Take Shape For Life featuring Medifast Meals

Research has shown that regular exercise can actually prevent your risk of getting cancer. But if you don’t get enough sleep, it seems to cancel out this benefit of exercise. In fact, one study showed that women who worked out but slept less than seven hours a night had a 50% higher risk of cancer than those who got more sleep.

Did you have a good holiday weekend?  I sure hope so.  We took a daytrip to the mountains yesterday and during the drive my wife, Joy, read this article to me from TIME.com called: Why Exercise Won’t Make You Thin. It’s well written; again reinforcing why so many struggle with “diet and exercise” as the answer to effective weight loss.  To lose weight through exercise alone you would need to work out strenuously for ninety minutes every day.  In which case you’ll be much hungrier each day and end up replacing just as many calories—if not more—than you just burned through exercise.

What, No Exercise?

No exercise for the first three weeks on Phase One.  Getting into the fat-burning state requires certain conditions.  If you increase your energy demands too soon you’ll add stress, slow down your weight loss and sap your energy. You must first focus on getting into a solid, consistent fat-burning state, without having to worry about damaging your knees or back.
Once you’re on track with weight loss, you’ll be in a much better place physically and mentally to increase your activity incrementally through fun choices that will help build muscle mass and burn calories.  This is something that can last you the rest of your life—at a healthy weight!

Choice Means We Can do it or Not

(Whatever “it” is)

Right now, whatever your circumstances may be, you can make a profound, fundamental choice for optimal health.  It starts with asking the question “Do I want to be optimally healthy?”  Never mind whether you think it’s possible or not because optimal health is available to anyone who chooses it.  Optimal health is simply creating health in your own life though daily choices.  Chapter 4 of Dr. A’s Habits of Health is entitled “Health Is All About Choice.”  He explains the difference between primary and secondary choices.  We also learn how to use structural tension to propel us toward our primary goal.  On Tonight’s live webcast I’ll be discussing this topic:

Get to Your Goal Weight so You can Get on With Your Life

Tonight’s LIVE webcast is for those people who want to make health a primary choice in their life.  I’ll be joined again by John and Cheryl Tooke who together lost 176 pounds rather quickly and now enjoy life at a healthy weight.  We’ll share with you personal insights and successful tips that you can use right now.  So much of this is in seeing the big picture and in believing that you can.  We’ll also be showing you the fun side of living the habits of health.  It’s TONIGHT at 7pm Mountain time, 30 minutes.  Click Here To Register Now

Taking Shape For Life

Our LIVE webcast last Tuesday was a big success, my highest attendance ever, and I’ve been getting a lot of positive comments and feedback ever since!  The webcast was the first part with John and Cheryl in which we set up the basics of getting into the fat-burning state.  John and Cheryl also shared their personal experience in losing 50 pounds and 126 pounds respectively.  It’s very motivating to learn from their stories.  Anyone can choose optimal health!   This is the recorded link for our webcast from Tuesday.  I’ll have it available for just one more week, so if you missed it, you can watch now:  Click to watch “Taking Shape For Life”.

It is the Continental Divide that slices America into two sections. If you are west of it your rivers will eventually flow into the Pacific Ocean. If you are east then all your rivers eventually flow into the Atlantic or Arctic. My home state of Colorado sits on that big split and it definitely shows. There are more mountain peaks over 14,000 feet in Colorado than anywhere else in the contiguous 48 states. California has 13 peaks, Washington State has one, and Colorado has 58.

On Wednesday I climbed two of my favorite peaks: Gray’s and Torrey’s. These are not technical climbs but rather an excellent indicator of strength and endurance. The climb is 9 miles round trip with more than 3,000 feet of vertical ascent. Gray’s peak has the distinction of being the tallest peak on the continental divide. At 14,270 feet the summit is nearly three miles above sea level. The air is thin up there. Amazingly spectacular views and the occasional mountain goat combine with a lack of oxygen to make the experience surreal. I thoroughly enjoy it. It’s Rocky Mountain high. At the summit I stand elated and exhausted. I’m standing on the rooftop of America (stole that from Kerouac). But you know what? There is no way I could have done that climb five years ago. At that time, with 40 extra pounds, even a gentle climb at low elevations was too challenging to really enjoy. I find it very interesting to see how my interests have shifted in relation to my body weight.

As a Health Coach I teach my clients that having a physical activity that they can really enjoy on a regular basis is essential to living life at a healthy weight. Many of my clients are regular, brisk walkers. They have a path, or paths, that they will walk daily or very close to daily. It doesn’t much matter what form of exercise you choose as long as your muscles are working, the blood is flowing, you enjoy it and you do it regularly. Ideally you are also building a little bit of muscle because your muscles naturally atrophy as you age. Do something to neutralize that. It keeps your metabolism up.

Below is me atop Torrey’s peak, 14,267 feet. I was fortunate to be up there completely alone for about 10 minutes.

eb.