I am lucky to say that I live with a wonderful ex-chef who makes fabulous meals.  He has agreed to help me out (after about 6 days of begging but whatever works!). I bought the Flat Belly cookbook and he even “post-it” a few recipes but said most of them are about portion control.

I realized sadly that I normally eat twice my weight when my chef takes a night off and we order take out. So I told him no more take out and on the evenings that he deserves a night off, I will find myself in the kitchen and putting together something that resembles food. So this was good news. Today is Day One. Yesterday was Moe’s Mexican food.                      

The other thing I realized that is has to taste so bloody good for me to go off this new way of eating – my new lifestyle. If I am going to have the best Mexican food again it will be from the Mexican deli on Valencia in San Francisco. It will also be a very expensive meal since I live in NY. So I will let you know when hell freezes over.

I did more work on the coaches on the edge’s book proposal and got some of it back from my copyeditor friend. Once these sections are done – we will be that much closer to getting it out to overly eager literary agents who will get us a great publisher who will give us anything we want. That’s legal.

I am keeping this short and I hope you will join in and let us know how you are doing and how we can help keep you on track. One of the things I want to do is take better care of me. So I did 2.14 miles on the treadmill and now I am off to have a HOT, smoothing bath. Here is NY the wind is whipping and the temps are really dipping below zero.   

So do tell!

        

I have been living under a rock when it has come to taking care of me, myself and I. I have worked my butt off all year (and yet my butt still clings to me like a whiny child) and I look around and I am round in a lot of the wrong places.  I would send a photo but my old camera died (we suspect it went out of focus one too many times) and the new one that Santa bought me is consulting with its lawyer.

So I talked about doing this and then I forgot to do it and then I came up with a 1000 excuses and now I am back to say that I have had it and would like a new start. This is where you all come in. I want to do a blog on getting healthy (had to say that so it doesn’t seem like it is all about weight lost) and I would love anyone who wants to join me come in and let’s get busy and support each other. BTW – it is all losing the weight. I would hate to start this off as a big fat liar.
that sort of looks like me. if there was no sun out and it was midnight.

I would like to blog 2-3 times a week about my progress but I would like this to be about all of you who would like to change or start something in your lives. I want to be there for you and vice versa.

We can hold each other accountable.

Okay, I will start:
lose 20 lbs. the healthy way – eating right and exercising more
Get the Coaches on the Edge book proposal out to literary agencies by Feb. 2010. It was originally for Jan. 2010 but now I am going to set time up (big chunks of time) to get it done. I have a wonderful friend who is a copyeditor and she is helping us to keep it tight and real. Thanks, Nicole!
I will make time everyday to stop and get quiet. If you knew how hard this is for me to do, you will know that this is BIG!

All right. Enough about me….unless you would like me to go on! What can I do to help keep you reach a goal? We are all in it together, so I am hoping that some of you will jump in and let’s make this new year the year of simplifying our lives by getting rid of things that are stopping us from moving ahead.

So who would like to join me?  I have been known to beg. It ain’t pretty.

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Step Two was about writing affirmations to help you stay positive.

Step Three got you off the sofa and exercising your right to be fit and trim.

Step Four was all about taking the time to meditate and getting centered in your universe.

Wonder what Step 5 can be about? I would like you to throw your own party. The theme? What’s a party nowadays without a theme?  Let’s try Celebrate Me party! Throw it for 100 or just light a few candles and treat yourself to a lovely repast. Maybe dessert by candlelight. I can make that one. Make fun invitations and send them out to your family and friends who already know how fabulous you are! Tell them on the appointed date that they are invited to come and celebrate you. Feeling generous? How about telling everyone attending to bring a list of the 100 best things they have ever done in their lives? Okay, make that 10.

The world can be an unforgiving place to live in and some days the moods of our loved ones are more down than up. You have the power to lift your spirits and those around you and you don’t need fairy dust. It gets into my hair. Do something silly. One of my favorites is having everyone show up wearing a feather and rhinestone encrusted chapeau. Not your style? Well have everyone show up in any hat as long as it’s not a baseball cap (or football or basketball). Help people stretch beyond their everyday lives and watch them become the creative souls they have yet to discover.

And don’t forget to invite me. I can party with the best of them. I have had a little practice. 

federico stevanin / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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So Step One found you moving on up to the place where we all belong – the top of our list!

And Step Two found you scribbling little love notes to yourself. Keep them coming. And maybe write one for your partner, spouse, child, friend, co-worker, neighbor, etc. You get the idea. Expand the love out to the universe. Write it down and let the love continue to flow. Who knows the Nobel Prize for Love could be yours one day! Right after I receive mine.

Step Three will get you off the furniture and exercising your right to be fit and trim.  

Step Three: Shake it. Move it. Walk it off. Work up a sweat. Get your body moving and grooving.  The reports just came out we as a nation are becoming heavier and less fit. Colorado was the only state to have the least number of obese people but it is an alarming 18.9%.  In 1991 not one state had an obsess rate higher than 20 %.( Trust for America’s Health Report). Yikes!

I have a confession to make. I have been a bit of a slacker in the area of Step Three. But I promise to do better.  I do. I promise.

Start slow, but get off that sofa and put the Ding Dong down.  It all comes down to loving yourself enough to gift yourself with some extra years to be with your loved ones. So join a gym, get a buddy to go walking and lift some weights. Put the fork down after one serving and drink your water. If it doesn’t make a difference in your life, don’t eat it. If you would kill for it then I would say have two spoonfuls and then put it away. A little more savoring means a little less laboring at the gym.

I got a pedometer strapped to me and from the looks of it, my yellow lab and I have a date to walk another 2,000 steps right after dinner. Of course, we will have to stop every two feet. I have no idea what she is sniffing at (yes, I do) and I really don’t ask too many questions. I’m just gonna walk.  My butt off.

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Step Two: We are still working on you. Becoming first does not happen overnight, but practice becomes reality with a little more work.  We are coming to the part of the dreaded homework assignment. I am out of school, you are thinking, and my diploma is hanging on the wall. We are never too old to learn something new. Your family and coworkers will admire and respect you even more. If that is possible.

Get a pen (pencils are still for sissies) and a journal, or a bunch of index cards or use the backside of your grocery bill and…write every day.  Find five minutes and write positive affirmations. Index cards are great because you can put them everywhere. Grocery bill receipts may not be pretty, but put your affirmations on the fridge or any place else where you know you will be visiting more than once a day. And read them. And say them out loud with conviction. No positive thought is too small or too big. Open up that journal and repeat after me, “I deserve all the best that life has to offer. I know by loving myself first that I can love my family and friends and dare I say it, myself, more everyday.” Nice plug for me, eh?

My affirmation this week is “I am prefect today. And tomorrow is looking even better.”  And I raise my voice with one brown and one black shoe on. Note to self:  Turn on a light in the morning, would ya?

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Whether you are planning on reinventing yourself after retirement, or you are working as a high level professional or you are somewhere in between, you need to take charge of My New Balance Sheet for My Life and with pen in hand (pencils are for sissies) begin to enter things that really make you happy. Happiness during a recession is possible.  Repeat as needed.

As I look down at my list (yes, I did one before I signed on), I see some very basic entries that will not shock you, but the order may make you go, “What is this woman thinking?”

Number One – I top the charts with a couple of gold stars next to my name. I needed to take ownership of it. You need to take ownership of it.  Right now.  If I decided, for whatever silly, insecure reason, to lower myself to the bottom of my balance sheet, then I would be guilty of not being the best mother, wife, partner, business women, entrepreneur, friend or extraordinary woman that I know is hiding inside of me.

Yes, trust me,   it took some time for little old me to realize this, but we must be number one in our lives. Once you are filled with love and admiration for yourself, then that love and admiration will radiate out to warm the hearts of all who come in contact with you. You know how the Sun is in the middle of it all? How life would not be able to exist without its rays? Well, from now on you are an excellent facsimile of that Number One Planet. Just don’t leave home without the SPF#15.

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