Health Habits

improve your health, habit by habit

Posts Tagged ‘motivation’

Are You Willing to Die on a Treadmill?

February 14th, 2010

The next time you think that you can’t do something…..watch this
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Posted in Mental/Emotional

Tags: motivation Paulo Coelho the alchemist will smith

Workout Tunes #9

January 29th, 2010

Do you smell like…

teen spirit

Nirvana – Smells Like Teen Spirit

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Workout Tunes #6

January 8th, 2010

White boy rappin.

Eminem – Lose Yourself

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Workout Tunes #1

November 22nd, 2009

Music can be a powerful workout tool.

Especially on days when I just don’t feel like working out.

These are the days when I throw on the headphones and listen to a little Rage Against The Machine.

Nothing gets the blood pumping like Rage.

Popularity: 2% [?]

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Posted in Exercise, fitness, working out

Tags: fitness health motivation Music rage against the machine ratm workout

Successful Fitness Motivation or "how I finally whipped my lazy butt into shape"

July 30th, 2009

Let’s be honest.

We all know what it takes to be in good shape

Exercise daily
Eat healthy, nutritious food
Stay hydrated
Reduce your stress
Get 8 hours of sleep
Quit smoking, Quit McDonalds, Quit drinking gallons of Coke, etc….

And for some lucky people, working out and living a healthy lifestyle come naturally. They Just Do It™

However, for the rest of us, the effort required to “get into shape” takes too much…..effort.

It costs too much
It’s too hard
I don’t know what to do
Fitness people are jerks
People will look at me
People won’t look at me
I’m too fat
I don’t want to get all sweaty
I don’t have enough time
and it’s still too hard

So, we give up, give in and get out of shape.

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If that sounds like you or someone you care about, read on and find out:

Why we do what we do,
Why we don’t do what we should,
And how you can re-program yourself to actually enjoy exercise.

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The Best Fitness Tip you are ever going to get

Your biggest impediment to getting in shape isn’t a lack of money or knowledge or natural ability.

It’s your emotions.

It’s the beliefs you hold that exercise is too hard and diets don’t work and you have fat DNA.

And I am here to tell you that until you change these beliefs and the emotions that come with them, you will never, ever get in shape.

In fact, every single day, I work with people who are desperate to get in shape…but they don’t believe they can.

But, lucky for them, I do believe. I believe because I have seen it happen over and over again.

So, I lend them my confidence and my emotions.

True, I work them hard and I yell at them for breaking their diet. But, I always make them understand that they can get in shape and that I am going to make it happen.

And like magic, when they start to believe, they start to improve.

For some people, it’s right away. For others, it takes a few weeks.

But eventually, my beliefs and emotions become their beliefs and emotions.

And it’s those emotions and belief in themselves that drives the improvement in fitness.

And if you don’t think that emotion influences performance, ask this guy…

The meanest personal trainer in the world

But, let’s say you don’t have access to a charging bull or don’t want to pay for the airline ticket to fly me to your home town.

What do you do?

You need to make 3 Decisions

What are you going to focus on?
What does getting in shape mean to you?
What actions are you going to take?

FOCUS

Are you going to focus on your past failures? – NO
Or, are you going to focus on your fantastically fit future self? – YES

What you focus on creates emotions. We want/need positive emotions

MEANING

What does living a healthy life mean to you?
Does it MEAN fatigue/pain/sweat/expense/pain/lack of confidence/pain??? – NO
Or, does it mean feeling great, looking great and actually being great? – YES

Is it a punishment or is it a reward?

Meaning creates emotions. We want/need positive emotions.

ACTION

Your emotions WILL control your actions…positive emotions = positive actions
And, when you are ready to take positive action, you will find that there are more than enough resources available to transform your body from fat to fit.

But, of course, you should start by looking through the Health Habits archives.

And, if you need more help with creating these positive emotions, you can start by watching this TED talk by Tony Robbins.

See, I told you there were lots of resources available.

And, before anyone starts thinking that they don’t need that Tony Robbins motivational crap, keep in mind that there are a whole bunch of big brains hanging on Robbins’ every word…including Al Gore. So, don’t go getting all cynical on me now.

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Loneliness worse for your health than smoking and obesity

February 16th, 2009

Picasso - the old guitarist

According to the research of Dr. John Cacioppo, loneliness has a major impact on your overall health – both mental and physical.

In his research, Dr. Cacioppo employed brain scans, monitoring of autonomic and neuroendocrine processes, and assays of immune function to test the influence that social connection has upon our health. His research showed how our perceptions, behavior and physiology are strongly affected by a loss of that connection.

In fact, Dr. Cacoppo’s research has shown that loneliness can cause:

an increase in your blood pressure
an increase in your level of stress and cortisol production
a negative impact on your immune system
an inability to get a good nights sleep
an increased level of depression and anxiety
an increased risk of developing Alzheimer’s Disease
a reduction in your will to exercise
an increase in your cravings for comforting foods high in processed carbohydrates
an increase in caloric consumption
an increase in alcohol consumption
an increase in the consumption of a variety of drugs…both legal and illegal, and…

a feeling of sadness that feeds upon itself, causing even more isolation and an even greater sense of loneliness.

These finding were presented by Dr. Cacioppo at the most recent conference of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

According to Dr. Cacioppo, “healthwise, the difference between a lonely person and a popular person was akin to “a smoker and a non-smoker”.

“That stunned all of us, myself and all my colleagues in terms of the effects it had,” he said. “It shows just how powerful it is.

“Loneliness lowers the ability to control yourself. It is really easy after a bad day to have a second scotch and a third to get some comfort.”

Dr. Cacioppo’s research has led him to believe that our need for connection can be traced back through our evolutionary roots.

In order to survive in the past, humans needed to bond to rear their children. In order to flourish, they needed to [increase their levels of altruism and cooperation].

Just as physical pain is a prompt to change behavior, such as moving a finger away from the fire, loneliness evolved as a prompt to action, signaling an ancestral need to repair the social bonds.

The problem of social isolation is likely to grow as conventional family structures die out, said Dr. Cacioppo.

People are living longer, having fewer children later in life and becoming increasingly mobile around the world.

Surveys also show that people report significantly fewer close friends and confidants than those a generation ago.

All of this adds up to more loneliness and more health problems because of that loneliness.

According to the good doctor, we need to realize that “human beings are simply far more intertwined and interdependent—physiologically as well as psychologically—than our cultural prejudices have allowed us to acknowledge”.

And if we don’t address our very real need for connection, we are risking our own psychological and physiological health.

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