Why I hate the holidays...

clean eating

Okay I don't hate the holidays, I just wanted to see if that statement would get you to my page. I may be a huge fan of The Grinch but I do love the holidays.  Sure I've got my complaints like Christmas seems to come before Thanksgiving but whatever greedy people.  One holiday at a time please.  

So here we are again Mr. Thanksgiving.  Is it just me or do these holidays seem to come faster and faster the older I get?   Let's not stay on that topic too long...  :)

Thanksgiving... time to over indulge in delicious treats, large portions and hopefully a perfectly cooked turkey right?  WRONG!  Look, if you fear the holiday season it's probably because you've over indulged the rest of the damn year.  Instead this year I want you to indulge in portion control.  

I'm not talking about more water and veggies here, although you should do that.  I'm talking about remembering what Thanksgiving is truly about; giving thanks for what you have.  Life, love, happiness or whatever you want to give thanks for.  I challenge you to concentrate on those things this Thanksgiving instead of mindlessly hammering back food.  Take a little food off your plate, avoid the turkey comma and instead use that time to play with your grand kids, nieces or nephews.  Or stay awake and re-connect with a family member that maybe you've lost touch with.

Let's be honest you can eat turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing and gravy all year long.  Hell for about ten years I was addicted to a frozen dinner that was just that.  It was like Thanksgiving everyday for me.  I doubt if you practice a little self control this Thanksgiving you're going to walk away saying, "I wish I would have ate more so I can feel like crap now instead of being happy and comfortable."  If I'm wrong and you do, pick up that frozen dinner I was talking about  :)

 

Conclusion...
Coming back to my original statement, use this holiday as it was meant for.  Enjoy time with your family and friends or hell give back to others less fortunate.  If you're reading this then I'm guessing you probably have the option of stuffing yourself fat during the holidays.  Many people are less fortunate and are hoping to eat at all on this day.  Give your time, maybe some money and your compassion to them.        
  
Okay Jimmie I'll 'try,' good point Jimmie, or I just don't care Jimmie it's Thanksgiving I'm going to eat.  Fine fine I can't win them all.  Anyways I want to tell you about Beachbody's Ultimate Reset program.  In 21 days and you're looking at a 10 lb weight loss and healthy detox of your system.  Looking forward to hearing from you soon new customer  :) 

If you want to know about me...
I'll be spending this Thanksgiving with some dear friends of mine who 'took me in' 3 years ago since my family is a little far away to fly out to for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  Thank you to the Jacobs' for allowing me to share this day with you and your family for the past 3 years.    

Happy almost Thanksgiving Everyone!!!
Love, 

Jimmie
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I thought I'd do something different at the end of this blog.  My writing methodology is typically to jot down a ton of notes, and see if I can make it into something that flows and is relatively coherent later.  What if I shared my 'bloopers' with you and you could see some of the notes and unedited rants that didn't make it into the final blog.  I've never seen anyone do this before so here it is.  Normally this part below would have just been deleted.
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How bout this, use thanksgiving, your one day of the year not to do this, over indulge.  What a crazy idea.

You're just going to stuff your face with delicious crap, pass out and miss that time with family anyway.  

Stop allowing these holidays to be an excuse and take control.  

Look here's how it goes.  You fill up on Thanksgiving then you have about a week until Christmas parties and family gathering start.  Oh wait, you don't have that week yout hought you didn because look at all those delcious left overs, can't let those got ot watse!.  Still you figure you have time but let's be serious you don't have or can't find the time to lose the Thanksgiving weight.

Then Christmas hits which is like a 2 - 3 week event and you're gaining even more.  Well why stop there? I already messed up my routine might as well keep eating.  We stil have left overs and New Years is right around the corner so I'll just start my weight loss journey then.

January hits and you're fired up and ready.  The problem is you have to use all of January to get rid of what you started at the end of November.  Crap.  So now you've been working your ass off all of January like the rest of the country and you're tired and less committed now.  January was hard!  Why was it so hard.  Because you let yourself fall out of routine for an entire month last year! 

Fb and the web are filled with recipes, some good some bad but treat the day for what it was meant for!    Thanksgiving is the ultimate social [word] of other people making others eat.  Break the streak of eating way to much and feeling like crap the next day.  I don't want to drink to much becasue I don't want a hangover, well the day/ hours after thanksgiving are the equivalent to a alcoholic hangover. 

Ok fine there's a bunch of delicious food at the table and you want some of it.  Change portions.  Cram a bunch of veggies in your system filling you up so there's not as much room for bad stuff.

Don't eat as much because you'll have more leftovers. 

Here's a secret... you can have turkey, stuffing, gravy and everything else every single day of the year. 

My Current Hurdle

abs

This blog post is a current reflection of my own actions, habits and lifestyle; good and bad.

While looking back at my own health & fitness goals I gotta say, I'm on a pretty good path.  At least much better than I was any of the years before now.  I have found a good routine of maintaining my health & fitness which has taken me years to achieve.  Still... currently I don't seem to be moving forwards and I'm not moving backwards.  I'm comfortable; and being comfortable for me isn't comfortable!

I must admit my biggest hurdle for taking my health & fitness to the next level is drinking.  I LOVE MY MARTINI'S and I'm having an issue cutting back on them.  Hell it's taken me a few years to perfect my martini recipe, why would I waste all that time spent?!?  Ohhh they're so good and if you ever come over I'll make one for ya!  I still have the occasional beer or two but for the most part I try to stay away from them after reading this article (http://foodbabe.com/2013/07/17/the-shocking-ingredients-in-beer/).

Now to be fair to my little liquid friend the martini, he's not the full culprit of this story.  It's the decisions I'll make after having one of two of these suckers, usually leading me into some kind of late night crap food fest. It's a sad snowball effect.  Not to mention all of the other side effects alcohol has to your body that we rarely think or know about.


That all being said, one of my goals is to etch off those last few percentages of body fat, and this liquid heaven isn't helping.  I must say I've made some huge strides over the years.  It used to be that I would have 2-3 beers a night justifying my actions by complaining about the stress of my job or life in general.  It was an easy 'out' and it seemed to work, although I know there are much healthier ways to de-stress!

Now I keep my 'partying' to Friday and Saturday nights.  I'm not saying that I don't sway from that every now and then but it's kind of the deal I've made with myself.  So here's the problem, I'm a numbers guy.  If I'm drinking 2 nights of the week that's nearly a third of my week!  What the hell?!? How come the week seems so long and the weekends so short, yet somehow 2 days is almost a third of my week???  It sure doesn't seem like a third of my week is 'weekend time.'

What's also hard is that I love going out with my friends!  If you know me personally or follow me on Facebook you know we do some really fun and unique things almost every weekend!  The problem is many of these events include or have alcohol and I fall into peer pressure far too easily.  Okay okay I'll admit that I'm sometimes even the instigator!

So here's what I've come up with... I've created this card to help me with my goals.  I figure I can keep my schedule of 2 nights a week 2 drinks per night but that's it!  If I want to go crazy one night, I have to sacrifice a full night.  But the best part of this card (at least for me) is I won't want to cross off all the little martini's.  It's now a game and each time I cross one off I'm losing.   Also by having a visualization of what I could be giving up by having my little martini's, I'm hoping that will be enough to keep me away.  I'll let you know who wins!




I challenge you to this, if you're having problems quitting a habit that is keeping you from your goals do the same.  Track it, learn about it, and then come up with a plan to correct it.  You may not always win but progress is progress no matter how small.  In my example I turned my strength of loving challenges against my weakness the martini.  Do the same yourself.              

I don't have all the answers, I just take it day by day.  I look at the progress my own health & fitness has made over the past years and all I can do is be proud.  I know I'm on the right course and maybe by writing about this it will give me the push I need to do even better.  But in the end everyone has to make their own decisions and choices on what they want and what's important to them.

If you're having similar issues what are they?  And how have you found ways to overcome them?

-Jimmie



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