Once we actually begin the process of working towards them, we start out really strong. That momentum may last about a week or two, but eventually we hit a wall. Once that wall has been hit our momentum begins to slow down, and once that happens some of us just abandon ship altogether.

In the end we don’t achieve any of the goals that we set. Instead, they just get pushed back further away and becomes all the more daunting for us to work towards.

I’ve been down this road many times before. If I’m being honest it’s a very natural part of the health and wellness journey. You’d be a fool to believe that you were going to get everything right the first go round. This is because our bodies are not the only part of us that is undergoing a change.

Our minds and emotions are as well. This naturally makes your first attempt at reaching for your goals challenging because you don’t know what to expect mentally, physically, and emotionally. Whenever we are faced with something new there are two things that always happen.

In the beginning we embrace the challenge and actually look forward to being an active participant for it. Once we get a little taste of what the challenge has to offer, we get this overwhelming instinct to run for the hills because we trick ourselves into believing that at some point we will fail.

So we enter this fight or flight mode where we’d have save ourselves from failure rather than risk it for the biscuit. I’m telling you not to run, and here’s why. [Read more…]

For a while now exercising consistently has been my greatest source of release. Especially when I’m feeling super stressed and overwhelmed! There’s nothing like releasing all that tension and built up negative energy in a workout that is going to make you sweat. Especially when you sweat, because sweating means that you really are putting in the work.

Now don’t get me wrong. There are many moments when I would much rather not sweat. Like when I’m going on nice walk, I’m sitting outside reading a book, or even when I’m just at home watching a movie. In very simple moments like that I do not like to sweat. In my mind there’s no rhyme or reason.

And yes, I will go to great lengths to prevent myself from sweating as a result of lack of physical activity. However, when I’m sweating because I’m being physically active, I embrace it completely! This is because I know for a fact that I put in a lot of effort to achieve some small goal, and the sweat is validation for me to know that it was 100% worth it.

But this post isn’t about sweat. I know you’re wondering where I’m going with this topic so let’s not stall any longer.

With sweat, especially after a workout, may come some pain. The good kind of pain though, the type of pain I encourage you to embrace. I’m talking about the pain you feel when you know your muscles are tightening because you just crushed your workout.

For so long I never really knew how to get rid of that pain. After a workout I would literally just lay out on the bed and wait for the paid to subside. However, earlier this year I made a commitment to myself to better my health in all aspects. That included the way in which I recovered after a workout. [Read more…]