Avoiding Failure is Avoiding Success

When it comes to our health sometimes the biggest mistake we make is trying to avoid failure. 

When we try to avoid something that is unavoidable like, failure the impact of the failure is usually negative and harmful instead of helpful. When we see failures as they are: part of the process of success, we embrace the lessons we learn when we fail. When we see failure only as a failure we learn little to nothing from the failure. 

This is why fad diets are mostly ineffective. I say mostly because there are always a few success stories (even know most of those don't pan out long-term).  

Trying to avoid failure by adhering to some crazy restrictive fad diet doesn't actually help us avoid failure, unfortunately, In most cases, it causes an endless circle of failure.

How many people do you know that have tried more than five different popular diets to only be looking for the next one because even though they may have lost weight on the last five they gained it all back and a few more to boot?

Failure is something we will all face and when we try to avoid it we end up delaying the inevitable and feel much worse about the failure.  

So what do I do?

No matter what you do failure is going to play a part so embrace the opportunity to learn from your failure because that's really what is going to bring success 

Failure doesn't mean you are a failure it just means your learning; more about yourself, more about how your body reacts, more about nutrition. You are learning.

So ditch the latest diet fads and start learning about your body, your strengths and build personal eating habits that allow you to eat the foods you like in a way that promotes health and vitality. 

Eat Slower -  This is a great habit to help build a healthier you and yes sometimes you will fail and from these failures, you will learn strategies to better eat slowly and the more you fail the more you learn until one day you will find yourself being the slowest eater at the table.

Eat until satisfied (Think 80% full) - Another great habit to build a healthier you! Again you will fail but those are the times you will learn the triggers that cause the failure and before you know it you will be eating less because you're done.

Eat less processed food (avoid highly processed food) - This is the food that feeds more than our appetite, it feeds our body with nutrients for a healthier you.  

Listen to your body and don't let the latest confirmation biased weight loss book convince you that: Carbs are bad, Fat is bad, Grains are bad, Dairy is bad, Fruits are too high in sugar, Alkaline is the way, Meat is evil, putting butter in your coffee is the secret to good health.

Now if you don't feel very good after eating dairy, stop eating it. You have stomach problems after eating bread, stop eating bread. You don't like bananas, stop eating bananas. You love butter in your coffee, drink it that way. 

Be careful not to stop or start eating certain foods because someone else is trying to create a fear narrative that's not real, in hopes of promoting their preferred lifestyle.


www.zaofit3.com 

One small change to your eating can get big results

The Game Changer

There is just a few more days 0f 2017 and then on to a new year with new resolutions and renewed aspirations for a new you.  Gyms are packed with people January 1st but are back to the same by February. Why? Because we just want a quick way to lose lots of weight so we can go back to our old eating habits and our little to no exercise habits, and still keep the weight off, but are reminded quickly that this is an endless path to disappointment with our weight, appearance, and self-esteem. 

So what can we do about it? 

Consistency!  We have to find habits that promote good health that we can and will do consistently for the long haul. This is a proven effective way of reclaiming and keeping long-term health!

So why aren't more people doing this if it is a proven method for helping thousands of people reclaim their health for the long haul? 

Because most the time, these changes, that we can do, and are willing to do are usually small changes that do not bring immediate results, they work over time. And let's be honest, unlike our friend ELF, that's not our favorite:) 

This new year, make it your goal to build healthy habits that are sustainable, and stay clear of all the fad quick loss diets and focus on being mindful of what you eat when you eat, and how you eat. 

I want to give you one of the most important habits that you can practice and it's so simple you won't believe it's so valuable, but it is. And even know it's simple it's not always easy to be consistent, but if you are it with pay big dividends for your health in the long run! 

Eat Slowly. 

Here are some simple ways to eat slowly

• Put your fork down between bites.

• Relax. Breathe. Take a few extra moments before you pick the fork up again.

• Set a timer if needed — start with 15 minutes per meal as a basic goal. Work up to 20 or even 30.

• Chew a few more times than you think you need to.

• Enjoy and savor each bite. If you’re eating something delicious, take pleasure in it. Notice smells, flavors, and textures.

• Eat mindfully without distractions such as TV, smartphones, or the computer. (Pleasant conversation with friends and family is, of course, welcome.) 

Why eating slowly is so awesome!!

1. Slow eating creates mindfulness. Mindfulness creates awareness.

When you get the hang of slow eating and your body cues, you'll become aware of when they’ve over-eaten.

2. Slow eating attunes people with flavors, textures, and smells of food.

People instinctively begin to seek out better choices, simply because of increased awareness. Their emotional-brain elephant is gently guided, rather than wrenched unwillingly.

3. Slow eating provides important information to the GI tract and gives satiety hormones time to kick in.

If we rush, we don’t smell, taste, or texturally experience our food. Our bodies don’t notice stuff getting shoved into the pipeline until it’s too late.

However, when we eat slowly, our satiety hormones have time to work. We stop eating naturally, earlier.

4. Slow eating helps with digestion.

The step-by-step information processing also helps with cueing digestive activity such as peristalsis or enzyme secretion further downstream. Our GI tract doesn’t get caught off guard.

So you feel better after you eat.

If you suffer from heartburn this just might be a magic cure :)

5. Slow eating doesn’t depend on controlling what you eat.

This means you can do it anywhere, anytime, with any kind of food — whether that’s a Mother’s Day brunch, a business lunch, dinner at Grandma’s, a Vegas buffet, or S’Mores around a campfire.

No matter what’s on your plate or who’s around you, you can eat slowly.

6. Slow eating makes the client’s body the boss.

This means eventually you won’t have to rely on calorie counting, weighing and measuring food, or any other means of external control. you’ll feel much less anxious, and much more self-assured.

Paradoxically, relinquishing external control gives you more real control.

Mindfulness is the path to this outcome.

This year make a commitment to building habits that build a healthy you!

And if you would like to know more about this other habits that are proven to help you move toward your health goals, and would like help implementing them I would be happy to discuss more, just head over to my website or email me. 

Website: www.zaofit3.com                                                                                                               Email: zaofit3@gmail.com

Jerry Mullins                                                                                                                                       PN1, DSW, CPT, WMS

How can a penny help you get healthy?

The other day when I was on a morning run with my wife and a friend, I was thinking about some of my clients and former clients and I found myself asking why some really struggle and others flourish? If I could just find out "the why" I could be a better coach. I understand we all have stories that can give some insight, and there are a lot of great resources that I use (school, books, mentors) to help be the best coach I can be, but this particular day as I was running, and I started thinking about my wife, and she found change project. Boom! I realized it's all about the penny! So here's how it works: If while running she sees money she stops and picks it up, most the time its pennies but she has found all kinds of different coins, even some bills and other things like pocket knives and even a posable bunny. 

 My wife's old jar and new jar (first got too small)

Most people when running with her for the first time laughs when she suddenly stops. Usually, the person looks back and asks; "did you drop something" and she responds "No I found a penny" and at this point, she proceeds to tell them how she collects money that she finds regardless of its denomination. Most people laugh when she tells them she's saving money to pay for her trip to run Boston (marathon) someday, but others that have run with her for any period of time are inspired. Some even collect pennies themselves. Why? Because she has made believers out of us by collecting over a hundred dollars the last several years.

What do My clients and their health have to do with my wife and her coin collecting endeavor (obsession)? I believe it's the same reason you and I don't stop and pick up a penny, well, at least why I don't. When I see a penny I think its value is not worth me stopping in the middle of a run to pick it up; well it's only a penny and some of the pennies are barely even recognizable. Now if a see a quarter I think about it, I still don't pick it up but I do think about picking it up and if I see a dollar it's mine. What I have learned from my attitude towards her found change project; Is that because of her faithfulness to pick up everything she sees no matter the value, she has collected about one hundred dollars, a couple of pocket knives, a cool rock that says "Jesus Lord of all", a pretty shell and has inspired others to start their own found change jar.  

My coaching philosophy is a slow process of building habits and learning to make choices that are a little better. One of my favorite sayings is "Think a little better"  When it comes to your nutrition and exercise we can always do a little better. The problem with this philosophy is that it's like collecting pennies and most people don't want to collect pennies we want dollars! But you see if my wife only collected dollars she would be at a fraction of where she is, as a matter of fact, she might not have anything saved, because why save the dollar when it's sitting in your jar for over a year all by itself, it's a little discouraging so we might as well spend that dollar, right?

So what am I trying to say? When reclaiming your health you can be like my wife who no matter how tired she is, or how hard she has to push to catch the pack, how the run is going or how small the denomination of money is, she picks it up, because she understands that the Boston (marathon) is expensive and every penny gets her one penny closer to her goal.

Or you can be like me and pass the pennies hoping that you will find the stockpile of money that will pay for Boston all at once and end up with nothing. 

There is no magic bullet (short cut) to get you to your health goals, it comes one penny (small habit, little better choice) at a time. The awesome thing is that some days because of your faithfulness to the small things (pennies), big things (dollars found) will happen.

If you are looking to reclaim your health and are willing to build habits that bring long-term results by making small changes (collect pennies) I would love to talk to you about some options that will give you the tools needed to collect all the pennies you need to reach your health goals.

zaofait3@gmail.com

Open the pharmacy

Some people think I'm a little fanatical about my running. Yes, I do enjoy running, and I probably run more than most, I also do enjoy the spiritual, emotional and physical benefits of running. But it's not as much about running than it is about the benefits of exercise. Yes exercise. Running is my choice for exercise, but it's not the only choice. These days it's not uncommon to hear people argue over what is the best form of exercise, but unless we do it, I don't care how much science we have it's not going to work. The same goes with nutrition. We can argue all day what nutrition plan is best, but those that know nutrition are aware that there isn't a one best plan for everyone. My point is that we are all different and the exercise and nutrition plan that we follow can help one succeed and another feel like a failure. The important thing is to know that moving and staying active with something you can enjoy and eating as much real food as possible opens up the best pharmacy in the world; the one inside of you and me. The pharmacy that we have within us can heal and help us better than any drug in any pharmacy man has created thus far, unfortunately, most people have closed their pharmacy. The keys are in our control, but we have to put them to use so we can open the pharmacy up for business. I do believe there are situations where people need medicine from an external pharmacy, but a lot of times we need them because we have closed our own personal pharmacy and we have to get the medicine somewhere else. Here is an amazing thing about our own pharmacy: Our pharmacy knows exactly what we need and how much with no guessing! Yes, imagine if you went to a doctor and they gave you a prescription that wasn't based on a guesstimate of what the average person that was your size weight, and gender needed, but rather what amount you needed for you as an individual. That's what your body is capable of doing. Open your pharmacy and keep it open 24/7, it's your best plan for quality and quantity of life.

If you are wanting to open your pharmacy and you could use so help email me at zaofit3@gmail.com

A Script can save you lots of regret!

I want to take a minute and talk about the importance of scripting when it comes to change.

Scripting is thinking about what you would like to happen in a difficult situation.

So why is it so important to your health?

The other day I was at a leadership meeting for a conference that I help plan in the Spring every year. Our meeting was at Izzy's and one of the leaders while eating his mound of pizza and fried foods said he was on the Mediterranean diet as prescribed by his doctor. He went on to tell us that he has done very well for the past two weeks and wanted us to know that he was just enjoying this one meal, but would be right back on it tomorrow. Now there are a few things that made me sad about this conversation, but let's focus on how scripting could of made all the difference in the world for this guy. I could tell by his conversation and conviction, that he had every intention of making good choices when he got there, but there was so many good (Bad) choices that he was overwhelmed and just grabbed what he knew.

So how could scripting help?

I like the things on his plate as much as he did, but I scripted out a head of time.

Here is my Script: Go strait to the salad bar and fill my plate with highly nutritious food and when I'm done and mostly full I return to get something from the not so nutritious area.

So what did I do at that meeting? You guessed it. I went by my script and had a spinach salad lots of fruits and veggies some cottage cheese and for extra protein I got a friend chicken breast and pulled off all the skin and ate the meat, then I went and got a bowl of soft serve ice cream concoction (I think), yes it is a red light food!

Do I have more self control? No I don't believe I do. I scripted out what I would do so I was not left with lots of options, yes I was tempted, and I usually am, that's why I have a script to follow when I know things will be tough!

The more choices we have the more likely we are to pick what we know, and what were familiar with. But when we script out a plan we are more likely to choose what we have already decided to eat.

Try using a script when your going into a tough situation and share with me how it works out for you.

Junk-Drawer Syndrome

The other day I was going through and cleaning out some cupboards and drawers in our kitchen and I came across one of our two junk-drawers and thought it was time to take them down to one. So I went through and sorted everything out of one draw, by doing one of three things with everything in it: One: I put the actual junk in the garbage
Two: I put things where they actually went
Three: I put them in the other junk-draw.

Maybe your wondering how we got two junk-draws, maybe not, but let me explain anyway: When we bought our current house nine years ago and we were putting things away in our new kitchen, I said "let's make this drawer our junk drawer" my wife immediately said "no I don't like junk-draws". she decided we were no longer going to have a junk-draw, and this was the perfect time to do away with it. So as the years went by we would slowly add a few things to one of the draws in the kitchen that kind of sorta fit with each other, but not quite, and after a few years two of these draws seem to get more and more stuff that didn't fit and had no real connection with each other, and boom we had two junk-draws. So that's how we got two. But why I'm talking about junk-draws. First of all junk-draw is the wrong name to call such a valuable draw. Second the reason why we have them is because they really do carry valuable stuff, stuff that has been separated from it's purpose, but never the less is valuable. So where am I going with this whole junk-draw thing? Well a junk draw is filled with things that we found and we know they have value, but were not quite sure what their purpose is when we find them. But like I said they are valuable and they do have a purpose even know at the present time we don't know what it is, and we don't want to throw it away because we know it's valuable and when we discover what it actually goes with or is a part of life just seems to be better. We know that if we can put this thing, we found in the drawer, that someday we will find the thing that brings out the value in it! It already has value and we know it does but we just can't see it apart from what it was made to do.
  Have you ever found that perfect nut or bolt, you know the one that you could no longer buy, that could fix that broken chair? I have, it's awesome! This for me is a revelation! People are valuable way more valuable than the things we find in a drawer, but when people don't know and are separated from their purpose, we can't see their value, and even worse they don't see their value! There are people that have been put in the Junk-draw or have put themselves in the draw, and they feel worthless and misplaced, and others see them as a wasted life, when in reality they just need to be where they belong, where their value is evident to everyone including themselves. So I say, for the things that are laying round our house, that we don't know how or where they fit, let's go ahead and put those things in the junk-draw until their time to be discovered happens, but for people that have intrinsic value, let's fight against the urge to do this same thing and strive to help them discover the purpose that couldn't possible make them any more valuable than they already are, but will bring out the value that is already who they are.
  If you are reading this blog and feeling yourself like junk (worthless), I want you to know that nothing could be further from the truth! You were created invaluable and are loved by God and have purpose that brings a joy, adventure and excitement to your life! I would encourage you to stay away from people who would confine you to the junk-draw and surround yourself with people that will help you discover the things that make obvious the value that is already who you are.

Why do people trade Love for Hate?

As a person that has led people ever since I was eighteen, and have always strived to learn more about people so I could better lead. I know I'm not where I want to be as a leader, but I'm learning and growing every year. There is one thing that I have noticed in a small group of people that I just don't get (I'm Lost) I try to understand but just don't get it! What is it? It's the action of walking away from everybody and everything that is loving and good and chasing people and things that are not.

You might be saying "people don't do that!" but I would say with confidence that they do, and it's happening every day. Anybody that cares about people has seen it a number of times and no matter if we know that person personally or not, it breaks our heart. So many people suffer from this and even know the number of people that do this type of thing is a minority, it affects everybody at some point in our lives, if not directly most definitely indirectly. So what does it look like?: It's the parent that neglects their child/children, the child that rebels against their parents, the spouse that abandons their husband/wife, or the person that walks away from their entire family, to name a few.    So what makes these people they are moving toward harmful? That's easy. Anybody that allows you to walk away from a loving and nurturing support system is not only harmful but hateful, not only to the loving support system but to you! If they were truly caring and loving they would support and encourage the continued relationship with the people that love you. I don't get it, maybe because, even know I've done lot's of things I wish I could change or do better, I have never walked away from a loving support system or loved ones, and I most definitely wouldn't have done it in favor of a person or group of people that showed contempt toward my future. So I ask why? 

If you are more enlightened to this situation than me please share and comment to help me understand why this happens. Maybe you were that person, and were blind to it and now you see, whatever it might be please share anything you believe will help understand and help families and individuals deal with this tragedy.

Letter to that guy

To all the little boys out there who think their men. You know the ones. The ones that think they can treat young ladies like their property, like something they wear, get tired of it and throw away. The ones that take beautiful princesses and make them feel that they are less than. They are the ones that take these precious little girls, those little girls that were created by God, and treat them like an ordinary skipping rock. Yes, these beautiful souls were created to be honored, protected, and loved like a perfectly cut diamond that was made for a special purpose, and created for a perfect setting, to be worn and cherished and protected by one person forever. But you chose to take that beautiful precious diamond and use it for a skipping rock and wonder why everybody seems to hate on you. Let me inform you; people aren't hating on you their loving on the one your hating on.
  One day you may have a precious daughter and hopefully, you will come to a realization how foolish you were, but until then do your community and every other human being a favor and move to an island with all your fellow fools and live there, for let says the rest of your life. Or at least until you grow up and realize that loving someone requires selfless sacrifice, a sacrifice for which you know nothing about.

I know your name and I know your game, telling her; "no one else understands you like I do" only works while she is blinded and then it all comes crashing down, but unfortunately by the time they see you for who you really are they have already been taking down a path of hurt, pain, and regret, that will affect the rest of their life, of course, that doesn't bother you because your intention was to get what you could for as long as you could. I know you want to make her feel like she's broken so she will hold tightly to you, the only one that can fix her, at least that's the lie you tell her, but in all reality, you are the one broken, and unfortunately broken people like to break others. I just want you to understand that you're not fooling anybody else and you will pay for your lying and manipulating ways. Yes, I know you think you have gotten away with something, but believe me, you haven't, you have only temporarily taken down another person with you. Understand when I tell you; love is more about what you do than what you say, so don't be surprised when the people that really do love that precious young lady that you so shamelessly use, end up doing everything in their power to make you a distant memory, and please don't talk about love as if you know what it means because you got as much clue about love as you do about being a decent human being. I will end by saying I really do hope and pray that you actually wake up and see that you too are valuable under all that loserness, but for the sake of us all; leave our nieces, sisters, daughters, and granddaughters alone while you figure out yourself.