All Entries For motivation
The Slowest Loser has met his match: The Harshest Kitty.
One evening last month, our six-year-old daughter Annabelle ran into the house crying and shrieked: "There's a bear out there!"
Fortunately, the "bear" was actually a black cat. He meowed at us loudly, then scampered up the stairs, seemingly starved for food and affection. He rubbed against our legs, loved being petted, and jumped into my wife Tami's arms.
"This was definitely once a house cat," Tami said.
"I wonder where he came from," said Annabelle.
We put "Lost Cat" signs up in our neighborhood, fortunately to no avail. The cat won our hearts, and today, he's a Corwin.
We wanted to give him a name that referred to how he found us. I lobbied for Cici, standing for "Can I come in?" But we ultimately settled on "Blakely," an English name that means "from a dark meadow," which describes part of our backyard at night.
Little did I know that Blakely had an alter-ego – a nutrition expert known as The Harshest Kitty, pictured here plotting to eat my goldfish.
Posted 9/2/2010 5:28:00 PM By: Bruce Corwin : 206 comments
Friday night I made a whole-grain blueberry crisp with soft-serve banana "ice cream." I experimented with a slow-cooker version of my favorite Turkish lentil soup. (Still tweaking that one.) Saturday I made homemade salsa with tomatoes and peppers from my garden. Sunday, I used that homemade salsa in a variation on my black-bean and sweet potato casserole. I subbed thawed and chopped frozen broccoli for the sweet potatoes and a lemon-coriander brown rice for the quinoa (it's a recipe from the upcoming cookbook, so I can't share it just yet), then paired it with spicy and smoky scalloped sweet potatoes.
This weekend's cooking marathon coincided with some bad news: My grandfather suffered a significant heart attack and will need open-heart surgery this week to clear some blocked arteries. Although he's in good spirits, and the doctors say his prognosis is good, it's still a scary thing to experience. To make matters even harder, my grandparents live in Wyoming, so I can't just rush right there to be with him.
I am staying optimistic, sending as many positive thoughts as I can in his direction. I've called, I've written him a letter, and I've sent photos of my new house and recent travels for him to look at while in the hospital. Tonight I'm going to make a batch of my famous granola for him and my gramma. Needless to say, my mind has been preoccupied at times.
When I'm sad, when I'm stressed, when I'm pondering major life changes, I head to the kitchen. Caramelizing onions, roasting tomatoes, chopping carrots, sifting flour all help to center and ground me. For me, cooking is a form of meditation. From a jumble of disparate ingredients springs forth a cohesive dish that, if all goes as planned, highlights its parts and unites to form an even greater whole.
For as long as I can remember, I've coped with sorrows and stress with food. The difference is that these days, instead of eating said food to numb myself or depriving myself of it as a way to control my life, I cook the food--and then usually eat reasonable portions of it--as a way to process my emotions. Like yoga or running, cooking soothes me. It provides me with a way to nourish the bodies and souls of others and lifts my spirits.
Posted 8/31/2010 12:01:54 PM By: Stepfanie Romine : 82 comments
"What's So Funny About Peace, Love and Understanding?"
Written by Nick Lowe, this is the most poignant and chilling song title/lyric I know. It implies that the world is so out of whack and cynical that even suggesting that humans' noblest qualities could govern our world is a joke, and that anyone who makes such a suggestion is a New Age fruitcake.
True, it's a half-empty world view. The media gravitates to the negative. Billions of unreported acts of kindness are carried out every day worldwide, including on SparkPeople and The Slowest Loser SparkTeam, where everyone is mutually supportive. As author Max Ehrman wrote in his legendary 1927 self-help essay, Desiderata, "[T]he world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals; and everywhere life is full of heroism."
Still, history shows that most nations' borders were established by war, not consensus, peace, love or understanding.
Therefore, self-destruction of the human race is conceivable. This was part of my rationale when I pondered ditching my weight loss journey due to the potential Mayan Apocalypse of 2012. I confess that Poll: Should I Just Give Up on Weight Loss? was tongue in cheek, as I've signaled by calling this The Slowest Loser Summer Fun Apocalypse Series (today's post is the third of three parts). But I learned important lessons about the staying power of food substitutions and a healthier diet by posing the question:
Posted 8/26/2010 5:37:00 PM By: Bruce Corwin : 105 comments
By Beth Donovan (~INDYGIRL)
Sometimes the difference in whether you gain or lose is how you see yourself. Sports trainers often use visualization to help athletes meet their goals by simply by having them imagine or see themselves as winners. What if we all stopped looking at ourselves as dieters and looked at ourselves as fit people? Would we still be so depressed about our situations that we would eat that extra helping? Or would we have a little more bounce in our step and park a bit farther away from our destination? Would we train for a 5K? The possibilities are endless if we don’t limit ourselves with a label of “unfit.”
Yes, so maybe we really are not at peak fitness, or anywhere in the vicinity. I personally am disabled and have more than another 100 pounds to goal, although I’ve lost 132 pounds to date. Part of how I lost weight though, was thinking of what I could do. Sure, there are plenty of things I can’t do, but there are also plenty of things I can.
Take a good look at yourself in your mind and consider yourself fit. You are fit. You are fit to do something about your situation. You are no longer a dieter. You are fit to make your own healthy choices and, if you desire, you can make the occasional indulgent one. The ball is in your court. It’s time to pick it up and play.
Posted 8/26/2010 5:22:31 AM By: dailySpark Guest Blogger : 112 comments
By Kate Eakman
Imagine running four or five miles in the dark on a back country road. You ran six miles yesterday afternoon. And you still have another five or six miles to run later today.
You haven’t showered since early morning yesterday. You haven’t slept in a bed since the night before last and you won’t get to sleep in one for another day. Rest breaks are in a van filled with five other sweaty runners all doing the same thing you are doing.
Ice and water are your friends.
Exhaustion--well, exhaustion is your enemy.
You paid good money to do this.
And you are having the time of your life.
Welcome to Hood to Coast, a 197-mile relay race that begins at Mt Hood’s Timberline Lodge and ends at the Pacific Ocean in Seaside, Oregon. Every year 1000 teams of runners strap on their running shoes and prepare to participate in the Mother of All Relays. The runners take turns completing legs of four to seven miles, taking 14 to 36 hours to complete the course, one that tests physical and mental strength and stamina.
Posted 8/24/2010 6:03:13 AM By: dailySpark Guest Blogger : 119 comments
Editor's Note: By popular demand, our Behind the Scenes at SparkPeople feature has returned.
Name: Josh Knepfle
Position at SparkPeople: Chief Technology Officer
Age: 34
Family: My wife, Julie, and I have 4 kids: Joellen (7), Jacob (5), Janie (2) and Jonathan (7 months, above)
How long have you worked for SparkPeople? I started working at SparkPeople in October 2001, but I had worked with Chris previously at eBay and Up4Sale.
Tell us your proudest accomplishment at SparkPeople or a fun fact about your job: I’m most proud of the efficiency of our team in keeping the busiest diet and fitness site running well 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
How do you stay in shape? I like to take advantage of our small gym here at the office. I’m here before 7 a.m. most mornings, working out on our elliptical machine and recumbent bike before I start work. I also try to incorporate my kids into my workouts (taking them to the park for hikes, wrestling with them, having them sit on my back while I do pushups, etc).
What's your favorite food? I really love crab legs, and the raspberries, blackberries, and tomatoes from our garden taste so good right now, too.
What's your favorite indulgence? I have trouble turning down any chocolate, especially when it comes in a baked good. My mom’s brownies come to mind. But, I also love a really good fruit pie or cobbler, especially blueberry.
Posted 8/23/2010 11:02:48 AM By: dailySpark Guest Blogger : 171 comments
The head of public relations at an investment bank (who had a lot of explaining to do) once told me, "I've worked on Wall Street for nine years, and the only functioning emotion I have left is envy."
Last week, as I watched my fellow vacationers munch on pizza, ice cream cake and chicken cheese quesadillas while I made healthy food substitutions, I had two functioning emotions: jealousy and envy. So, as I explained last week in the inaugural Slowest Loser Summer Fun edition, I looked for a rationalization that would let me cancel my weight loss journey and eat as I pleased. I nominated the Mayan Apocalypse of 2012, explaining that the calendar of the ancient Mayan civilization in Latin America mysteriously ends on December 21, 2012. Many people interpret this to mean that that day will bring the end of the world. Others disagree.
I asked dailySpark readers whether I should adopt this apocalyptic scenario and use it as a reason to indiscriminately scarf down whatever I wish in the next 2+ years. So many people responded that I've decided to extend this topic into a three-part Slowest Loser Summer Fun Apocalypse series.
What did dailySpark readers tell me?
Posted 8/19/2010 5:00:00 PM By: Bruce Corwin : 157 comments
Confession: Last week, I was in a funk. I could blame the heat, some personal stress, a busy schedule, or a general sense of ennui, but truth be told, sometimes there is no concrete reason for a case of the blues or the mean reds.
Sometimes we just don't wanna eat our vegetables, put away the laundry, go for a run, eat a sensible dinner, mow the lawn, or roll out of bed on time. And then--boom--we suddenly do again.
When we're heading down a slippery slope, eating one too many macaroons after dinner, skipping a workout, or ordering a second glass of wine instead of the club soda you know you should, it doesn't take much to reverse your path.
I'm a Type A personality, a perfectionist, an overachiever. When I am less than my best, I tend to see that as failure, at least for a fleeting moment. I'm hard on myself.
This weekend was not the best for me. I spent most of Saturday on the couch after an allergic reaction to something containing cashews. (Actually, it was due to the Benedryl I took to combat the reaction that rendered me a dizzy, woozy, incomprehensible blob.) Sunday I felt hungover from the reaction, which left me feeling sort of blah.
Monday when I awoke, I decided I needed to make the most of my Monday to rebound and re-energize myself. And so, I made one healthy decision. Then I made another.
Posted 8/18/2010 5:07:07 PM By: Stepfanie Romine : 87 comments
Happy Anniversary, dailySpark. You've come a long way, baby, since those early posts back in mid-August 2008. I was a newbie to SparkPeople back then, just getting to know the sites and the wonderful employees and members here.
Since then, we've all grown--and shrunk together. Without all of you, we never could have grown into the well-respected healthy living blog we are today.
We've interviewed everyone from top weight-loss expert Dr. Martin Binks (one of our most popular interviews!) to Olympic swimmer Dara Torres, Hungry Girl Lisa Lillien to fitness gurus Denise Austin and Leslie Sansone.
We started with just five bloggers, but we've more than doubled. We have shared guest blog posts from fitness experts Chalene Johnson, the Fit Bottomed Girls, and David Kirsch. Sports nutrition expert Dave Ellis is a huge fan and contributor, and we've welcomed top healthy living bloggers and inspirational members. Those guest bloggers are constantly surprised by the sheer number of comments we get on each blog post--and how positive they are. Thank you for helping to set the dailySpark apart from the rest.
While SparkPeople is home to the tracking tools, educational articles, exercise demos, and community that allow each of us to be successful along our healthy living journey, the dailySpark is an outlet that allows the SparkPeople experts to show the human side of weight loss. Each of us is here at SparkPeople not only as an employee but as a person who has struggled with weight, body image, and self-esteem. We've been where you are and where you've been, and some of us are right there alongside you now. Regardless of where we are in our own weight-loss and healthy living journeys, we're always standing on the sidelines cheering you on.
Recently, I had a heart-to-heart talk with Tanya, our healthy eating expert. She shared her passion for the underdogs. Like Bruce with his The Slowest Loser series, Tanya felt a kinship with those readers and members whose path from here to there took a slower, meandering one. Having learned to live with thyroid disease, she knows what it's like to do everything right and still not achieve the goals you set for yourself.
Instead of giving up, she set new goals, rewrote her rule book, and became an inspiration to countless SparkPeople members. She started a new series, called One Step Closer. Her cardinal rule: Healthy living isn't about being perfect; it's about consistently moving one step closer to your goal, whatever that might be.
Posted 8/16/2010 5:00:04 AM By: Stepfanie Romine : 63 comments
Welcome to The Slowest Loser Summer Fun Edition.
This week, I'm on vacation. I'm having a blast with my brother's family at the beach, especially my awesome brother Erik, who tells a great story.
I have only one problem. Everyone here is feasting on pizza, Oreo Cookie Blizzard ice cream cake and cheese quesadillas, while I'm still substituting whole grain bread for white rolls, light Swiss cheese for brie and water for lemon-lime soda, all in the name of The Slowest Loser quest to lose 35 pounds in 70 weeks. I'll have a bite of the unhealthy stuff here and there, but my heart isn't in it. I know that vacation is where some weight loss regimens go to die, and I'm in no mood for a three-pound setback. Either I'm gonna do this, or I'm not.
But the Not Option has never looked so tempting as it has on my fellow diners' plates at every meal. While leisurely surfing the web this week, I found a terrific rationalization to just call the whole thing off and eat whatever I want:
Posted 8/12/2010 6:32:00 PM By: Bruce Corwin : 201 comments
I lost 40 pounds five years ago, and I've kept it off since then. That doesn't mean it has always been easy. I put on seven pounds during the last six months at my old job due to stress and a hectic schedule. I lost it after coming to SparkPeople, but I will admit that my weight is more of a range (plus or minus three pounds) than a firm goal.
Recently, I noticed a trend: Every year, I usually start to reach the upper end of my weight range during the summertime and the lower end in wintertime. (I weigh myself a couple of times a month.) I'm not a beach-goer, and I don't wear shorts or skimpy clothes except to run, so I have never been one to worry about getting in shape for a bikini. Still, I do pride myself on eating right most of the time and sticking with a regular exercise routine.
At various times of the year, depending on my schedule, my mood, and other outside forces, "regular" exercise and eating "right" take on various meanings. Sometimes that means workouts almost every day, or it might mean working out just four days a week. It might mean home-cooked, from-scratch, veggie-heavy meals every night, or it might mean splurging on sweet potato fries at dinner, making do with a bag of carrot sticks and hummus on a road trip, or ordering a mushroom-and-peppers pizza because I am just too tired to cook.
Since I completed my first half-marathon late this spring, I haven't set another fitness goal. I've been running and practicing yoga, with some strength training and cross training, but I haven't been as focused on my fitness. I had spent 18 months working toward progressively larger fitness goals: yoga teacher certification, then my first 5K, 10K, and that half marathon. I don't cope with heat well, so I ultimately decided to take the summer off from training. My mind and body needed a rest.
As a result, I've put on a couple of pounds. My middle feels softer, even though I know the rest of me is stronger from all the yoga, dancing, and walking hills in Istanbul.
I'm OK with all of that. Want to know why?
Posted 8/11/2010 5:01:06 PM By: Stepfanie Romine : 102 comments 
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