Trick or Treat

It is sadly obvious that the “economic downturn” that is leaving families homeless, jobless, and without their retirement savings is due, in a large part, to greed. If all things break down to Love or Fear, as some spiritual minds believe, then greed certainly doesn’t fall on the side of love. Greed and Fear. How quickly they spread. Like all illnesses they hit those who are the most vulnerable, those who are discouraged, stressed or run down. So self-care becomes even more vital at a time like this.

For those who are able to breath deeply and find a rhythm, no matter what is happening to them externally, each day can still be filled with gratitude, and yes, even joy.

We are like those kids at Halloween, we can run away, scared by every mask and every ghoul. We can turn off our porch lights and hide in the darkened living room, hoping no one comes to trick us. Our other choice is obvious, we can take a deep breath and remember that there are no ghouls. Masks are only illusions. We can sit on our porch and share what we have with our neighbors. We can even join in and put on our own mask if we need to. We can choose to wear a mask of joy and “act as if” to get through scary days. (Not the same as denial, of course!)

My point is that in good times or bad, you are still living this ONE day of your life. It is yours, and you can refuse to ACT on fear. We may all be afraid; we do not know how things will turn and unfold with the economy, or with anything for that matter. But how we ACT is another story.

Will we sit, in our fearful, darkened living room and EAT all the candy? (It is worth noting that eating disorders are the most common addiction worldwide, and the cause of incalculable illness and emotional agony.) Like Halloween, addiction is a mask – it is not real. It offers a false face of comfort and escape, but underneath is a jailer who will fight with everything he has to keep you imprisoned and in despair.

Each of us has our own jailer, of course. Sometimes it is tangible, like food or alcohol or drug addiction, smoking, gambling, sex. Sometimes it is intangible, and it hides behind the mask of another person or an idea, like our old friend, GREED.

It is up to each of us to rip off the mask and make peace with the charlatan. We can be HOPEFUL at this time and release the EXCESS, caused by greed or fear. It may be frightening, but it is a time of rebalance. Whether we are losing excess debt or excess weight (in whatever form), we know there is a period of adjustment and perhaps grief.

Our habits as a person and a nation are going to have to change to support the new body. The more fit body. The healthier body.

We are the most prosperous nation in the world, and that is not about money. We have freedoms that are only dreamt of by other countries and other people. We can worship. We can speak freely, in word and in print. We can elect our government. We are based, not on a cultural or genetic similarity, but on one idea: Freedom.

The point of this essay is to encourage each of us to ENCOURAGE one another toward inner peace. To claim our own freedoms right now, in this moment. Your freedom. Your right to refuse to be locked in by addiction, hopelessness, greed, fear, or negativity of ANY kind.

This is your one precious life, and perhaps the biggest “trick” of all is that you’ve had the key inside you all along.

To your self-care, Laura Fenamore
Body Image Mastery Mentor
www.LauraFenamore.com

A Few Great Responses on Everyday Exercise

I wanted to share my experience with you.

My story started in 2001 when I was on vacation on the beautiful island of Aruba. I was sitting at the poolside bar, enjoying a nice cocktail. While enjoying the sun and life in general, I saw a man across the pool. He must have been at least 300 if not 400 pounds and he was digging his way through a huge hamburger. I watched the scene and got filled with horror. I looked at myself and although I was nowhere near the size of the man across the pool, I had to admit I developed somewhat of a beer belly. I guess my weight must have been around 230 pounds or so. I realized it was way too much for somebody of my age, 47 at that time. The repulsive scene across the pool triggered a switch in my head. I decided I never wanted to become like that man.

But what to do? I had a busy job, with lots of international travel. Every day was packed. I was always on the road and didn’t have time for sports. I decided I had to change. Once I was back from my vacation, I started searching on internet how I could ramp up a sports schedule, without killing myself. I started finding out everything there was to know about fat burning and cardio exercises, which heart rates I had to observe and so on. The next thing I decided was that the morning would be the best time for my exercises. Around lunch or in the evenings was not going to work for me, I was always on the phone. I just set my alarm clock half an hour earlier. I designed a training schedule and began working out every day.

So, now I had designed an increase in calorie burning. What about the intake side? I don’t believe in diets. But I realized I easily could cut down on the amount of food I was eating without starving myself. I also had figured out that beer has a lot of empty calories. So I decided I was going to stop drinking beer and I switched to two glasses of red wine a day. These two things probably would make a difference, I hoped, together with the work outs.

While I was slowly increasing the intensity of the workouts, the first two months not too much happened. But then all of a sudden in month three, my body literally started reorganizing itself. After six months of exercising, I had lost no less than 40 pounds and everybody started making comments I looked so good. It was a great reward.

Still today, 7 years later, I work out every morning. I am very fit and have a better stamina than a lot of my hockey team mates. Most of whom are ten years younger than I am.

I will turn 54 this year and I weigh 185 pounds, perhaps still a little bit too heavy, but certainly in a much better shape than back in 2001 when everything started.

What did it cost me? Apart from a few workout machines I bought at home – nothing. I just made my health and my body a high priority and I had the discipline to keep it like that. I feel my day is lost if I don’t start with my workout.

Regards, Wil


Hi Laura,

Keeping active is both a priority and a challenge. You see, I work in a salon and I write for industry publications. Both of these keep me seated most of the time. As a manicurist and a writer, I have to get up and move to stay healthy, but when you are busy it is hard to do. My solution is to almost always be training for my next marathon or half marathon event. It's like an accountability partner. You can't fake training on race day! Clients are always asking about my next event (most of which I do for charity) and how training is going. No, I'm not fast, and I won't win the purse, but I do get a finishers medal and the healthy rewards that go with training for the event.

So far, I have finished 5 marathons and countless half marathons. I even had the opportunity to take my mom to Ireland to cheer for me. The best part is it doesn't take much time and only costs a pair of shoes. I run/walk several days a week for less than and hour and do one training day as a super long run/walk. Thanks for listening, and thanks for the newsletter. - Erin


I vary my exercise routine. 2 days per week I work several muscle groups with weights focusing on dumbbell exercises to build strength and muscle mass. The other days I will vary between walking on a treadmill, doing a 1 hour bootcamp or spinning class at the local YMCA to focus on cardiovascular activity. I also use the steamroom 6 days per week to sweat out the toxins and I drink about 100 ounces of water per day. Additionally, I focus on a balance of proteins with high quality carbohydrates (fruits and vegetables). I have been following this routine most of the last year and it has been tremendous as I have lost over 30 lbs and am enjoying feeling strong again. I'm 52 and going strong. My best to you! - Joe


Hi Laura, I'm thinking about a response to your question about exercise -- it's definitely a top priority for me everyday. It always has been. At least as long as I can remember. My bedroom door opened on to the swimming pool in the house where I grew up in Manhattan Beach. I rolled out of bed, opened the door and swam almost every morning...in a kidney shaped pool.....maybe that helped me adapt to open water swimming. xxo m


Hi Laura, I dance at home or walk almost every night. I am going hiking this Saturday. I try to stay active. Margo

Four Steps to Being Inspired to Exercise

Our bodies are magnificent instruments. Almost without any effort they operate day after day, year after year. They digest, they move, they smell, they feel and they breath. The air we breath. There is nothing in life as simple and as profound as the air we breath. The average person could probably live four to six weeks without food and an average of ten days without water. But air. Air is a completely different story.

We must replenish our air supply millions of times a day. Every breath is the food of life. It is how our cells renew themselves. In fact, oxygen is even a key ingredient in weight loss. Our bodies simply cannot metabolize fat without oxygen and water. It is no accident that our magical bodies, when asked to work harder, demand more oxygen. Energy is metabolized when we work out, and it needs oxygen for the process to work. The more we move, the more air we need. But how do we find the inspiration to ask our bodies to work harder to begin with? That’s the million-dollar question.

For some of us, exercise is a love affair, but for others, it is a chore, or not part of our lives at all.
The very word inspire, broken down to its Latin roots, means to give breath. So finding a team of supporters to inspire us, as we make a renewed effort toward every-day movement and self-care is irreplaceable. It can mean the difference between success and failure as we try to create a life of physical activity and health. Why not build your own team of supporters? A small team. Your personal team can include friends, coworkers, relatives, a trainer at the gym – anybody can be part of the group that in-spires you to claim your right to be healthy and live longer. Next, build a plan around that team.

Try following this four-step recipe for your new life:

Step 1. Invite the RIGHT people to be on your team. Remember, this is the team to INSPIRE you. Don’t ask anyone to join who has a history of criticizing or demeaning you. For this effort to work you will want to choose upbeat, motivated team members who you genuinely enjoy spending time with. Consider inviting those friends you love, but rarely have free time to see.

Step 2. Pick a specific day of the week to MOVE with each member of the team. By setting up these four “inspired movement” sessions, you will not only feed your body, but your soul with thank you too. FOUR days a week, you will have one hour with someone you enjoy and feel encouraged by. Maybe Monday morning is a friend from the gym, and Wednesday evening is your spouse. By setting specific times, you become accountable not only to yourself, but also to your teammate.

Step 3. Plan activities that you enjoy. This sounds simple, but with a friend, exercise becomes playtime again! Saturday speed walks and Thursday racketball. Maybe one of your team members loves Yoga or swimming. It doesn’t matter what you do, just be inspired and get MOVING.

Step 4. Remember that breathing isn’t just about exercise. Pick a friend to really talk to. Talk about WHY you overate, your fears, your hopes for your new body. BREATH and open up to someone. Seek their inspired responses. Conspire with them to make NEW plans for your new life.

The Today Show recently did several shows on life expectancy that looked specifically at men and women living past NINETY years old, who were still healthy. Dr. Thomas Perls, Director of the New England centenarian study stated clearly that part of how long we live is based solely on LIFESTYLE CHOICES. (You can see how your own choices effect your lifespan at www.eons.com.) He stated that exercise is HUGE to a healthy life and to subtract at least FIVE years due to a lack of exercise. He went on to share that the three legs of a long life are: eating healthy, staying active, being social.

So creating a supportive, spirited support team not only turns exercise into fun, friend-filled breaks in your week, it also gives you more years to spend with those friends! This encouragement can truly help you to make the lifestyle changes necessary to live the good life and turn being physically fit into something you look forward to.

The truth is that we simply cannot have healthy bodies without consistent exercise and movement. Our hearts WANT to work. Why not start by choosing your team. You will be amazed at the support, friendship and intimacy you will discover by asking those four people to help you on your new road to health and wellness.

To your inspired life! Laura Fenamore
Body Image Mastery Mentor
www.LauraFenamore.com

The Prioritization of Self – Every-Day Exercise

Creating global sustainability has become, thankfully, far more than a buzz word. As a people, we are, thankfully, concerned with being respectful of our beautiful, generous home, the planet Earth. After all, without an Earth, where would we live? Sounds simple, right? How ironic that so many of us overlook our more personal home, our own bodies. We must ask ourselves the same simple question: Without a body, where would we live?

Every day, we prioritize everyone and everything before we “treat” ourselves to a good walk or an aerobics class. We act as though movement is a luxury to be earned after our work is finished and the dishes are put away. All week long, we drive our kids from one activity to another, while we literally sit behind the wheel of the car, growing our bodies bigger and bigger, and our personal sustainability more and more unlikely.

My life call, and my occupation, are tied to body image, but that doesn’t necessarily make hitting the gym any easier. Like everyone, my schedule is jam packed. I have clients I mentor, courses I teach, books and articles to write – every single day – not to mention friends, family, and public speaking engagements. But like a loving parent, I cannot speak to my clients endlessly about the prioritization of self and the importance of exercise without living those values. Hypocrisy does not sit well with me.

But what are we to do differently? The to do list is endless, and day after day, so many truly important things just don’t seem to happen. Free time feels more like an oxymoron than a goal.

The simple and encouraging reality though is that the time you invest in caring for yourself, especially exercise, not only comes back to you at the end (exponentially, in fact), but it frees you from countless sorrowful hours you would have spent on illness and pure exhaustion from being inactive and overweight.

Your choice is literally the gym or the doctor.

Today, love yourself so much that you choose personal sustainability, and stay HERE, alive and thriving for many years to come.

Make every-day exercise your NUMBER ONE priority. CHOOSE to stick around long enough to do that “to do” list. In fact, why not add a few things to it.


Encouragingly yours,
Laura Fenamore
CPCC and Body Image Mastery Mentor
www.LauraFenamore.com

Waves of Doubt

Probably the hardest thing that we deal with in our lives is doubt. Oh sure, we go through enormously difficult situations – we lose jobs, we lose loved ones, we get sick, the list of hardships can be mind boggling.

But doubt is probably the most difficult hardship to conquer. It can literally come from nowhere and can feel like the snake in the garden, winding itself sneakily through our joys and our confidences. It can attach itself to our best relationships and undermine our finest moments.

Before his death, Socrates once described pleasure and pain as two sides of the same coin, saying that one could hardly live without the other. I wonder if we too easily cast doubt into the same pot as pain and disregard its enormous value to us as human beings. If we can accept doubt as part of our life process of faith, we can see that they are literally the yin and yang of one thing, rather than being at odds with one another.

Doubt and Faith. I suppose we much too easily believe that the opposite of love is hate or apathy. When in truth, the thing at odds with deep love is that undermining thread of doubt. Like the Buddha says though, life is suffering, and if we can accept that it is so, we can simply ride the wave of life and love each part, each experience, even the painful ones. They are part of our human adventure, and they make the beautiful all the more rich. And the wisdom and compassion that is born out of pain is immeasurable. So how can it be bad?

The waves of doubt in our love stories is no different. They are natural, they are human. We have not caused them, nor can we prevent them. But if we accept that this is as it should be, we can ride them. We can ride the ups and downs of our deep loves and know that they are beautiful and strong. The doubt is not bad.

The truest loves, in fact, are simply not the waves. They are the ocean. So deep and so strong that the tossing waves are only on the surface. Underneath, they are flowing, beautiful currents.

As human beings those waves of doubt will run through everything worth loving. They will run through our relationships, they will run through our efforts to love ourselves. They will ripple from our birth to our death, and even have the audacity to touch our experience with the Great Creator. We will doubt It’s love for us and our own right to exist. We will wonder what this life IS.

If we are able, however, to ride those waves with some expertise, the depth of love is always there to enfold us. This is the yin and yang of love. IF we allow it, we will grow to know that it cannot exist except with a love worth doubting. We are supposed to question the things of worth. We are literally born to question life itself.

Love is the one thing that joins us. It leaps tall prejudice in a single bound. It conquers speeding apathy with a word. It breaks all threads of division – race, religion, nationality, sexuality – LOVE is the great bond rising above all of those things. So bring on the doubt. I will know you, doubt, by your fruit, and for that reason, I will welcome you.


To your health, Laura Fenamore, CPCC, Body Image Mastery Mentor
http://www.blogger.com/Local%20Settings/Temporary%20Internet%20Files/Content.IE5/BITMSETR/www.LauraFenamore.com

I LOVE MY BREASTS

In case you haven’t heard, October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. TODAY, before you do anything else, go to http://www.armyofwomen.org and register to support the mission to fight breast cancer. I am happy to support Dr. Susan Love who is up to great stuff with finding a cure for the problem.

I love my breasts! I can say that with pride today.

That wasn’t always the case though.
I can honestly say I hated my breasts for many years.
I hated them. And I have come full circle. I love them now.

When I was fat, they were huge and saggy. I did not get the perky breasts that my other sisters got. I got the saggy ones, and I was pissed off about that. Later, when I released my excess weight, (100 lbs. at age 25), I had smaller and saggier breasts. Along with the weight, I lost the elasticity in my breasts. I used to make my breasts the villains -- wrong for being saggy, wrong for not being perfect.

10 years ago I went to a doctor due to an abnormal mammogram. With a history of cancer in my family, that is nothing to take lightly. Courageously, I opened myself up to this doctor for her support and her strength regarding my health, instead she took that opportunity to say that I was a “great candidate” for breast implants. She may as well have said, “Laura, your breasts are an embarrassment to society.” While those were not her words, that was definitely her message.

I remember leaving her office in shock, crying. It took me a long time to see that my reaction was normal. Doctors have a challenging job, but they are not taught compassion and love in med school. I have done a lot of healing around the thoughtlessness of this doctor, and am gifted to actually laugh about her words now. As I write this, I feel guided to send her this post so she might realize that the impact of her words is not necessarily only skin deep.

I know now that this doctor was a catalyst for me to come to peace with my gorgeous breasts. Her criticism put me in touch with my own disapproval and self hatred of that part of my body. In forgiving her, I was able to forgive myself. So this doctor was an angel in disguise. That is how I came full circle. Having two healthy breasts is a privilege! Today I can say I love my beautiful saggy breasts. Every time I see that cartoon with the woman with saggy breasts (Sylvia), I laugh and say, someone's got to have them and I love mine. I love my breasts and thank them everyday for being healthy. Visit www.cartoonstock.com/directory/s/sag.asp for a great laugh!

The area I live in, Marin County, has one of the highest rates of breast cancer in California and in the country. I often see women in the grocery stores and at the gym with kerchiefs covering their heads and I silently say a prayer, blessing them with love and praying for health and restoration to them. In an instant it puts any old remnants of my old saggy breast conversation into perspective. To those of us who have had a life long history of healthy breasts, stay grateful. To those of you women reading this who are suffering or have suffered from breast cancer, I hold you in love and pray for total health and peace and restoration to you and your body.

Breasts represent nurturing and nourishment. I want you to nurture and nourish your health mentally, physically and spiritually. You need it, your sisters need it, your daughters need it and mother earth needs it. Here is my October wish for you: That you can stand proud and naked in front of yourself in the mirror and shout out, I am perfect just the way I am and my breasts are beautiful exactly as they are.

To your health and beauty, Laura Fenamore, Body Image Mastery Mentor
www.LauraFenamore.com