I am a husband, dad, project manager, coach, athlete, and Christ follower who is passionate about helping people be their best; physically, spiritually, and mentally. With encouragement and accountability, I can help you with your nutrition, workouts, and making a plan to meet your personal goals. Get the results you've always wanted. Be your best self.
Today is a great day to set a goal for yourself. We often need motivation to do hard things, so setting a goal can provide the push we need to get it done.However, we are also easily discouraged when we fail at achieving our goals, and that failure makes it harder to try again. To give ourselves the best chance to achieve our goal, we will be wise to heed the following advice from Michael Hyatt. Below are a few myths about goal setting that I find especially helpful. What is your goal?
1. Your past determines your future.
This is false IF you are willing to change your approach. Challenge this myth by changing your belief about yourself and the outcome you desire. 2. Safe goals are the best goals.
Boo hiss. Safe goals are not compelling. There’s a powerful link between the difficulty of your goal and your performance, satisfaction, enthusiasm, and happiness. Go beyond your natural urge to play it safe and set a big, hairy, audacious goal. 3. You fail if you fall short.
This is only true if you only measure the gap. Measure the GAIN instead and focus on how far you’ve come. When you look at why you fell short, you’ll likely find ways to improve. Recognize your progress and be encouraged & motivated to stick with it. The only true failure is not trying in the first place. 4. Writing goals is not necessary.
Ever build a house without blueprints? Ever travel without some kind of itinerary? Then why trust your goals & dreams to memory alone? Write goals. Period. Post them where you can see them often. Internalize them, see your future self with the goal accomplished, and be regularly spurred by the thing you committed to. 5. Specificity doesn’t matter.
Remove all the guesswork in a vague goal by specifying HOW, and WHEN for example. Goals like “exercise more” or “lose 20 lbs.” are not specific enough. Answer how and when you will do these things, make a plan/ schedule where you can mark of intermediate milestones, and set yourself up for success!
We all tend to agree on that, but we can rarely seem to agree on what “love” actually means.
Here are some of the most famous words ever written about love.
Within in them, God is giving us a timeless road map for building stronger relationships. Below are seven very simple and practical ways to put these words into action in our daily lives and our relationships.
“Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.” – 1 Corinthians 13:4-7
Here’s how we put love into practice (it’s simpler than you might think):
1. Love is patient, so in our rushed world, be patient with people.
2. Love is kind, so in our sarcastic and often rude world, show genuine kindness to people.
3. Love is not jealous or proud, so in our self-focused world, put the needs of others ahead of your own.
4. Love keeps no record of wrongs, so in our world full of grudges and bitterness, choose to offer grace.
5. Love rejoices in the truth, so in our world of dishonesty, always tell the truth and fight for trust in relationships.
6. Love never loses faith, so in our world of skeptics and cynics, choose to believe in the presence of God and the power of love.
7. Love endures through every circumstance, so in our world of quitters, stay committed and never give up on yourself or your loved ones!
No matter your season of life, or the season of the year, it seems we are all VERY busy. We are so busy that one of the first things we sacrifice from our crammed schedule is self-care. We all know it’s important to take care of ourselves, but there is a lot of noise out there about what is really necessary to optimize our health. While there is certainly no cookie-cutter solution for everyone, below are six healthy habits that will set you up for success on your healthy living journey. Try incorporating them into your morning routine to make the rest of the day feel less chaotic.
THEY EAT VEGGIES AT BREAKFAST
If you take time to eat breakfast (and you should), are you eating what you need to really feed your machine? I promise you can do better than toast or bowl of cereal. Aim for a balanced breakfast that includes protein, fiber, fat and a variety of colors from real food to keep you satisfied and prevent mid-morning cravings. I love knowing that my breakfast is jam packed with super healthy real food ingredients to jump start my day. Try these simple Spinach Egg Cupsfor a grab-and-go option.
2. THEY HYDRATE
Since your body gets dehydrated overnight, drinking water when you first wake up is a great idea. And proper hydration is crucial for glowing skin and maintaining healthy muscles and joints. I like to add lemon to my first big glass of water to wake up my digestive system. Fill up your water bottle for the day and plan to refill it a few times during the day. There are too many benefits to being well hydrated to list here, but suffice it to say that you need to drink lots of water.
3. THEY SWEAT IN THE MORNING
If you are like me, there are way too many easy excuses to skip exercising after work. Many people find they’re most successful with exercising if it happens before heading to the office. I love getting my workout done at home in the morning with the help of the greatest library of workout videos available streamed to any enabled device. Most take only 30 minutes to do and require little or no equipment. If home workouts, the local gym, or going for a run in the morning isn’t for you, find another way to get moving in the early hours of the day. That could mean parking farther away, taking the stairs or exercising at your desk. Just 15 minutes of moderate-to-intense activity daily can help you reach your healthy living goals.
4. THEY MAKE A GAME PLAN FOR DINNER
Not only is meal prepping a huge time saver but it also ensures you always have a healthy option on hand. Before leaving the house in the morning, make a game plan for dinner by defrosting proteins or using a slow cooker to do the work for you. It’s also helpful to find a recipe and write down your shopping list so you can pre-order your groceries (we love the Kroger ClickList) or swing by to pick them up on your way home. My go-to healthy eating resource, 90/10 Nutrition, offers a meal planning service and integrated shopping list app that makes it easy to plan your trip to the grocery store.
5. THEY TIME BLOCK THEIR DAY
Whether it’s emails or social media, there are plenty of distractions that can be obstacles to getting everything done. That’s why time blocking is a great tool. Review your top to-dos, and set aside a specific amount of time for completing them. Make sure your health priorities (such as a midday workout or meal-prepping) are in the plan, too. Schedule your morning routine like you do any other important appointment.
6. THEY REST
It’s important to ensure you’re getting enough sleep, but remember to account for the time required for your morning routine. Include a few minutes to relax — I love to take some quite time to journal my prayers. Don’t feel guilty for taking a few minutes to enjoy your coffee, read the news, mediate or take a walk. Set yourself up for success by allowing for some rest time every morning.
Do you ever feel really stressed, frustrated, bitter, or just in a dumpy mood? Maybe so much so that you feel exhausted? These feelings describe the opposite of happy. And we just want to be happy, don’t we? I’m going to share something with you from my personal journal that may offend you. I have an answer to this stress & exhaustion that may surprise you. It surprised me and I wrote it. That happens to me on occasion. I believe deep insight, inspiration and encouragement come to me by simply taking the time to write. You should try it. You might be surprised at the wisdom you have locked up in your mind. I digress.
I believe that a major cause for our stress, exhaustion, frustration, and general unhappiness is because we blame others for our unmet expectations. We have expectations (from deep in our mind, but rarely verbalized) that others will do as we please, or as we need (expect), for surely our needs are simple and reasonable. The trouble is that we subconsciously tie the satisfaction of our expectations to our happiness. If others don’t comply, we get upset. And it’s all their fault. They must fix it (behave differently) for us to be happy. This of course, is a terrible way to live.
To have our mood and attitude dependent upon the actions & behavior of another must be exhausting and stressful. A sober self-assessment is required for we will never easily acknowledge this is really happening to us. The truth is, we can never control the behavior of another, but we can always control our own behavior. We are in charge of ourselves.
So someone close to us is not behaving well according to our opinion of the matter. (Isn’t the expectation we hold more strict for those closest to us?) What are we to do? We should take the advice of Jesus. He said we are to simply love. Love always wins. Being frustrated, bitter, stressed, and exhausted will not make another’s behavior improve. But love will. Yep. #lovealwayswins
One of the hardest things to do is to love those who hurt us or make us upset. Jesus said we are to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. To me that means to love those who make us upset. Jesus said we are to do to others what we would have them do to us. What would happen if we really did this?
I believe this is just like what Jesus has shown us. Jesus loves us with an incredible love, an everlasting love, a love that pursues us even when we turn away, even when we are bad. Jesus died for us because of his great love for us and so we could be with him in heaven for all eternity. There is no other way for us to get heaven than by the loving sacrifice of Jesus. His love is entirely selfless and perfect in every way. We don’t deserve his love and we can never earn his love. Our response to that love is to love Jesus in return. To obey him and know him and serve him. Not because we must earn his favor (because we already have it), but because we’re so grateful for Jesus’ love and loving him is a natural way to express gratitude.
In the same way, If we can REALLY love those who frustrate us like no other (aka those closest to us), if we can just love the people we expect to behave a certain way to make us happy but always fail, I believe the natural response of that person will eventually be to love us back out of gratitude for the grace, mercy and love shown them. That’s just how it works. #preachingtomyself #easiersaidthandone
As followers of Jesus, we are to be known by our love. We can draw others to Jesus by simply loving them. We can make our relationships better by simply loving those close to us despite their flaws and frustrations. It’s our choice. Stop waiting for others to “get it together” and just love them. I’m willing to bet that if we love others well, our frustrations will decrease and our overall happiness will increase. Love always wins.
If you think strength training is only for bodybuilders and athletes, it’s time to challenge your assumptions. Strength training offers several important benefits, and you don’t need to frequent a gym or own a bunch of equipment to get the job done.
Here are seven benefits of strength training:
STRENGTHENS BONES
The fact is, by the time you celebrate your 30th birthday, you’ve already reached your peak bone mass. And if you’re not careful, your bones will gradually weaken, making them more susceptible to breaks and fractures. This is especially concerning for women, who represent a whopping 80% of the estimated 10 million Americans with osteoporosis. To keep your bones strong and sturdy, you need to challenge them. Strength training is one of the most potent bone-building weapons according to a research review in Clinical Cases in Mineral and Bone Metabolism.
“[Strength training makes] the muscles pull on the bones, causing them to slightly bend and ‘squeeze,’” says Michele Olson, PhD, FACSM., a senior clinical professor at Huntingdon College in Montgomery, Alabama. This “squeeze,” she says, increases the process of turning over and laying down new bone.
2. PREVENTS INJURIES
If you run, bike or play recreational sports, regular strength-training sessions can keep you healthy and injury-free. Many running and sport-related injuries are caused by muscle weaknesses, notes Janet Hamilton, MA, certified strength and conditioning specialist, registered clinical exercise physiologist and owner of Running Strong in Stockbridge, Georgia. For example, knee injuries in runners can often be traced to weakness in the hip muscles, Hamilton says; in particular, the medial glute muscle that powers lateral movement and keeps the hip stable. Strengthening this and other sport-specific muscles can lessen the impact on your joints, tendons and ligaments, keeping you running, jumping and lunging sans pain.
If you’re currently injury-free, you can maintain adequate strength with a couple of workouts per week, Hamilton says. On the other hand, if you need to address an underlying weakness, plan on doing specific rehab exercises 3–5 times per week.
3. BOOSTS ATHLETIC PERFORMANCE
Just as strength training can help you stay injury-free, it can also elevate your performance in your sport or activity. “Strong muscles will be better able to produce greater force, generate greater power and sustain for longer durations before fatigue or failure,” Hamilton explains.
How you structure your strength sessions depends on your primary activity. For example, if you’re an endurance athlete, you’ll benefit most from higher-repetition exercises (15 reps or more). If you prefer to play basketball or rugby, aim for lower-rep exercises (6 reps or fewer) to build power. I address this issue of strength training for endurance sports like triathlon in a short video.
4. HELPS LONGEVITY
Using data collected from more than 80,000 U.K. residents, researchers from the University of Sydney discovered strength training reduced risk of death from any cause by 23% and death from cancer by 31%, regardless of whether that training involved bodyweight-only or weighted exercises. If you add some good old-fashioned cardio, your risk of death from any cause is reduced by a total of 29%. To live long, researchers recommend strength training at least 50–60 minutes per week and doing at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity cardio every week.
5. PREVENTS AGE-RELATED DECLINES IN MUSCLE MASS
Just as your bones quit bulking up around age 30, you also start losing muscle mass (also known as sarcopenia) at about the same time. Often, the older you get, the less you move, Olson says. This only speeds up your strength declines and makes everyday activities — like getting up from a chair and carrying groceries — incredibly challenging. Regular strength training can not only help you maintain your current muscle mass, it can also help you create new muscle. When you lift weights, you damage your muscle fibers. As your fibers repair themselves, they add more protein to each fiber, ultimately making them denser and stronger, Olson explains.
6. CURBS ANXIETY
New research from the University of Limerick, Ireland, reveals that lifting weights can ease anxiety, especially when done in group settings. After analyzing 16 studies on more than 900 subjects, researchers discovered that resistance training 2–3 times per week significantly improved anxiety symptoms regardless of session length. To keep anxiety at bay, grab your buddies for a group lifting session or join one of my Team Quadzilla virtual Challenge Groups.
7. BURNS MORE CALORIES AT REST
When it comes to torching calories, cardio typically gets all the credit. But while cardio burns more calories during exercise than strength training, building muscle through strength training allows you to burn more calories after exercise. This is because, unlike fat, muscle is a metabolically active tissue. In other words, every pound of fat you replace with a pound of muscle raises your basal metabolic rate or the number of calories your body burns at rest. According to Olson, one pound of muscle burns about 7 calories per day at rest, while fat only burns about half that amount.
To focus on muscle growth (also known as muscle hypertrophy), perform sets of 6–12 reps with a moderate weight and limit rest to 1–2 minutes between sets, as recommended by the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM). Keep in mind: No matter how much muscle you add, it won’t be enough to out-burn the excess calories from a poor diet. So be sure to prioritize vegetables, fruits, healthy fats, proteins and whole grains.
Credit Lauren Bedosky and the myfitnesspal blog for doing the heavy lifting on this article.
Team Quadzilla 