Tag Archives: exercise

75 Hard Challenge, Round 2!

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This is Day 9 of my second round of the #75HardChallenge. I finished the first round last August. If you haven’t heard of it, the challenge was created by @andyfrieslla.

Why I chose to do #75Hard the first time: I had a truly awful week in real estate. 75 Hard is a mental toughness challenge and I decided at that point, I needed some mental toughness. On Day 63 of the first round, I was skewered by a client who also used to be a friend and it devastate me. No mental toughness. But what I did get was radical clarity! The challenge was worth every single minute I devoted to it.

Why I chose to do a second round: I still want mental toughness! LOL! I’m still shooting for the mental toughness aspect the challenge should bring. Additionally, I feel like following the challenge is making me a better person day by day.

Why I love 75 Hard: It’s scalable! That means ANYONE can do it. If you notice in my video, I can’t do push-ups off the floor yet. Yet! So I do them off of the rail and they are tough! But one day, they won’t be tough and I’ll be doing them off the floor. I aspire to this.

At the age of 61,I’m just getting started. There are so many things I still want to do and 75 Hard will be the foundation to those things. Have you done 75 Hard? If not, when are you starting?

E is for Exercise

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I do a lot of exercise. Believe it or not, I even like it! I’ve been a walker for a lot of years. For most of my walking miles, David has been with me and I think of it as our alone time where it’s just us and no distractions. But even when David hasn’t been home, I still walk. 

walk

I was waiting to lose down to a certain weight to start running again. I used to run a lot in the early 1990s but felt like I was just too heavy to run now even though my walks were getting faster and faster and I had friends on the runkeeper app encouraging me to just run.

When we moved here, I left the scale behind. Because I had no idea if I was at the magical number that would allow me to begin running, I just started running. And it was hard. No, it was HARD. 😀 I ran quite a lot of distance back in the day and I just don’t remember it being so hard back then. Of course I was 25 years younger so that could’ve had something to do with it. But I persevered telling myself, “pretty soon, this will be your warm up”.

run

Now, I’m not there yet but I have been able to to gradually increase my mileage and I’m now up to two miles a day. Best of all, I’m getting air all the way down to the bottom of my lungs the whole run. Which is great since I like to breathe.

And cycling. How I love that. I’ve been doing that twice a week since I got my bike. I go a little further each time and it’s just fun. 

Every day living here in Downtown San Jose, involves a lot of exercise. Unless I have the dog or  something really heavy, I always take the stairs. Our apartment is on the third floor and the garage is even one floor further down. I walk every where downtown. Library, grocery store, post office, dinner. It’s great. I’ve been more active here than I have been in a lot of years.

And I like it. I really do. I love feeling strong when I’m walking down the street. I love feeling accomplished when I get done with a run or bike ride. I know this is good for my health but it’s also good for my mind. I am a rare person who doesn’t wear headphones while exercising. I have deep discussions with my inner self and I come to a lot of conclusions, make a lot of plans this way.

If you don’t exercise every day let me encourage you to give it a try. Even just a ten minute walk to start is better than nothing at all. Then work your way up little by little until you are enjoying more physical and mental well being. You’ll be glad you did! 😀

Book Review: Healthy Joints for Life

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Healthy Joints for Life: An Orthopedic Surgeon's Proven Plan to Reduce Pain and Inflammation, Avoid Surgery and Get Moving AgainHealthy Joints for Life: An Orthopedic Surgeon’s Proven Plan to Reduce Pain and Inflammation, Avoid Surgery and Get Moving Again by Richard Diana
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a terrific book that confirms what I’ve learned on my own about how eating can impact your joints. I love the fact that it addresses the problem with a solid plan of attack instead of just putting a bandaid over joint inflammation with a pill.

The book is chock full of scientific information which is easy to understand and vital to complete understanding. The stories of actual patients trials, errors and successes are helpful and encouraging. As a sports fan, I also loved the sports stories.

Included is an eight week program that helps you to incorporate the program laid out in the book, step by step.

If you suffer from joint pain and want to live healthy, I highly recommend this book!

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Eat Move Sleep

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Eat Move Sleep: Why Small Choices Make a Big DifferenceEat Move Sleep: Why Small Choices Make a Big Difference by Tom Rath

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Eat Move Sleep is a great little book full of practical health advice. Written by a man who has every reason to eat and live healthfully, each chapter ends with three action items you can put into practice immediately. There are thirty chapters so by the end of a month, you will be practicing a lot better lifestyle habits.

One of the most powerful statements in the book is that sugar is the new tobacco. I believe this! Sugar is in all of our food even in places you wouldn’t think to look for it. I believe that if people get the sugar out of their diets, they will be taking a huge step towards good health.

I highly recommend this book if you want to head into a more healthful way of living. It’s great advice! 🙂

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PSA – Brought to you by the letters D, P, and R

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I’ve started doing HIIT – high intensity interval training. I’ve read about it for a really long time and finally decided it was the next frontier and it was time to go there.

Pathfinder Parkway

I like to run on the Pathfinder Parkway. It’s pretty and quiet and even though there are usually a lot of cars in the parking lot, you encounter people only rarely. I love it.

Monday was the first time I’ve been to the Pathfinder since returning to Bartlesville and it struck me how much dog poop is littering the path.

poop pile1

Today, there was a pile RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE of the path.

poop pile2

Now, they don’t call me Lauri Grace for nothing. I have a hard enough time running and not face planting without slip sliding off of my feet via a pile of dog poop.

Seriously, folks. Would you want to step in a pile of someone else’s dog poop while you’re trying to exercise in the beauty of nature? Would you want to step in a pile of your own dog’s poop?

Clean up after your pet

Here’s what we know, you and I: dogs poop.

For that reason, when you take your dog outside, you should be prepared.  Bring a bag to clean up after them.

It’s been made super easy to do this. You can get these cute little bone shaped plastic bag dispensers that you attach to your dog’s leash so they are always there. You can buy these at a pet store or – beauty – you can get them at the Dollar Tree for a mere dollar.

poop bag holder

And, dig this, you can get a three pack of replacement bag rolls also at the Dollar Tree for a tiny dollar.

After you pick up after your dog, as a responsible dog owner would, the City has even graciously placed a trash bin at the entrance of the path so you can make a deposit. Easy peasy.

bin

So c’mon friends and fellow Pathfinderites, let’s consider our fellow exercisers and save them from a stinky, broken experience.

Thank you.

This PSA brought to you by the letters D, P, and R. (Dog Pooping Responsibly)

Stop! In the name of health

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**Note: I do not intend to appear judgmental about anyone by writing this post. It’s strictly about me and what’s right for me.**

Yesterday, I was visiting with a friend who had just come from watching over a diabetic friend who had been having an insulin reaction. She told me that her friend was diagnosed as a diabetic at the age of eight and now, over 40 years later, this is just one of the challenges she has been confronted with in living with this disease. The concern in her eyes and voice was obvious.

While walking Rabi downtown this morning, as we always do, we saw an employee of Conoco-Phillips making her way in to work. This extraordinarily heavy woman was on one of those walker devices that also contains a seat.  She was sitting in the seat and moving her way up the sidewalk using her legs. She had to stop and rest after going a little way.

How are these two incidents related? They made me stop and pay attention.

David and I stopped eating flour and sugar regularly back in November of 2009. I had started to notice that including these items in my diet, made my joints hurt. First my knees, then my hips, then my hands. David noticed that his nose would get big and red.

When we stopped eating flour and sugar, I immediately felt better and David’s nose started looking normal. We both lost weight.

I’ve been working really hard these past few weeks trying to get everything thrown out and packed up. My diet has slid. When it’s 106 degrees and you’re loading a dumpster with garbage, a cold beer sure does taste good. There were times when I just wasn’t that hungry or didn’t want to fix something myself and I’d grab a sandwich out.

So on top of all of the over use stress on my body from the pure physicality of what I was doing, I also wasn’t fueling myself for optimal performance.

I started thinking about this last night hearing about my friend’s friend and again this a.m. when I saw the heavy woman on the walker. Now, I don’t know for sure why the woman this a.m. was so heavy she had to use that walker. But what I do know is that if I put myself in her shoes, I’m that heavy because I’ve eaten wrong and hurt my joints to a point where I’m severally overweight and unable to walk on my own. I don’t want to be that woman.

My friend’s friend has no options. She’s had to live with a lifelong diagnosis of diabetes and as much as she lives right, exercises, eats right, she still isn’t completely in control.

I AM in control. I only have to keep the sugar and flour out of my diet and I feel great, my weight decreases, and I sleep better. So why don’t I do this? Well, I am definitely more convinced than ever that I will be on top of it from now on.

I am going to be a grandma in March. I want to be able to get down on the floor and play with my grandkids.  I don’t want achy joints to be what stops me. 🙂