Beachbody Coach

Hey guys! Its been a hot minute since I have posted. Life has been pretty crazy lately; mainly in the job facet of my lifeIMG_4002(but that’s for another post 🙂 .

As you most likely know, a few months ago I became a Beachbody coach. Some of you are already insanely annoyed by the increase in workout and motivational Facebook posts(sorry, not sorry). And, hopefully, some of you find it fun, inspiring, and enjoy reading it(thanks!). Either way, I am having a blast doing it.

Why Did I become a coach?

I may not have always been as fit as I am now, but I always “tried” or thought I was trying to get in shape and be healthy. While on my journey to health, I often encouraged my coworkers, family, and friends to do it with me. After all, achieving something is always more fun with someone else by your side. For years, I have unofficially been “coaching” the ones in my life towards better and health and fitness.

When the opportunity arose to be a Beachbody coach, like most people, I was very hesitant about it. I actually said no to even doing the work out programs and shakeology for AT LEAST a year. I didn’t want some girl “motivating” me to get my butt in gear when I thought that was what I was already doing. Well, it’s been one of the best decisions of my life and that “some girl” has become one of my great friends. I can’t believe it took me so long to commit.

What even is beachbody?IMG_4224

Beachbody is an umbrella name of a company that is comprises of health and wellness tools to lead a healthier life. It has well known work outs such as P90x, insanity, etc. Another large part of beachbody is meal replacement shakes (Shakeology).

What is Shakeology?

These are all natural, plant-based shakes contain phytonutrients that work to fuel the body after exercise. It also containIMG_4387s probiotics that helps regulate digestion, and essential amino acids to help repair muscle after exercise. There are several flavors and the options to create new recipes are endless. I am never bored and I now crave my shake every single day. I have been getting pretty creative with my shakes too…with my newest creation chocolate oatmeal cookie…YUM. The part about it is, it tastes like I am cheating but I am totally not! WIN-WIN-WIN!!

Why does beachbody programs have such a high success rate?

ACCOUNTABILITY!!! As a coach, I run accountability groups every month, all month long. Every-single-day I post in my groups about challenges, motivation, inspiration. My challengers ask questions, share recipes, share struggles, and they encourage each other. In this type of environment people thrive off seeing other people taking the proper steps towards health and fitness. I am having an absolute blast running these groups and learning so much!

One of the main reasons that a lot of diets and work out plans fail is because there is not accountability aspect. No one is checking in on you DAILY, seeing how you are doing, caring about your struggles, offering solutions for a better day. That’s where I come in. I LOVE seeing people succeed and if I get to be a tool to aid in someones success, even better.

Why am I on a diet?

I AM NOT! Beachbody is NOT a “diet” and it is not only for people trying to lose weight. I am at my goal weight and am firmly in maintenance mode. I have toned up quite a bit. “Diets” don’t work. You must be the change you want to see. I drink my shakeology and do my workouts daily because I have changed my lifestyle.

Don’t think at-home workouts work?

You are so wrong. I thought the same thing. I pretty much said there is no way I would ever do them and if I am not spending hours in a gym then I am not working hard enough. Oh man, I was so wrong and I am SO happy that I was wrong. I am currently doing 22 minute hard corps. It is literally 22 minutes long and I do it in my kitchen or in my front yard as I watch the sun come up. Here I am on week 8 (of 8) and I have never been so toned and strong in my life.  This brings me back to the accountability piece…it makes you WANT to do it and stay committed. I have not missed ONE day of my program (even while I was on vacation I did my 22 minute hard corps).

Haven’t worked out in a while? Don’t think you can do it?

Beachbody has hundreds of work out programs. There is something for everyone, even kids! There is a program to fit all needs/wants/goals, with different levels of difficulty based off of where you are in your fitness journey. Most work out programs also have modifiers that give you a good place to start with.

I could go on for a while..but I will wrap this up.

Lastly, being a coach and being a part of the beachbody family has completely improved my confidence and my overall mental and emotional help. It gives me complete support in everything that I do, it has reconnected me with many old friends (which has been amazing!!), and it has boosted my confidence tenfold.

 

♥Be the change you want to see. And as always beYOUtiful ♥

My happy place

Everyone hatenniss a happy place. It could be the beach, maybe a vacation spot, a restaurant, the library…any place where you are content and able to put aside life and just….be.

For me…it is on the tennis court. I am so happy when I am out on the court playing tennis. It’s that one thing a week that I consistently do.

The past couple days I was in a tennis tournament. While, yes, I was extremely nervous and scared, I was so happy to be competing out there on the court.

I feel extremely blessed that I had such great friends who took time out of their Thursday and Friday nights to come support me.

Thursday I played in mixed doubles. We were supposed to start at 7pm, I think we walked on the court sometime after 9 and got off after 11. My friends could have easily said “its too late” or ” I need to go to bed” and that would have been TOTALLY understandable…but they didn’t. They stayed up past their bedtimes to cheer me on. Thanks guys.

Friday night I played women’s doubles. One of my friends brought work there to still be able to support me since my match was before the work day concluded.

The last tournament I was in, I was pretty adamant that friends do not come watch me. I was too nervous and scared. Well, I am over that now and grateful to everyone that came!

It’s fun having something you can do when you at 5, 25, 105. Tennis is a lifelong sport and I am so excited to be “back in the game” if you will.

Tennis has been a good way to meet other people on this island where we already have a common ground. I have met so many people that I probably would never had met off the court and that’s part of the beauty of tennis.

 

 

 

By the way, I lost…but I had SO much fun. And really…isn’t that the point?

Why am I not losing weight?

imageSeriously though.

Since college I’ve “worked out” pretty regularly and ate “okay”.

I was by no means obese, but I was never a small girl. I knew this and always wanted to change it, but for the life of me, could not figure out why the scale was staying the same…or worse…going up!

Maybe first, real quick, I should talk about MY why.

As we have previously discussed, I am a physical therapist. I can’t stand when people are hypocritical. If I am going to sit there and tell my patients to work out and lose weight, I feel I need to be healthy and in shape too!
My bigger why, however, is that I didn’t love myself. If you don’t love yourself, then you need to make a change. I finally commited to making changes that would make me happy, healthy, and confident.

I made two super common mistakes.

  1. I lied to myself about my eating habits.
  2. I did exactly the same thing over and over and over again at the gym.

From college, until about two years ago, all I ever did at the gym was the elliptical. Almost daily, elliptical for 30-60 minutes, and that was it. Your body cannot continue to change if you don’t change too!! Changing your workouts is key to seeing continued results so that your body can break through the inevitable plateaus.

ABS ARE MADE IN THE KITCHEN, NOT THE GYM!

I am sure you have all heard this before. I would keep a tally in my head of what I ate that day and literally lie to myself. What? No, I didn’t eat 6 cookies. If I say it didn’t happen, then it doesn’t count. I’m not even kidding about this. When I racked my brain to why I wasn’t losing weight, I could convince myself, every time, that I wasn’t eating “bad”.  Let’s not even talk about the frequent bowls of pasta I ate for dinner and the fries I ate for lunch.

So how did I lose my weight? I have such a crazy formula for losing weight, it’s going to blow your mind!

Wait for it…

Exercise and eat better!!

I know, I know, your mind IS blown.

I don’t really want to say “diet” because that implies you do something for a bit, lose the weight, and return to your “normal”. Rather, I adapted to better eating habits and changed my way of life. At first, it seemed like a daunting and frankly miserable task. Of course, all my favorite things were huge “no-no”…soda, cheese, bread, pasta.

In the beginning, I was super strict because, well, you almost have to be. I had to take everything away from myself so I could figure out what moderation really is and how I could achieve a happy balance without being miserable. I didn’t have a set time limit “for x amount of weeks I will do y”. One day, about two years ago, I started eating right and the rest is history.

Do I still have soda sometimes? Yes!
But do I have one everyday? No and you know what…I don’t even want one every day anymore.

Do I ever eat pizza, pasta, and bread? TOTALLY! Again, not every day.

I am not perfect, I am human. I have weekends of total and utter binging. The important thing is that I am able to do that and then continue back to my new “normal” life. If your new “normal” is overall healthy, indulging every so often is not going to derail all the work you have done.

Anyhow, I know a lot of people, myself included, want some new fad diet to magically lose weight. But at the end of the day… good ‘ol diet and exercise is what really, and truly, works.

How well did it work? I lost 30 plus pounds and have kept off for almost two years.

For me, the key was to find food that I still got excited about, but didn’t need to feel guilty about.

More on that later.

 

I will post another blog with more specifics about what I actually ate and what workouts I did at the gym.