June 2016 Goals

Hi y'all! So June was a pretty good month. I traveled to both Nashville and New York. I got to spend quality time with my parents, see old friends, drink too much wine on the Long Island Railroad, and tour a firehouse. Living the dream.

Because it's entirely normal to get a 20 oz soda cup filled with pinot grigio.
No, like really. It's an actual thing you can order at Penn Station.

Mindful Macros

Yesterday was fucking awesome. I cannot emphasize enough how much a positive mindset impacts everything you do. You might not be into Jesus or CrossFit, (but if you are, check out Faith Rx'd), but putting all of your effort into something and living your life for something important feels so much better than going through the motions while having an existential crisis.

Mindful eating versus macro tracking. So I am back to tracking macros now that I am home from New York. I was feeling mad puffy and bloated. But I am focusing on my hunger cues, what actually sounds good to eat, and how I feel in my performance. I read something on Krissy Mae Cgney's blog the other day that smacked me right upside the head.

"I started out as a strict macro-counter. I got a high from hitting my numbers dead on every single day and I weighed and measured everything that entered my mouth. I was in this 100%. Now let me be extremely candid . . . this is a sign of an eating disorder. I was obsessing over food and my definition of nutritional success at this time was predicated on hitting my daily macronutrient allowance dead-on. I found myself popping fish oil pills to hit my fat macros..."

I have definitely popped fish oil pills to hit my fat macros. I've also eaten a tablespoon and a half of butter off a knife.

Just trying to keep my shit organized.

The Best Version of Me

Today I am excited to lift all the weights with my CrossFit Identity bitches and hoes at the 5 PM. I woke up to the sound of my baby dogs snoring in my bed in Atlanta and I was filled with love. It was 6 AM and I made the decision that today would be a good day.

I will do everything I do today to the best of my ability to glorify Christ. I will take joy in my work and in thrusters because he has given me the opportunity to live this life and I am grateful. I watched a Barbell Shrugged podcast last week that made me reflect on my attitude towards training, work, and the way that I approach the opportunities I am given. Is it a job that I have to do or is it a gift? No one makes me CrossFit, run, take care of my dogs, or succeed at my career. I have choices and I choose to be the best version of me today.

When I look in the mirror, I see a lion... or at least I did until my majestic mane was dyed blue and then hacked off.

Have a great day y'all!

Nashville and New York

Hello friends! I made my annual summer pilgrimage to New York by way of Nashville. Here's what I've been up to for the past week.

WORKOUTS

I was in Nashville last week for work and got a quick run in one morning. I looked up routes on Map My Run and did this 2.6 mile loop. It was a really pretty run that took me over to Nissan Stadium. I decided not to run with my phone because I am terrified of being mugged. Sadly that means no photos of the beautiful sunrise or the apartment building that's basically in the water next to the bridge. Nashville built some legit pedestrian/cyclist paths on their bridges, which is nice because it encourages commuting by foot or bike.

The red line is the portion I ran before the GPS kicked in.

Back on Long Island

I'm back on Long Island and enjoying myself immensely. My flight was ridiculously delayed last night coming in from Nashville. I was not very pleased, especially because I hate flying into LaGuardia. My dad is a saint and still came to pick me up even though it was after midnight.

This morning my mama and I hit up Pure Barre Huntington. The class wasn't particularly difficult but my thighs were smarting from the Hotlanta Half and way too much time sitting in airports and on airplanes.

After class, we ran errands and I got a toasted, scooped egg bagel with tuna fish from Bagel Boss. I don't eat bagels very often, but when I do, I want a real Long Island bagel. I also got a large iced black coffee and it was delicious.

Fast forward a few hours and a work call later, and I was off to get my nails did. Someone put a padlock on the gate that connects my parents' cul-de-sac to the local middle school parking lot. Apparently it's to keep parents from driving up our street to drop off their kids. Since I was walking to the nail salon and it's right near the middle school, that put a major crimp in my style, but no worries, because I just hopped the fence. Thanks CrossFit.

French manicures are required whenever I'm back in the 516.

Speaking of CrossFit, today is my 3rd anniversary. I feel like a putz for not going on my anniversary (two years in a row) but I'll make up for it when I get home.

My parents and I had a delicious dinner at the Brass Rail in Locust Valley. The lobster bisque is fantastic and I tried monkfish for the first time. I really love monkfish liver, but this is the first time I've had the meat of the fish. Very tasty. I also had a martini that hit me harder than expected. That made completing a vendor application for the state of Tennessee super fun. The key lime pie tasted more like cheesecake. It wasn't bad but it was no Publix.

I'll be terrorizing my mom all week so get excited for some posts about Pure Barre and yelling at people in grocery stores. (For real, it's already happened once since I've been here.)

Intuitive Eating

Tomorrow kicks off my crazy summer travel schedule. I'm going to be away a lot in June, July, and part of August. I've decided to experiment with intuitive eating until August 1.

Intuitive eating is eating based on your hunger cues. MIND FUCKING BLOWN. Sadly, most Americans don't properly interpret hunger cues. We either overeat or undereat. We eat based on our emotional feelings and not because we listen to our bodies feeling hunger.

I've been tracking macros in My Fitness Pal for seven months and I should have a pretty good understanding of my body's needs by now. I am the queen of the food scale. I'm incredible at putting the correct amount I am trying to measure on a plate or in a bowl or cup. I've developed a strong ability to visualize correct serving sizes.

Using this knowledge of serving sizes and nutrition, I am challenging myself to make good food choices for the next 6 weeks without measuring. I want to break free of the scale, put my knowledge into practice, and hopefully lower my stress about traveling.

I'm scared. I'm scared that I'll completely fall off the wagon and gain 15 lbs. I'm scared that I will lose my muscle mass and increase my body fat. But this fear is irrational and it is tied to my fear of food. I want to learn to trust myself to make good food decisions when I don't have the safety net of accurate flexible dieting. Flexible dieting lets me eat crap when I want it because I can still hit my macros with nutrient dense food. This works great for me when I am home because I don't keep crap in my house and have to make the decision to go out and get it. When I'm in airports and hotels and strange cities, it is too easy for me to reach for candy and fried food. I want to teach myself trust when I travel so that traveling stops being something I dread. Basically I bring the vacation mindset towards food on every one of my trips, but not every trip is a vacation.

Today I've had a protein shake; some multigrain bread with peanut butter, butter, and fig spread; and some steak tips with vegetables. I didn't measure any of it but these are things I eat relatively often. Instead of tracking serving sizes, I am going to track how I feel with my food and exercise choices on this blog. Today I'm feeling pretty good so far. Wish me luck.

Rest is a Four Letter Word

I, like many people, don't enjoy rest days. What do you mean I am supposed to not workout on this day? Wouldn't activity recovery be better? Can active recovery be a 6 mile run? Try as I might, I keep finding that rest days are beneficial and even necessary to meet my goals.

Way back in 2007, I joined Equinox for the very first time. I loved it but I also needed to justify to my parents what was then considered an expensive gym membership. It was the summer after my junior year in college, I had a fake internship that only took place on weekends, and my parents were 100% financially responsible for me. To show my dedication to my pricey membership, I went to the gym every single day, sometimes twice. The instructors and front desk team loved me. I worked really hard and had a great attitude about it. But then on Day 34, I couldn't do simple v-leg raises with a Swiss ball. (And that my friends is how creepy detailed my memory is about workouts I did almost 9 years ago.) Bonne is telling me to put some effort in but I legit couldn't do it. My abs and legs were toast. Probably because I hadn't taken a day off in over a month. I went to visit my grandmother and only did a little running for a few days, and magically I was back in the gym the next week stronger than ever.

Then in 2010, I was regularly attending 2 to 3 Equinox classes a day while teaching and attending grad school full-time. February break rolled around and I was psyched to spend multiple hours at all three Long Island Equinox locations. But I felt exhausted and sick, and overcome by crippling anxiety about having to go back to school. (I really did not like teaching.) So I spent 2 straight days in bed eating the crap snacks my parents hide in the cupboards (hello Doritos!) and I lost 3 lbs. 

Jenna told me I had to start taking a rest day when we tried carb cycling. I was all, "Pure Barre is my rest day!" And Jenna was all, "Pure Barre is NOT your rest day. You need to rest, especially if you're going to go low calorie for a day." I learned that I do not like low calorie days. I also learned that rest days aren't so bad.

As I shared a couple of weeks ago, I did not workout at all on Saturday and Sunday of the Atlantic Regional. I spent all weekend on my feet cheering for Coach Bre but I was not going to CrossFit and I didn't feel like running either. Last week, I tried to take it a little easier. I went to Pure Barre Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday. I did go to CrossFit on Tuesday because the programming looked awesome but I wasn't adequately hydrated or fueled for running in 90 degree weather and knocking out thrusters. Anyway, I weighed in at 140.2 lbs. Rest is good.

Memorial Day Murph

On Memorial Day, CrossFitters around the country perform the hero WOD Murph to honor and remember the men and women who have made the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom.

In memory of Navy Lieutenant Michael Murphy, 29, of Patchogue, N.Y., who was killed in Afghanistan June 28th, 2005.

This workout was one of Mike's favorites and he'd named it "Body Armor". From here on it will be referred to as "Murph" in honor of the focused warrior and great American who wanted nothing more in life than to serve this great country and the beautiful people who make it what it is.

Partition the pull-ups, push-ups, and squats as needed. Start and finish with a mile run. If you've got a twenty pound vest or body armor, wear it. - CrossFit main site 

photo courtesy of Elena Pesavento

The start of the first mile run.