SINNING!

Ciao Bellissimi!

A slightly toxic and choclafied Chris here taking chastened finger to sticky keyboard to write to you about starting over.

Don’t you love that? Starting Over. It has such possibilities.

When my oldest son was younger he was very strong willed and as you know, so am I. Sometimes we would argue and it would start to get heated. I would get frustrated and have to ask myself, “Where is this going?”. Always it was going somewhere neither of us wanted to go. So I would stop and say “Can we just start over?” He would get a relieved look and say “Yes.” And we would and it was good.

This is a great tool when you have had an upset with someone you love. I have never had anyone say “No, you are a jerk and I hate you” when I have asked them that. Keep it in your back pocket.

In any case welcome back to reality. I hope you have enjoyed your champagne and sugar soaked few weeks where we all throw caution to the winds and just go nuts with the diet.

Chances are that you are feeling a bit bloated, toxic and sluggish both physically and mentally. And I know that for many of us, 2016 was a year filled with insane ups and downs that made the rusting tilt-a-whirl at a cheap, vacant lot carnival seem safe and comforting.

Happily there are solutions and they are not bad. There are gradient approaches to getting back on track and to an even better packet of habits than you started with going into the holiday season.

Let’s start with the body. I know you, like me overindulged. We have taxed our pancreases, livers and adrenals to the max with Christmas cookies, Champagne, fatty foods and the stress of having to be everywhere in one day with gifts wrapped and houses cleaned.

Stop! Breathe! Ok! now read on for the simple steps you must take to reboot.

Get rid of the White Stuff.

I had a friend lose a ton of weight and I asked her what diet she used. She said the “No White Stuff” diet. It is by far the simplest and easiest diet I have ever used and you do lose weight and feel a lot better.

Eliminate all white stuff: Bread, Potatoes, Pasta, Rice, (basically carb rich foods) and most diary.

Stuff yourself with vegetables, fruits and good fats.

Choose good meats with as few chemicals or weird ingredients as you can find. Get a bunch of different vegetables and cook them up so that you have several different types for a meal. You can drizzle them with high quality olive oil and salt. They taste amazing, especially if you buy organic from a good store. Experiment with different spices and condiments.

When you get hungry in the afternoon, cut up an apple. I love Fuji’s and once your body gets used to having them at a certain time, you will crave those instead of other snacks. If you are really starving, have a small handful of nuts with it. These smooth out your blood sugar levels so you are not dying of hunger all day. Additionally the vegetables and fruits are a great way to cleanse your digestive system of the things we have assaulted it with.

Control your portions.

Eat lots of vegetables and a small portion of steak or other proteins. If you MUST have a cookie or a dessert, have a bite and DON’T DO IT ON AN EMPTY STOMACH OR YOU WILL HOOVER UP THE ENTIRE TIN. Don’t doubt me on this. I know. If you are still craving, have a cup of hot tea and see if that doesn’t handle it. In all cases, if you fall off the wagon hard, just get back on. Don’t start thinking in terms of failure. Failure comes from giving up.

Focus on what you CAN have.

Guess what! Avocados are not white! You can have them! You can also have hummus. Use carrots to dip into it. Or (I LOVE THIS) Smear a bit of it on top of your steak. Go to the specialty stores and buy the gourmet things you love. Olives are great. Caviar is too. There is a ton of great food you can enjoy and now you have the best excuse. Just don’t go crazy with the high calorie stuff. Remember! Portion control.

Go to the gym.

Sorry. You have to. Recently I watched a course from the Great Courses about nutrition. The professor was super knowledgeable and she talked about how lean muscle mass burns calories even when you are not moving. If your body has a lot of lean muscle mass, it will burn a lot more calories than a body that is mostly fat.

So exercise the parts of your body that have the most muscle mass to them and improve those. Big muscles, like legs and butt, use a lot of energy just existing. Work those.  I have noticed that it takes me about three weeks of steady weight lifting to see the difference both on the scale and in the mirror.

Cut out alcohol and drugs.

Today I was reading a copy of Cooking Light Magazine and I was appalled. Every other page was an advertisement for some pharmaceutical or other. Americans take so many drugs to control things that would control themselves if we just ate right and exercised and handled our lives.

I don’t advocate simply dumping your drugs but do stop drinking and smoking and do the above steps and see how you feel. If you are like many, you may start to feel like you don’t need certain drugs any more. Then talk to your doctor about weaning yourself off.

Alcohol is a slippery slope. I LOVE red wine. I mean it I LOVE IT! But I can see where, if not monitored carefully, it could become a problem. There is alcoholism in my family and it would be foolish for me to ignore that. If you do drink, drink in moderation. Put a limit on it and stick to it. Don’t drink every night because it becomes a habit which is then hard to break.

Take vitamins and other supplements.

The food we get today is not like the food we used to get back in the day. It is highly processed and if you have any doubt about it, go to Southern Italy where everything comes right out of the ground with no chemicals and junk. Eat there for a few weeks and then see how you feel. There is a marked difference between that and what we have. Unfortunately the state of our food makes it necessary to supplement our diets.

Ok so that handles your body! Now what about your LIFE?

Ditch the Energy Vampires

Many of you have already read my blog posts about the Energy Vampire.

This personality is so important and so destructive that it cannot be overlooked. Review the above post and the others on Energy Vampires here in Chasing La Bella Vita and then look over the people you deal with on a daily basis,

Is there and energy vampire among them? If so, distance yourself.

But don’t confuse a Negative Nelly with an energy vampire. With the Negy Nely you might have an opportunity to raise this person up. There are some people in my environment who are somewhat gloomy in nature but after I jolly them out of it, they are really fun.

Others are severe Negy Nelis and you get nowhere trying to help them see the fun or humor in life. In the end you get frustrated when they come up with yet another packet of reasons life sucks and you pretty much suck right along with it.

With these, again, distance yourself.

 Find Super Motivated and successful People and stick to them like glue.

You will find that super successful people have certain mindsets and ideas. These ideas and mindsets contribute mightily to their success. Listen to these people and adopt the successful mindsets. You will be amazed at how simply seeing things differently will change your life.

Be the Helpiest Helpy that ever Helped.

Helping people is the highest purpose in life. Fulfillment of that purpose makes you happy. I have seen people who I thought were on their way out, suddenly find themselves needed by someone and they blossom like a watered flower.

Find and Pursue your Purpose

Keeping the above in mind, many of us have a very specific purpose. Sometimes we see and recognize it and sometimes we don’t. If you do, you are blessed, pursue it. If not, take a hint from the above and ask yourself what you would do if you had the choice and how would it help others? That might help you find it.

If you don’t know yet for whatever reason, keep looking. And understand that sometimes it might change as your life changes.

Keep up your communication with family and friends.

I lost my mom this last year. Fortunately, I have read a lot of memes on Facebook about never knowing when you are going to lose someone and I stayed in communication with my mom and family. Although one can dismiss Facebook memes (and probably should 90% of the time) This one should be taken into consideration.

Talk to the people you love even if you don’t always agree. If you are oil and water, find areas of agreement and only talk to each other about those areas. Become skilled in steering the conversation over to topics that are not inflammatory. It takes some doing sometimes but it can be done.

If, however, the family member is a true energy vampire, do the minimum according to your obligations and leave it at that. Not everyone deserves your time and care. Only you know how you will feel if that person ceased to exist one day. Knowing that, do what you need to to avoid regrets.

And now that I have you all squared away,  I have to go and practice what I preach. Full disclosure: It is New Year’s eve so I polished off some of the gluten free chocolate chip cookies while typing this to you.

Tomorrow however, I promise you I will be good and will follow my own advice. Mostly because I plan to polish off all the cookies tonight or simply sneak them out to the dumpster.

We will hold hands and do this together.

Do we have a deal?

OK! Here is to a great 2017!

Write me and let me know how it goes.

OX Chris

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