What have I been up to? Creating Community

Sometimes you have a goal and you fall a bit short--then you have a choice; do you try again or let it go?  Depends on the situation, if the goal no longer serves you--let it go otherwise try again.  

So my loyal readers, I apologize for the less than consistent blog posts. At the outset I promised myself and therefore you a post once a week, I fully intend on delivering. Chalk it up to the lazy days of summer? Not exactly.  I've been busy building community; spending some very quality time with my family, exercising (see milestones below), building a business that will give me some more freedom (financial and time) in the future, making new friends.  But fall is upon us and I do feel the need for routine and some grounding, so back to the weekly blog it is!

Health Milestones: Ran a 5k in Salt Lake City. My goal was under 40 minutes, and I crossed the line, unofficially in 38.  Continued progress to  4 mi and 5 mi runs.

Lifestyle Milestones: I took 2 trips and managed to workout very consistently and make decent food choices, this has NEVER happened before...it was always an excuse, until this time and wow how empowering it was!!!

Business Milestones: Attended the USANA International Convention and was inspired by all of the amazing stories of health. In the presence of some amazing inspiration and brilliant minds-Dr. Oz, John Maxwell, Libby Weaver, Myron Wentz, Dr. Christian Northrup--to name a few. Being present in the amazing energy that is my USANA family and Tribe--Team Northrup was simply electrifying.

What's the secret?  Lean in...wait for it...my biggest lesson so far to ensure progress/success is to surround myself with positive peers (this has come in the form of people reading the blog, of people asking me what I'm doing, liking my workout posts on facebook, my husband stepping up to make my workouts possible). These are people that provide positive peer pressure and are aligned with my goals, otherwise, as I am retraining my mind and body to crave only things that serve it (hard work, by the way)--I make it really difficult for myself. Action steps you can take to create this community for yourself:

1. Set the intention.
2. Tell those close to you your goals and what you need from them to succeed, there is NO way for them to know unless you tell them. They will respect your process if you let them be involved; you might just inspire their own journey.
3. If you don't have a community of like-minded and like-hearted people, create it (or join mine).
4. Set free those that are not serving you. Bless them and let them go.

New Goal:

Sept 23: 10k run10feed10.com I LOVE this model, so happy to have come across this. The run was full but i signed up for the mailing list (setting intention) to find out a week later they are opening another route on this day. If you are in/near NYC come join me or cheer me on!! 

Announcements:

RESET Group with the amazing Dr. Deborah Kern drdebkern.com  
Deb comes with may years of experience in low-glycemic nutrition and optimal health and is a wealth of knowledge--you get her wisdom for free!   If the timing is right for you to embrace RESET, let me know (Jenelle.project50@gmail.com). She will be running the RESET starting SEPTEMBER 16!
visit my previous blog post for more RESET information.

"Push-Up Progression Workout for a Stronger Core" by Shaun Zetlin 
is out on amazon.com, ibooks, barnesandnoble.com in e version and will be out in print September 4th!  Its such an amazing accomplishment by a key member of my community, he trains me in this method and the results are unmatched (in my opinion) visit http://www.zetlinfitness.com/ for more information.

Stats: Coming soon--stay tuned for a bonus post on Thursday! 

One Month Down....a lifetime to go

I've been exercising regularly in the morning 2-3 days a week for 4 weeks. After a night of not being able to sleep-I think I fell asleep somewhere between 1:30 and 2 AM, the alarm went off at 5:45 and (with a little nudge from Christopher), I was off. Out for the run by 6:00. Is it now a habit? So many times I've started working out in the morning only to have a less-than-perfect night of sleep and turn off the alarm and go back to sleep. As recently as 2 weeks ago, I did that very thing, but now I feel like I might have formed a new habit. What do the experts say? Of course I did a little research (its in my bones...) I was familiar with the concept that a habit is formed in 21 days.

The 21 day idea was born from the time it took for an amputee to not 'feel' the missing limb, so its a neuro-muscular outcome, a sensory perception thing, perhaps.  A more systematic study was conducted in 2009 to suggest on average it takes 66 days to form a new habit, depending on the complexity of the habit. 

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A little bit from the PsyBlog-http://www.spring.org.uk/2009/09/how-long-to-form-a-habit.php

This graph shows that early practice was rewarded with greater increases in automaticity and gains tailed off as participants reached their maximum automaticity for that behaviour.
Although the average was 66 days, there was marked variation in how long habits took to form, anywhere from 18 days up to 254 days in the habits examined in this study. As you'd imagine, drinking a daily glass of water became automatic very quickly but doing 50 sit-ups before breakfast required more dedication (above, dotted lines). The researchers also noted that:

• Missing a single day did not reduce the chance of forming a habit.
• A sub-group took much longer than the others to form their habits, perhaps suggesting some people are 'habit-resistant'.
• Other types of habits may well take much longer.

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 66 days seems like a long time. But these healthy habits are meant to last a lifetime so in the big picture 66 days doesn't seem so bad...

A month later- The STATS

Tricep - 25 (-1)

Suprailium - 27 (0)

Patella - 10 (-2)

25% body fat.(-1%)

Change in Weight (-9.2)

HOORAY Progress!!!