Motivation, Bouncier Balls and more!!

Hi everybody!

No added sugar, no dairy, no wheat!

No excuses this summer for rain stopping play, so hope you are having fun playing in the sun! Although as I write this the rain is pouring down but that doesn't mean we can't still be healthy and fit! It's given me a chance to focus my attention on playing in the kitchen today and trying to create some healthier alternatives. The FAT-SCRAP fruit cake has been a great success as it tastes and smells so delicious..I can promise you this as I have one cooking in the oven at the moment. Here's the link for it again in case you missed it

FAT-SCRAP Fruit Cake
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A few weeks ago one of our FAT-SCRAPPERS (Apple) introduced us to Bounce Balls, a nutritious nutty snack which she found on sale in the juice bar in town. Having tasted them I thought that I could come up with something equally tasty, easy to make and cheaper so here is my first attempt..And I have to say, I think they are even nicer!!

Bouncier Balls

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For those of you who need a little bit of help in motivating yourselves to eat healthily and exercise regularly I have written an article here with some tips.
How To Motivate Yourself To Eat Healthily And Exercise Regularly







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Trevor completing Big Wheel Event

Next week my husband, Trevor is taking part in the Help for Heroes challenges. On Monday he will be completing the three hour challenge comprising one hour each of rowing, cycling and running and then on Thursday he will be rowing for four hours as part of a team completing the 12 hour challenge. If you feel you can help him with his fundraising for this very worthy cause you can make a donation here which will be greatly appreciated

Help for Heroes fundraising

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I would like to introduce you to the wonderful Liza Nightingale, who is a qualified Personal Image Consultant from Reflection Image Consultancy and is passionate about empowering women and men to feel and look amazing. I spent a wonderful 3 hours with her recently where she helped me identify a palette of colours that harmonised with my natural colouring and pampered me with a full makeup application in colours that complimented my colour palette.

As well as "A Reflection Colour Analysis", Liza also offers

• A Reflection Wardrobe Makeover
• A Reflection Make-up Session
• A Refection Style Analysis
• A Reflection Personal Shopper

Reflection Image Consultancy believes in energising your personal style and not trying to change it. An individual consultation takes your style and personality and then with clothes, colour and make-up advice can change the way you look and feel about yourself. It is an eye opening and fun journey.

– Liza makes sure of that!

Reflection Image Consultancy
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I have published two more dates for the 4 week group FAT-SCRAP Programme for this year. These are 18th September to 16th October and 6th November to 4th December so if you, or someone you know wants to get in shape before Christmas this is the healthy way to do it!

To change your body you have to want to change your lifestyle. If you go on a diet you are just making a temporary quick fix. FAT-SCRAP encourages you to make healthy eating and exercise part of your regular routine so that the fat comes off and stays off!!

FAT-SCRAP Introduction

That's all for now folks!

Sue x

How To Motivate Yourself To Eat Healthily And Exercise Regularly

Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it's always your choice.” Wayne Dyer

 

Examine your needs
We all need to eat and we all need to move but we all make different choices about what and how much we eat and move depending on how it makes us feel. Viewing the task of choosing to eat healthily and exercise as satisfying your needs to be healthy and fit will lead to you seeing yourself as a healthy and fit person. Connecting with the value and reward in your healthy choices and how you are satisfying your needs will allow you to take responsibility for your motivation through taking a different perspective and creating your own rewards.

 

Reward yourself
On the subject of rewards, yes we all want to see some reward for our efforts but should we wait for other factors like the number on the scales, the size of the dress, etc to reward us to feel motivated and then blame those things when perhaps they perhaps fail to meet our expectations? Or would we feel more motivated if we tuned into the rewards that we can give ourselves like a pat on the back when we are feeling pleased with the delicious healthy meal we have prepared; a smile in the mirror as we think about our achievements; the love we give oursleves each time we do something that is going to benefit us; the respect we give ourselves when we give our body what it deserves.

 

So using a combination of examing your needs and your need for reward is an effective way of motivating yourself.

 

Here are some other ideas for motivation..

• Keep focusing on the compelling reasons why you are doing what you are doing e.g reducing your blood pressure, preventing disease, becoming stronger...
• Keep focusing on the little things that you can achieve that will help you reach your long term goal 
• Build in accountability by doing things like keeping food diaries and booking training sessions in your diary. 
• Take control of your time by adding the value to it. Is eating healthily and exercising worth the cost (sacrifice of time spent doing something else) and worth the effort (making time to do it)? 
• Think about the negative consequences of not being healthy of fit or being fatter.
• Look for the fun and enjoyment in your choices
• Spend time with people who will support and encourage you.

FAT-SCRAP JUNE 2010 WEEK FOUR

There is no love sincerer than the love of food – George Bernard Shaw

Hi and welcome back!

Do you have a good relationship with your food?

FAT-SCRAP has been designed to help you get in touch with the foods that will make you feel good in the long term but to do this your relationship with these foods has to be a positive experience right from the start. So at what point can you begin having a relationship with your food?

One of the first stages of digestion is called the cephalic phase which occurs even before the food enters the stomach. It results from the thought, sight, smell, or taste of food. So if digestion starts with the thought, surely thinking about what you are going to eat is the first place to begin.

You plan a meal, for example a roast dinner. Now straight away you have something to look forward to, perhaps you can even visualize your meal and imagine the smell and taste. You are already sending positive messages from your brain your body is receiving them. Just think if you miss out this crucial part of the digestive process you are missing out on increasing your metabolic power!

The next part of the relationship is choosing the food. Using your senses you can look, smell, feel, touch, imagine the taste of these foods and hear yourself confirming your choices as you put them in your basket. Go to food markets in other countries and you will be reminded of how passionate food shopping can be– you can probably picture it now…the vibrant colours, the busy noise, the varied smells, the excited energy…. Now think about what it is like for you when you go shopping. Could you anticipate and relish the experience, spend time carefully savouring, digesting and assimilating your choices engaging your digestive system in the whole process? Even the checkout can become a positive experience as you touch and connect with each item.

You can connect again with your food as you lovingly prepare it. Once again, your senses can be fully aware of what is going on as you peel, chop, rinse, and cook. As you see the food coming together the smells become stronger, your taste buds become excited, your saliva starts to flow in anticipation, your thoughts become more tuned into the pleasure and enjoyment..

And then you sit with your meal in front of you, you can absorb the appealing colours and aromas and be thankful for what you are about to receive……

As you eat the food all of your senses are on fire - Let the passion (and metabolism) burn!! You can become even more aware of all of the flavours, aromas, textures, depth, weight, temperature, colours as they result in responses from your body from the moment they enter your mouth and continue on their journey of nourishing and satisfying you.

And this is where the brain and the food must be in unison for if we feel pleasured, nourished and satisfied we won’t want to eat more! It’s when we don’t pay attention to our food that our brain misses the experience and interprets it as hunger!!!

So now can you see the benefit of having a fantastic relationship with your food?

Another important factor to add to the process of digestion is relaxation. If you are feeling stressed, anxious, rushed, forced, or negative when eating, the body goes into the fight or flight response and in this state important vitamins and minerals are likely to be excreted, blood flow to the digestive organs decreases, hormone levels change and can encourage weight gain, and fewer calories are burned.

And what about the consequences of our food choices? Again, if you have enjoyed, savoured and felt positive about them, then that is going to have a positive response from your body. So what happens when you feel guilty, bad or naughty?...STRESS!!!! And negative responses from your body.

So to sum it up...
If you treat your food with the love and respect it deserves, in turn it will love and respect you.

Bon appetite!!

Sue x

FAT-SCRAP Velvety Chocolate Pudding

Oh my goodness! An all natural, healthy version of a chocolate desert..can you believe it?! And what's more it tastes delicious! But be warned..as with anything you eat, it contains calories so think carefully about how much you eat of it and make it part of a balanced meal. For example, start off with some thing light like a salad or veggie sticks and salsa and then follow it with this heavenly treat!

1 banana
1/2 Avocado
1 heaped teaspoon cocoa powder
1 heaped dessertspoon nut butter
1 strawberry

Put all ingredients into food processor and blend until smooth.
Pour into serving dish and top with a strawberry.
Yummmmm!!


Alternatively you could serve this as a dip!

I'm sure you might be able to think of some variations on this..any ideas?

FAT-SCRAP JUNE 2010 WEEK THREE

“Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it's always your choice.” Wayne Dyer

Hi and welcome back!

This week I thought I'd discuss the topic of motivation with you, especially as it has come up a lot during our sessions.

When I first became a personal trainer I thought it was my role to motivate people to eat healthily and exercise until my NLP trainer, Linda, told me that people have to motivate themselves; my role was to be motivational.

So my friends, how do you motivate yourselves?

Examine your needs
You joined FAT-SCRAP ultimately to reduce your weight/body fat levels viewing the task of doing this in a positive way and linking it to your need for food and exercise. We all need to eat and we all need to move but we all make different choices about what and how much we eat and move depending on how it makes us feel. Viewing the task of choosing to eat healthily and exercise as satisfying your needs to be healthy and fit will lead to you seeing yourself as a healthy and fit person. Connecting with the value and reward in your healthy choices and how you are satisfying your needs will allow you to take responsibility for your motivation through taking a different perspective and creating your own rewards.

Reward yourself
On the subject of rewards, yes we all want to see some reward for our efforts but should we wait for other factors like the number on the scales, the size of the dress, etc to reward us to feel motivated and then blame those things when perhaps they perhaps fail to meet our expectations? Or would we feel more motivated if we tuned into the rewards that we can give ourselves like a pat on the back when we are feeling pleased with the delicious healthy meal we have prepared; a smile in the mirror as we think about our achievements; the love we give oursleves each time we do something that is going to benefit us; the respect we give ourselves when we give our body what it deserves.

So using a combination of examing your needs and your need for reward is an effective way of motivating yourself.

Here are some other ideas for motivation..

• Keep focusing on the compelling reasons why you are doing what you are doing e.g reducing your blood pressure, preventing disease, becoming stronger...
• Keep focusing on the little things that you can achieve that will help you reach your long term goal
• Build in accountability by doing things like keeping food diaries and booking training sessions in your diary.
• Take control of your time by adding the value to it. Is eating healthily and exercising worth the cost (sacrifice of time spent doing something else) and worth the effort (making time to do it)?
• Think about the negative consequences of not being healthy of fit or being fatter.
• Look for the fun and enjoyment in your choices.
• Spend time with people who will support and encourage you.
• Use the FAT-SCRAP tools!!

If you would like to discuss or share with us how you keep motivated we would love to hear your comments!

Sue x

FAT-SCRAP JUNE 2010 WEEK TWO

"The home is the center and circumference, the start and the finish, of most of our lives." Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Hi and welcome back!

I received today's quote (above) in a newsletter from Sue Rasmussen,a coach in the USA who specialises in decluttering. If you get chance, have a look at her website as she has a lovely style and an holistic way of approaching her subject. http://www.unclutter-organize-transform.com/. I recently decluttered my spare room and it felt so good getting rid of some of the things I was storing in there that were weighing me down!

So you may be wondering what this has to do with FAT-SCRAP?..Well if you think about it, you are getting rid of some of the things you have been storing that have been weighing you down!

Look at it like this..Your body is your home, it's where you live all of your life. And, just like your home, you want it to keep you secure and comfortable but how you do that depends on who you are and what is important to you. One person might like to see themselves living in a "show home" style home because it makes them feel secure and comfortable whereas  another might like to see themselves living in a "lived in" style home because that makes them feel  secure and comfortable. When we choose our home, we choose depending on our current desires and needs for comfort and security but throughout our lives our desires and needs change and so often our homes change.

You have joined FAT-SCRAP because you are feeling a desire and need to change your home. Maybe you don't feel quite so secure in your home anymore. Maybe it is not as strong as it used to be, or maybe it has been neglected and getting run down, maybe you don't feel comfortable..whatever your reason, changing your home requires some physical decluttering - getting rid of some accumulated body fat, cleaning and freshening up your food choices, putting away some old habits and replacing them with new habits....and some mental declutter- changing some of the beliefs you may have about losing weight, diets and exercise as well as beliefs about what you can and can't do, throwing away the negative thoughts that may be holding you back and finding positive thoughts that help you move forward....In short, you are decluttering your "home" of the things that no longer serve you well.

In Sue Rasmussen's newsletter she also included an article about decluttering which I'd like to share with you here so that you can think about how you would apply her advice about decluttering your home to your body. I have highlighted the last line in particular as I believe it reinforces what I am always saying..to change your body and maintain that change, you have to change your lifestyle!

I look forward to hearing your comments..

Sue x

Today's Article - Transform Your Space, Transform Your Life
by Sue Rasmussen, MCC

I truly believe that when we transform our space, we transform our entire lives as well.

Why, you might ask?

When you clear out clutter, organize your stuff, and move around your furniture, there is a corresponding level of change that happens on the inside as well.

When you set up your environment, you set it up based on your current beliefs, your taste and style, your likes and dislikes, your current lifestyle and habits, and what seems important in the moment.

And each time you make a change in your environment, it takes looking inside and make new decisions about what you decide to change.

Each time you decide to let go of something that is no longer serving you, set up your space to really work for you, in a new way that you absolutely love, you are honoring who you are today.

Not who you were last year.

Or who you were as a business owner or professional ten years ago.

Who you are TODAY.
And I guarantee you, the person you are today is very different from the person you were even last month, and certainly last year.

Give yourself permission to change.

Allow yourself to evolve.

Let yourself 'grow out of' your stuff and the way your environment supports you.

And remember that you when you change your environment, you are changing your life as well.