New Wagon.

So I fell off the gym wagon. It’s bad; I can’t even remember the last time I went…. I think I may have gone once back in March. I hate the gym; most people will tell you once you start going you’ll love it. I am still waiting for the love. Of course I do feel better when I go and I am always proud of myself for that small accomplishment. If you go to the gym regularly I think you should be proud even if you didn’t push your hardest or ran as long as you could have. You went. You moved today. It’s a step in the right direction and I think we are all usually too hard on our self, thinking we didn’t do all we could. So as a side note to this post don’t forget about those small goals, it makes meeting the bigger ones a less bumpy road and hopefully you will enjoy the view along the way. Back to my point of this post, I decided not to get back on the gym wagon. I am instead getting on a whole new wagon so to speak. I want to like what ever it is I am doing to get to the body I hope to have someday. If everyday is a struggle and I hate every minute once I get there I won’t be able to maintain. I came to a rather stupid epiphany recently, stupid in how simple it is and that I should of realized this early. I am always so focused on my goal that I set very strict rules for myself that allow for little to no flexibility, so once I get remotely close to my goal I give my self a break, this “break” usually ends with finding myself back to where I started. Not only do I undo all that work for nothing I also am now either mad at myself or feel incredibly guilty. So this new wagon will hopefully be the ticket to my best self and a new lifestyle. Not a boot camp to drop 10 pounds in a week that leaves me binging on the weekend, and once again back up those 10 pounds.

The New Wagon Guidelines

Part One- Move

I think in order to achieve the body I want it will take a combination of diet and exercise, again this time without the gym. The gym clearly isn’t working for me. There have been months on end I go 5-6 times a week and I didn’t look too different from now. They say you need to mix it up, that your body gets use to the same routine and stops giving you results. That may have been the issue, but without someone telling me what to do I feel kind of lost. So everyday I would just hop on a cardio machine put my ipod on and check out mentally for the next 45-60 minutes, then I would float around picking random weight machines without a game plan, wasting time and energy and without getting results. None of that. Another pitfall of the gym are the members- the girl who clearly spent time getting ready for the gym, the guys there for that type of girl, the girl in amazing shape that makes me want to just throw in the towel and go home to eat a pint of ice cream and the guys in ripped t-shirts throwing weights around and yelling. All of these people I can do without. The game plan now in the beginning will be a lot of experimenting. My goal is to try new things and mix it up a lot. With the nicer weather starting and longer days it will be easy to mix indoor and outdoor routines. I read both Shape and Women’s Health magazine, which come with new workouts every month. I will be trying some of those out and I will get some posts up about them as well. I also plan and trying some DVDs for when I don’t have a lot of time or the weather doesn’t permit getting outside. I picked up one DVD today, they are harder to find then I thought. I really want to try The Tracy Anderson Method (she trains Madonna, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kelly Ripa, Jennifer Aniston, ect).

With her workouts you don’t need any special equipment, you just use your body weight and her method claims to give you long lean muscle- I like both these ideas, and many swear by her method. The downside is that there are a lot of mixed reviews. Many say the DVDs are VERY hard to follow and offer little instruction, with this type of program form seems to be very important and I could see why without clear instructions results would be slim. The regimen also requires doing both the cardio and toning DVD 5-6 times a week, that equals 2 hours a day. A lot of the reviewers couldn’t stick with that many hours. I don’t have a problem with getting in two hours a day, however I am afraid my tiny living room doesn’t offer enough space for the cardio dance routine. And lastly they are expensive, ranging from $30-$80 depending on what you purchase. If anyone has tried these let me know your experiences with them. I am putting purchasing them on hold for now. I will start with the one I picked up today.



During my research of the Tracy Anderson Method many reviewers mentioned these workout DVDs and I found several of them at target today, I just picked up one (which was only $7, score!) and plan on starting with it Sunday or Monday. I’ll keep you posted on how I like it.

Part Two- Healthier Habits

I will not be counting anything, weighing food, watching carbs. Nothing of the sort. I already eat pretty healthy when it comes to breakfast, lunch and dinner. My pitfalls are snacking and how much I eat. Yes sometime I eat just because I like to eat, its like a hobby. An very hard to break but so good until you see the bottom of the carton, pint, box or bowl hobby. I will simply try to make better choices, easier said then done I know. I will watch my potion sizes, choose whole foods for snacking and allow one indulgent thing a day. We all need to indulge. A few goals I am working towards will be;

Choosing fresh fruits and veggies for snacking
Limit my sugar intake
Quit diet soda
Choose fruit over juice and tea over coffee
Make sure my plate always has more veggies then carbs
And finally for now; when indulging- enjoy it with no guilt!

So as I take off on my new shiny wagon I will keep you posted. I am sure there will be lots to report! And if you read this whole post thanks for hanging in there, I know it was long and maybe boring.