Thoughts, feelings, actions and COOKIES!

This one is going to be kind of “psychology heavy” but I’m going to take some psychological concepts and strategies and apply them to real life food and training examples. The power of psychological concepts is that they can and should be applicable to pretty much everything we do.

The first thing I want to write about is something I hear most days from someone. Not always at work, but of course, given my job, I hear it in that setting. I do, however, read it online all the time! It’s the terrible statement of “I don’t feel like it”... whatever “it” is. Dialectical Behaviour Therapy teaches the concept of 3 states of mind – rational mind, emotion mind and wise mind. Rational mind is how it sounds – logic, reason, planned, science. Emotion mind is the opposite – feelings, reaction, impulsivity, the “right now”. Wise mind is the product of combining the two. Ideally, wise mind is where we want to be most of the time for most decisions. When someone says “I don’t feel like it” they are stuck in emotion mind. I had a young guy tell me this a couple weeks ago when I asked what was getting in the way of him getting to class and he replied with “I don’t feel like getting out of bed” and my response was “I didn’t FEEL like getting out of bed this morning either, but look, here I am, meeting with you”. We discussed the idea of doing what is consistent with your goals, regardless of how you “feel”. My goals are consistent with making weight and lifting as much as possible at nationals, so last night when I “felt” like eating a cookie that didn’t fit into my plan for the day, I did NOT eat the cookie. I was tired on my way to the gym and felt like I wanted to buy a coffee and sit for 3 hours and watch gymnastics and play on my phone, but I didn’t. Instead, I went to the gym. This is different than “I’m sick and need to recover”. I’m talking about “I had a long, unremarkable day at work and don’t feel like training”. I behaved in ways consistent with my goals, not my current feelings.

The other thing that comes up often is this idea that just because you have a thought, it must be true and you must do something with it. This ties closely to the idea of the above idea, but it’s a slight variation. We know in psychology, thoughts and feelings are different and they are both different than actions. If I were to say to someone “last night you were feeling tired and wanted to skip the gym... what were you thinking?” They will often say “I was thinking I’m tired”... no, what were you THINKING... what were the thoughts that went along with that feeling? Instead of pushing my imaginary person here, I’ll use me. When I was feeling tired, I was thinking “wow, a coffee would be nice... wow, sitting on the couch relaxing would be nice... it’s only one training day, right?” So, my thoughts were different than “feeling tired”. If I were someone who acted on my thoughts, what would I have done? I would have bought a coffee and sat on the couch, rationalizing away that it’s “only one” training day. I often use the example with clients “I am a banana!” (Thanks Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) and they look at me stunned and I ask them “did I become a banana?” Well, no, obviously. So, you mean, I can THINK something and it isn’t true? I can think “I’m over weight and weak, so I might as well not bother” and it doesn’t have to be the truth? An extension of this I use is that I can think “I am a banana” and not only did I not become a banana, but I have ZERO obligation to find a banana suit and dress up as my best banana. You can think something and yet, have zero obligation to act on that thought. I use this one often with thoughts of suicide and self harm (although, if you are having thoughts of suicide, please call your local help line, Kids Help Phone, 911, go to the ER or another place you are safe! This is not a replacement for the assistance you need). Last night I thought “mmm, a cookie would be good” and I had a bite and then I thought “mmm, I could totally eat that whole bag of cookies” and I walked out of the kitchen thinking “I’m not going to make weight if I eat a bag of cookies”. I had no obligation to eat that bag of cookies just because I thought about it. You can replace your thought with a more helpful thought, or you can just observe the thought and notice there is no obligation to act on it.

The point is, our thoughts, feelings and actions are connected, but ultimately we get to choose what we do. Neither our thoughts nor our feelings about a situation are an obligation to act in a certain way. Instead of skipping the gym and eating a bag of cookies, I remembered that I have bigger goals than what I want now with my emotion mind. I pulled on my rational mind, went to the gym, had a bite of a cookie and made choices that are consistent with what I choose (but those cookies ARE really good).

Things 5 pin bowling taught me about powerlifting...

This one is kind of funny, and something I've talked about a bit with people but never organized into one place. First, it's quite enjoyable to me when someone in my "lifting world" finds out that until a couple years ago I 5 pin bowled quite seriously. In fact, I was a bowler long before I ever touched a barbell... I was a bowler before I knew what a barbell was.

1) Bowling taught me it's neither the small details nor the big picture. They both matter! In bowling, you have 10 frames a game. Often, you have many games. No single ball or frame will make or break the day, but if you don't take into account that every ball matters, you can end up taking each opportunity for granted. Each day in the gym matters, gotta go put the work in, but no one day will make or break a training cycle. It's about how you put all those days together just like how you put all those balls and frames together into the big picture that matters. You can't focus on one without acknowledging the other though.

2) Bowling also taught me how to save adrenaline for when it matters. I know this sounds absolutely ridiculous, but trust me when I say there can be a lot of adrenaline just like in any sport. Adrenaline wears you out. You need to learn how to save the adrenaline for when it matters so you don't get totally worn out. If you need a bunch of adrenaline every time to show up to throw your 4 games in league, you'll never survive a 20 game day without crashing, so you learn to practice without adrenaline. Same goes for lifting. Save the adrenaline for a meet, or at the very least, PRs in the gym. You should not be hitting PRs every day you train unless you are brand spanking new. If you need adrenaline surges and to be hyped up just to hit your every day squats, what happens in a meet? How much more hyped do you need? You should be able to hit that opener without a big burst of adrenaline... or you might want to reconsider your opener.

3) Bowling taught me to save my energy and effort for game time and turn it off in between so I didn't get burned out. Imagine long days, several games a day, 10 frames a game and however many balls you might throw (hopefully it's fewer rather than more). If you didn't learn how to turn it off in between, you'd crash and burn in a couple games. This relates to the adrenaline stuff. You can't stay "up" all the time. It's too exhausting! So, you need to learn how to come off the approach, finish that frame in your head, get some mental space until it's time to step up again. Develop a habit or pattern of behaviour that helps you to do this. For me, I'd slap hands, give my next teammate some encouraging words, and then I step to the very back of the group - the physical space allowed my brain to get mental space. When the player before me was up, I would make my way to the approach from the back of the group. This was closing that space, physically and psychologically. I would then start giving myself mental cues and listening to my coach's voice. Often I would nod in agreement. Often I would smile or laugh as well (the tension relief is powerful). In powerlifting this is the same. I'm sure that sometimes my laughing and joking in the staging area can feel like I'm not taking things seriously, but instead, I'm actually distancing myself mentally so as to not exhaust myself too early. Most of the time, after an attempt, I'll come off, agree on a next attempt or tell my coach to make the call and then crack a joke or talk about something else. I'm giving myself psychological distance. I can tell you, when I haven't done this, I've had a harder time, just like in bowling. If you can't give yourself the psychological break in between frames or attempts, you will crash early.

4) Now this one is important. My old bowling coach would understand if I said "ABIC" - that stands for Any Bowler in Canada. What that means is that on any day anything could happen and I could beat any bowler in Canada... but that also means that any bowler in Canada could beat me. This is a message in humility but also respecting other athletes and the sport. I could go in to any event, being considered the "favourite" to win, and still have my ass handed to me. I could go into any event, being a total underdog and win as well. I can think of instances where both of these happened and I've tried to bring this to powerlifting. It was a bit different for a long time because in powerlifting, in many instances, I'm not exactly considered a favourite to win, but of course, like anything, it depends who is there. But, the message stays the same - if I go into a meet and assume that I am going to win because "I'm stronger, better, etc" I might find out very quickly that the universe has plans in humility for me. It does not frankly matter what my bests are vs my competitors... I still have to respect the fact that I need to go out there and do the work and not take it for granted. I am a firm believer when you stop believing and respecting that there is always someone better than you, you will get your butt kicked!

5) Bowling taught me the value of competition and hard work. Dedication to a game or sport is a wonderful thing. The time you spend putting in the work that doesn't always pay off as planned, but fuels your fire anyway. I can think of a tournament where I went in after months of corner pin drills and I won, likely because I spared more corners than the girl who came in second. It ended up being a tournament of corner pin spares and my hard work paid off. I can also think of times where I practiced months on end, and showed up that day and couldn't hit the broad side of a barn! It was like I was throwing bricks. Powerlifting is the same - training can go very well and you face the reality on game day that you might have a flawless meet... or you might be throwing bricks LOL But either way, regardless of how it's going, be a competitor in spirit. Do your best in that moment and compete with integrity. If I go back to bowling, I have said I will have the phrase "play with integrity" stitched on my towel because it is that important. You may win, you may lose, but always compete!

Letting go of expectation of result

Something I learned from a bowling coach (yes, until about 2 years ago I competitively 5 pin bowled), was the idea of letting go of expectation of results. Let me explain... I'm on the approach, I have control over what I do, sometimes I even threw a really great ball, hit the pocket flawlessly, and sometimes that corner pin would still stand. Now, this might even happen a few frames in a row, and then I'd start to get frustrated, so I'd likely get a little tense. In bowling that can mean not finishing the shot and even more corner pins standing, or worse, lots of head pins. Then, one day I had one of my mentors tell me to let go of any expectation from the pins. I can do what I can do and only that. Sometimes the pins are not going to fall the way I think they "should". But, I can't control them. I can only control me. So, let go...

That doesn't mean let go of a desire to do well. Or let go of doing your best with the things you can control. It means simply, let go of this idea that something "should" happen just because you did what you could. We can apply this to many things. Weight loss - you can control your calories in and calories out, you can eat "healthy" choices, you can clock a perfect mathematical weight loss plan... and you still might not lose the kind of weight you "should".

How about as it relates to lifting? Put the time in the gym, do all the work, have your nutrition in line, the peak phase is perfectly executed. Meet day still might not go according to plan. Your opener might need to be dropped. You might have a problem with touching in your shirt. Maybe that deadlift that "should" have been easy didn't budge.

Apply this to basically anything you can think of!! I've picked just a few, but it works with almost any scenario. Relationships? Do what you can, invest the way you believe, do everything in your power... but ultimately you cannot control the other person and s/he may not act the way you believe s/he "should". In trauma work, I can implement the model I use exactly how it's written. I can make it safe and fun and create an environment where healing "should" happen... and it still might not. I have a quote on my computer. It's been in my life since 2003 and on my various computers since 2008 - "Today I will do what I can... And I will give the rest up to the Universe". I can only control what I can... I only have so much power and so much influence. Ultimately, I cannot always control outcomes.

I love this quote because it simplifies this idea. I need to know what I can control and what I should let go of to be healthy and happy. Trying to hang on to what those pins do 60ft away is only going to be frustrating...

The insidiousness of stress... and why I haven't blogged

This blog isn't going to be filled with lots of photos (maybe just a few). Frankly, I just don't have time for that right now. What it is going to be about is stress and how it can have such a devastating effect on us. I thought I was invinsible to stress. I figured that if I could get through what I got through years ago, I was basically a stress-busting machine and nothing could get me. I WAS WRONG!

It started in May. I bought a new house; couldn't sell my old house. Then in July I moved, but 3 days after I moved, I competed in North Americans. So, while I was preparing for a major meet, I was packing and doing all the things required when you buy a house. It wasn't easy. Then that ended, but it was the summer and my kids go a million directions all summer and I end up traveling more than I end up staying home. Plus, I keep working full time, and usually put my hours in over fewer days so I can open up lots of days for travel. And I kept training. I also don't drink much and am not a big partier. But, 3 of the last 4 weekends of the summer I did both. While that was psychologically fun, it was still very stressful physically. Add on that my kids started back into school, my youngest started competitive gymnastics (which I started paying for) and we had to find horse back riding lessons; my eldest got a job, but doesn't have a license so I'm the transportation and she started high school, which made for an intense couple weeks. OH YA!! I was still training. Not just training, but also running my brother's highest volume raw block. And then, we opened a new hospital and I had to move work locations to a place that I wasn't necessarily thrilled about. The body cannot tell the difference between physical and psychological stressors. They all pile on.

Cue: health problems. Rapid, excessive weight gain. Edema in my legs that wouldn't subside. Severe mood swings with little provocation. Shortness of breath. Well, that got me a nice little amount of medical testing (the edema and shortness of breath is what really did it I think). Nothing was wrong with me!! My own GP did note my cortisol was on the "upper end of optimal". Started working with a naturopath. The best conclusion we have is that I just let the little things pile on without ever really dealing with them. This is why I say stress is insidious. It slowly accumulates and we almost don't see it happening. Until it levels us.

I started doing something I never thought I would do - I started intentionally relaxing. Call it meditation or relaxation or whatever you want. The important part was that I started taking intentional time to focus on breathing slower and deeper. I know some stuff about the brain and metronomes, so I actually started doing this every morning to an 80bpm metronome (I've since slowed it to 75 because 80 got to be too fast!).

My life is still stressful. I'm a single mom of 2 girls, both busy. I train and compete and love it. I work full time and do a lot of what I'm passionate about (child trauma work). I travel loads back to Alberta. It just means more and more that to maintain this kind of busy lifestyle I need to be diligent with my own stress management. My weight has started coming down. The edema is pretty much gone. The mood swings are basically nil and I haven't noticed extreme shortness of breath recently. I haven't done my metronome breathing in 4 days though, so I think it's time to use this blog as my reminder that slacking on relaxation is only going to bite me in the... ;)

Happiness as a verb

When most people talk about happiness, they talk about it as a state of being. Being happy is a thing to be. It's "something"... in a basic sense it's happiness as a noun.

People have all sorts of "wisdom" about how to become happy. Here's a few ideas below that I found with a quick search.

See what I mean... so tell me, HOW do you DO these things? What's the real action in doing this? Do you just have to think it? So is happiness just thinking magic happy thoughts?

Once upon a time I was this woman, with 2 great kids, a career that was moving forward doing pieces of what I love, participating in a sport I love in the gym that is the epitome of excellent, having just moved back to the city where my family is. I remember being so sad and being in bed thinking "when do I get to be happy? I do all this good work in the world and I'm kind and decent mom... why don't I get to be happy?" AND THEN SLOWLY IT DAWNED ON ME... When am I NOT happy? Well, I'm happy with my kids (I mean, they're kids, it's not all fairy tales and rainbows, but I was generally happy with them). I'm happy at my job (I make decent money and get to work with abused kids, which is my passion). I'm happy in the gym (it's hard work, but I love it). I'm glad I moved back to this city (although sad about it for other reasons). I guess I WAS happy... I mean, sure, there were times when I didn't experience happy, but overall, it was true - I was happy :)

THIS ^^^^ DO MORE OF WHAT MAKES YOU HAPPY!! If you are not happy, find things that make you happy and do them more often. Happiness is not a magical state of being that just descends upon you one day... happiness is a VERB.. it's a WAY OF BEING... it's action! So, if you just read a bunch of happiness quotes that are abstract and you don't really know how to make it happen, don't worry. Just identify one thing you can do that makes you happy... do that as many times a week as you can. Then find more things that make you happy and start doing those. If you don't know what makes you happy, start your journey to find out. Now, go into the world and DO HAPPY!!

Comparison doesn't have to be the thief of joy

I said this recently and I'll keep saying it.

We've all heard it... this is a fairly famous quote. But, what if instead of thinking of comparison as the thief of joy, and hence, trying to stop comparison, we just changed our thinking.

"Social comparison theory states that in the absence of objective measures for self-evaluation, we compare ourselves to others to find out how we're doing. Going back to our example above, the measure for how good your concerto is depends on comparison to other concertos. Does it hold up to Mozart's concertos? Is it better than most other modern concertos? There are essentially two types of comparisons that people make: upward comparisons, or comparing ourselves to others who are better than we are, and downward comparisons, or comparing ourselves to those who are not as proficient as we are at a given task." http://study.com/academy/lesson/self-comparison-theory-upward-vs-downward-social-comparison.html

What if I told you that you could use comparison to feel better about your situation? Well, that's exactly what social comparison theory says. We could make upward comparisons and say "I suck" compared to that person. We could make downward comparisons and say "that person sucks", but what if we spun it to be positive? What if, instead of "I suck" you said "I'm not as good at X as that person, but look where I could strive to be!" AHHH!!! And, what if, instead of "that person sucks" you said "Wow, I should be thankful for what I have (skills, talents, possessions, job, etc)" Again, AHHH!! In both situations we aren't allowing social comparison theory to place negative value on our comparisons... we are noticing them and using them, either to strive for better OR to be grateful.

I don't look at the beautiful Marte Elverum (above) and say "wow, I suck, I'll never be that strong, that outgoing, that pretty"... I look at her and say "wow! I can get stronger... look what a beautiful woman can do... maybe I can be better too". Conversely, I don't look down on other lifters who aren't as strong as me and say "oh, I'm so good compared to you", I am grateful for all the hours I spent in the gym and all the coaching I've received and the nutrition help I get. At the end of the day, don't allow comparison to be the thief of joy! Use it to drive you to happiness, gratitude and the knowledge you can achieve more than you probably believed.

Strong never should've been the new skinny

This stuff has been written about a few times by a few people. But, again, I am way behind the 8 ball with this whole blogging thing, so just bare with me while I catch up to everyone else ;)

I HATE THIS!! I understand when women use this phrase as some kind of empowerment message. We want to be strong and healthy. Sure! But, this message is not that if you really look at it. This message is the message that if you're "skinny" you are flawed. Look, all I had to do was search "skinny" on Google Images and look what I found very quickly.

FAIL? Really? She fails at something because she has this gap in her legs (yes, I know it's a thigh gap, which vacillates between being coveted and hated). Give me a break that this somehow means she should have a big circle on her with the word FAIL there. Ya right... because today the person that made this decided that by his/her beauty standards this wasn't desireable. What a load of crap!

What if we decided that no one FAILED because of a body shape or structure? Strong isn't the new skinny... this is just one more way that we have given society the right to tell us how we are supposed to look. Now, by today's standards I'm supposed to look "strong" (how does strong look anyway?) and not skinny. Except sometimes I'm supposed to look skinny. And now the big ass is considered "in" but what about all those women that tried for so many years to have a small ass... and what about those women that don't naturally have a round ass. Believe it or not, we aren't all "failures" because of this. Guess what guys... I SQUAT and I DEADLIFT, and I don't have a big ol' round booty that you can rest a coffee cup on...

Which of these women looks "strong"? Do they all look "strong"? How about WE STOP PRESSURING WOMEN TO MEET SOME B.S. STANDARD OF BEAUTY! And how about the women that meet certain cultural standards stop ragging on women that don't? If I see one more comment or meme that indicates in some way that "real women look like..." or "real men prefer...." I might actually scream!! Guess what women? We do it to ourselves... we are the ones that are perpetuating these standards. I'm not saying don't try and meet cultural standards of beauty IF YOU WANT, but stop ragging on women that don't for whatever reason. I wear make up, I get my hair coloured, I am relatively fit and care how I look as far as social standards go... but what I won't do for one more second is suggest to any person that because she or he doesn't meet the flavour of the week, s/he has failed or is somehow less.

The ultimate choice

Today I saw someone pose the question "what have you done to make a difference in your life?" (or something to that effect). Many people are talking about making a choice to exercise, making a choice to eat differently, some get a little more insightful and say they decided to love themselves, accept themselves, etc. All good answers, but this is my blog, so this is about my answer :)

Without going into detail about some of my struggles and the challenges I faced in my life, I will say, by the time I was 22 I was escaping one marriage, with a 1 year old, in the middle of my graduate degree, overweight and overwhelmed. In the next couple years I would start to change my mindset on a few things. For now, I'm going to connect it to my weight and then I'll expand. I'd been overweight my whole life. By the time I was in my early 20s I had reserved myself to just being this way. It was not my choice. It was just who I was. I was never going to be different. And then I got connected with a weight loss program that taught me it was my choice... and I started to find success. While I am not connected to this program any more, the things I gained during the years I was involved was invaluable as it was a catalyst in my life.

What did this teach me? It taught me that while there are going to be times in our lives when we will truly be a victim (for example, my marriage), ultimately I can make a choice to remain a victim or I can make a choice to stop accepting my lot in life and do something different. I use the statement often that I stopped letting the universe act on me and I started acting on the universe. I stopped simply accepting that I was always going to be overweight, abused, or whatever it might be. I started looking at what I could do to make things different. I might not always be able to stop the legitimate victimization that happens, but I can stop allowing perpetrators to control me. Despite facing some struggles during my divorce, I did NOT stop fighting for the things that really mattered, because I learned I could ACT ON this and not just accept it. Despite facing some struggles getting through graduate school, I did NOT stop working towards my degree and in the end, I got it because I focused on doing what I could do every day to get it done. Things suck sometimes... that's the way it is, but when you stop rolling over and letting yourself get stepped on, you can take the kicks, get back up and start acting on the universe. What do you have to lose? Nothing is going to change unless you decide to change it.

It's my blog, and I'll whine if I want to...

It's not so much a whine as it is a vent or expression of frustration. WOMEN!! Every single one of you (so, like the 3 of you reading this, who aren't the issue anyway haha!) needs to step back and take a look at the times in our lives we have hurt other women. I can see the times I have done it and I have owned it and done my best to not go back to those behaviours. We live in a society where it's not only okay, but acceptable and sometimes encouraged to be cutthroat and vicious to other women.

I want you all to think about why this is okay? Why is it okay to say rude things and criticize another woman's body? Why do people laugh when we make fun of another woman's clothing? Since when is it absolutely acceptable and even sometimes coveted to be the "other woman"? We live in a world where we are raised to think we need to FIGHT and SCRAP to "win" - men, status, beauty... Maybe, if I roll my eyes and talk about what a "bleep bleep bleep" that girl is, my boyfriend won't like her and he'll view me as better. Maybe if I comment on how trashy she looks, people will notice how much higher status I am socially that I don't dress like that. If I hit on him and he comes home with me, he wants me more than his wife/girlfriend and then I "win". STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT!

One of the reasons I love powerlifting so much is that I see less of this. I used to be involved in other sport, where this was rampant. I can still look back and remember some of the terrible things my friends and I said and it makes me sad that I resorted to the same crap. Now, I admit, powerlifting isn't free of this... I still see it and I hear it and it emerges, but it has always shocked and impressed me that there is so much less of it than in other places. I'm not saying you need to like everyone. I'm the first person to tell you I'm not going to like everyone and everyone isn't going to like me... but, what we should do, is respect each other. What you're wearing doesn't impact me... wear it! What you do for exercise doesn't impact me... do it! What plastic surgery you want to have done doesn't impact me... pay for it! And I don't win anything in life because I hit on your husband/boyfriend... if he goes home with me, I probably shouldn't want him anyway, because clearly neither of us is respectful.

Wouldn't it be nice if we remembered the reasons we fought for each other, not against each other? I see the next meme all over the place and I really love it... my powerlifting friends share it all the time (of course). I'd like to see it happen... I'd like my daughters to grow up in a world where THIS is the case...

Mirror, mirror, what do you see?

This post comes with a big disclaimer: This blog is not meant to be a substitute for direct therapeutic intervention. It is meant for educational and entertainment purposes only. It is primarily my thoughts and opinions and should not be used in place of individual or group therapy services. If you believe you may have a serious condition that requires intervention, please contact your doctor or local Mental Health services.

When you look in the mirror, what do you see? This post is one that I have resisted writing, in part, because I find the topic a bit overdone, but also because it's a highly personal topic for me. A wonderful woman, April, who has become someone I consider a dear friend, asked me to write about it, and I can't say no to her ;) How is my take on this going to be different? Well, I'm not going to tell you simply that you should go lift weights and transform instantly into a powerful, strong, self assured woman! That's what most people do, right? I've read all those blogs... and those, combined with my lifting and my education have not been successful for my magical transformation and surge of all good feelings of self worth.

Most of us are going to struggle with this from time to time. We can call it self worth, self confidence, body image... it all comes down to the same thing. At the end of the day, it's about how we view ourselves and in turn, how we speak to ourselves about that. We've all heard the term "fake it till you make it" and it's actually true! If you tell yourself over and over that you are strong and beautiful, your brain will start to believe it... but, if you tell yourself over and over that you are fat, ugly and unworthy, well, your brain will believe that too. We live in a society where most of us can never live up to the images we are bombarded with. This used to be a "female problem" but more and more it is becoming non-specific... guys have these ridiculous standards now too. I'm not going to tell you to "get over it". One more post like that and I think I might scream. What about those of us that don't just "get over it"? Now, one more time I get to feel like I don't live up... not only do I not live up to the physical standards of society, but now I get to feel bad that I feel bad that I don't!! I'm going to ask a few questions that I hope you will think about though... 1. What do you think might happen if you stopped criticizing yourself all the time? 2. What is the worst or most threatening part of liking yourself where you are at? 3. How do you think your life would change if you liked your body? 4. What needs to happen for you to decide that you want to like your body? 5. How will you know it's time to change the way you see yourself and the way you talk to yourself? There's more I could write, but I think these get the point across. That's how this blog is different... I'm not going to tell you that you SHOULD like your body... who am I to tell you what to think, do, like or act? Heck, I'm sure as heck not going to climb up on my soapbox and shout from the rooftops how you should all love yourselves when I wake up many mornings and pick myself apart and do all the things I wish we didn't do to ourselves.

As I said above, this isn't therapy... but, if you think you might like to start making some changes in how you talk to yourself, how you view your body and challenge the negative self image, here's some ideas. I'm giving you slightly non-conventional ones here, but basic CBT thought replacing works too, but lots of people know that already... 1. No full length mirror month - this can help for body image stuff, but if you are picking apart your face and hair too, it won't work the same. I know this works, because when I broke my full length mirror, I found after a month or 2, I had stopped obsessing over my cellulite... I stopped using the dry brush, pin pricky thing, creams and I stopped crying most days and telling myself how hideous I was. Out of sight, out of mind. 2. Sticky note positive affirmations - this is stolen from a million other people but mostly from a therapist I worked with (I was the client) and she had me buy bright neon sticky notes and write positive self statements on them and stick them all over my house. Here's the kicker - phrased positively and present tense. Write "I am fit and healthy" not "I will be fit and healthy"... fake it till you make it, right? 3. Trace your body - this one can be powerful and can invoke a lot of feelings. The task goes - you take a long sheet of paper (big enough you can have someone trace you) and you draw what you THINK your body is... then you lay down and someone traces what you really are. I like to up the ante on this one by having the person write all those negative phrases, words and thoughts down on this paper... every nasty thing someone said to you or you said to yourself... the thoughts that haunt you and make you feel terrible... sit with that paper... see it and really feel the way those words hurt and sting... now, when you are ready, shred it or burn it... and with that tearing or burning, I want you to speak out loud all the things you are giving up with that - give those thoughts and the hurt, sad feelings to the Universe.

Be well in the world... and please, if you need more support, find someone locally you can speak with. Sometimes these struggles are a symptom of a more serious condition and you deserve to seek support for that. Don't be afraid... things can be better.

Change is a choice

I debated calling this "it's all a choice" but I feared people would misinterpret that as meaning I think people "choose" to be victimized, taken advantage of it, etc. And really, it is centered on change, although can apply to many things. So what do I mean change is a choice? Of course, change is a choice! The problem with most people is that they unknowingly stick themselves in the role of victims. Change is hard.. it's uncomfortable and it's unsettling.. How many people have you personally heard say things like "I meant to but..." or "I was going to but..."? I'm going to relate this to eating and training for a bit to make it more tangible. Woman A wants to lose 20lbs. She gets on board with a solid eating and training plan. She gets her macros and knows where to start. Let's say she's been seriously undereating for a long time and needs to build back up a bit so she has somewhere to cut from. Eating 200g of carbs a day scares her - she fears she's going to put on a bunch of weight and she doesn't trust that this will work. What she's been doing isn't working either, though, so she knows in her head she needs this change and she needs to try something different. She has 2 choices - eat the macros, eat the carbs, regardless of the thoughts and fear that circle her brain every night... or don't. I hear so many people say "help me... every night I get to 125g of carbs and I'm so afraid to eat more that I don't... what can I do?" YOU CAN MAKE A DIFFERENT CHOICE!! There's no magic to this. Every one of us has to face the anxiety of change. There's no way around it. Anxiety is the most self-reinforcing condition there is - every time you avoid something that causes anxiety your brain says "oh, that feels good, let's do more of that avoiding thing". Every time Woman A avoids eating more carbs and her anxiety retreats her brains says "see how good it feels to avoid that?" So, how do you get this anxiety to go away without avoiding the thing that invokes it? You withstand it... Woman A eats the extra carbs. Maybe she can't commit to eating 200g on day 1, but she can withstand the anxiety that emerges when she eats 145g on day 1 and she can do that days 1-3. Then she can withstand the anxiety that comes when she eats 165g a day and she does that for a few more days... and so on. This is what I mean when I say it's a choice. IT'S A CHOICE TO WITHSTAND THE ANXIETY THAT ACCOMPANIES CHANGE! There are lots of things you can do to help yourself cope with the anxiety - the one I highlighted was using an exposure ladder (small increments towards the ultimate goal), to make the anxiety "smaller" and able to tolerate better. Google any kind of mindfulness activities and find what you like. You can teach yourself to positively self talk. When I have anxiety over something I am working on I will tell myself "hey anxiety brain, I see you there. I know this is uncomfortable, but you're not going to kill me, so you're no big deal". Sounds corny, but try it perhaps... warning, these strategies are things you need to keep trying because it won't work flawlessly from the starting horn. It takes time and mastery. At the end of the day, we all have a choice in our actions. Is what you are doing consistent with the person you are choosing to be? If not, then pick one thing you can do today to get yourself on the road to that person. No matter how uncomfortable it makes you, no matter how much your brain tries to trick you... change is hard, withstanding the anxiety and distress is hard... it's also a choice.

Inspired by my brother and a million people posting PRs on FB

Quite awhile back my brother (#stinnsystem4life) posted about not giving up when the PRs slow down, or even, God-forbid, STOP. He used the metaphor of climbing a hill and how it gets slippery and you really gotta dig in to reach the top... but that many people decide it's too hard and stop. It was a great post and he's a smart guy. Shortly after that I wrote something brief, referencing him, for the people involved in this Eat to Perform group about not getting discouraged with the PRs don't come so easily. When you first start eating and fueling your body properly, you will find the PRs come flowing... if you even have moderately decent programming and form and you're relatively new, this can be huge and you can make giant gains. Even I, despite being 7 years into lifting when I shifted my eating, have found the competition PRs to be steady (although let me state, it's hard to isolate one thing that has helped as right around the same time I started eating better my brother brought out the Stinn System.. while he'd always programmed for me, this programming was a long time in the making and included some cool blending of ideologies)... and I'm superstitious, so let me "knock wood" after making that statement above. Okay, back to the topic at hand. Some day, no matter how good your training and fueling is, the PRs will stop. The competition PRs will stop and the gym PRs will stop. You will face going into the gym and not hitting those same big numbers any more. This is when you need to dig in. Or, I guess you could quit, but I don't think you should. I don't even think you should jump ship and find a new program unless you've now stagnated for a long time. What you need to do is get your head into it. You need to go in and do the work, day in and day out. You need to recover well, eat well and keep training. You likely don't need to deload... in fact, a huge pet peeve of mine is when relatively new lifters say "I've been running 531 for 3 weeks and I PR'd all my other lifts, but didn't PR my overhead press, should I deload?" PROBABLY NOT! You probably just didn't PR your overhead press... Most people don't ever work hard enough or long enough without enough recovery and food to truly overtrain. Sure, it happens, but the average person won't get there. And when you do start to find yourself "over-reaching" (happens before overtraining), you'll know and then you should ease up for a few days before you're off and running. Ultimately, I'm not talking about these exceptions... I'm talking about when you are going to the gym and it stops feeling easy and constantly reinforcing. Just under a year ago I was consistently squatting 127.5-130kg in the gym in a belt... pretty regularly... now, look, I wasn't squatting 127.5 then 130 then 132.5 week to week. I was consistently squatting my top single for that day in that range. Guess what, 2 weeks ago I squatted 125kg for a single (brother told me to do a second, but I felt like I was in a bad position). I didn't quit... I didn't get pissed... I did my drop sets and came back the next day and the next and the next. Because I have a hill, just like everyone else, and just like my brother, I intend to climb it and check out the view.

Sugar "addiction"?

I wanted to write this with research, but today a post on the a FB page prompted these ideas... I'm not editing at this point for errors and I am not backing it up with research right now although I may go back and edit after We can all be addicted to pretty much anything... but at a physiological level we are all "dependent" on sugar (most people link the physiological dependence of a substance on the word addiction) because our bodies need it to function... in fact, our bodies need it so much if you take carbs out it goes through a process to convert protein and fat to useable energy. At a biological level we are all dependent. Does that mean you are addicted to sugar or do you just really like it? Are you addicted or do you just seek energy? This is a close second for me when people tell me these small things in their lives are "traumatic"... no, you are bummed, or it was upsetting... it is not traumatic. Do you know what a true addiction looks like? Would you sell your body for a sugar cube? Would you not pay rent so you could eat some ice cream? I don't care much what processes it hits in the brain.. I get it well, that the sugar+fat combination hits the very same receptors and pathways as drugs. Did you also know you can just really like cocaine and not be addicted? Or marijuana? Or gambling? You can set off all the wonderful pathways in your brain for reinforcement and adrenaline, but not be addicted. I think saying "I'm addicted to sugar, help me" is often akin to people saying "our church basement flooded... it's so traumatic"... it undermines the seriousness of a true addiction and it puts you in the role of the victim... because people can be truly powerless to addiction and if you are powerless to sugar, then it's not really your fault, right?

The motivation post I've basically written 100 times

mo·ti·va·tion ˌmōdəˈvāSH(ə)n/ noun the reason or reasons one has for acting or behaving in a particular way. "escape can be a strong motivation for travel" synonyms: motive, motivating force, incentive, stimulus, stimulation, inspiration, inducement, incitement, spur, reason; informalcarrot "his motivation was financial" the general desire or willingness of someone to do something. "keep staff up to date and maintain interest and motivation" synonyms: enthusiasm, drive, ambition, initiative, determination, enterprise; informalget-up-and-go "keep up the staff's motivation" Sounds pretty easy doesn't it? I mean, dictionaries make everything sound complicated, but really, motivation is just simply my reason for doing things. What if I said, in my experience, motivation is just a made up, abstract concept that really doesn't drive us to action? You might disagree or you might start to ponder this thought. Dr. David Burns writes about how ACTION actually precedes motivation. Burns writes: “If you said motivation, you made an excellent, logical choice. Unfortunately, you’re wrong. Motivation does not come first, action does! You have to prime the pump. then you will begin to get motivated, and the fluids will flow spontaneously.” I ask people often "so what do you do when motivation fails?" And they never have an answer because what they DO is usually quit. Now, Burns refers to this in regard to treating mood disorders but it can be applied to pretty much everything. In fact, I apply it on a pretty regular basis when I am posting on Facebook in fitness groups. I think I have averaged writing it out once a week for the last several months on facebook pages when someone says "help! I lost my motivation". Of course you did... because it's not real and you can't actually hang onto it. When I reply to these people or when I'm talking to my clients, I don't ask "what can you think of to help you?" I always say "what can you DO to take one step in the direction you desire?" It doesn't really matter what their "motivation" is to change their lives.. It matters what they can DO to change their lives. And then it's about what is that person prepared to do (but that might be another post). In the end, what is most important is stop sitting around waiting for the Motivation Fairy to sprinkle some dust on you to lift you magically off your couch... even if she stops in for a moment, it won't be long before you are back on your couch. ACTION creates MOMENTUM... MOMENTUM creates what feels like MOTIVATION. Do one thing today... don't think about it, don't plan to start Monday when you "feel" like it... do one thing today that puts you on your path that you want... whether it's related to eating, lifting, or anxiety. And then every time you make a choice, don't think about what you want... just make a choice to do that over and over! But choice is also another blog....

Why I'm blogging

Well, I have often been known to say I started powerlifting before this blogging thing caught on, so I missed my moment. Best I ever had before this was a training blog but I rarely kept up with it and it was really just to have all my "stuff" in one spot. Frankly though, the gym is more important than blogging what I did (it's all written old fashioned style in a series of notebooks piled up at the gym). I got connected with a fitness and nutrition group almost a year ago and in chatting with those folks and seeing the growth in their community, I started doing more rambling. In that, I often said "I don't blog, so you guys get this thought here..." And that happened a few times. Knowing I had this old account I could just find and log in to (thanks Google for making it so easy... I happily oblige in helping you take over the world), I decided maybe I would blog. Maybe no one will read it and maybe no one will care, but why shouldn't I at least write my thoughts down and then I have them shared. Heck, I wrote an article on strength sports and the value of visualization (as well as a brief guide on how to do it) and I spend countless hours tracking it down all the time when people ask about it... I'm not that organized in case that wasn't obvious. So, here's my blog... it's going to be various things but mostly it's going to be my thoughts and ideas that come based on the fact that I cannot disconnect my psychologist brain from the other aspects of my life. I've been a psychologist too long and I am annoyingly reflective and introspective (just ask my partner about the annoyingly part). I'm also passionate about powerlifting and so many aspects of our society and culture. I'll try not to get too personal and mushy too... blech!!