Young adults, kids, & childern......

My passion is to guide you to be well                    9.28.12

As I continue to channel health & wellness content to all those interested, a shift from my approach is being applied.  The shift is in the direction of training.  I look at everyday as we are training for life, are you practicing quality sleep, nutrition dense eating patterns, moving that body optimally each day?  Life is practice, each day is another opportunity to do what we want with our individual choices.

The mission is to be the best single daddy I can by choosing to share my life experience with my son.  This experience just so happens to be a way of life that supports being human.  I still will be blogging about health & wellness, but more so directed to ANY parent out there that wants to incorporate more quality experiences with their family, not to just spend time, but to teach basic fundamental principles of exercise, nutrition, and basically WELLNESS into day to day occurrences.

Living life each day is a gift, but with adult responsibilities, sometimes we get distracted from what truly is important in life.  I find my family and health are most vital to my experience on EARTH and my smile correlates with how I feel.  I want to smile, I choose to smile, my smile is supported by daily choices that allow my body to thrive.  Everyone wants happiness and no one wants to suffer.

My intention is to guide others with activities, ideas, and openness to thinking differently about who you are and what you do.  We can all shift our minds to new experiences.  How many parents out there want to do more, but feel a bit overwhelmed to do so?  Let me support you and be your guide.  I have been developing many health and wellness concepts to be applied into a simpler approach that can allow YOU to smile :) everyday!

A healthy how to guide to lose weight. Start HERE!

Physical Activity of LIFE!                                         9.14.12

Taking care of your inside parts is what counts the most, health is an internal thing and when we exercise we truly are impacting our guts more then you may think. 
 No matter where your starting point is with your life and condition of the body, these are the first steps to identify healthy habits to build a foundation for a healthy lifestyle. 

1.  How much sleep do you get each night out of seven days?  To maintain an ideal body weight an adult should accomplish at least 7 hours each night.....SLEEP is a vital variable to maintaining & achieving an ideal body weight.

2.  Start a food journal with writing down EVERYTHING you eat over 7 days  A specific focus on food consumption (diet is anything a person eats) with looking into how many calories each day, while identifying Protein, Carbs, Fats in grams for each category.   Not a bad idea to eliminate both Alcohol & Sugar from the diet.  Drink WATER, you cannot consume to much of this!!!!!

3.   Physical activity is a MUST for everyone.  The idea is to balance your movements into something you enjoy participating in, basically the rule is 60 min. a day on most days of the week.  Look into measure your heart rate during exercise/physical activity, as this is the best tool for driven results.  Find your target heart rate & put your heart in it!!!!

4. Set a goal that is both reasonable and specific (results can be measured).  Actually write it down and check daily what have you done to accomplish it. 
Get educated on moving smarter, not harder.  The idea is to be effective, safe, and results driven.  Seek out knowledge on you own through several different mediums.  Ask questions to a dietitian, personal trainer, wellness coach, or other fitness professional.  Be aggressive with your health and being in the know is a great way to be effective. 

5. A base assessment of body fat should be conducted in the beginning, this measurement (NO SCALE for WEIGHT, bad reference point) should give a fat to everything else ratio & that number will decrease over the course of becoming more physically active.  This is also the reference point for results for the future.  For body weight their is no quick fixes, truly the solution is a lifestyle that supports as much movement as possible.  Making daily choices that have positive outcomes will continue the habits necessary to live well.  

How can the heart be monitored?

That helps my heart feel better.......

What you NEED to know about your Heart...                 9.12.12

The lub dub in your chest is a major player for personal health, so if you want to be healthy in the least amount of time (truly its a lifestyle) or lose fat off your body, well its time to start paying attention to that HEART!  Understanding the science about the inside parts of what makes us human is important to being successful with accomplishment of any health related goal. 

Fat burning Zone, Training Zone, Aerobic Zone, well they are all the same and make up a person’s specific Target Heart Rate Zone. I should also mention it is the most effective way to train the body during aerobic physical activity.  Your heart rate matters and should be monitored to maximize your workout so you know when to kick in the intensity and when to pull back & allow your beats per minute to slow down (yeah, its ok to walk & be training effectively).

Its all about the numbers here, keep that in mind when training for anything (just maintaing a healthy life, running a 5K, or when trying to lose weight).  I train my clients to be smarter and move more effectively.  The first lesson is to use a heart rate monitor for training, especially for burning body fat because it provides immediate feedback for results driven training.

A simple HR Monitor (I recommend Polar Brand) can be purchased for under $35 & can be used in a pool too!  Playing games with your heart can lead to a more rewarding workout, as you become smarter about what is taking place inside your body, your results will start happening much faster!

Healthy body weight MAGIC!

How to lose weight, healthy style.....                                   9.7.12

As a Wellness Coach & certified Personal Trainer I am constantly assessing a persons body fat % which is 1 of 5 components of a persons’ health-related fitness.  To achieve an ideal body weight through balancing your body composition (fat to muscle ratio, again 1 of the 5 parts of health-related fitness) try combination training with your other components of fitness every time your workout, exercise, or perform physical activity.
Many variables factor into a persons ideal body weight or more importantly body fat %.  I have identified 4 MAJOR players in the role to improve body weight to be in a healthy range... these are the first steps to identify the number one way to lose weight, influence your metabolism in a health concsious way!! 
 SLEEP - the idea is to regulate your metabolism through patterns or regular doses of zzz
Hydration - think water, water, water for everything you drink!  Its that simple.
Physical Activity - Diversify & practice Muscular strength & endurance, flexibility,& cardio
Nutrition - Ideally eating 5-7 feedings will have the greatest impact on your metabolism & 1/2 o                what you eat should be fruits & veggies.
The best way to fire up your calorie burning furnace is through balance with a patterns & routines that encourage maximum results.  With physical activity, combination style exercises that take you from training cardio, to strength & endurance.    By focusing on 3 of your 5 components your body has nothing to do but increase that heart rate to fire up that METABOLISM during each time you exercise. 
For body weight their is no quick fixes, truly the solution is a lifestyle that supports as much movement as possible.  Making daily choices that have positive outcomes will continue the habits necessary to live well.  

Can streching do anything for me? WOW, you have no idea....!

A MAJOR component of health-related Fitness - FLEXIBILITY              9.6.12

Your physical health can be improved through physical activity, hopefully that isn’t ground breaking news?  What types of physical activity should you do to improve or maintain your health?  The idea is to create a balance, don’t focus all of your attention on one aspect and neglect the other parts.

The 5 Components of Health-Related Fitness are:  Cardio-vascular Endurance, Muscular Strength & Endurance, Flexibility, and Body Composition.  This post is all about the Range of Motion for each joint which directly impacts a person’s flexibility. 

I focus clients movements on specific joints that humans poses and their are 13 major joints on the human kino-matic chain (starting at bottom up):  ankles, knees, hips, wrists, elbows, shoulders, and neck.  With utilizing the way a joint moves, that can help to isolate-muscle and/or recruit more muscles for a specific task (exercise).

When stretching any part of our body it is important to already be warmed up, with our heart rate elevated and joints more lubricated.  The idea is to perform stretches in sets and reps just like when lifting weights.  Ideally, 3 sets per stretch is encourage with at least 30 seconds on task too.  Muscles are located above and below all joints, so the focus should be to eventually stretch all the major muscles in our bodies.

Improve your circulation, impact your energy, feel better, all from simply taking time to move your joints in the very specific way, by STRETCHING to work on your component of health-related fitness called FLEXIBILITY!

Update: WATER, is it relative?

How much does H2O matter, imagine this?                                         9.2.12

The main reason I am writing this blog is to put out quality info on various topics that relate to a human's health, basically covering the four parts (Physical, mental, emotional, and social).  The focus today is to touch on the physical side, which is the part that most people easily associate with health. 

When is the last time you checked your Hydration?  Do you know the easy way to see if you are adequately hydrated?  Well it is simple, simply  look at your pee.  Clear or lemonade color is great, while yellowish or apple juice means dehydration is taking place. 

 WATER is the basis for every bodily function, from respiration to digestion; a person’s energy levels through metabolism are regulated to your bodies ability to store water in its muscles, organs, & blood.  No matter what your fitness goal could be, everything rests on the simple condition of drinking more water and/or being mindful of the other habits in our lives that remove water from our system. 
Being adequately hydrated is an amazing first step to practicing daily healthy habits to build a foundation for a healthy lifestyle!!  The important fact to know is a majority of the water in our bodies is stored in the muscles (blood & organs too).  So if a person does not practice muscular endurance or strength training exercises, then their ability to store water is limited.  It is important to balance physical activity through your 5 components of health related fitness.  Think H20!!!