Do you have a list of home projects to tackle, but keep avoiding?  My list of home improvement projects keep piling up.  As I’ve been redesigning how to balance work, family, health, and home, one of my goals has been to incorporate them into one as often as possible.   This week, with the wonderful promise of spring and warm weather, the kids, Grams and I ventured out to the yard to clean up, start a new shade garden, and roller skate/blade (well, the kids anyway).

What did we do for this workout?

1.  The night before I involved the children in picking a shade garden plan that would fit the space and we dug out their roller skates and roller blades.  I love Better Homes and Garden’s online plans.  When it comes to putting plants together and knowing which ones work in what conditions, I’m pretty hopeless.

2.  In the morning, we went to Home Depot and picked out everything we could find:  lawn seed, plant fertilizer, compost, mulch and plants that were part of the plan (we could only find 1).  Grabbing and lifting the bags are  a great functional training exercise, too!

3.  The Garden Preparation.  Here’s where the bulk of the workout resides.  The kids helped rack and bag up leaves.  My focus was on breaking the ground and mixing the fertilizer/compost.  After twenty minutes of solid garden preparation, I was working  up a great sweat.  The kids, in the meantime, were skating up and down our sidewalks (I love all the sidewalks in our back yard).

4.  The First Planting.  We planted our 3 little plants, washed down the side walk, watered, and ordered the rest of our plants online.  In a couple of weeks, we’ll get to complete this little corner with our arrivals, add a few outdoor pieces of furniture and be ready to enjoy the colors of spring!

Next week,  the plan is to tackle the garage which will be quite the project.

 What home improvement projects have you been putting off that can also serve as a great workout?

In the last week, I’ve been trying out the Insanity Workouts.  It’s always disheartening to start a full blown workout when all exercises up to this point had been sporadic and light.

I finished up the 4th workout today with a lot of stops and resting, but the victory is in making it through the whole workout.  I look forward to seeing progress over the next few week and not feeling as exhausted after each workout.

The nice thing about the Insanity workouts is that they don’t require any gear.  The intensity is dependent on your level of fitness, so it is a useful when out of shape or in prime condition.

Have you been stuck in a rut and not sure what to do to get out of it?  With the coming spring weather, what are your plans for trying something new for your body?

Have you ever found yourself in a situation in which you just had to check out?  Remove yourself from everything that you knew and face a completely different world?

I had no idea that I had set aside Go Workout Mom for two years!  I had every intention of starting back up and getting right into the great discussions about Wellness Coaching and healthy living with children.

Today, I am starting small.  I have found that I miss the community of blogging and my body has as well.  When I’m not sharing tips, ideas and ways to be healthy, move and live, I have found myself moving less, eating less mindfully, and less in touch with the support base that keeps us all going.

Here’s the short version as to why I checked out of maintaining Go Workout Mom.

• We moved from Nashville where I restarted a career.  I had a lot to learn and still do.  The days are long (10-13 hours) five days a week.
• We’ve placed the children in school.
• Ryan got a new job.  He’s away from home for 5 to 6 months except for the weekends.

We shifted from a one-parent working, homeschooling, close to many family and friends environment to Now.  It’s a natural shift in living, but one that required that I check out.

I finally feel settled enough to reconnect through Go Workout Mom–these decisions were not easy and filled with frustration for some time.  I’m excited to rekindle this hobbie and develop Go Workout Mom through a working mother’s eyes.  It’s amazing and a blessing to have experienced being Stay-At-Home Mom, Entrepreneur Mom, and now, Working Mom.  All of the experiences have come with their own challenges and great moments.

Of course, I see that I have lots of cleaning up to do on the blog both behind the scenes and on the screen.  Please be patient as I rediscover the newest plugins and refresh the site!

Thank you for all of you that have revisited and stayed with Go Workout Mom.  Your support is wonderful.

Sincerely,

Cindy

I am happy to announce that my partner and I, Fitness Link, are now providing Fitness, Metabolic and Wellness Coaching services beyond the local Nashville area!

With our Valentine’s Day Partner Package (a 3 month Lifestyle Journey) we are able to provide you with personal services via phone and email. What you receive:

• 12 weeks personalized exercise programs
• Metabolic Typing Food Plan/list Program
• Individual Wellness Coaching w/ bi-weekly check-ins

For details, visit our Fitness Link Blog:

Valentine’s Day Partner Package

Have you worked with a Wellness Coach?

Wellness coaches are trained to help clients develop and implement personal wellness plans by:

• Accepting and meeting us where we are today
• Asking us to take charge
• Guiding us in doing the mindful thinking and doing work that builds confidence
• Helping us define a higher purpose for wellness and uncover our natural impulse to be well
• Helping us tap into our innate fighting spirit
• Addressing mental and physical health together
• Helping us draw a personal wellness blueprint
• Helping us set realistic goals; small victories lay the foundation for self-efficacy
• Harnessing the strengths we need to overcome our obstacles
• Helping us view obstacles as opportunities to learn and grow
• Helping us build a support team
• Inspiring and challenging us to go beyond what we would do alone

Wellness coaches use positive coaching psychology, which integrates more than fifteen other fields. Coaching psychology, in part, is the relational vehicle for implementing the tenets of positive psychology, a field focused on the scientific study of happiness and well-being.

I am currently working to become a Wellness Coach. As part of the certification and growth process, I am working with practice clients. As a practice client, you receive my services for free over the course of three months. If you are excited about achieving health, fitness and wellness goals, then enter with a comment below by January 15th. There will be two winners.

I am striving to provide services that answer to your complete well-being. I believe that you will enjoy and flourish from this approach to unleash your vision and confidence in yourself. Feel free to email questions or ask for further details.

The Wellness Coaching Program

1. Coaching sessions are free and conducted by phone. We will determine a regular time that fits your schedule.
2. Complete an online Well-Being Assessment prior to the first coaching session.
3. An initial coaching session for 75-90 minutes to develop your Wellness Vision, 3 month goals, and first set of weekly goals
4. We will conduct 30-45 minute weekly sessions for three months

Beware of limiting labels. Were you always “the smart one”? Or “the pretty one”, “the shy one”, “the athlete” or “the geek”? It’s difficult to escape childhood without being given a label. The labels may have been flattering or they may have been demeaning. In either case, chances are you lived up to the label you were given.

Think about it. Let’s say you were “the funny one.” The attention and praise you were showered with whenever you did something funny felt great, so you kept at it in order to receive that praise. But what happened when you wanted to be intelligent and serious? Chances are you didn’t take the risk. Venturing into the unknown and risking criticism or falling short of your goal wasn’t worth losing your tried and true role as the entertainer.

Even though a label may be flattering, it’s limiting because it can prevent you from stepping out of the comfort zone of how you’re being viewed and received. We fail to strive beyond our labels. Without the label, all areas are fair game as there are no expectations of how you should behave.

People love to categorize people, places and things. It is easier for many of us to organize and compartmentalize things when we know what category everything belongs in. If you grew up in a household with siblings, maybe each of you had your own label, which served as a way to easily describe you. “The smart one”, “the pretty one”, and “the baby” may have been descriptors that helped your parents easily introduce you to their friends, but these labels could also have held you back.

What about negative labels that we may have been given, or labels we may have interpreted to be negative? If it was said enough times, we probably just accepted it to be true. Unfortunately, this is how our belief systems are formed. Someone we trust (or a group, organization, society, etc.) says the same thing with conviction over and over again. Eventually we buy into it and it becomes part of our beliefs.

But what if that person or group that we trust was also on the receiving end of some limiting beliefs? As a result, they may be misinformed, may not know any better, and they unknowingly pass that damage along to you. Because of your trust and belief in that authority figure, you accepted the label (good or bad) that they placed on you.

For example, let’s say you had a parent who always called you “lazy”. Maybe they were trying to motivate you to be another way or maybe they thought it was an accurate description of how you behaved. In either case, you grew up thinking, “if they said it all those times, it must be true.” So when opportunities came up, you heard that ongoing tape in your head – “you’re lazy” – and figured that whatever was involved may take too much effort for you because you are just too lazy.

Here’s the good news – you can get rid of all of these limiting beliefs once you identify them, evaluate them and decide to discard them. Just as I keep saying, it’s our job to change what we don’t like. As I’ve also said, it may not be easy, but it’s so worth it.

Can you think of some instances where your labels stand in the way of the happy, healthy version of yourself that you want to be? Are you “the fun one” and that makes it difficult for you to say no to indulging at parties? Are you “the clumsy one” and that makes it difficult for you to try a new exercise routine?

What if you could throw away the old labels that aren’t contributing to your success and pick new ones that support your goals? What if you decided you were “the adventurous one”? Or “the healthy one”? Or “the happy one”? What would that version of you be able to do?

Debi Silber, MS, RD, WHC The Mojo Coach™ is a Registered Dietitian with a Master’s degree in Nutrition Science. She’s a Certified Personal Trainer, Whole Health Coach, Lifestyle Expert – just for moms, speaker and the author of The Lifestyle Fitness Program: A Six Part Plan So Every Mom Can Look, Feel and Live Her Best and From Mom To Wow: Your Ultimate Body, Mind and Life Makeover Guide. Debi’s been branded The Mojo Coach™ because for nearly 20 years she’s inspired and empowered overweight, overwhelmed and unfit moms to “get their mojo back” through gradual, lifestyle change. Sign up for a free report, 52 weeks of weekly tips and a subscription to Debi’s newsletter, Mojo Moments, at www.TheMojoCoach.com.