Nope, it’s not about the flightless bird or New Zealanders today – we are all about this tiny, overlooked fruit in grocery store that has so much to offer you. What are its nutritional credentials exactly? Well, here’s a start:
It has about twice the vitamin C of oranges, per serving
Constipated? There’s more to help than prunes and psyllium – kiwi contains fiber and an enzyme that maybe help move things along, if you get our drift
Folate – this B vitamin helps prevent neural tube defects in pregnancies but is also important for building red blood cells and reducing homocysteine levels
Antioxidants to help neutralize free radical damage
A common question is whether one can eat the skin or not. Yes, you can eat the skin. It’s fuzzy and can kind of tickle the mouth a bit, but it has fiber and the skin doesn’t have much of a taste on its own. In terms of the fruit, the texture is similar to that of a banana but with crunchy seeds in the middle (similar to chia seeds). We think these elements come together to create an interesting and sweet snack.
How to eat kiwis:
The easiest way is to slice it up and enjoy it on its own.
“My main issue was a lack of energy and a fear that I was not getting enough nutrients from my diet. I am definitely feeling more energized now, and I’m eating a wide variety of foods with plenty of nutrients. The nutrition coaching made me more aware of my daily habits, even those not related to food! It allowed me to recognize how different foods affect my energy level and health issues. I now crave healthier foods because I can feel that my body runs better with them.”
Progress
“I was surprised at how much I began to crave fresh fruits and vegetables! I love sweets but have never really loved anything green. I would come home from work and want a salad. Very strange!
A huge breakthrough for me was realizing how each new habit impacted other areas of my life. I learned the order in which I should focus on aspects of my health to most effectively get back on track. I really enjoy having more energy to put into different activities that I’ve always wanted to try. I’m taking ice skating lessons now, which I didn’t have the energy to even consider before changing my diet.”
Results
“I now sleep and eat more consistently, eat more fresh food instead of processed food, and listen to my body. If I eat something and it upsets my stomach or I feel off (usually something processed), I try to avoid that food in the future. Likewise, if a food makes me feel great and I crave it, I eat it more. I also eat out a lot less, which has the added bonus of saving me money. The biggest strength is being tuned in to my own body. I choose what I eat consciously instead of letting my emotions or cravings pick for me. I also have a plan for what to do if I fall off healthy eating, which will make me more resilient in the future when issues arise.
Beans and rice were staples for so long that it’s no wonder I started eating so much fast food to break it up. With my new healthy habits, making sure to spice things up will help me stay on track long-term. “
– Madelynn N.
—————————-
This client in her early 20s wasn’t feeling the energy and vitality we’d all hope, and assume, for someone her age. Like so many vegetarians and vegans, including this author, she fell into the trap of fast-food/ junk-food vegetarianism. But all that’s changed! Now that she has healthy habits in place, and knows how to pick herself back up when she falls, there’s a resiliency that will set her up for success way into her future.
“It [the coaching journey] provided a clear focus on challenge areas and necessary goals and accountability to overcome them. I hoped to learn about my mental blocks to living healthier and I wanted to learn strategies to address them. Yes, my expectations have been met.
I have developed the strength/willpower to address all matters leading to a healthier me. I surprised myself when I drastically altered my work and personal schedules to make time and put myself on the front burner. My major insight/breakthrough was definitely the schedule disruption.
I benefited from, and enjoyed the most, what I learned about why my eating habits were poor and the tools to address this (eating at consistent times, drinking plenty of water, poor snack replacement, etc.). I am tracking my meals now (sometimes) and am more conscious about my food intake, eating times of day, and meal prepping myself.” – Dr. Kim Carter
It has been an honor and a pleasure working with Dr. Kim over the course of a few months. The most striking session was probably our first – she realized that she didn’t have much time to dedicate to herself and her health, and she fixed that right up in less than an hour! The keystone action of removing and choosing the activities that fit with her values and goals certainly helped as we added in healthier foods, routines, mindset, and more. Let’s find your keystone habit and build a healthier version of you – schedule your complimentary, 20-minute Discovery Call now.
While the song is about grief, and we don’t desire to hurry this month along, it makes us think about how most of us struggle with getting enough sleep. So, today we are going to get serious about sleeping better, all together, in September.
Kids are back in school, and, for most of us, the summer activities are dwindling down. The sun is setting a bit earlier and now is one of the best times for us to follow the natural rhythm of the season by getting to bed a wee bit earlier.
The problem is, even if we know we should prioritize sleep, there are a couple tricky things that get in the way. Here are some common issues and ideas to help thwart them:
1.The ‘Gremlin’ or ‘Inner Child’. This one got us good over the past weekend. It was date night and Netflix paraded a German post-war mystery/thriller show in front of us. Why not give it a try? Turns out that it was a series and, as our normal bedtime rolled around, the Inner Child trickster was all ready to protest “but I don’t wanna go to bed! I want to see what happens AND I’m learning/practicing my German AND tomorrow is Sunday so I can sleep in…” on and on, the rationalizations went. Long story short, staying up until 3am not only messed up our sleep but the tired, slow, foggy thinking and lack of motivation to do anything the next day led to more of the same on behavior on Sunday night. Thank goodness we got back on track on Monday. How to solve this: the first step involves awareness that the voice in your head is one of your inner child or gremlin. How will you be able to tell? Well, generally the thoughts you’ll have are about very short-term, false pleasure and how you “deserve” to do, or eat something. There’s a ton of rationalizing and usually done in a way that fools you into thinking the bad choice is a benefit (i.e. “I’m learning German with this show!”). The inner child doesn’t care about tomorrow’s hangover – it’s all about getting the candy, staying up late, partying and playing NOW – without evaluating potential consequences. Whether it’s with sleep, food choice, or something else, evaluate where the gremlin or inner child tends to pop up for you.
2. Rely less on Willpower and more upon Routines. The former you can only do for a certain amount of time until it either becomes a habit or falls apart. Routines can help create easy, automatic behaviors – just like brushing one’s teeth doesn’t require as much will to execute as it is just following part of the morning or evening ritual. When we turn off our devices at 11:30pm and expect good, deep sleep we are skipping the transition time our brains and bodies need to make before going to sleep. By creating an effective bedtime routine, you’ll signal to yourself that you’re moving into restorative, restful sleep time and you’ll likely see an improvement in both quality and quantity of sleep. Stay tuned for our bedtime routine in a future blog.
3. Don’t “Should” yourself – be Realistic. You might have ideals of going to sleep at 9pm and getting up to be a productive, early bird at 5 or 6am; however, it’s important to be realistic about your evening activities and how late they run (this is why our Experiment in Early Rising & Exercise didn’t work out so well). If you’ve been a night owl for most of your life, part of it could be genetics or your particular cronotype (and is unlikely to change), oryou’re going to need to set up some small improvements first (e.g. going to bed at 12:45am instead of 1am). When you put the kids down for bed, do the hours afterward get stretched out as you enjoy some much-needed alone or self-care time? Don’t give up your me-time; adjust the dial a bit and consider watching one or two episodes of your favorite show instead of four before bed. You don’t have to sleep when your kids do, but if you stay up too late, no one will be happy the next morning.
4. Track your Progress and Celebrate your Wins. Remember how the teacher would give you a gold star for reading a book and after 20 stars you got a reward? We can do the same thing for ourselves by tracking and celebrating our own progress. One of the best tools we use, and share with clients, is our Habit Tracker. With a simple sticker or “x” you can see how many days out of the month you had enough water or sleep, got in some exercise or meditation practice. Consider tracking ONLY sleep for this month, in order to not overwhelm yourself. Perhaps a simple prompt “in bed before 11pm” is a place to start tracking your success this month. Celebrate as you see the row of stickers or “x” marks build and reflect to see how the habit has served you (e.g. more energy, etc) well. This will help reinforce the change you’re making.
Let’s create a movement to reclaim our rest as we all sleep better, together, in September.
We’re not referring to the 1999 movie, loosely based on Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, though it’s a fairly timeless movie. We also don’t hate you; in fact, we are quite fond of you…but are you fond of yourself?
Today, we’re bringing to light negative self-talk, the ways in which we show unkindness or even hatred toward ourselves. Have you ever thought…
1. Ugh! How do I weigh this much? I hate my body!
2. No wonder no one likes me. I’m so boring.
3. I give up. I can’t do this.
4. Sooner or later, I always mess up anyway.
5. You’re such a fat loser, how could you eat a second piece of cake?
6. Here we go again, me and my ‘thunder thighs’ won’t get to wear shorts this summer.
7. Others won’t like me. They’re better than I am.
8. I’m not good enough. I have to strive to be perfect and please everyone else.
9. What’s the use in trying? I’m not worth it.
10. How could you have said something so stupid? You’re such an idiot.
Each of these statements has been a part of the soliloquy playing through a person’s head. Many of them are universally shared.
Sometimes the saying “you are your own worst enemy” is very true. Most people can name 10 ways in which they hate themselves easier than they can list their positive qualities. Here’s the twist: if we are capable of being our own worst enemies, then we are also able to be our own best friends. Don’t expect your inner dialogue to change overnight though, these conversation patterns will need to be disrupted and then practiced.
How to transform negative self-talk
1. Start with awareness – “oh, I just had a thought that I always mess up” and gently probe to see what triggered the thought: “I got scared because my co-worker asked me to use new software to run reports and I don’t know how.”
2. Label the thought and evaluate it to see if it’s even true. If so, you can choose another thought that is also true on for size. Practice this, it likely won’t immediately replace the negative self-talk.
3. Sometimes you have to go into neutral before moving into the positive thoughts and affirmations. Otherwise, the chasm between what your brain believes is true (the negative “you’re a fat slob”) and the thoughts you’re trying to adopt (the affirmation “you are a beautiful goddess”) will be too great to cross. So, instead of trying to move from a thought about hating your body to loving your body, you may need to focus on the neutral fact that you have a body.
4. Give your brain a duty – it could be to search your memories to find 3 times in your life when you were most proud of yourself for overcoming adversity or to seek out 5 things you appreciate about your body. When you give your mind a job, like code in a program ordering the computer to find a file, it will do it.
Have your HATED yourself into Weight Loss?
Chances are, you’ve likely used the disgust and the fury of hating your body as the fuel to starve and beat yourself into losing some weight. Instead of 500-calorie deprivation diets and over-exercising, there is another way…
Curious to see how you can love yourself into a healthier lifestyle and happier body?
Check out Lose the ‘Quarantine 15’ this Quarter; it’s not a competitive, bootcamp-style program. It’s a group training and coaching program designed to help you build a better relationship with yourself, your body, and with food.
It’s not just focused on weight. We have metrics we’ll be tracking for body composition, tips to improve sleep and digestion, along with organizational tips for your time and home so you’ll make time for self-care and have handy essentials available to make quick and delicious meals.
Have more questions or want to get acquainted before grabbing your seat? Schedule your introductory “Ready to Lose the ‘Quarantine 15’ – let’s talk!” call. We’re happy to answer questions and help ensure that this program is a great fit for you and your needs.
What do you think when you hear the word “minimalism”? A way of life only for hipsters traveling the world with their laptops and backpacks? People living in tiny homes?It may surprise you to learn that, for one to be a minimalist, it doesn’t require you to be a cool-hat-wearing twenty-something, own less than 200 items or make YouTube videos about minimizing your closet.
Perhaps you can relate. If your twenties were all about trying new hobbies, identities, styles and outfits, there’s a good chance that you’ve accumulated *things* to go along with those. What happens in your 30s and 40s? If you’ve chosen a mate, had kids, have a steady job, and have settled into who and where you are right now, there is a good chance you’re surrounded by annoying or aspirational reminders of who you once were. Ten years ago you may have been dating a rock climber and, at the time, you needed the gear. Same goes for things you once loved but don’t anymore – rollerblading, embroidery patterns, cookbooks with laborious recipes, the guitar sitting in the corner – and make you feel guilty. That size 2 little black dress looked great on you during your dancing days, but now that you’ve gained 20 lbs, it hangs around waiting for you to be able to wear it again. One day.
Part of the problem which our possessions is that we have become inured to their presence. We don’t *see* the rollerblades we’ve passed in the garage over a thousand times. It’s like we have blinders on and so, in a way, minimalism is about bringing awareness back to what we own and why. It also encourages us not to delay and procrastinate in making decisions for some designated time ‘in the future.’
The average household is said to have over 300,000 items; does that seem accurate to you? Do you feel it is a bit excessive? Maybe it’s time to put your house on a diet.
While we’ve stopped short of counting everything we own, over the past 6 years or so, we’ve counted and cataloged our way through purges of household items (with questions such as: “do two people in a household really need 45 glasses/cups/mugs?”). For this year, one of our goals was to remove 2020 items from our household – roughly 168 items each month. Every single item was written down to help keep track and to see if we actually regretted removing it from the household.
Surprise! Most of it is not missed at all – not our third spatula, the ill-fitting shirt, knick-knacks, expired supplements or makeup. The beauty is that each room is easier to keep tidy and clean. The clothes in the closet have space to breathe and don’t fall on top of the person looking to get dressed.
Minimalism and essentialism are both related to intentional living. Where they differ is operating in the physical versus mental realms of life improvement.
Mr. Chef recently ordered granola and seeing it was a reminder of how we miss the crunchy grain-seed-sweet mixture of it all. What we don’t miss are ingredients that include questionable vegetable oil sources and excess sugar. The good news is that it’s possible to have the best of both worlds – a delectable, crunchable mixture AND have it be higher in fiber and protein from ethical, whole food sources. We made a fresh batch today and are sharing the recipe with you. Go with the flow and have some granola-y, groovy mornings. Can you dig it?
Prep time: 15 minutes, cook time: 40-45 minutes
Makes about 6 cups
Ingredients
2 1/2 cups rolled oats
2 cups chopped (or sliced) almonds
1 cup shredded coconut
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup dried fruit such as raisins or goji berries
1/4 cup hemp seeds
2 Tbsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
Instructions
Preheat oven to 275 degrees Fahrenheit. Mix oats, almonds, coconut, cinnamon, and salt in a large bowl then add olive oil and maple syrup. Use rimmed baking sheet and spread mixture out evenly. Bake about 40-45 minutes, stirring every 10-15 minutes, until golden and toasted. About 30 minutes in, add hemp seeds and goji berries to bake for the last 10 minutes. Allow to cool completely and transfer to airtight container. It should keep (if the delicious granola even makes it this long :D) for about 2 weeks.
…well not quite in trouble, but recently the feeling of burnout has been trailing behind us, like a blazing fire following a gasoline leak. The steady, hazardous drip came from an embedded, almost subconscious thought: “I love my work, I don’t need a vacation.” While the former is true, the latter part of that statement is definitely false. It wasn’t until recently that we realized our last vacation was 13 months ago. With little more than an occasional half-day off in over a year, the reason behind our exhaustion came into focus. Without sustained and intentional time off, we were burning the candle at both ends; everything was becoming too much effort and yet we pushed forward anyway.
Perhaps you’ve felt it too, the sneaky symptoms of burnout include:
— Falling asleep quickly only to wake up in the middle of the night
— Less healthy, natural color in face
— Relying on quick-energy food options to get through the day
— A tired-but-wired feeling, never being able to fully relax
— Lack of a desire to connect with friends
— Feeling like you’ve been “run over by a truck”
— No energy, tired all the time, fatigued
— Waking up exhausted, not well-rested
The common responses of “busy,” “tired”, and “stressed” when asked how you’re doing is the zeitgeist of our current time. It’s the consequence of our sleep-deprived, 5-hour energy lives. For productivity, it’s pump-or-pill-yourself-up, and at the end of the day we ‘wine’ down and scroll through or watch screens.
You may feel like you can handle the frantic pace and multitasking of life for awhile – maybe you claim to thrive when life is too busy. However, eventually, everyone pays the piper. The stress we don’t even know we’re under starts to accumulate and we, our minds and our bodies, are unable to cope with it.
Why am I Exhausted?
First things first. Get evaluated by a healthcare professional and lab work to rule out underlying conditions such as anemia, thyroid disease, depression, allergies, side effects of certain medications, insomnia, chronic fatigue syndrome or fibromyalgia.
Second, as with most things in life, this problem is a matter of balance between supply and demand. There are times when work gets hectic or short-term caregiving can cause exhaustion and there are other times when, despite our busy lives, we feel energized and ready to take on life. At a basic level, when our lives have more demands, we tend to feel tired. If this is short-term, we typically have energy in the bank to help us through. Common examples include pulling an all-nighter to tend to a sick child or a work project, or even running a half-marathon. The problem is when the demands don’t let up and others pile on. The scale then tips very unfavorably and we deplete our reserves, our emergency energy, and we become exhausted. It’s critical here to point out that there is a difference between being ‘tired’ (which can typically be remedied by a good night’s sleep) and ‘fatigue’ (which tends to be a longer-standing state not easily remedied by a massage or a day off).
Tools
Fatigue is a wonderful teacher. While she might initially make you slow down, it’s only to give you the opportunity to examine your life, learn more about yourself and what’s truly important to you. She certainly taught us a thing or two these past few weeks – namely getting back to the basics, examining our thoughts, and using the tools we have in our toolbox.
As one example, we will often use a life inventory tool as we work with clients to help bring awareness to certain areas of life in need of support. We explore your relationship with food and physical movement as well as your mind functioning and stress, self-care, and spirit.
We help you plug your energy drains and naturally increase your personal energy level so that you can meet the demands of the day.
Along with this is personalized support, mindset adjustments, setting boundaries, learning to delegate and stop people-pleasing, and building up natural energy stores with proper nutrition and lifestyle changes. Our goal is that your sense of wellbeing is good most of the time so that you have a higher quality of life. If this sounds like natural energy restoration you are looking for, schedule a complimentary call and we’ll get started.
The kids are in school and fall is right around the corner. You know what this means- temperature drops, staying indoors & more baking. Or does it?
Instead of doing what we’ve always done, and getting the results we’ve always gotten, it’s time to make a different choice this fall and winter. To decide in favor of our health instead of against it. To surprise ourselves with how healthy we can look and feel, and how good our lives can be.
Maybe this is the perfect time to move yourself from the back burner to the front. You’ve pushed your needs and your niggling health issues aside to focus on taking care of the people important to you. Now it’s time to cease being in denial and face what is going on in your body and your mind. If weight gain has been a feature of the coronavirus quarantine, now is the time to take control and reclaim your body’s composition, immunity, and vitality.
Caffeine and chocolate fiends, unite! This smoothie is the perfect wake-me-up for summer. Here’s the recipe we made today along with ideas for modifications:
Disclosure: some of the links below are affiliate links or discount codes, meaning, at no additional cost to you, if you click through an affiliate link and make a purchase, we may make a commission.
This recipe is meant to be healthy and full of veg! If it’s not sweet enough for you, consider adding your favorite form of sweetness (e.g. more fruit, stevia, dates, etc). Looking for more greens-based smoothies that are lower in sugar? Check out the Green Smoothie Challenge eBook! It has recipes, grocery lists, along with tips and tricks for making smoothies part of your life.
Instructions
You know what to do here – load all ingredients into the high-speed blender, cover, and blend to desired consistency. Enjoy!
onebitewellness 