Fitness 101: Eating What you want with the Exercise Barter System

Hi Sweeties,

As I had promised in my last Fitness Post that the series will continue with what I call the “Exercise Barter System”. As I had explained in a previous post that every human being is supposed to consume atleast 1200 calories a day even if they are trying to loose weight or tone up! Anything below that would cause starvation mode to kick in causing you to gain more weight instead of losing any.

First of all if you are planning to google the Exercise Barter System I can assure you that it’s something I coined.  But there is scientific reasoning behind why it works. Now there might be other dietitians talking about this in different terminologies but I am not aware of that right now 🙂

Those of you who dont mind exercising  a little bit can enjoy the benefits of Exercise Barter system and no by exercise I don’t mean getting a gym membership or getting on the treadmill or any other machine. Getting exercise just means being active! Getting your heart rate up! Burning calories in any way shape or form! It could be running, jogging, Dancing, hoola hooping or a million other things (I will be discussing different forms of exercise in the future as well so feel free to come back or hit the follow button) Lets  say you are supposed to consume 1200 calories a day to drop a pound a week and you are going to a party this weekend. You know there will be cheesy goodness there and drinks! Tons of sugary drinks. You know you will be in trouble cause everyone around you will be indulging into more than their fair share of the goodness. You don’t have to deprive yourself you can exercise off the amount of calories you are planning to consume or well consumed  already (depending on when you are planning to work out) If you consumed 400 extra calories than you were supposed to, well burn those 400 calories that day before or after the party. Worst case scenario do it the next day or that week! Meet you calorie goals before the week ends and you have nothing to worry about!

See the calories you receive from the Exercise Barter System as a reward to yourself! You want that piece of cake? Go ahead work for it and enjoy it! As mentioned in my previous posts I will be discussing some free online tools that can help you maintain all of these numbers and exchange system with just a few clicks a day! So once again feel free to stop by often or hit the follow button. The reason this works like a charm is you are already consuming the minimum amount of calories per day to loose weight WITHOUT exercising and since you over indulged you can get active and burn those extra calories and everything goes back where it needs to be! Hence the term “barter system” you give alittle here to get something in return 🙂

Happy munching!!! And as always know you are in control of your diet and its not the other way round!

Weekly Style Shopper: Work is Important but so is Your Attire …Be fierce at your Job

Hi Sweeties,

This weeks theme for me was pencil skirts. Since I need new ones for my own job! I ran across this cute one at H&M and I feel its different due to the black waist band. Its not the typical grey or black. It’s actually both! I love the Polka Dot peplum top alot too and it comes with a cute belt! Totally worth buying!

I am not sure why but I have always had an obsession with pencil skirts they make you remain feminine but say I mean Business. Well at least in my head. When wearing such a busy top I think the jewelry can stay to a minimum but if you dont care you can take it up a notch by adding a nice bracelet or watch 🙂 Also shoes don’t have to match what you wear they can be your rebellious pop of a different color. It says am not just another typical worker you think I am dressed head to toe in the same color scheme…wait wait..no I am going to surprise you at every turn 🙂

       

Earrings: Charlotte Russe – $5.00

Skirt: H&M – $24.95

Shoes: Charlotte Russe – $20.00

Top: Forever 21 – $24.80

Back to Classics: Black and White

Hi Sweeties,

This was my outfit on MLK Day. I wanted something casual yet slightly rough and tough. I also havent worn all black in a while so I decided to opt for black and white. All we did was go out to eat and then run some errands. Midway through the day I developed a horrible migraine (On going issue cause of my allergies and having mold in my place which we are moving from in 15 days!) I was going to give up on not taking pictures but I was like you know what I am going to do it! I am going to push. I always think about the models on American’s Next Top Model who have to go through crazy things to get a good picture taken. Clearly I didnt have the top model strength cause the pictures actually show my pain lol. Need to work harder on that I guess.

        

Boots: Dansko

Button Up: H&M

Skinny Jeans: Snake Print – H&M

Vest: H&M

Watch: Fossil

Inspiration of the Day: Positive View

This quote can provide a positive outlook in so many aspects of ones life: career, self esteem, workout or any other goal that you might have! This one is going to be printed and posted on my work wall 🙂

Fitness 101: Fail Proofing your Diet plan as easy as 1 2 3

Hi lovelies!

I know the posts have been scattered but I am mostly focusing on educating my blog audience first then getting into the some hardcore information into the tools they can use to get where they want to go with their health and fitness. I want to give you the weapons and let you learn how to use them to your advantage before I throw you out in the battle ground hahaha…why am I making this sound like combat? I don’t know. It might be all the football I have been watching lately 🙂

Anyway fail proofing your diet plan is easier than you think. I had talked to you about making smaller goals in my last post to keep yourself motivated as well as indulging a little bit in your cravings will keep you from devouring an entire box of pizza or chocolate when you finally crack due to deprivation of any sort of food enjoyment in your life.

A normal individual when goes on a diet plan they look at their diet as “I MUST DO THIS EVERYDAY TO THE TEE” well to fool proof your diet plan “everyday” isnt how you should look at things. You should look at things combined over a span of a week! Now why do you think I am saying a week? The healthiest way to loose weight or tone up is by dropping about half a pound or a pound per week as recommend by most dietitians and doctors. Therefore we are going to look at our goals as a weekly thing! If you are allotted to eat a certain number of calories, proteins, carbs and fats per day and you went a little over today you can cut down a little next day or any time during that week to still make it to your goal by the end of that week.

The reason this works better is that you don’t have the constant nagging feeling of “I have been bad today and now my diet is out the window” You dont just simply give up. You don’t feel that you have lost control. You actually feel in control and you seem to understand that hey I am off today or going out with friends and I expected today to be a bit bad for my diet but the following day or next couple of days I will be extra stringent and make up for these extra calories by either working out (I will explain what I call the exercise barter system in my next post where you can eat what you  and go over your daily intake rates without worrying about adding extra pounds) or cutting food intake.

So lets do the math here: Sarah can only consume 1360 calories per day but she over consume her calories by 300 today. Instead of being sad and beating herself down. Sarah decides that the rest of the week she is going to maintain her weekly goal by reducing her food intake by 300 calories she over ate. Now she has the option of cutting 50 calories over a 6 day period or 100 calories for 3 days straight. As you can see Sarah isn’t feeling like her diet is controlling her. She is in control of her diet. She has OPTIONS! She has solutions and its okay if she had that extra slice of pizza cause she was out with her friends 🙂

Hopefully this gave you insight into how you can gear yourself up and move on past a failed day because you know what? You haven’t failed the week itself…and whats the worse you’d fail the entire week? Well then you have the whole month to fix what you messed up this week. What we need to understand is as Humans we are in control of our Diet and Nutrition and its not the other way round 🙂

Feel free to follow my blog as I am going to be doing more fitness and health post and how I am managing to keep the pounds down and still enjoying chocolates, Chips and Cookies, Pizza and burger on a regular basis 🙂 Also please read up on the previous post cause honestly you don’t want to miss out on the vast amount of information I have been putting out as it will keep you motivated and happy to get to your goals faster without getting frustrated 🙂

Inspiration of the Day: Growing Up

Hi Lovelies! I have decided that since my blog is all about women empowerment and helping each other learn, grow and change for the positive I am going to start another regular posting which will be Inspirational quotes that can enlighten and help us grow mentally and emotionally. Help us cope with whatever we may be going through in our lives and our esteem struggles. I am all about printing some of the quotes that mean alot to me and putting them around my desk at work so I can draw inspiration from them when ever I feel down 🙂 Feel free to follow if you need a dose of inspiration in your life!

Team Purple Rough and Tough in leather- Go Ravens

Hi lovelies,

Today is the big day well one of the big days in Football. My team the Ravens has officially won the Division Championship and we are one game away from Super Bowl (in American Football for those of you who are reading this from other parts of the world 🙂 )I hated American Football about 3 years ago. I grew up over seas and Cricket and Soccer (err which is what REAL FOOTBALL IS everywhere but in America lol)

Anyhow I had to work at a NFL Store and its my habit to know my products really well so I decided to dwell into American Football world. 3 weeks down the road I am routing for the Ravens and screaming at the TV screen like a maniac. Now when there is a Ravens game on TV I refuse to leave the house or have to be around  TV where ever I go.

As each week progressed I was going nah lets give our team another weak and I’ll do an outfit Post with my Jersey as an Outfit. And when better to do it then this week? This was taken on Day one of my Purple Jersey weekend. I had initially decided to wear something purple the entire week but instead I decided to just wear my Jersey every single day of the weekend! Girls whether you like football or not this is one of the cutest ways to pull a Jersey off and still look feminine and cute. If you have an invitation to a Super Bowl Party. All you need is YOUR jersey or just borrow a friends, boyfriends, brothers, sisters or whoevers. Put a longer tank top on to cover your behind in those tights to keep it classy unless you dont care everything hanging out. I just find covering my behind classier 🙂 And then put the jersey on! I wear mine with leather leggings and if going out with a leather jacket as well. Makes me feel cute but tough..like I can chow on some bones of the team we are going against…Yeah I gets pretty aggressive. My friends are always stunned at how someone can be as nice as me but a complete opposite of that when watching football. And no we are not talking about curse words or bad words…I am just plain violent and competitive lol

Anyhow heres to hoping Ravens are going to Kill the Pats tonight and we will head to Super Bowl… GO team Purple!

Boots: Dansko

Bracelet: H&m

Clutch: SnakePrint – H&M

Leggings: Leather -G by Guess

Tank Top: H&M

Top: Ray Rice Jersey – Ravens- NFL.com

Watch: Fossil

Your Weekly Style Shopper: Grey is the new Black this Winter Featuring Kim Kardashian

Hi lovelies,

I have always been a bigger fan of skin tight dresses and skirts but since a little over a year ago I have started finding true love in flowy, girly, loose dresses and skirts as well. When all of a sudden I came to a realization I don’t have any wide and belowy skirts or dresses in my closet. And ofcourse the skater skirt is currently being worn by every model, celebrity or even fashionistas everywhere.I found one that I am in love with on Asos and its currently on sale! I have the blazer I chose already in mint color in my closet and I love wearing it cause of its unique biker jacket type style. I also realized how shades of black, white and grey are everywhere!!! So hence this post came about as the Fifty Shades of grey cough cough come on I had to jump on the Christian Grey bandwagon 🙂

Today is my officially my first day away from work. It’s getting hard not responding to emails coming in but I am trying my best to atleast continue halfway through my break without touching any work.

Blazer: H&M – $29.99

Booties: Fioni – Payless – $20.00

Skater Skirt: Asos – $19.35

Top: Bejeweled Forever 21 – $11.50

Life Control 101 : Walking Away…the appropriate time to do just that

Hi sweeties!

Its very appropriate for me to write this post right now because TAKING  A BREAK is exactly what I am going to be doing starting tomorrow. Those of you have been avidly reading my blog know that last Friday I had a mini melt down. That is exactly when I decided I need a break. Luckily for me most people at my office know how much time and effort I am putting in so asking for a day off only a week in advance didnt raise any brows.

If you are anything like me you decide not to take time off when school work or office work starts to pile up. Heck even if you are too busy with your home life. You cancel that vacation and whatever else you had planned because you know people have expectations of you. You drain yourself in so much work that you don’t even have time to stop and eat. You start being cranky, have lack of energy, come home collapse at night and do it all over again the next day. It’s like your a mouse in mouse trap just going in circles.

How can you avoid this vicious circle? TAKE A BREAK…it is very important that you take breaks specially when work load gets to this extent. The mentality that this isnt an appropriate time to drop everything and walk away is very wrong. Taking 24 hours to 48 hours and then coming back to the task at hand will keep you motivated, be less whinny, good for everyone dealing with you and good for your own health. And you will be able to think with a clearer mind and actually increase your productivity further which will be bogged down if you are stressed and fatigued day in and out. Trust me from my experience I have noticed that after a break I went back to doing twice the amount of work I did the week before when I was overwhelmed and tired.

I know this that when that person, office or school work needs you the most the last thing you think of is disappointing them but to be honest if you dont walk away for a bit you will eventually collapse and the road from burnout and stress recovery will be way more harsher. You will loose interest in what you are doing and even loose credibility at your job as someone  who has no interest in their job anymore.

 When to know its time for a break vs becoming someone who always ditches work on others when they are needed the most:

1-Do you spend more time thinking about whats on your checklist to do than actually getting things done?

2- Are you catching yourself thinking about your tasks and to do list when you should be enjoying your time with family or doing something fun?

3- Are you overwhelmed and can not catch up to the tasks that are being put on your plate?

4- Have you started despising things that you loved doing once at work or school?

5- Are you Snappy, Cranky or losing your temper easily? Have others noticed a change in your behavior?

6- Is your performance at the task you were good at going down?

7- Your skipping sleep or meals to finish the projects assigned to you?

8- You dont remember the last time you had FUN?

9- Are you catching yourself constantly looking at the time and hoping you had more hours in your day?

10- Although you are sleeping enough your body and mind are still tired?

If more than 4 or 5 of these sound true then you are fatigued and your body needs a break.  Trust me the 24 to 48 hours you take off and try to shut your brain off would reward you in finishing your tasks in lightening fast speed.

Everything is good in moderation if you push yourself too far you are bound to break but if you work hard and then play hard you have a healthy balance in life. So stop , smile and take that break you deserve!

 

Life Control 101: Introduction – For those need that help on Stress and Time Management

Hi Sweeties,

It takes alot of guts from my end to discuss my past and present so openly but I wanted to throw this out there for those who wanted some tips and tricks into how to keep insane, function and manage a million things at one time. I am sure there are millions of people out there who probably do alot more than I have ever done but these posts aren’t going to be about comparison or something I am boasting about. It’s just my journey through life and my struggle of getting a grip on things around me and I am a firm believer that writing things down makes it easier to follow them so by helping you guys I would be helping myself too …lets kill two birds with one stone lol

Anyhow my childhood life up till grade 4 was pretty easy. I actually have no recollection of anything bad. But consciousness of what is right and wrong started weighing heavy on my brain after I switched school in grade 5. The feeling of doing right! The guilt of saying no to anyone or any task it all just started to become a really bad habit that to this day I struggle with. If someone asks me for help my immediate response is a big “YES” although I know I have too much on my plate. I have recently learnt the importance of self love if you want to call it that and I am practicing it in my life right now. Lets get into my teenage years. All I recall is my parents owning a business and it was a 24/7 affair! I recall working 12 to 13 hours a day with a full load of undergraduate classes. Ofcourse with my mommie dearest not having a license I was also her chauffeur. Also the night time food delivery person for my dad when he had to work 24 hours straight shifts as my brother was too exhausted to get up and go take over so my dad can make it home. Yes I understand mismanagement and if I were to go back there now I would have devised better plans. But thats why I am writing this section on my blog! Cause I have been there, I have learnt and have gotten smarter!

Moved on Campus in hopes that I would get some time to concentrate on school work as it was getting really hectic at home with my mom’s constant banter of wanting to go shopping or running errands was taking time away from my projects. Became a Resident Assistant in the dorms. Those of you who have held the job are aware how much work that position can be day and night! We are literally little slaves to the Residential Life office. I wanted a little extra money so I decided to also become a desk assistant and most of my shifts lasted from 12am to 6am in the morning. I also around the same time was an IT assistant in one of the offices on Campus. Errr there was a semester I went bonkers and took 21 credits cause I really needed to graduate. Not to forget my mom still need a chauffeur.

Currently I work as an IT person for the University I graduated from and have been covering two extra people’s job one of whom retired in last march and one that left in august. I have had nights where I was up till 2 or 3am working at home after getting back from work and went right back the following morning. Trying to be a good wife cooking dinner and doing other house wifely tasks that are expected. I wont lie though my husband is my big support and sometimes he gets the short end of the stick because he is working part time and continuing through the journey of his education. I am adding Graduate school to my already full plate this Spring.

I have gone through the excruciating, unnecessary and unfair process of immigration! Seen a fair share of legal battles when it came to our business as a teenager and fought the case as rest of the my family was too scared to speak out for their rights. I have married outside of my race which in itself was a battle given the culture I come from. But things have seemed to smooth out with my family now that they have realized skin color and race dont matter. It is the heart and kindness of the person that counts and trust me my husband is the nicest person you will ever meet well also my dad lol.

Now that you have  a small glimpse into my world and my journey through life. I will talk from time to time on here about what have I done to break the bad habits, to manage my time better, to keep myself going when I just wanted to throw my hands up like everyone else around me. Feel free to stop by often or hit the follow button so we can embark on this journey of self change for a happy and healthy “US”!

Also feel free to post some of your journeys and what you are struggling with. Make sure to add a few strengths because you know you made it here today because you aren’t weak 🙂