The Official Blog of Tara Marie Segundo, M.A.
My 168 Hours Rule® states that it’s not the hours that you’re formally exercising that are the most significant in your life when it comes to staying lean and fit. The most significant hours are those waking hours when you’re not engaged in formal exercise. These hours far outweigh those that you are working out and will either support or destroy your efforts to stay in good shape.
People who are in the gym the most are not the most fit. This is a fact. There are people who work very hard in the gym or otherwise training, and they do it 4 or 5 times per week for an hour or more. However, these people are not necessarily the leanest and most conditioned.
We are all busy, but we also all have the same 168 hours in a week. My formula states that you have to subtract the average hours you sleep in one week and the average hours you exercise one week to determine your “golden number.”
This golden number represents the remaining waking hours of the week during which you can chose to move as much as possible and turn everyday into an athletic event, or sit around and create what science calls, lazy biology.
Most of the ASK TARA MARIE emails I receive are from people with whom I have never worked. I recently got an email from a client who I have trained off and on for several years. We stopped meeting in mid-December because he said that the end of the year is busy and we would pick up again in January. When I didn’t hear from him by mid-month I emailed, and he said he was awaiting lab results from his doctor and would be in touch…I never heard back. Three weeks later, I emailed him again and got a reply, which I posted below along with my advice. If it seems that my words are harsh, please understand that the situation had reached a critical point, and hand-holding is not what he needed. Someone had to tell him the truth without mincing words because at that point, his life was at stake. We often take our health for granted until the first stroke or heart attack, and this is foolish disrespect of the human body.
Here is Sam’s letter:
Many of the guests on my radio show, TARA MARIE LIVE are authors, and prepping for each show has given me an opportunity to read a plethora of great books. This week my guest is the author of a fantastic little book that provides no-nonsense, practical tips to burn off the excess body fat that has plagued you for years. This 103-page gem is called, FIRE UP YOUR FAT BURN, and its author is Dr. Lori Shemek. This is the perfect book to toss in your bag or briefcase, and devour a few pages every chance you get. It’s an easy read and chock-full of information written in terms that everyone can understand. She explains why inflammation in your body is a key reason that you’re over fat and suffer with other diseases–and she tells you how to reduce inflammation and optimize your health. We have been led to believe that it’s a “calories-in, calories-out” equation, but the truth is, a calorie is not a calorie when it comes to their expression in our bodies. As I was reading this book I kept thinking that rather than, FIRE UP YOUR FAT BURN, the book should be called, COMMON SENSE…as it simply is this. Dr. Shemek gets a gold star for this one!
Very rarely do I recommend specific weight-loss programs but this is one of those rare instances where a program really deserves an honorable mention.
It’s a 20-week, weight-loss education course called Lifestyle180. It was developed and is led by my good friend and colleague, David Greenwalt—a Certified Wellness Coach. It’s a really solid course that yields amazing results for participants–and one extra bonus is that you can win your share of $18,000 cash prizes awarded to the top finishers.
I’ve done several interviews with David on my radio show and he really is a wellness and weight-loss expert. He specializes in compulsive eating and the hard cases or the “weight-fighters,” as he calls them. These are people who have tried and failed for more than a year and most often for several years. Sound familiar? It’s frustrating, I know.
David says it doesn’t matter if you have 10 pounds or 200 to lose. Trying time and time again without success depletes your self-esteem. If this describes you then I strongly recommend you give Lifestyle180 chance.
David’s focus is on permanent weight-loss. His company slogan is “Evidence-based lifestyle-education for permanent weight-control.”
It’s common to feel like a failure for not having your weight under control. It’s supposed to be easy, but it’s not. It’s becoming impossible for many–unless they have what my good friend David Greenwalt offers–and that’s a proven weight-loss education course that has students losing as much as 70 pounds in 20 short weeks!
I wouldn’t share this with you if I didn’t know David and hadn’t personally taken the time to review the program. I’ve known David for more than five years and he is the REAL DEAL. It’s time we all move beyond dieting and focus on PERMANENT weight-loss. That’s exactly what David Greenwalt focuses on with his Lifestyle180 program.
I was recently asked to write an article for ExpertBeacon.com about long term weight loss and more specifically, some of the behaviors and attitudes we must implement to have long term success managing our weight. Click here to read, “Long Term Weight Loss Requires Having Confidence and Avoiding Weight Cycling.”
Enjoy! Tara Marie
TARA MARIE’S TOP TEN WAYS TO SET YOURSELF UP FOR SUCCESS!
FIVE: Understand the power of cumulative exercise.
The single most common excuse that people give for not exercising is lack of time. I get it. I know what it’s like to have so much to do that you don’t even know where to begin. As my life has gotten more hectic, I have also had to get more creative.
At one point, I would not go to the gym at all if I didn’t have time for my “full” workout. My definition of a full workout meant time to do cardio, weights, and a full stretch at the end. Back in those days, I could kill an easy two and a half hours, five times a week doing my “full” workout. The days that I can devote that kind of time to the gym are long gone, but I’ve adapted.
The truth is, life is hard and life is always changing. We go through periods that are more challenging than others, and hopefully as things flow, they will also ebb. It is during the busy times that you must be extra diligent about maintaining some semblance of a routine or risk getting so out of the habit of exercising that you wake up a year and a half later wondering when the extra twenty-five pounds accumulated on your back side.
I am offering a FREE teleseminar for people struggling with binge eating. It will be based on my blog, Battle Binge Eating with R.A.G.E.®
We will be discussing what binge eating is, what it is not, and how to connect the behavior to your emotions so you can bring self-awareness and self-control to any situation. Please join me for this event and pass this information along to anyone who would benefit from it!
Battle Binge Eating with R.A.G.E.®
Date: Tuesday, November 27
Time: 8 PM Eastern Time
Conference Line: 805-399-1000
Access Code: 534333
I’ll meet you there!
Happy Thanksgiving, Tara Marie
I have had the great pleasure of working with a wide variety of clients, including young athletic types, moms and dads just trying to stay fit, and often, people that struggle greatly with eating issues that plague so many of us. As I have said before, I have suffered with my share of problems regarding body image and compulsive behaviors around eating and exercise.
One of my lifelong struggles has been with binge eating. I was finally able to conquer my compulsion to binge, and I now teach my clients to do the same using a system that I devised that brings awareness to the problem and helps the client connect the undesirable behavior to its triggers—and offers an alternative means of dealing with the stressors of life.
Binge eating is a coping mechanism used by millions of people, and at its best, it serves as an ineffective way of assuaging unpleasant emotions and temporarily distracting us from our feelings. At its worst, it compounds every problem with which we suffer and gives us one more thing to worry about when the binge is over. Often, binge eating becomes a form of self-punishment. Binge eaters hate themselves for not being able to control their own behavior around food.
I know EXACTLY what it feels like to be obsessed with an irrational urge to eat to the point of being physically sick. I understand the shame involved and the need for secrecy. I have experienced the isolation, and it is a horrible way to live.
If you suffer with binge eating, it is of primary importance that you understand that it has NOTHING to do with food. You don’t want the FOOD, but rather the FEELING that the food gives you. In fact, as long as you continue to believe that your problem is food, you have little hope of overcoming the behavior. Food is never a PROBLEM, nor is it ever a SOLUTION.
When we binge, we reach for foods like muffins, pies, cakes, bread, uncooked cookie dough, frosting, chocolate, ice cream, chips, crackers, pizza, etc. These foods literally change your brain chemistry by way of increasing serotonin and other neurotransmitters and calming anxiety. I have never heard of someone bingeing on steamed broccoli and celery stalks.
We binge for the same reason that people smoke one cigarette after another, take drugs, or drink to excess—to cope with feelings that are uncomfortable or in some cases, we want to totally numb our pain. It’s not very different from giving a baby a pacifier, as it creates instant calm.
Anyone who has ever binged can attest to the fact that the good feelings are fleeting. Once the binge is over, guilt, shame, disgust, self-loathing, and feelings of worthlessness overwhelm an already-troubled person.
Conquering binge eating IS possible, if you are willing to do the hard work to learn another way of living and coping in an increasingly stressful world…and all you need is R.A.G.E.®.
TARA MARIE’S TOP TEN WAYS TO SET YOURSELF UP FOR SUCCESS!
FOUR: Give yourself a break.
I always get nervous when people describe their weekly exercise routine as though it is set in stone: “I do chest and triceps on Mondays, half of legs on Tuesdays, I rest on Wednesdays, do back and biceps on Thursdays, the other half of legs on Fridays, and shoulders on Saturdays. I also do abdominal training on Tuesdays and Fridays and cardio for exactly 45 minutes on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Sundays.”
While I admire their commitment, I wonder how they handle it when life gets in the way. I used to be very rigid with respect to my exercise routine—so much so that if I had planned to do a certain workout on any given day and I ran late or I could not be at the gym to perform my predetermined routine, I would skip the workout altogether. This is faulty thinking and I always felt frustrated because life rarely goes as planned (at least mine does not.)
I have learned two lessons that have served me well, both in the gym and in other areas of my life: remain flexible at all times and do the best you can with the circumstances you are given.
