strength, whether it is to the top of Mount Everest or to the top of your career. -Abdul Kalam

Fun: Have fun while you are climbing. I’ve learned that everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while you’re climbing it. -B. Bancard

Success is about your will to be successful. It takes patience, time, consistency, pain, setbacks, you will encounter many obstacles and in the end, you must have the will and desire to keep climbing.

In the end it will always come down to you. It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves.

- Sir Edmund Hillary

Even when you do everything right and you have made it up 90% of the mountain, it doesn’t get easier, it gets harder. When attempting to climb Mount Everest it is the last 10% that is the most dangerous. This is because after climbing 90% you have used all your energy, the peak is the steepest and the air the thinnest. When you are there you will have to dig into yourself and pull out your will for success.

Success does not come quick or easy, however we all have the ability if we learn how to climb and have the will to succeed. Start climbing and climb step by step and I promise you will get there!

G.A.

I have had many people continuously ask me what exactly is whey protein and what are the benefits. Yes, it is something that helps us in building muscle but there are more benefits. We all know that Muscle is one of the most important factor when it comes to metabolism, and whether or not it will be fast or slow. So it is something you need. The question is always, how much do we need? Everyone has their specific needs so it varies but we all do need it!

Obviously there are more sources than just whey protein ie.e. Fish, eggs, chicken, beef, game, and the list goes on, but here are some benefits of whey protein powder.

What is Whey Protein?
Whey is a dairy product. It comes from cow’s milk and is formed during the making of cheese. Even if you are lactose intolerant, most people are able to still enjoy whey protein with no problems.

The benefits:
weight loss– It’s been shown that whey protein has an indirect impact on hormones that influence the feeling of being full. So if your hunger is satisfied you’ll be more likely to stick with your nutrition plan, and not give in to temptation with a cheat food or meal.

Boosts your immune system– It contains a building block for the antioxidant glutathione. Glutathione is known as the ‘master antioxidant’. It’s important to detoxify the body of poisons, repair DNA, block free radicals, and for producing good health and a long life. Whey protein has been shown to be one of the best sources to unlocking the building block to glutathione.

supplements your diet– Being a protein supplement it is excellent for people who simply cannot get their required protein in for the day. Or if you are simply trying to increase your protein intake, whey protein would be the best, and one of the simplest, sources of protein to do that with. You see we all need a certain amount of protein a day. Without protein you would die. The recommended amount is .8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight. As I mentioned, we all have our specific needs and goals so this may vary. Remember muscle is your #1 asset to a fast metabolism, and protein builds lean muscle tissue. A minimum of .6 grams of protein per pound through 1 gram per pound of body weight is a good starting point. Athletes will sometimes go higher than that, but for the general person it is not necessary.

Whey protein comes in 3 different forms. Isolate, Concentrate, and Hydrolyzed. There are actually others, but those are the 3 you will see most often. Concentrate is the most commonly used in the powders you will find in supplement stores. But its quality is the least. Whey protein concentrate will yield a powder between 29-89% protein by dry weight. It is the cheapest to make and will have more carbs and fat then the Isolate and Hydrolyzed, but the carbs and fat are minimal anyway. It is still a very good protein, and is very easily digested. Look for Whey Protein Concentrate (WPC) products that are at least 75% protein by dry weight.

Whey Protein Isolate (WPI) is next. It contains 90% or higher protein and very little fat. It is more pure than WPC, but that isn’t always a better thing. It won’t give you any extra muscle or size and it will cost you some extra dough.

Hydrolyzed Whey Protein (HWP) is the last one on the list. HWP is basically WPI with broken down peptides (predigested). It is the most usable by the body. But again, that isn’t always a better thing. All 3 have all of the essential amino acids you need for a complete protein, and that is what the body needs to help either maintain, repair, or grow new lean muscle tissue. Other drawbacks to HWP is the taste. It’s very bitter. Another problem with it is cost. Another step is needed compared to WPC and WPI and that adds costs to the manufacturer and then to you.

Some companies will actually give a blend of 2, or 3, different kinds of whey. But just remember all whey proteins are power packed with amino acids, and will help you put on some metabolism boosting lean muscle tissue. It’s one of the best supplements you can be taking for yourself, right behind a multi-vitamin/mineral and essential fats!!

Another Protein powder is Micellar casein, which is an extremely slow digesting and rich protein source that continues to feed your muscles long after whey proteins have dropped off. This is a great protein for right before bed when you want to feed your body a slow digesting protein while you prepare for a long nights slumber.

While whey protein may increase protein synthesis to a very high degree, higher than casein, scientists are now recognizing that micellar casein is much more important in preventing muscle breakdown. In fact, additional research is demonstrating that the slow and sustained release of amino acids from micellar casein can cause a ‘timed release’ trickle of amino acids into the bloodstream which can last for as many as 7 full hours after ingestion. (i.e. most of the time if not all of the time you sleep!)

Micellar casein is the natural, undenatured form of casein found in milk. It is separated from milk by means of ultrafiltration, without the use of chemicals, which increases the amount of bioactive milk peptides that support immune function as well as enhance muscle growth. "A property of micellar casein is that it may have the ability to form a "gel" in the gut. This provides a steady release of amino acids into the blood stream, which makes it an excellent choice for a long lasting anti-catabolic protein."

BACK TO THE BASICS… THAT ACTUALLY WORK.

With all these theories and rules to working out, why don’t we go back to the basics. The basics that WORK. They have worked for me and I see them working for my clients! Let’s keep it simple!

There’s a lot of misinformation out there that seems to be confusing a lot of people. I’m going to bring it back to the basics and keep it simple.

1. Wake up and eat. Repeat every 3 hours.
The days of eating 3 square meals are gone. They really never should have been. What they did to a person’s metabolism and fat burning ability was reduce it to an almost non-existent function. Look, in order to burn fat and burn it all day long you need to eat a minimum of 5 times a day and every 2-4 hours. The more times you eat will actually be more beneficial to you. It’s what’s known as the Thermic effect of food. You burn calories every time you eat.

OF COURSE WE ARE TALKING ABOUT THE RIGHT FOODS, RIGHT?

2. Think fibrous foods and lean proteins when it comes to foods.
When it comes to stubborn body fat the first think you want to reduce is your total carbohydrate intake. So try and think about fiber before anything when consuming carbs. Fibrous carbohydrates have a very high Thermic effect and fill you up a lot better than carbs without fiber in them. So focus on vegetables, fruits, and whole wheat or oats. You also want to cycle your carbohydrate intake down as you progress throughout the day. So the most carbs you would consume would be at breakfast and then you taper them off as you go throughout the day.

You also want to get lean protein. Protein builds lean muscle and muscle is huge when it comes to a fast metabolism. Protein also has the highest Thermic effect over any type of food. So concentrate on lean chicken, turkey, beef, eggs, milk, fish, and game.

EXERCISE BASICS

1. Incorporate full body interval, weight training into your routine.
This gets your metabolism, strength, and fat burning operating at full capacity! Whole body routines will get the most out of your workouts in the least amount of time.

And when you add interval training to the mix you’ll be burning the fat all day long, and your energy will be skyrocketed.

2. Change it up!
People that don’t like to exercise are not going to exercise if it is boring. And doing the same thing day in and day out for weeks or months or even years on end will get boring pretty quickly. Plus you will stagnate a lot more quickly. The body is very smart and will adapt to something you do over and over again. And if there isn’t some kind of change it simply won’t be stimulated enough change or make new gains.

A change can be something as small as changing your rest period between sets or rounds. It can be a change in weight, change in reps, change in exercise order, or change in a combination of such.

But I like to change it completely around. Exercises, time, rest, number of sets or rounds, weight, everything. I also like to change the implements. Variety is the key to keeping your body guessing and always growing and getting stronger, faster, better at long and short intervals.

Think basics, they work!

Meal 1.

5 oz. lean turkey breast, 2 oz. lite swiss cheese and 1 cup bell peppers chopped

Meal 2.

1 cup cottage cheese, 10 walnuts

Meal 3.

4 oz. turkey breast, 1 cup asparagus tips, 1 cup broccoli, 5 almonds

Meal 4.

2 cup brussels sprouts steamed, 5 oz. lean ground beef, 1 teaspoon butter (yes, real butter).

Meal 5.

6 ounce chicken breast from Koo Koo Roo, 1 pint green beans, 1 pint italian veggies, (zuccini, yellow squash, peppers). 

*Koo Koo Roo chicken has their our sauce it’s basted in which I love… and their veggies have a little oil on them but I don’t worry about it as it’s just a bit and I eat so clean all of the time that a little extra oil can’t hurt me   I ate at Koo Koo Roo all throughout my first show and most every week still.

Meal 6.

1 tablespoon peanut butter, 1/2 cup egg whites

What is “Stress”?

The classic definition of stress is “any real or imagined threat, and your body’s response to it.” Celebrations and tragedies alike can cause a stress response in your body.

Some stress is unavoidable. Some mild forms of stress can even be helpful in some situations. But a stressor becomes a problem when:

• Your response to it is negative.
• Your feelings and emotions are inappropriate for the circumstances.
• Your response lasts an excessively long time.
• You’re feeling continuously overwhelmed, overpowered or overworked.

It’s important to realize that all your feelings create physiological changes. Your skin, heart rate, digestion, joints, muscle energy levels, the hair on your head, and countless cells and systems you don’t even know about change with every emotion.

Americans, in general, tend to eat under a state of stress and anxiety.

While under stress, your heart rate goes up, your blood pressure rises, and blood is shunted away from your midsection, going to your arms, legs, and head for quick thinking, fighting, or fleeing.

All of these changes are referred to as the physiological stress response.

Under those circumstances, your digestion completely shuts down. So a major problem with eating while your body is under the stress response is that you could be eating the healthiest food in the world, yet you won’t be able to fully digest and assimilate that food, and your body will not be able to burn calories effectively.

How the Stress Response Affects Your Digestion and Health

The stress response causes a number of detrimental events in your body, including:

• Decreased nutrient absorption
• Decreased oxygenation to your gut
• As much as four times less blood flow to your digestive system, which leads to decreased metabolism
• Decreased enzymatic output in your gut – as much as 20,000-fold!

Many nutrients are also excreted during stress, particularly:

• Water-soluble vitamins
• Macrominerals
• Microminerals
• Calcium (calcium excretion can increase as much as 60 to 75 mg within an hour of a stressful event)

As if that’s not enough, your cholesterol and triglycerides also go up, while gut flora populations decrease. You’re also more likely to experience increased sensitivity to food and gastroesophageal reflux, or heartburn.

But perhaps most importantly, when your body is under the stress response, your cortisol and insulin levels rise.

These two hormones tend to track each other, and when your cortisol is consistently elevated under a chronic low-level stress response, you’ll likely notice that you have difficulty losing weight or building muscle.

Additionally, if your cortisol is chronically elevated, you’ll tend to gain weight around your midsection. We’ve known for some time that body fat, and especially visceral fat (the fat that gathers around your internal organs, around your midsection) is a major contributing factor to developing diabetes and metabolic syndrome.

The bottom line?

When you eat under stress, your body is in the opposite state of where you need to be in order to digest, assimilate nutrients, and burn calories. Besides, when under stress we tend to eat ungodly amounts of calories all in one or two sittings… that is bad news !!

Everyday Stress Relief

There’s no doubt that finding ways to relieve your everyday stress is an important, if not essential, aspect of optimizing your health. All the organics in the world can’t help you if your body can’t assimilate the nutrients you put into it.

Stress is a serious factor in the illness of nearly all of the patients seen at my clinic. Because in addition to everything mentioned above, stress also plays a major role in your immune system, and can impact your:

• Blood pressure
• Cholesterol
• Brain chemistry
• Blood sugar levels
• Hormonal balance

You cannot eliminate stress entirely, but you can work to provide your body with tools to compensate for the bioelectrical short-circuiting that can cause serious disruption in many of your body’s important systems. But there are many strategies you can employ to help you deal with stress and unwind each day, including:

• Exercise. Studies have shown that during exercise, tranquilizing chemicals (endorphins) are released in your brain. Exercise is a natural way to bring your body pleasurable relaxation and rejuvenation.
• Proper sleep
• Meditation (with or without the additional aid of brain wave synchronization technology)

Meal 1.

4 oz. lean turkey breast, 2 oz. lite swiss cheese, 4 red lettuce leaves, 1 tsp. dijon mustard

Meal 2.

4 oz. cottage cheese, 20 walnuts

Meal 3.

14 large’ish shrimp grilled, 1/2 cup chopped cucumber, 2 cups spinach leaves, 1/2 cup halved asparagus, 2 tbsp. balsamic vinegar & olive oil (1 each).

Meal 4.

1 cup brussels sprouts steamed, 5 oz. lean ground beef, 2 sliced cucumbers, 10 almonds

Meal 5.

1 cup coffee w/ 2 tbsp. half n’ half, 1 (6 ounce) chicken breast, 2 cups green beans

Meal 6.

1 tablespoon peanut butter, 5 egg whites

I did these exercises (3 sets for 20 reps each, go all the way thru then repeat)… plus 4 sets of lying leg curls.

Oh yeah, and I took an hour spin class…. fun stuff !!!!

Barbell Clean 1. Stand with feet straight and shoulder-width apart, knees slightly bent. 2. Bend at waist, grabbing barbell with hands slightly wider than shoulder-width apart (palms face body).

DB Snatch: 1-Arm 1. Stand with feet straight and shoulder-width apart, knees slightly flexed; chest up. 2. In one hand, hold dumbbell in front of knees.

Lunge To Overhead Press: 2-Arm - Frontal 1. Stand with feet shoulder-width apart. 2. Hold dumbbell in each hand at chest level (palms face body).

Lunge To Overhead Press: 2-Arm - Sagittal 1. Stand with feet shoulder-width apart. 2. Hold dumbbell in each hand at chest level (palms face body).

Lunge To Overhead Press: 2-Arm - Transverse 1. Stand with feet shoulder-width apart. 2. Hold dumbbell in each hand at chest level (palms face body).

Lunge, Balance To Overhead Press: 1-Arm - Frontal 1. Stand with feet straight and shoulder-width apart. 2. Hold dumbbell in one hand at chest level.

Lunge, Balance To Overhead Press: 1-Arm - Sagittal 1. Stand with feet straight and shoulder-width apart. 2. Hold dumbbell in one hand at chest level.

Lunge, Balance To Overhead Press: 1-Arm - Transverse 1. Stand with feet straight and shoulder-width apart. 2. Hold dumbbell in one hand at chest level.

Lunge, Balance To Overhead Press: 2-Arm - Frontal 1. Stand with feet straight and shoulder-width apart. 2. Hold dumbbell in each hand at chest level.

Lunge, Balance To Overhead Press: 2-Arm - Sagittal 1. Stand with feet straight and shoulder-width apart. 2. Hold dumbbell in each hand at chest level.

All the exercise in the world will make little difference if you are eating poorly. Nutrition is 80% of what it takes to get your body into the best shape ever.  For the Figure or Fitness competitor, nutrition makes the difference between winning a show and placing LAST.

This is the most important secret of the best physique athletes. They know how important a healthy diet is and how easy it is to gain fat by eating poorly even if you are working out consistently.

BE SMART…. Look at what you are eating… read the nutrition lables, be responsible.

Think about this, your average intensity 30-minute treadmill session burns between 200-300 calories. 1, 2 oz. Snickers bar contains 273 calories and a 16 oz of Mountain Dew contains 220 calories! You just wasted a half hour of hard work by eating one candy bar OR drinking a Mountain Dew.  Simple sugars will undermine your hard work and should be eliminated from your diet whenever possible.  While time can be tight, with the proper thought and preparation, you can make the nutrition plan work.