TRAVEL BLOG

Let's be honest about how reasons affect our overall health, fitness and daily lifestyle. Reasons are often used to avoid a workout or eat healthy meals, agreed? They are really the same as excuses that keep us from getting fit.   We want the fit and healthy body but come up with every reason in the book to avoid doing the work to achieve the goal. Why? What continues to get in the way of the thing we most want?   We almost have a rebellious attitude toward health and fitness . We convince ourselves we can achieve our goals even with unhealthy eating and exercise habits. A negative attitude, excuses, and rebel behavior is definitely not going to achieve a healthy body or mind. We really need to change our mind in order to change our body.  If getting fit were easy, everyone would be doing it. Health and fitness require effort and planning. Why is there such an issue with working for our goals? Everything in life worthy of anything takes work. Health is a gift and fitness is the act

The popularity of getting various body parts pierced has been growing over the past few years, but the concept is as old as humanity itself going back to ancient times. Ever since mankind figured out that it could poke a hole through some physical part of the body, piercings have been seen as a statement of individuality and fashion. People from many different cultures have pierced their bodies for centuries. If you look in a history book, you will find that Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans decorated their bodies with piercings and tattoos. Many pierced their bodies to show their importance in a group, or because they thought it protected them from evil. Today, we know much more about the risks of body piercing. Body piercing is a serious decision. Before you decide to get a piercing, ask your parents, trusted adults, and friends what they think. More information is available at this site: http://youngwomenshealth.org/2013/08/07/body-piercing/ . In recent modern times the art of body pier

I love eating healthy, being active and how I feel as a healthy woman. I adopted a healthy lifestyle years ago and never looked back. Today it's my state of being and natural existence. My passion for health and fitness has become my occupation which is really a goal we should all have in life. When we do what we love, it really doesn't feel like work. It's a sharing and teaching of how I live my life. It feels awesome to be able to provide this gift to so many people. I am realistic about health and fitness. I don't teach perfection but celebrate progress. Fitness is not about a restrictive lifestyle but a healthy balance of eating right 80 to 90 percent of the time and regular exercise. I also don't believe in taking things to extremes where health would feel like a burden for me or anyone else. I encourage a strong and positive mental game and keeping health in perspective . When we enjoy our food intake and physical activity performed, it becomes a healthy hap

A growing trend in pre-natal care is pregnancy massage. Massage therapy during pregnancy is a wonderful complementary choice for prenatal care, according to Massage Envy. It is a healthy way to reduce stress and promote overall wellness. Massage relieves many of the normal discomforts experienced during pregnancy, such as backaches, stiff neck, leg cramps, headaches and edema (or swelling). In addition, massage for pregnant women reduces stress on weight-bearing joints, encourages blood and lymph circulation, helps to relax nervous tension -- which aids in better sleep -- and can help relieve depression or anxiety caused by hormonal changes. More information is available at this site: https://www.massageenvy.com/massage/massage-types/prenatal-massage/ . If you’re visiting or living in the UK, here’s a website that can direct you to a local massage therapist for this type of care:   http://www.bodyworkmassage.co.uk/ . According to Massage Envy, massage therapy during pregnancy is a wo

Fitness gimmicks are a billion dollar industry causing frustration for consumers not seeing the results of their promises. The truth is nothing exists in a bottle or package to create lasting fitness. I am a strong advocate to debunk food and fitness myths and their false guarantees to deliver a perfect body in 10 days or less. I can really get on a soapbox about this subject and sometimes do. Today seems fitting to fling a little soap around and clean up the fitness myth mess created by dishonest marketing in the fitness world. Most of America wants to get fit fast and companies are not dumb in knowing how to market that dream at top dollar. Store shelves and online sites are crammed with millions of miracle fitness makers. As consumers, we are responding to those scams and making supplement companies very rich indeed. You are the target group these billion dollar companies have placed their focus and promising fitness in a bottle of wonder . Next time you open your wallet to buy a g

Age is just a number. Some of us believe it holds a negative stigma as we get older. This is far from the truth and each day should be considered a gift and every age a celebration. Wear it proudly! We are never too old to get fit and it really comes down to feeling our healthy best at every age. Honestly, I don't even think about my age unless someone makes a comment. Being fit and having a positive attitude makes me feel youthful and excited about living. Each day is a new chance to make better choices physically, nutritionally , and mentally. How exciting is that! I like to start each day being thankful for the many blessings in my life. I have been through a tough journey and still standing, extremely happy, and going strong with my fitness. Aging is really a state of mind. I refuse to get all hum-drum about getting older but focus on what I can do to improve my life through the aging process . What it comes down to is not my age but what I'm doing through the ages to mak

Did you know karma can easily apply to fitness? It basically means whatever you do will come back to you. So, if you're doing good things, good things happen in return and vice versa. If you're  sorta kinda committed to your fitness , the results will show. It really comes down to reaping what you sow. I happen to believe in karma fitness. The thing about karma is there are consequences to treating others and yourself badly. It will eventually come back to bite you in the backside. If you're avoiding your health, eating poorly, and living a sedentary lifestyle, your body will give back what it has been given. Being lied to for example sucks and speaks more about the person doing the action, but guess what ... karma. How does this apply to our health? Let's reflect on a few questions: Are you being honest with yourself about your fitness? Are you giving your body a healthy life? Do you make excuses for your behavior? Do you want to eventually suffer the consequences of u

To this day I dislike being called skinny. I have had my share of teasing as a kid and even into adulthood. Body shaming goes both ways in this life. What's important is loving yourself right where you are while working toward your goals . It wasn't until discovering how to build curves with resistance training that my life changed for the better. I was blessed with my Dad's genetics and thankful, but it has been a challenge to put on weight including muscle. I am also constantly hungry and seem to burn up energy faster than the average person. I turn to healthy carbs to fuel my body and feel good throughout the day. I can feel lightheaded if I go too long without eating, especially carbs. My metabolism seems to work faster than I can fuel it and it can be frustrating. Some say they can just look at food and gain 5lbs whereas if I look at food, my body says let's burn it up. I will not workout if I feel hungry and prefer to down a healthy meal before hitting the weights

How do you feel about coffee--that java that makes you jump, that black elixir of silky goodness, the cuppa joe for the morning wakeup call? Well, believe it or not, adding coffee to your daily diet can help with your health. If you already drink it, you’ll be glad to know that in addition to providing a boost to get you going, and the taste that may make you happy, coffee has some remarkable powers to help your body and brain. According to this website, http://coffeeandhealth.org/ , a new study examined the relationships between coffee (total, caffeinated or decaffeinated) and tea consumption and risk of melanoma in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC). EPIC is a multi-centre prospective study that enrolled over 500,000 participants aged 25-70 years from ten European countries in 1992-2000. Consumption of caffeinated coffee was inversely (i.e. favorably) associated with melanoma risk among versus non-consumers, but not among women. There were no st

What we eat plays the largest role in our health and fitness. Working out is a great compliment and necessary to create a balanced program. However, there are more hours outside the gym and in the kitchen making or breaking our fitness goals . Eating right requires a fairly disciplined nutrition program consuming wholesome real food, mostly plants. This is not to say eating the occasional treat is off limits because that isn't realistic. Sticking to healthy eating 80 to 90% of the time is enough to maintain a fit and healthy body. When eating right and exercise becomes a lifestyle, there is no stress or overthinking the process . We operate on auto-pilot doing what feel is natural and normal. We would feel weird eating crappy and suffer the consequences of not feeling good the next day. Nutrient timing or eating superfoods every several hours is typical for those living a healthy lifestyle. There is not much thought in calorie counting or fear of eating too much but a focus on cons