Fun Friday: Tips, Tricks and Inspiration

Happy Friday! Here are your Tips, Tricks and Inspiration!

Get Off Your Bottom and Save Your Life!

There was a very thorough and helpful article in the March/April 2015 issue of Weight Watchers Magazine on how sitting is the new "smoking." Your life can be seriously shortened by a sedentary lifestyle, even if you are regular exerciser. I cannot find a link to the Weight Watchers article -- which is excellent and worth your time to track down and purchase -- but here is a link to a shorter article on the same theme.

The crux of it is this: your desk job may be killing you! If you have a desk job, see if a standing desk can be made available for you. Get up at least once an hour for 5 minutes; this can have a huge positive impact on your health. Even better is getting up every 20 minutes.  The Weight Watchers article has a whole page of ways to implement this lifestyle change.

Tricks

We all know movement and exercise are crucial to weight loss and maintenance. But the trick is to keep ourselves motivated. 5 or 6 years ago, I started wearing a fitbit, intrigued by the accelerometer and more accurate (than a pedometer) step-tracking. There are several competing products out there now, too. It doesn't matter which product you use, these activity trackers are amazing. They make you aware of how active or sedentary you are and they are practically work-free. You just put them on with your clothes each day and charge them every few days. They sync by blue tooth so all you have to do is walk near your computer. All the products have mobile apps, of course. Most sync with the Weight Watchers app and other popular weight loss apps.

These products are a perfect example of something you don't technically need but once you start using them, you won't know why you waited so long! In the interest of full disclosure, I read a study that said half the users lose interest in the product over time. Fair enough. For the other half, though, these simple devices can lead to long-term lifestyle changes.

Start small. Simple devices like the fitbit zip are under $50. (Full disclosure: I am just a fitbit fan. I am not getting anything out of this free and unsolicited endorsement for their products!)

Inspiration

As I said recently, friends help with the challenges of ongoing weight loss. Sometimes they help without even knowing it! The fitbit app allows you to "friend" other fitbit users. One of my friends, Anne, gets tons of steps every week. Last night she had over 84,000 for the week! I asked her, "How do you always get so many steps?" Her answer: "I told myself there will be NO MORE days under 10,000 steps." So simple, right?  She totally inspired me! I took up the gauntlet for myself and I went from being in the middle of the pack of my friends to consisently in 2nd place, right behind Anne, of course! 

What this means in real terms is that I am now moving through my weekends instead of sitting through them. Last Saturday, I knew I'd be scorekeeping at 3 games and watching 1 or 2 more ballgames. I decided to leave my chair in the car. I stood up and did some jogging in place in between batters. I ran all over that ballpark. I never sat down! I'd have never done that without my 10K/day commitment. Sunday, I cleaned my house from top to bottom. Okay well I didn't get it all done but it was my most productive weekend in ages. 

Connecting with other fit-minded individuals is such a boost. Yes, it's exposing too, but transparency is a great thing. It's so freeing to be an open book and in so doing, you may inspire someone else. Allow yourself to be inspired --or be an inspiration -- this week!

Vitamins, Slowing Down and Active (not) Kids: Friday Tips, Tricks and Inspiration

Happy winter Friday, fit friends!  Here are your tips, tricks and inspiration:

We all know that savoring our food leads to more satisfaction in eating and helps calm those cravings. It's also true that our brains need time to receive the message that we have had enough. The biggest benefit to slowing down though, is the social one. When we are savoring our meal, we have time for conversation, time to really hear our dinner partners and read between the lines. Even when dining alone, savoring that meal allows us time to think through our day (just past or just starting) and feed our souls as well as our bodies.  In that tack, let's start with these 5 tips to eat slowly from Fooducate. To these I would add two tips from Weight Watchers: Put your fork down between each bite -- it's harder than it sounds -- and/or take a small sip of water between bites.

This week's trick focuses on another way we may be tricking ourselves. As I've long suspected, yet another study seems to show that taking vitamins just isn't a good use of your money! We need to get as much nutrition as possible from our food, folks! If that isn't enough, this scary article from the New York Times demonstrates that some people have suffered real harm from dietary supplements. Please be both wise and cautious in your use of supplements.

Do you think your kids are active? I think mine are! Yet this new study highlighted in Obesity Panacea shows many are not as active as we think. My kids hate it when I read things like this because I start enforcing our hour-a-day-rule for exercise to earn screen time. I think teens and pre-teens are at the greatest risk because their school day is sitting-based. Hopefully this little bit of inspiration will get our kids moving and us, as well. I have started watching my own screen time since reading this study.

That's it for this week's news. If you are facing a weekend of inclement weather as we are, think of ways to get the whole family out for some fun and activity. Maybe a visit to a local skating rink or bowling alley will add some fun to your weekend! Have a great one!