Starling Fitness: Daily writings on Fitness, Diet, and Health

Eating healthy and exercising regularly is work. Sorry… I know you’d like to hear that it’s just a walk in the park after you get skinny and being thin is a piece of cake. It’s not. It takes some effort. When you get thin, you have to keep eating healthy and exercising to stay that way. That’s how it works.

So, it better be worth it, right?

Why do you want to be thin?

What do you think will be better for you when you are thin?

What problems do you think being thin will solve?

What if you get skinny and you still have all those problems?

Is being fat really the issue?

Is there a way to solve those problems NOW while you work your way to being thin?

When I have arguments with myself about overeating, the wild child inside of me discounts all the reasons that I want to be healthy. I have to have some serious ammunition to fire back at her to remind her of all the benefits of eating healthy. What is your ammunition?

Just this morning, I looked at myself in the mirror. I was having an argument with the wild child inside me that wants to eat everything. Even though I felt sick to my stomach this morning, that little girl inside of me wanted to eat. “Why, why, why? Why won’t she let me eat healthy?” I asked her. “Why is it so important?” she asked me.

I don’t have an answer and it looks like thin people don’t either…

PostSecret‘s beneficiary is the National Hopeline Network. It is a 24-hour hotline (1 (800) SUICIDE) for anyone who is thinking about suicide or knows someone who is considering it.

About a month ago, I found this thread at Metafilter:

• How did you redefine your relationship with food? | Ask MetaFilter

There is some good stuff there:

Two things I had to seriously change about my thinking in order to keep myself sane and also not gain weight. I had to stop pretending that my male partner and I could eat the same food. He’s far larger and has a far higher metabolism. I make less testosterone, creating muscle mass on my body is a herculean task. He just has muscles. It’s a bastard. There’re usually two separate breakfasts, lunches, and dinners around here.

The other thing is that if I overeat I try not to consider it a moral failure and just keep overeating out of guilt and self-hatred. It was a reeeeeally hard practice to get into but now it’s second nature. So I ate an entire sleeve of oreos at lunch? Oh well, it’s still salad and an omelet for dinner, and fruit for breakfast.

I keep telling myself that I need to read the entire thing, gleaning ideas from it that will help me, but something is resisting that idea. I don’t know what it is, but I think it’s the same part of me that wants to eat an entire sleeve of Oreos…

Not in the mood to exercise? Just watch this video for about 45 seconds and you’ll want to run. There is something really inspirational about watching other people exercise. It makes me want to join the crowd!

Via: Video of the Week: California Dreamin’ » Complete Running Network

It has been a long time since a exergaming machine has surfaced. Say hi to Motivatrix, the newest exercise-gaming machine.

• Motivatrix

I have seen so many of these companies come and go that I never believe that their products exist until they are available on Amazon.com. Granted, Motivatrix looks like they are promoting their exercise equipment to sports facilities, but the lack of an “order now” button on their website really makes me doubtful of their existence.

Did they build one prototype and a spiffy flash-based website? I can’t tell. I’m trying my hardest not to get excited about this product, but it looks like it has the potential to be a lot of fun.

For more information:

• Motivatrix’s MX9 Workout Master replaces aging stationary bike – Engadget

• Silicon sweat / High-tech, full-body machines merge multimedia and exercise

• Get an interactive workout sans game console | Crave : The gadget blog

I has been a hard week and it only just started. Last week was just fine, but this week I have had problems every day. What did I try to do? I tried to limit my intake:

I reduced it by 100 calories a day. That’s it. Just a 100 calories a day. That’s like… an apple. Less than an apple…

Okay, a little more than an apple, but still it’s just a small, small, small amount. It’s like two Hershey’s kisses. A tiny, tiny amount.

Learning to eat healthy is still an adventure for me. Wish me luck!

It’s spring and I find myself going outside for my runs and walks lately. I’ve really enjoyed walking outside and I started wondering why I ever use my treadmill at all. I even started thinking that I wasn’t going to use it again.

That’s how long it took me to forget about winter… two weeks.

Two weeks of lovely weather and I have forsaken my beloved treadmill in favor of the great outdoors. I have to admit that I love exercising outside mostly because there is just so much interesting stuff going on. There are people to avoid, streets to cross, and lots of things to look at.

The other day, I took my camera with me on my walk and just clicked away. Here’s what I saw:

With this much to see outside, it’s no wonder that the treadmill holds no attraction for me. I’m just surprised at how quickly I have forgotten about the freezing winds and snow and wondering how long I can enjoy the beauty until the heat takes my breath and forces me back indoors.

I have wondered for a long time what use it is to be at my goal weight? I remember those rare times when I was thin. I wasn’t any happier back then than I am now. Why should I work so hard to be thin? Gretchen Rubin writes on her weblog, The Happiness Project, that people do feel happier when they feel more attractive:

• The Happiness Project: Does feeling more attractive make you happier?

People are willing to admit that their happiness depends on having friends, feeling close to their family, being satisfied with their work, etc…

But I think there are other elements to happiness as well—elements that we might not want to admit.

And one of those things is feeling attractive.

There have been times when I have felt attractive and they had nothing to do with how much I weighed. Learning to take care of myself and enjoy my appearance no matter what I weigh is an important step toward my goal. There were times when I was thin and beautiful, but I felt fat and bloated. It has nothing to do with how I actually look and has more to do with how I feel.

What can I do to make myself feel better about my appearance?

What will happen if I get to goal weight and I haven’t been able to like my appearance yet?

What if I loved the way I look right now? Would that stall my weight loss? Do I have to lose weight from a point of disgust or can I love the way I look AND lose weight?

How can I feel attractive right now? Is there something I can do with my hair, nails, face or clothing that will improve my opinion of myself?

It seems that I only get fired up when I feel unattractive. The problem with being “fired up,” though, is that I lose weight in such an unhealthy manner that I end up bingeing later. There has to be a better way.

A quick link to this entry from Tish Grier about faux-food and her reactions to it:

• love and hope and sex and dreams: Faux-Food Snobs

I love her response to the Faux Food Snobs:

“Oh. My. God. You eat POTATOES?!?”

Why, yes I do. They’re a great source of Vitamin C.

“But what about those CARBS! I simply can’t eat all those CARBS!”

Well, at least I don’t break out in a rash from potatoes.

“And you drink WHOLE MILK? what about all that FAT?”

Well, I’d rather have a glass of whole milk than eat a box of Snackwells–or some other “engineered” foodstuff…at least I know what’s in my milk (and it cures my sugar cravings really fast.)

I’ll never forget the day when I microwaved my Lean Cuisine for lunch and just couldn’t take a bite of it. I had eaten so many frozen dinners that I was just sick of even the smell of them. Rice was my savior then and Mike made good use of his fancy rice cooker for me. I never thought of potatoes. A potato sounds really good right now.

If you have become bored with the old salad routine, O Magazine has a Salad Mix N’ Match Chart that might spice things up for you:

• O Magazine Salad Chart

Stock up on the basics and you’ll be able to create something different every day for over a month. If you cringe when you think of eating another salad, it’s probably because you don’t have an interesting variety. Now, you don’t have that excuse!

Via: Oprah’s mix & match salad chart – Slashfood