New Moon and How It Can Be a Positive Phase for Your Fitness!

Image Credits: JCCC Astronomy

The moon revolves around the Earth, which puts it in 4 main phases: New Moon, First Quarter, Full Moon & Last Quarter.

The New Moon is the beginning of the Lunar Phase, and it looks like a slender, crescent in the sky. Spiritually it means for new beginnings and renewal, a chance to start over with a clean slate! When it comes to fitness there are many times you will fall off the bandwagon, but it does not mean you can't start over! As I have been practicing my photography skills lately, taking shots of the moon in distinct phases, I started looking up more information about it and saw how the spiritual meaning can really help my clients organize themselves mentally and spiritually to reach their fitness goals. 

Shot with My Nikon D3400

New Moon Journal Ideas:

You should be writing down your workouts, how much weight you used, your food intake and how you feel in your fitness journal. If you have not, this could be the reason you are not seeing the changes that you want. As a personal trainer, I always make note of clients' workouts, changes in training phases, their triumphs and failures besides also creating their meal plans. This is why you pay so much for personal training because we do all the paperwork (journaling), motivation, implementing and changing the plan that you are not capable of doing on your own. So, make sure if you do not have a personal trainer that you work with, write down everything when it comes to reaching your fitness goals. 

Here Are Some Other New Journaling Ideas to Consider Adding:

• What motivates you? 
• Release unhealthy habits that are hindering your fitness success and try out healthy ones. 
• Write down 3 - 5 reasons why you want to get healthy. 
• Visualize how you want to feel and look inside and out. 
• What is your favorite way to get yourself delighted over working out? 
• What fitness goals would you like to achieve by the next Full Moon? 

2013 Austin, Tx.

Write a goodbye letter to something that is no longer helping you reach your goals and fitness goals. Burn this letter under the New Moon as a way to release anxiety, anger, guilt, shame, fears, stress, and old habits. Make a visualization board for your regular and fitness goals! Seeing your goals in front of you really helps you to stay focused! Try out a new healthy recipe you found online, or a friend shared.

My Beginning 2007

 

Another thing to try is making a list of your greatest fitness accomplishments. This also includes just staying consistent with going to the gym. That is a huge accomplishment because most would rather be home. Make a playlist of your favorite songs for workout and cardio sessions. 

Stay focus, stay consistent and the changes will happen!

Candace

Beaver Full Moon is a Time to Rid of Bad Habits & Negative Thoughts that Effect Your Fitness Goals

Blood Moon Eclipse

During the Beaver Full Moon is a great time to start dump the bad habits and negative thoughts. Take on this Holiday season free of any impediments holding you back from reaching or maintaining your fitness goals. It is time to reach those goals and intentions before the Winter holidays are here. The Beaver Full Moon symbolizes the beaver's ability to be creators of their own lives which is the perfect time for self-reflection, meditation, and celebration for changing your life to the best it can be health wise. 

Blood Moon Partial Eclipse

On the other side, the Blood Full Moon Eclipse in Taurus symbolizes indulging in "the good life", comfort and pleasure is prioritized. Make sure to keep a healthy balance of the "good life". Taking part of too many Holiday celebrations that coincide with drinking alcohol and decadent foods can ruin all that hard work you have spent training and eating clean. Lots of pleasure can be found with maintaining an equilibrium of being healthy, keeping your fitness goals intact and enjoying the Holidays with friends and family.  

Beaver Full Moon 

Beaver Moon Spiritual Meaning and Intentions for Health and Fitness

• Protection
• Protect yourself from negative influences that will ruin all the demanding work you have put into getting healthy and strong.
• Release
• Release all those negative thoughts and bad habits that will steer you away from your fitness goals.
• Cleansing
• Drink lots of water, eat nutrient dense foods, get 7 - 9 hours of sleep, destress with fitness and meditation. Get outside and take a walk, run or bike. Getting in tune with nature has a very cleansing and relaxing effect on the human body. 
• Empathy
• Don't feel negative thoughts towards people who don't understand your fitness journey. Just remove Negative Nancys from your circle and surround yourself with likeminded, positive people. Remember, they lash out at you because they feel they must be responsible for their own fitness. 
• Transformation
• You are the creator of your own life. It is never too late to transform it into a healthy one physically and mentally. 
• Preparation
• Everything takes preparation. So does eating healthy, maintaining a weekly workout schedule and regular life. Our phones have made it very easy to schedule the week/month for work, family life and play. You can also use a pocketbook journal with a calendar. Schedule your workouts and meal preps just like you would schedule any other important appointment. You will have enough time to prepare for anything if you schedule it beforehand. 

Become and maintain the dream version of yourself you have always wanted to be. Make a visual board of your next goals for the end of the year to the beginning. Review your New Year's resolutions from the beginning of this year. Did you reach all or most of them? Get rid of old clothes that do not fit any more. You do not need to hold onto an item of clothing out of guilt. Donate, sell or throw them away. Having these clothes will only give you the opportunity to get comfortable with gaining weight again. 

There is nothing selfish about taking care of your health and well-being!

Candace Foxx

Take It Easy While Coming Back to the Gym After the Quarantine

The year 2020 has not been kind to all of us and if you did not have the luxury of having your own home gym, you probably lost your gains of muscle and gained fat instead. I have seen posts of people talking about that they have gained 25 lbs in 2 months of being quarantined. I have to break the BAD NEWS for all of you, it might take LONGER than 2 months to lose that weight all over again. Unfortunately, it is very easy for our bodies to gain fat, but it takes 10 times as much effort to lose the weight. One of the things you have to remember is you have to make a deficit in your caloric intake plus burn calories in order to burn fat. You also have to burn at least 3500 calories in order to lose one pound of fat. Your intake is 80% of the equation and you have to get back on track while you have access to a gym now. No telling if it will be shut down again in the near future. 

Take it easy when getting back to the weight and cardiovascular training. If you have not lifted since they shut the gyms down, do not expect to lift the same amount of weight you were used to before. You will not be able to push the weight and can easily injure yourself. Why do that and then end up not working out for a longer period of time. Start out with light weight and do enough repetitions were you feel a burn sensation in your muscles. Your gonna get sore all over again like it was the first time training. It will not be a pleasant feeling, but you did it one time before you can do it again. As you get used to the light weight training and you do not feeling a burning sensation while training, then it is time to move up in weight. Moving up slowly will ensure that you do not get injured. Train smart and with your brain, not your EGO!

The same for the weights is the same for the cardiovascular training. Long time ago, I had to take some time off of running because I was not gaining the weight I need for off season. I was used to running 7 miles or more. I took off 9 weeks from running and other types of cardio. When it was time to start with my competition prep, I decided to go for a run and told myself that I would only do 3 miles. Well once I got to 3 miles, I felt like I could go to 5 miles. I ended up running 7 miles, went home took a hot shower and made sure I stretched real good. Well, once I settled in that is when the soreness started to kick in. It went from SORENESS and STIFFNESS to PAIN. I could not stand it after 3 days and had to go get Cryo Therapy. After being flash freezed alive, I came out 70% better than I did walking in. I looked like the Tim Man from Alice in Wonderland! I also had to have several sessions with my massage therapist to help with the stiffness. I learned my lesson and will never do that again!

So if you are getting ready to get back into your old gym routine, just remember to take it easy! You will get back to your old PRs and distance in no time as long as you do it the smart way! 

Beginners: Beware of Fast Paced 30 Minute or Less Workout Programs

Are You Ready 30 Minute or Less; Fast-Paced Workout Programs?

I'm sure there are plenty people out there that FINALLY started their NEW YEAR NEW ME for 2020, barely got themselves used to doing some fitness activity and NOW quarantined at home for an undisclosed amount of time. Now what do you do? There are a lot of advertisements for at home workouts that require time and some equipment and then there are other programs that are fast paced and only take 30 minutes or less to do. Before you jump on the band wagon to these types of quick workouts, ask yourself, are you ready for high impact workouts?

A lot of these exercises do not seem like much, do not use much equipment and being done fast with a workout sounds very appealing, but how long has it been since you were active like the instructors are the program? If it has been more than 6 months since you were training consistently, you need to start from the beginning with regular slow paced workouts with adequate amounts of rest. This might sound boring and asking for too much time, but this will greatly reduce you chances of getting injured which will lead you to stopping your fitness goals for an undetermined amount of time. 

If you lack flexibility, core strength, joint stability and muscular development then you are deconditioned and need to start with a low intensity exercise program. A type of program that starts the focus on core strengthening, joint stability, flexibility and muscular endurance. Starting off with exercises that use a Swiss ball, Bosu ball and one legged exercise are key in strengthening stability and muscle coordination. In addition, the increased difficulty of using unstable exericses helps burn more calories which burns more fat. These types of exercises are done with moderate amounts of weight with high repetitions. Once you have mastered exercising with untable enviroments then you are ready to move on to more strenous type of training

In order to see results, I would recommend engaging in this type of training for at least 4 - 6 weeks. Log your workouts in a journal along with sets, reps and weight amounts. When an exercise becomes too easy is when you move up in weight. On this blog you can find many examples of exercises that include a Swiss ball (stability ball), a Bosu ball and are one legged. You can also find other examples on my Youtube Channel 

Easy Tips To Handle Family Holiday Get-Togethers, Galas or Parties!

7 Easy Tips To Handle The Holiday Events

• Eat clean and low carb throughout the day, so you can enjoy yourself at the party. You can also fast all day to enjoy yourself even more. 

• Do not attend a party or function while you are hungry; you will start attacking all your favorite foods. Make it an incentive to eat your greens first before you attack the sweets. The more you fill up with greens the less room you will have available for the bad stuff. 

o        Include at least 3 dark green vegetable side dishes

§     Has less calories per serving

§     Has vitamins, lowers cholesterol, and blood pressure

§     Tons of Fiber to keep your weight management in check

§     Recipes

§     Broccoli, Shitake and Red Onion Roast

§     Balsamic-Glazed Green Beans And Pearl Onions

§     Brussels Sprouts with Bacon, Garlic, and Shallots

§        Use Turkey Bacon for less calories

o        Healthy sweet potato recipes

§     Sweet potato is loaded with vitamin C vitamin A, potassium, calcium, and iron

§     Used by bodybuilders to help build muscle

§     Recipes

§     Sweet Potato Casserole

§     Marshmallow Whipped Sweet Potatoes

• If you want to try everything that is displayed to eat for Thanksgiving then get small portions of each.
• Getting 1 - 2 oz of each dish will save you unwanted calories you do not want to take in and will save you from looking like a prude during Thanksgiving.

• Take your time while eating
• Your body does not know it is full until 20 minutes. 
• Take your time and converse with you family and friends. I'm sure there is a lot of catching up to do

o        Healthy pie recipes

§     Make sweet pies without all the unwanted extra calories

§     Recipes

§     Pumpkin Pie With Rum

§     Oatmeal-Nut Crunch Apple Pie

§     Pear Custard Pie

• Drink some water between every alcoholic beverage.

o        Drink red wine, low calorie beer, or water splash with a little fresh squeezed juice

§     Cut out sodas, especially diet sodas

§     Red wine and dark beers are loaded with anti-oxidants

§     Drink beer like Miller 64 and other low calories that are under 100 calories

§     Fresh orange juice or homemade organic lemonade has less calories than the high corn syrup prepackage ones.

• Sit down at a table away from the bar and food so you won't be tempted to go get more food.

• Alcohol opens up the appetite. So the more you drink, the more you will eat ruining all the fitness goals you accomplished for the week or maybe a month. This depends on how bad you cheat on your diet. It takes 3500 calories to gain 1 lbs. of FAT! 
• If you want to try everything that is displayed to eat for the event of holiday then get small portions of each.
• Getting 1 - 2 oz of each dish will save you unwanted calories you do not want to take in and will save you from looking like a prude during Thanksgiving.

• Spend time socializing and networking so you don't focus on the food.

• Go for foods you wouldn't normally eat.

o        Eat only 1 - 2 servings of protein and other sides

§     Do not overload your plate

§     One serving or turkey or chicken without skin: 2 oz. = 50 - 70 calories (depending on how it was cooked)

§     Limit your eating to 2nd's and not 3rd's

o        Add whole grain to stuffing

§     Lowers many chronic diseases 

§     Helps weight management 

§     Lowers blood pressure

§     Lowers gum disease and tooth decay

§     Recipes

§     Bulgur Stuffing with Dried Cranberries and Hazelnuts

§     Wild Rice Stuffing With Apple and Sausage

• Look at all the food options before diving right in.

Cumin Spiced Turkey Burgers

Cumin Spiced Turkey Burgers

Ingredients:

1 lb. of 93/7 fat free natural ground turkey

1 rounded tbsp. of cumin
1 tbsp of olive oil

Directions:

Step 1: Add the cumin to the ground turkey and mix. Shape the ground turkey into 4 oz. balls and flatten them into patties.

Step 3: Place a pan on the burner on Medium/High. Next, add some oil with your olive oil spray bottle.

Step 4: Cook for 5 minutes on each side. Try adding some mustard!

Nutrition Facts Cumin Spiced Turkey Patties Serving Size 1/2 cup
Amount Per Serving
Calories 100.63 Calories from Fat  30
% Daily Value
Total Fat 3.33g	5%
Saturated Fat 0.17g	1%
Trans Fat 0.01g
Cholesterol 30mg	10%
Sodium 43.33mg	2%
Total Carbohydrate 0g	0%
Dietary Fiber 0g	0%
Sugars 0g
Protein 18.67g	37%
Vitamin A (IU) 0	0%
Vitamin C 0mg	0%
Calcium 0mg	0%
Iron 0.96mg	5%