Body-Happiness

We have become used to hating our bodies and it's a shared thought that's spreading to a younger population- an estimated 90% of teenagers are unhappy with the way they look, starting them off on a vicious and dangerous path to chronic dieting and pursuit of a perceived perfection. 

There's a reason why the weight-loss industry is a billion dollar one. 

Sad, but true, it is now more common to be unhappy with our bodies than it is to be completely content with our shapes.



We criticize our lumps and bumps in the mirror, groan at the parts that wiggle and flap and truly believe that happiness lies in the magical land of five-pounds-lighter. So, things go one of two ways: 

We make ourselves miserable on a diet only to feel it's still not enough...

OR

We get so frustrated with the confines of a diet program that we catch ourselves mid comfort-food binge feeling anything but comfortable. 

When we get a scrape, it heals if we would only stop picking at the scab. The good news here is that when given half a chance to, the body will heal itself. 

That's what this is really all about. 

There is an optimal healthy shape that each of our bodies are designed to hover around. Some call it a "set-point weight." I call it body-happiness.

Body-happiness is the point where everything in the body just... effortlessly works. It's the point where there is no struggle to maintain a number on the scale. It's the weight at which there are no aches and pains on the joints. It's where the body is not asking for caffeine, sugar or stimulants in order to get through the day. It's where our bodies want to be. 

But, we hurt it and take it away from that body-happiness. 

We hurt it with improper diet, rest and exercise, with a lack of self-love, with distrust and overall neglect. 

So, the body packs on extra weight as a response, in an attempt to protect itself from the pain. 

So, we attack the added weight with more negative energy and painful measures to make it go away. 

The body continues to respond to the negativity. 

And so on...

Let's stop this pattern before it does any more damage (because we know it's already done its share). Let's stop abusing our bodies and start realizing that since it's the only one we will ever have, we should start showing it some gosh-darn respect!

In a series of posts, I'll be focusing on body-happiness and figuring out how to get there. 

We all have what it takes to not only reach that optimal weight, but, more importantly, to give ourselves the acceptance we cry out for in the first place. 

We can redefine our paths of least resistance away from our unhealthy habits and guide ourselves to a place of health, wellness and abundant energy. It's what the body wants- to heal, to be comfortable and to find that feel-good body-happiness!

Why I Hate Calories-Burned Monitors

By the time I was done with my highly intense 20 minute, hop-on-hop-off, sprint-a-minute-walk-for-two, interval training on the treadmill, the calories burned monitor displayed a whopping 428!

Yeah, right. 

In the world of fitness and weight management, numbers receive far too much power than they deserve. Calories, pounds, fat grams, carbohydrate counts... (all of that, in fact, is an entirely other topic in and of itself that I could go on and on about, but I digress...) I say- keep math in the classroom, where it belongs and leave the calculations to our accountants. 

If I could, I would smack a sticker that says "enough" on the calories burned monitor of every piece of exercise equipment. Instead of feeling the pounding of our hearts , the beads of sweat on our skin and the endorphin rush in our brains, we look to the digitized number on a machine to tell us good our workout was. 

I don't think so, ya big ol' pile of metal, wires, plastic and rubber! 

"I just burned 500 calories on the elliptical!" Great. Wonderful. But, how do you FEEL? 


When it comes to fitness, let's forget the numbers and reassess the reasons for working out in the first place. 

The truth of the matter is, exercise is a very inefficient way of burning calories. Gasp. I know. A bold statement coming from a personal trainer. But, think about it: In order to burn off the equivalent of one tiny M&M, you have to walk the entire length of a football field. No thank you, I have better things to do with my week. 

So... am I saying that working out is a waste of time? NO!

I don't know about you, but getting in a sweaty session at the gym makes me feel wonderful, regardless of what any caloric-expenditure equation will be able to tell me. 

At an intimidating 5'0", I feel empowered as I feel the heavy weight of cold metal in my hands. The feeling of accomplishment from hauling my body weight up into a pull-up and pressing twice that weight with my legs? There's nothing like it. 

When I'm doing my thing at the gym, I'm not thinking, "must burn off the slice of pizza I had this afternoon." 

...but, rather "wow, my body is stronger than I give it credit for!" and that's what it should be about- appreciating the strength of our muscles and recognizing the awesome abilities of our bodies. 

We should be constantly celebrating our individual power rather than suppressing it by punishing ourselves with diets, workouts that we have to rather than want to do, and telling ourselves we are somehow bad for eating one thing over another.  

I feel sad for those that drag themselves to the gym, miserably trudging along on the treadmill, glaring at the calories burned monitor, waiting for it to reach some magical good-enough number... They're missing out on a chance to really experience what it means to do something wonderful for their bodies and overshadowing a chance to experience a natural uplifting of their spirits by focusing on a number that, in reality, is far from accurate, to be quite honest.

Exercise is a beautifully intoxicating experience that I partake in on most days of the week. I don't do it to manage my weight, change my appearance or balance out my food intake- those things come as a bonus. I do it for me, for the health of my mind and body and to remember that I am strong, able-bodied and powerful beyond what any number will ever be able to tell me. 

The Silent Language of Runners

The warmth from the sun being tempered by a slightly cooler breeze coaxed a pair of running sneakers on to my feet, sending me on an outdoors jog, despite the fact I had deemed it a “rest day” for my muscles to recover. Taking it at an easy pace, I paid no mind to the time or my miles-per-hour. This run wasn’t about athleticism or personal records- it was about feeling the earthbeneath my feet and enjoying nature’s gift of a perfect summer day.

There is an unspoken set of mannerisms among the running community. A slight nod of the head or wave of the hand is normal as paths are crossed. It’s a polite, subtle recognition of a mutual love for pavement pounding. Sometimes, it serves as a nonverbal “hey, I feel your pain” if the weather is challengingly extreme or a hill seems to be at a 180 degree angle. It’s like being in a club with a secret handshake and all it takes to become a member is to place one foot in front of the other and repeat.

I rounded the second to last turn on my usual route and saw a man with grayed hair, wearing multicolored spandex running gear and a dark pair of athletic sunglasses in the distance, running towards me. He seemed to be in his late fifties or early sixties, but in great physical condition, nonetheless. I gave him a quick wave of acknowledgement.

As I came around the final half-mile marker bend, trudging along at my casual pace, I saw the same man out of the corner of my eye, gradually gaining headway on me. Out of admiration of his conditioning (and partially due to my competitive nature), I picked up my pace, just enough to steadily keep a few feet behind him. I remained on the uneven sidewalk as he opted for the flat roadway’s shoulder.

There are two baby hills within the last quarter mile that I usually sprint, fueled by a runner’s high that never fails to push me through. As I revved myself in to full speed, I passed my unofficial running partner, ending my run at the top of the driveway accross the street, panting for air, feeling accomplished. Turning my gaze towards the man, we caught eachother’s attention as he gave me an enthusiastic thumbs-up and I smiled through my gasps, shouting “thank you!” knowing that he knew I was grateful for the extra motivational mental push he provided me.

As I crossed the street, I realized that the man was actually my neighbor. I watched him turn in to the driveway that I had used as my finish line for years. All this time, I lived across the way from a fellow runner that ended up being a source of motivation for the end of my run. On any other day, that man would just be a fellow road-runner that understood the unspoken runners’ launguage.  I smiled to myself as I realized that motivation and inspiration can come from anywhere- even from the neighbor accross the way that I had never once introduced myself to.

The Day I Went Postal on the Scale

The first installment in a series unraveling “my story…”  This process’ purpose is for reflection on past experiences in order to dig out the positive messages and lessons from the negative rubble…

Most 13 year old girls obsess about 13 year old boys, dreamy tweeny-bopper stars, the latest school bus gossip and what flavor Lip Smackers they bought at the store. As trivial as these fixations were, I would have given anything to have been stuck on the Justin Biebers of my day rather than what plagued me for years to come…

Wake up… get on the scale

Use the bathroom… get on the scale

Eat breakfast… get on the scale

Come home from school… get on the scale

Use the bathroom… get on the scale

Abstain from food and drink for hours… get on the scale…

An estimated 2.7% of girls between 13 and 18 years old suffer from eating disorders. -National Institude of Mental Health (NIMH)

From the age of 13, I became a statistic. How much I weighed and how little I ate were of utmost importance; I subconsciously grasped for a semblance of control somewhere… anywhere in my life.

My body image issues began early on and, although the core issues surpassed the superficiality of looks, I became obsessed with the number on the scale. I allowed a primitive piece of equipment rule my emotions and bar me from happiness, as the number never seemed to satisfy. If the number was too high, I failed; if it stayed the same, my efforts to bring the number down were useless; if it were lower than expected, it fed into the weight loss obsession- there was no winning situation. By day’s end, it wasn’t out of the ordinary to have stepped on and off of that device of personal torture upwards towards twenty times. I was no longer a person- I was an object.

Fast forward to today…

I look back at the days where a literal tenth of a pound reduced me to tears.  Bringing home an A+ on a paper or receiving first chair as a 7th grade flutist in the 8th grade band held no importance;no matter what I had managed to accomplish in my day, nothing could define me more than that plastic measuring device.

I cannot pinpoint the exact moment that it happened, but a switch flipped within me, shedding light on the hopelessness of my attempts to let a needle on a wheel of numbers define my “goodness.” Although I still fought a long path to recovery after this moment, I thank my lucky stars to have relinquished the obsession with the scale when I had.

I don’t remember the last time I stepped on a scale. When I go to to the doctors’ for a checkup, I insist on facing away from the display and request the number not be shared with me. I don’t remember what the last reading said, nor do I remember the exact moment when I decided “never again!” I do, however, remember the ceremonial moment in which I took a hammer to the cheap “Health-o-Meter” scale, channeling every last frustration it has ever given as I bludgeoned it to smithereens. 

Now, as a personal trainer and a holistic health coach, I preach against the use of numbers to show progress. I favor measurements in terms of energy levels, mood stability and the fit of clothing (not the actual size). Due to erratic changes in water weight, the heaviness of muscle trumping that of fat, hormonal levels in the body, etc, I don’t see such a volatile number as a fair way to determine body composition or, on a deeper level, self-worth, at all. Scales are for fish, not for humans.

Constantly a work in progress, I have morphed my sense of self far away from what my weight is. The people I affect, the changes I create, the smiles I cause are all much more indicative of self-worth than any number would ever be able to tell. The day I destroyed my scale was not the day my battle ended, but it was absolutely a landmark moment in my life in which I refused to be defined by such a worthless measurement. Even though the illness falsely made me believe I had everything in perfect order, going ape on the rectangular white scale with the bold black and red numberswas the moment I reclaimed some actual control over my out-of-control, food/image/perfection driven life.

Out of My Own Way

Dizzy and seeing stars, I gasped for air, gulping it down, causing my stomach to churn, ebbing on nausea. I regained the slightest bit of composure, watched the timer count the last second of the interval and hopped back on to the speedily-rolling belt of the treadmill, grasping for any last bit of motivation I could to complete the high intensity interval training run I had set out to accomplish. With ten seconds left of my final uphill sprint, I wondered if I could finish. I contemplated cutting the last stretch short… “It’s only ten seconds less than what you had wanted to do. What’s the difference?”

Fueled by anger towards the fact that a voice of such negativity and dishonor even existed within me, I dashed out the last ten seconds and pushed myself to sprint another ten. I wasn’t punishing myself for toying with the idea of cheating myself out of my workout- a negative cannot and should not be corrected by another negative. Instead, the added sixth of a minute, although barely conquered with teeth ground shut, served to prove that my limits were not as limiting as I had thought.

Harder this time, I sucked in as much air as my lungs would allow, aware that I was “that person” in the gym with the audible working-out soundtrack blasting “Erika’s Inhale-Exhale” on repeat. Hidden in the pained wince of my face was also a subtle smile from the pride i felt for getting through it all.

As I dismounted from the treadmill, I felt a buzzing energy in my legsthat I could easily have mistaken for/settled to call fatigue. My aim was to push my abilities to high levels and my wobbly legs were proof that I had met that. Much like the positive pain I referred to in a previous post, the soreness in the muscles of my legs was welcomed and earned. To the uninvited negativity that nearly made me quit before I was ready to, I vow to raise my personal bar even higher, yet, partially as a mockery of the nay-saying voice… try and stop me now.

Trying Something New

Normally, I take Mondays off from the gym, giving my body at least a day’s rest from training as recovery is just as important as the actual workout. Particularly sore from another intense Sunday morning Body Combat class, I woke up this morning with every intention of allowing my muscles to relax.

On weekday afternoons, I’m a mother’s helper, taking care of 2 teenage boys. As I read over the day’s to-do notes left by their mom, I noticed that at 5pm, I would be driving one of the boys to a restaurant that happened to be only a few miles from my gym.

(Side realization: My gym is a 20 minute drive from my house, without traffic. Calculating the math, I spend an average of 240 minutes, or 4 hours commuting to and from the gym. Usually not a fan of driving, these 4 hours are well worth it, even when there are at least 5 other gyms within a 10 minute drive from my home.)

Hoping to make the most of my drive, I decided to challenge my body a little harder  and temporarily push off recovery day. Then, I realized that I would finally be able to make it to Zumba at my gym- a class that I had never been able to fit in to my schedule! As a new instructor, I try to sample as many other instructors’ classes as I can, so I was excited, even though my muscles were screaming for the night off.

Never one to half-ass a workout, I quieted the nagging soreness of my fatigued muscles and gave the hour-long class my all (which wasn’t a difficult task as I fed off the high energies of the wonderful instructor and the other members in the class). I was even lucky enough to be invited up on stage for two different tracks! I left the class dripping with sweat and smiling from ear to ear, my spirits soaring high. 

As I sit here at the end of my day, every muscle from my neck to my toes ache and plead me to take tomorrow to rest and recover (which I fully intend to!). Although giving gratitude towards my body is no unique subject in this blog, it is something I hope to consistently do. It is far too easy to take for granted the endless abilities of an able body and I hope that this thankfulness is not one I would have to wait to know of once it’s gone. On this same note, I hope to practice kindness towards my body, treating it with grateful respect. There are different types of muscle-aches, even though they all register as pain. The pain from when I all-too-often twist an ankle or the pain during a six-month recovery from long-thoracic nerve palsy are unpleasantly unwelcome; but the pain from challenging the limits of my body… tearing down muscle so it can grow back stronger… though still making me wince from time to time, is a pleasant reminder that with hard work, my able body can accept the challenge, rise to it, and take it on like the ninja I am. Ki-yah! 

Linked by Exercise

The room was filled with buzzing energy. Sweat glistened off every body in the crowd. The music pumped through the speakers as hips shook, swiveled and shimmied. It was a diverse group- aged early 20s to mid 60s, tall, short, petite, heavier set.. all was accounted for and no matter who they were or how they looked, each and every person was smiling ear to ear, letting the music move them…. all on a Friday morning.

As everyone on Facebook knows, I was at Zumba instructor training all day yesterday. The eight hour long event embodied everything that I love about the fitness industry- a room filled with people all there with a common goal, a shared interest, a similar passion- to challenge personal limits and to spread the exciting energy of moving the body. Even though it was a studio filled with strangers, we all were connected through a special bond that needed no explanations nor introductions.

It truly is a testament to the nonjudgmental attitude a health/wellness professional attempts to maintain. The benefits and love for fitness never discriminates based on shape, size, race, nor gender. Every body, as long as it is human, is meant to move and when exercise ups the heart rate, those feel good chemicals stimulate the brain, bringing levity and happiness to chronically stressed and depressed lives.

Every day that I’ve worked on building my wellness business or challenged my body with exercise, I am reminded how thankful I am that I found my calling in fitness and health. It was always a fear of mine to have a job that I dreaded clocking in for and in this industry, I never once had to face that fear. Doing what I love makes “work” not feel like work at all. Through this passion, I’ve met some of the most wonderfully motivating and positive people and found a second home at my gym (that I’m certain everyone is tired of me raving about) that at times feels more familiar than my own house.

Body Viving and Dropping the Ball

Saturday 4/28

It’s no secret that the gym is a favorite place of mine. Saturday, I rushed out to my gym at a particularly early 8:45 in the morning to make it to a featured master class, Body Vive. Inevitably, there will be many future posts on things I am grateful for pertaining to my gym, but on this day, I learned how thankful I was to be able to laugh at myself.

When trying new things, there is always a learning curve where mistakes will be made and perfection is not expected. Thank goodness! Growing up, I constantly felt the pressure to never make a mistake and carried the expectation to be perfect (now, I understand my parents’ intentions were to push me to reach my highest potential, not to cause me stress… yet another thing I am thankful for, in retrospect). This forgiveness to err that I’ve adopted towards myself was much called for during Body Vive’s 55 minutes of new steps and movements.

Regardless of my unfamiliarity with the class, I took a spot, front and center, directly face-to-face with the instructor, my Body Vive ball within reach. My first thought was “Gosh, I hope I don’t drop that ball and make a fool of myself!” Of course, the self-fulfilled prophecy that it had become, not only did I drop my ball once, but lost it a second time! Initially, I felt embarrassed as I chased the ball as it rolled passed other less-butterfingers-prone Body Vivers, thinking I was probably the only klutz that lost her squishy, purple ball. I laughed it off and fell back in to formation.

A few steps later, we were instructed on a new move that had us turning in different directions, in (what was meant to be) unison. My feet fumbled beneath me as I mis-stepped, mis-turned, and mis-Vived.  Much to my delight, it seemed most of the room joined me in my confusion as we crashed into each other and bobbed when we should have weaved. At that moment, I unclenched my useless grip on attempted perfection and released it with a wave of laughter. Truth of the matter was, most people in the classroom that morning were just as new to the program as I was. I was NOT the only one making mistakes, stepping left when told to pivot right. But, I was the only one that thought my self-described epic errors made any difference!

After I realized the normalcy of my mistakes, I allowed myself to laugh at my missteps. I was able to enjoy myself as much as everyone else was enjoying the wonderful class and got an added ab workout from all the laughter. If I can’t laugh at my own mistakes, then I impose a sentence on myself to take life far too seriously. I guess you could say that on Saturday morning, in my first Body Vive experience, I learned a valuable life lesson to be grateful for the ability to laugh at myself, all stemming from dropping the ball- twice!