The joy of yoga

Anyone who knows me knows that I love yoga.  Even though I'm a Pilates instructor, I think I like yoga just a tiny bit better.  I used to practice yoga almost 7 days per week, but once I started doing P90X my yoga practice dwindled to once a week.  I didn't mind though it was a nice change and challenge.  I did two rounds of P90X, and 4 weeks of Insanity in between. 

Fellow Team Beachbody Coach, Mike French posted a 30-day/3 times per week Yoga Challenge on Facebook. This sparked my interest because I know he and his wife Tami, train really hard. Way harder than me.  Since I was done with P90X for the time being, I wanted to take it down a notch and refresh my body.  This seemed like the perfect answer. 

Let me tell you that yoga is by no means a walk in the park.  I've been doing power yoga with P90X's Yoga X as well as other power yoga programs designed to burn calories, torch fat, sculpt you abs, arms and legs.

My body responded right away to the change.  The next day after my first time back with yoga, I was sore all over.  My abs hadn't felt this sore in a very long time.  This soreness then carried over into the next day too.  When it was time for my second day, I worked through the soreness but had to do a lot of grunting and deep breathing to get through the positions.

When I was finished, I was sweating, breathing heavy and feeling like I had an awesome workout completed and under my belt.

I know most people cringe when they hear the words yoga, stretching or flexibility exercises. Trust me, if you stick with it, you will really look forward to these workouts and gain a brand new body.  You may also gain a whole new perspective on life too.  Yoga teaches patience, practice, not taking things too seriously, and being able to laugh at ourselves when you tumble out of a pose.  It teaches you to relax into a pose instead of fighting to get there.  You learn to breathe deeply, feeding your muscles the oxygen they need.  And you get an awesome sense of accomplishment when you can finally get into a pose near perfectly.

I'd love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave a comment here or send me an email to fitwithjessica@live.com

My vacation and staying fit

Vacations, we all love them,cherish them and eagerly await them. We even diet and exercise right before our vacation in order to look good, maybe even hot, and to perhaps feel great while on our retreat.  But most of the time we will throw all of that hard work out the window when we go away, only to feel bloated, guilty and maybe 5 pounds heavier when we return.

I don't know about you, but I can still have a great time on my vacation if I take the time out to squeeze in exercise and plan some healthy meals and snacks.  I know this isn't a very popular idea, but trust me, if you give it a try you won't be disappointed.

Recently, my family and I had the opportunity to take some time off and travel to Florida to visit with my mom and also my dad. We stayed at Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge, Kidani Village.  First off, we were blessed to stay at this amazing resort.  It made it very easy to keep up with eating right and sticking to my P90X routine (at the time of my vacation I was in week 11 now in week 12).  We stayed in a room with a fully equipped kitchen. I know there are a lot of people who don't find cooking on their vacation fun, but with 4 kids it really saves us from a lot of headaches and spending too much money on food.  Knowing we would have the kitchen, I packed my vanilla whey protein and Shakeology, along with things like plain oatmeal, whole grain bread, beans, brown rice and other healthy goodies.  Once we got down there I hit up Wal-Mart for the rest of our pantry. 

You can save a ton of money, time and calories by just eating breakfast in your room. With a dishwasher right there all we had to do was prepare, eat and stack dishes. Then we were ready to hit the pool.

We did indulge a few times and ordered private poolside dining, but we tried to stay healthy with that too.  The resort made it easy to pick healthy choices such as Tandoori chicken with chickpeas.  But for most of the days, I just ran up to the room to blend up (well my husband did that) a chocolate and peanut butter Shakeology.

Exercise wasn't a problem and I really looked forward to that part of the day. I woke up around 6:30 am (I know, I'm crazy), every morning to stretch and then take a walk to the fitness center.  I know this doesn't sound like something to look forward to, but the walk to the fitness center was so beautiful, relaxing and peaceful. The sun would just be coming up, there were flowers everywhere and cool little lamps to guide your way.  I really enjoyed this sacred time to myself every morning and felt this was truly one of the best parts of my vacation.

I stuck to my P90X schedule as closely as possible. Since I was on vacation, I didn't want to spend too much time in the gym, so I adjusted my routine to include 25 minutes on the treadmill or stepper and then 25 minutes of a strength routine.  Then on my scheduled cardio days I did 35-40 minutes on the treadmill or stepper and then 10 minutes of abs.  I feel like even though it was a quick routine, I worked really hard.

Again, I know most of you might find this not fun at all, or maybe even slightly crazy, but I didn't gain any weight while away and no feelings of "why did I eat that much?" type guilt.

I've got lots more to blog about, but will wait until later on.

I'd love to hear from you! Please feel free to comment or send me an email to fitwithjessica@live.com.

Some of the reasons why I workout

The other day, while doing a very hard P90X back and legs workout, I got to thinking "why am I doing this??"  I mean a lot of other people aren't spending their child's nap time exercising. They're doing house work, they're catching up on phone calls, sewing, crafting maybe some other business.  I don't know. But why am I sweating, huffing and puffing my way through 45minute long, tough workouts 6 days a week?  Why am I watching what food I put into my body? 

Well in my last blog, I pointed out that its the small things we do every day that amount to the big things.  So even though we may not see results in microwaved instant, they will come in time. And its not all outward appearance, its what's going on inside of your body that counts too.

But we're creatures that like to see results outwardly more than the inner benefits, especially when it comes to exercise and nutrition.

So here are some reasons why I do this to  myself:

• I really like having a flat belly. I know it may seem vain, but I like looking down an not seeing what used to be a bulge.  Plus I had 4 kids, so to see my belly this flat, is pretty cool.
• I love having the energy to keep up with my 4 kids.  When I take them to the playground, I like to be able to play with them.
• I love that my body is flexible and strong.  Again, when I play with my kids, I love the fact that I can squeeze through all the narrow mazes and crouch down real low and not bump my head or hurt my back.  I can swing from the monkey bars and jump from the high places without fear.
• Even though P90X is a challenge, I love how I feel mentally and physically after completing a workout.  As a mom of 4 kids, things don't always get finished, or if they do often it will appear that it never got worked on (like the family room always getting trashed by Hurricane Alexa).  But I get a feeling of accomplishment when I do exercise, especially if it was very difficult to get through.
• I love when my kids decide to join me while exercising.  Michael (he's 4) has been doing the warm-ups with me during P90X and some of the exercises.  Alexa (she's 2) likes to join me in yoga an stretching.  And my older boys, Chris and Anthony like to do push-ups and cardio with me.
•  Someone once said to me that I should have fun and just eat.  What's funny is that I do eat (about 1900 cals), and just because I'm not stuffing a slice of cheesecake in my mouth doesn't mean I'm not having fun! I love to eat, but for some reason I don't equate it to having fun.  I eat to fuel my body and give me energy. Having the energy to play with my kids is fun.

• I love to look good when I get dressed up.  Listen, I don't do dress up often, but when I do, I love it when my husband says "you look hot!"  Who wouldn't want to hear that? I totally love the fact that my husband is still attracted to me.  And let me tell you, he's not the type to give out compliments just because.
• I like to see my muscles in my arms.  Again, I know this sounds vain, but its nice to see a little biceps and triceps action.
• I love when I go to the doctor and my blood pressure is good, and my cholesterol is good too. I know there's nothing sexy or hot about that, but it is a good feeling to know you're taking care of your body the right way.

So those are just a few of my "why's." I know some of you think I'm crazy because I don't go out drinking anymore or have a glass of wine every night (instead I meet a friend at Starbuck's on occasion). I don't eat a lot of "fun" food.  I spend my free time working out and trying to get others to do so.  Yes, it is a little crazy, but I like it. 

Its not for everyone, but if you're not happy with how things are going now, its not too late to make some changes.  The only thing you have to lose is maybe some high cholesterol, some high blood pressure, some inches off your waist and some pounds off the scale.

I'd love to hear from you.  Leave me some feedback here or send me an email to fitwithjessica@live.com