Before and After

I'm a kind of person who use to subscribe to all YouTube channels, Instagram pages related to total body workout, abs workout, lazy workout,cardio and so and so. If you think, I do all these, the answer is "Nah,Nah,Nah"... The only thing I do subscribing to all these is to admire the before-after pictures with my jaws dropping. Where in this whole world, these people get motivation to undergo such a huge transformation? Great, they are! But do you think, they will stop there? Nooooooo! Only and only if they continue their training and workout, they will continue to look as in the "AFTER" pic or otherwise, they will look back as in the "BEFORE" pic.

I always wanted to have one such awesome BEFORE-AFTER pic of mine. All it demands is, to do hard workout day-by-day,everyday but I hardly do a workout. Somehow, I motivated myself and made up my mind, to go to gym daily. I got new shoes, new capris, tank tops and know what? All these were just for a 3-day drama. I didn't continue and started resting along with my new shoes,capris and tank tops. Those treadmills,cycle,ellipticals drained all my energy out along with my motivation. I just felt, it's not my kind.

Then I came up with an alternative which is of my style. Pilates, Oooo!Hooo! Rather than bored and checking out the timer to end soon while doing tread mill, I found its kind of fun to do pilates. I got my personal pilates trainer,errr, VIRTUAL-pilates trainer.Yup! Cassey Ho. Have you ever heard of her? She's a sensational youtube celebrity and a pilates trainer. Which part of your body, you want to shape into or you wanna burn? Be it the abs, thighs, booty or arms, she has got the pilates moves for it in BLOGILATES YouTube channel. So,now comes my self-challenge.

Journey towards healthy lifestyle : Self-challenge 4

I'm really not determined enough to do a hour-long workout. So, I split  my workout in terms of body parts rather than time. One day, I will take up abs,arms and thigh workout, the next day I take up leg,booty and muffintop workout. As I do these workouts, I tend to do it for a hour-long sometimes or just for quarter of an hour. In spite of the time, I feel content about burning a particular body part.
It is really a fun to do such mix-ups and working out. Initially, my body was so stiff and c-couldn't accommodate to the moves but as I continue doing it, my muscles are getting accustomed to it.

So far, if you had asked me what's the happy pain, my only answer would have been 'labor pain'. Now, I have a second answer, Yes! Sore muscles. Sore muscles are happy pain too!

The feel you get when you see your capris and jeans becoming loose.... Phew! Man!!! It's not less than a bliss... It can only and only be attained via a workout, CONTINUOUS WORKOUT. If you miss a day or two between, never mind but remember, never go three days continuously without a workout. If you wanna read a book or watch tv rather than working out, do it but in parallel just tend to do some moves or stretches, as they say "two mangoes in one stone hit" :)

My personal belief is that it's not just the diet or the green tea or the weight-loss drink which will help you to shed your pounds. All those might detoxify your body. But without seeing the sweat by working out, you can't achieve the 'AFTER'-pic-body which you want.

Now, the PUBLIX weigh scale shows my weight, few pounds lesser and gives me the same excitement as the before-after pics. 

No more 'WTF?'

One minute silence to all who haven't read this post title as 'No more Where's the food?'. I'm a big foodie and not a day will pass for me without asking/encountering these phrases - 'Where's the food?' or 'What's the food?'. I always wonder, 'Why the hell,fattening foods are so tasty?'. My day starts,runs and ends with the thought of food. One end, I couldn't control my food cravings and on the other end, I worry about putting on weight.The biggest offense of being a shorty is that we will look bulky even if we put on few pounds.

As days passed, my food cravings grew up high in the graph along with my worry about being fat. Eating is an absolute pleasure to me but ironically, I felt anguished over my unhealthy eating. One day, when I strongly felt, "THIS IS IT", there needs to be an end to this. I sat alone and went through the things which I might change to stop my over-unhealthy-eating.The things which I say now may sound familiar, but I write this to share how I adapted these practices.

Journey towards healthy lifestyle : Self-Challenge 2

Just like everyone, I sought help from internet for any diet plans. And I was drawn towards 'GM diet'.It is a 7-day diet plan, which definitely won't let you starve.So, I took this as a challenge and went for it. The diet was tough for the first three days but from day 4, my body became accustomed to it. I customized the diet plan as per my eating style (but not changing the core of the diet), and it was roughly like this:

Day 1 : Fruits day
Day 2 : Veggies day
Day 3 : Fruits + Veggies
Day 4 : Banana + Milk
Day 5 : Sprouts + Soup + Veggies
Day 6 : Sprouts + Soup + Veggies
Day 7 : Brown rice + Cooked veggies

As a catch-up line, this diet plan was said to make you lose certain pounds in a week. More than losing pounds, I strongly believe that, it will detoxify your body. Once we undergo this diet for a week, we will continue to have a control on our food portions and our cravings too. This diet is not recommended to undergo continuously for more than a week. Whenever, you feel like, it's time to detoxify, you can  take this up. If you find it tough, just be a little-evil by cooking the meals which you hate to your family members, so that you might feel that  the diet food is much better.(Well, I did so :P )

Journey towards healthy lifestyle : Self-Challenge 3

You thought, I would finish of this post with just one self-challenge,huh? Nah,nah,nah...
Here comes, yet another simple self-challenge : Early dinner.

My usual dinner flow is like :
Preparing dinner - feeding my son - serving my husband - doing the dishes - eating. 

So, it would be not less than 10 or 10.30, I will have my dinner. I made a simple change to my above flow and now my dinner flow is like :

Preparing dinner - eating - feeding my son - serving my husband - doing the dishes 

Now, I tend to finish my dinner by 7.30 or maximum by 8 and shut my mouth after that. I feel light by the time go to bed. To reap more benefits,try adopting the inverted triangle food habit (heavy breakfast-medium lunch-light dinner) along with the early dinner habit.

I won't assure that you can lose weight by practicing these habits, but I will assure that these simple habits will affect your lifestyle positively and make you feel lighter and in turn happier.Always remember, it's not about becoming skinny, it's about becoming healthy. Adopt few such habits and you are one step closer to a healthy lifestyle,just like me :)

Couch-free-YOU

Being lazy, I always lack motivation and find excuse to start any new habit pertaining to lead a healthy lifestyle, be it a diet, going to gym, doing workouts at home and anything of that sort. So, how to arrive with a win-win situation, i.e., continue being lazy and nurture a healthy habit? :P

Here's when I convinced myself, to self-challenge and start doing simple things which, in course of time, will integrate into my lifestyle. These challenges may sound crazy up to the time you see a positive difference. If you are one of me, even if you are not,take up this teeny-tiny challenges and enjoy pushing yourself a little forward and be better than you were yesterday.

Journey towards healthy lifestyle : Self-Challenge 1

Do you know one silly thumb rule of any home - All furniture should be pointing to the television. Laying on the couch, with a TV remote and Netflix running non-stop would be one of the heaven-on-living-room kinda feeling,isn't it? Only until, we see ourselves in the mirror with fleshy-hanging muscles.

                                  

Blame the couch which gave the little piece of heaven and didn't let us get off it.While enjoying the pleasure laying in the couch for hours, we had totally suppressed the fact that our knee joints and spine will frail in near future because of such weary postures. The yoga instructors,usually call the criss-cross sitting position as "Indian sitting" and insist to habituate it. From a normal sitting style at home,it has become the posture-taught-in-yoga-classes. It was the moment of truth when I realize the fact behind my mom saying to sit down with the plates on the floor/carpet while eating. You may wonder what's the big deal in that, until you realize that your "abs" will have a hard time to grow more if you practice it. 

So, here's the push I made.Call it silly, I challenged myself, not to use the couch and sit with criss-cross legs, when I tend to sit for long time. I challenged to sit with my plates down on the floor, bend and eat (which I used to do in my childhood). I'm starting to enjoy it .I love the knuckle sound in my knee joints and the posture of my spine. They look pleased. Now, I strive to do many cool stuff,like DIY,reading,blogging instead of having a nap which I usually do if I were laying in the couch. 

To all who endeavors to adopt a healthy life style, give it a shot,bid adieu to your couch, feel your knee-joints and love the straight posture of your spine.

Come on, say with me "Bye-bye to all the passiveness which you gave me, my dear couch. I break up with you" :)

Just another H4 spouse

Life was so stressful then. The 'Salary credited' text didn't bring even a small smile in the corner of my lip. The longing for weekends seems to be the-wait-forever. The fear of Monday morning ruined the Sunday evenings. Family went virtual and work became real. Job gave the money but no meaning.

Then came that day. A fine Saturday morning when I was walking out of the railway station to go to my in-law's home to meet my toddler son and enjoy weekend with him. It was that morning, when I got an unusual call from my hubby who was in US. Yeah, I name it "unusual", because it was in that call where we made the decision of the life-time. "Let the wait be over. Do quit your job and come to US with our son". It gave me infinite mixed feelings than my hubby's can-you-marry-me?

With a typical Indian middle-class family, two incomes is one of the "MUST"s to run family with our breaths-not-hold. But if it is worth missing the family, was the question which we were unable to answer for a long time and my hubby finally arrived with an answer strongly.

Just after a month of that call, I was in US with my 3 year old and no job. No more work stress, no more virtual family, full time home-maker, who wants more? 

Subscribed for Netflix. "FRIENDS" episodes were playing in marathon. All Bobby Flay's shows were finished watching. Cursed Netflix for not posting new episodes of Food Network shows. Finished wondering about American homes in HGTV shows. The always-called slow reader became a book worm and completed reading all fictional books and the online order of books were kept on delivering to the house.

But, then came the day when the other side looked greener. With increasing expenses,the no-income-me started feeling idle. You know what the H4 spouses will do within few days they reach US, becoming FAT. All because of bored-eating. I was not an exception. 

And again I became stressed. Being fat, hair loss, idle, blah,blah,blah. I started adding more "blah"s to the i'm-stressed-because-of-this-list, until I came across a quote while doing a good-for-nothing-browsing.

"A YEAR FROM NOW, YOU WILL WISH YOU HAD STARTED TODAY"

It felt as if someone turned on the light above my head. How true the quote is!! What if I feel that I should have started today, after a year? That night didn't go peacefully. The next morning was born with bright light not just outside but in my thoughts too. It's not about being fat, having hair loss, having no income which stressed me, its the lifestyle. I promised to lead a happy,healthy lifestyle and removing all blahs from my i'm-stressed-because-of-this-list.

Dear H4 spouses, I'm one of you. Make this H4 period, not just to relax and getting stressed. Take this period to practice a happy, healthy lifestyle and spreading the vibes to your family and friends. At least if not for others, let it be for you. Join heart and hands with yourself and start a journey towards happy-healthy-you.

I will share my experiences, my trials, my errors in the upcoming posts. Please post your comments by taking your hands out of that "PRINGLES" box. :)