#10in10 - 10 Day Health Challenge!

#10in10

10 miles of cardio in 10 days!!

EVERY DAY YOU MUST ENGAGE IN:

3 strength exercises, at least one focused on your core area.

Cardio training: no more than 20% of quota on the bicycle.

Reduced fat intake and increased raw food consumption.

CARDIO TRAINING:

5 mi each of the first 5 days

10 mi each of the last 5 days

****Break up your cardio by working out at various times of the day.  Begin and end your day with a quick run, and hit a bike ride and the elliptical briefly in the middle of the day.

Results ONLY come from hard work!

DIETARY RULES:

*Do NOT eat after 8pm

*Drink 64-128 oz of water daily.  The more, the better: try to drink a gallon (128oz).  This is especially beneficial when combined with freshly squeezed lemon juice.

*Eat as many RAW foods as possible (THINK: If you were a caveman, what would you eat?)

*Limit your use of CAFFEINE (yes, I said it!)… this causes your body to retain water (dehydrating you) and makes it more difficult to detox.  If you must consume it, try to keep it to AM hours so as not to disturb your sleep, or substitute it with green tea, which helps lower your cholesterol.

TIP: Start your day with drinking a tall glass of water (preferably with freshly squeezed lemon juice) and a morning run (1-2 miles) before breakfast.  This will immediately jump-start your metabolism and you will burn off 20% more calories.  Your first meal of the day should be your biggest, so eat in balance before setting your digestive track right with a little yoga.  Adding 1oz of Bragg's Apple Cider Vinegar to your water everyday will help with regular detoxification and overall body composition.

TIP: Increase blood flow, metabolism and flexibility by doing yoga!  Download a yoga app and focus on relaxing your way through 15 to 25 min of this deep stretching every day.

TIP: Plan your meals carefully.  Breakfast should be your largest of the day, followed by a smaller lunch and even smaller dinner.  Portion your servings and don’t be afraid to stop eating before your plate is clean.  Our eyes are often bigger than our stomach and the common result is overstuffing (remember that excess calories are units of unused energy and turn to fat cells for long-term storage).  Eat some complex carbs in the AM so you will have enough energy for your workout, but stay away from starches (breads and pastas, also) for the rest of the day.  Fruits and vegetables keeps the digestive track flowing regularly and help detox the body of processed substances.

TIP: Want a quicker detox?  Buy ONE container of 100% Cranberry Juice (NOT the juice cocktail version!) and drink ALL of this throughout the period of a day, along with your normal amount of water.  This will flush your digestive track and rid your body of any slow-moving meats and starches.  Doing this at the start of the challenge will help you feel lighter and enable a more-efficient workout.

TIP: Download MY FITNESS PAL.  As you track your meals and exercise throughout the day, pay more attention to your nutritional values and needs than to your calories consumed.  Look at the pie chart and compare your ratio of nutrient consumption (fats, carbs & proteins) to the suggested ratio.  What are you eating too much of and what do you need to consume more of?

THE GOAL?

Let’s get right for the season!  We all know how important it is to FEEL as good as you LOOK!!  It’s time to get healthy after a winter of hibernation!  In 10 carefully managed days and consistent activity, you will snap back into shape and begin to form the habits of maintaining it.

****NO SIZE NO DIET: If you get in touch with YOUR health and body, treat it how YOU should individually, you will look INCREDIBLE how you should, naturally!  Let's be as beautiful as God designed us to be!

Success Is A State Of Mind

Let me ask you a question:  What will it take for you to be successful?  In other words, what do you need to accomplish in order for you to consider yourself having reached success?  Perhaps a more relevant question is what is your definition of success?  The former dictates the latter.  What kinds of standards do you set for yourself?

All of these things inevitably affect how you will succeed, and what this success will entail.  If you only do the minimum to get by, you might accept the smallest triumph as a victory.  On the other hand, if you are a perfectionist, you might sense failure when you don’t cross your T at a square perpendicular angle.

The trick to this, as is with anything, is to find the balance.  Where is your ideal medium?  This will be dependent upon your lifestyle, routines, and natural habits.  How high can you place your goals and standards before they cease being beneficial and begin becoming inefficient, tedious, and inhabiting?

Where does success come from?

Success itself is comprised of opportunity, ambition, and potential.  Opportunity is related to what is happening, being offered, or who is present in the society.  Ambition is the hunger or drive to be successful and potential is defined as how capable one is to achieve their goal.

There are some characteristics that can be traced throughout history as being present commonly among successful people.  These Include:

An Unwavering Passion.  Pursue that which you love.  Be passionate for what you do, only then will you try your hardest to reach it.  If you pursue that which you have no passion for, you risk abandoning it for something more appealing.  Commit and be dedicated.

Open Mindedness.  Have the imagination of a child.  Even the most intelligent realize that they will be forever learning.  Be flexible, at times you might start from one direction and end up in another.   Make the most of wherever you are and be open to new ideas!  The result might be better than you imagined.

Hunger.  Starvation for excellence.  Desire to be an expert, to master the craft, and to make it bend to your will.  Never lose sight of what you are striving toward.  This trait in particular helps with “hopeless” circumstances.  Sprint, don’t run.  Most people walk and even wait motionless.  Sprint.

Progression.  A forward-looking approach.  Learn from the past and move on.  Take the wisdom and experience and leave the rest.  Use it to better your future approaches.  This is the only way you will grow to your fullest potential.  Optimism is king, and the means to become one.

Creativity.  A constant flow of ideas.  Amazing problem-solving and innovation.  Love for the art of your specialty.  Never stop creating.  This is the life-line to your brand.  The most successful people always have a constant flow of new products or services to keep them relevant and profitable.  How can you be innovative?  Better yet, how can you be innovative with your previous innovations?  Offer your audience complete originality.

GOOD LUCK AND NEVER GIVE UP!

Back To The Basics

A little inspiration for my readers:

Can you remember when you were little?  Think back.  I mean REALLY little; your mother still holding your hand to the school bus little.  Do you remember how you used to act, how you used to think, feel, and be?

You were careless and were concerned with a different set of priorities.  You had other pet peeves and triggers.  Simpler things made you happy and you were more family-orientated.  Instead of worrying about what others will see you in and spending hours to pick and reevaluate your outfit, you styled yourself with whatever suited your mood and were done with it.  And I’m pretty sure a lot of us had little bloated baby tummies and did not flinch once in front of the mirror.  We loved running around, being reckless, and rolling in the mud.  Getting dirty was an adventure, not a chore.

Remember how we used to interact with others.  Without troubling ourselves over future possibilities and scenarios, we acted upon impulse.  Although taking certain consequences into consideration is sometimes crucial in the decision-making process, why should it affect the way in which we converse with others?  In other words, why should the prospective reactions from others determine our initial actions?  At the risk of sounding cliche, my perfect world is one in which all are true and sincere without the fear of judgment on their conscious.  It is your life you’re living, so why should others dictate your story line?

Dance for all that are watching.  Speak for all who are listening.  Shine for all those residing in darkness.  Be yourself for the world.  Be true and self-fulfilling first, burdened and careful last.   IT IS OKAY TO PLAY NOW, PAY LATER (thanks, Mishon).  You could spend your life dreaming of living, which sounds redundant, doesn’t it?  It is always good to work then play, to balance yourself in order to survive, but remember also that youth is for doing things you cannot do with age.  And why should your age signify the number of regrets you collected along the way?  “Playing it safe” may look appealing at the moment, but deciding not to do something could be just as regretful as the alternative.

The longer you prolong a decision, the more attention you are taking away from others to be made.  You could spend just as much time considering an action as you could spend completing it.  For example, while you are trying to decide if you are going to participate in the bull-riding contest in front of hundreds, you are diverting your concentration from other opportunities you may have.  In this time, the prize could be claimed by another contender, the love of your life could be considering introducing him/herself to you, or your favorite celebrity could be behind you in line for the contest.  I’m not trying to pressure you into becoming a Yes-man, and some decisions require more consideration, but definitely do NOT hesitate and miss an amazing moment due to fear.

There are a million scenarios that could occur as a result of participating in such a contest.  You could fly off and break your arm.  You could accidentally rip your shirt and expose yourself.  You could fall off the fake bull after the slightest movement.  BUT sometimes the pain of today is worth the memory for tomorrow.  Five years from now, does it matter if Jessica Alba point-blank witnessed you rolling ridiculously, unnecessarily, and embarrassingly off the fake bull before it even begins to jerk you?  You fall flat on your face, and happen to be wearing a skirt or extremely short shorts, slightly exposing yourself.  But what do you do when you pick yourself up?  The moment has begun and you are helpless to that fact.  But your next move makes your story.  Get up and run out the door?  Or hop up, shake it off, and get back on the bull?  Most of the time, the important factor in a situation is not what happens, but how you handle it.  The world is filled with unfortunate events, but succeeding against all odds is always admirable. 

When you are old, wrinkly, lacking full mobility, and left to your thoughts alone, what will be memorable to you?  Rolling out of the spotlight and sneaking off to blend into normalcy, or getting back on the bull, winning the contest and a high-five from Jessica?  Even if you don’t win the contest, you still might get the high-five, which might just be as satisfying.

Today, a lot of people are preoccupied with being leaders, not followers.  So when you are older, will you be a speaker or a listener?  Will you be passive, and reminisce with others of their tales, or will you recount your own, and continue to awe your audience?

Beauty Pioneer: Pharaoh of the Nile

Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator

In a time and world where men ruled and it was possible to get slaughtered just by irritating the wrong man, a woman of gold was born and brought to rule through her own seduction, wit, beauty, zeal, and charm.  At the time, all thrones were being handed to blood that flowed through men of the royal families.  However, the royal women of Egypt were of a different breed. 

Cleo IV had an extremely theatrical lifestyle, described as a “mistress of disguise and costume.”  She was known for her ornate and exquisite shows of splendor, many of which add to the myths we hear today.  She kept constant the mystique and illusion her entire reign over Egypt.  She strongly likened herself to the goddess Isis, and retained the nickname “New Isis” by her people.  Her appearance was so entrancing, like that of a siren, that her only possible relation could be supernatural.  When she was given the power of dominant rule at 18 and chased away by her own kin not long after, her comeback was so dramatic, it goes hand-in-hand with her depictions today.  She raised an entire army of mercenaries and returned to Alexandria a year later, snuck into her own palace, and was rolled out secretly in front of Julius Caesar, current ruler of the Roman Empire. 

“For she was a woman of surpassing beauty, and at the same time, when she was in the prime of her youth, she was most striking; she also possessed a most charming voice and knowledge of how to make herself agreeable to everyone.  Being brilliant to look upon and to listen to, with the power to subjugate everyone, even a love-sated man already past his prime, she thought that it would be in keeping with her role to meet Caesar, and she reposed in her beauty all her claims to the throne.”

It was here that she captivated Caesar for life, taking ownership of his heart and protection for the rest of his life.  Her son, Cessarion, was declared sole heir to his throne until disputed and claimed by Caesar’s other son and general.

This general, Mark Antony, fell in love with Cleopatra VI, as well.  She snared his heart when she arrived on the shores of Tarsus with the robes of Isis billowing in the ocean breeze.  It was rumored by many that she was a sorcerous, and cast spells and held men under her control.  After she stole Mark Antony from his wife and lover, he then rejected them in public in order to be with her and wage war on Rome.  They were then defeated and became the last and richest independent state to fall to the Roman Empire.

The queen did everything she could to keep her country prosperous, happy, and sovereign.  She fought bravely for it like no man would.  She used everything she was given in order to remain in power.  Many describe her as able to appear likeable to anyone, with a “sweetness in the tones of her voice” and intelligent wisdom in her words of counsel.  She was ethnically Greek, as was the majority of the people in Alexandria, who descended from Alexander the Great’s general Ptolemy I.  Those who sat on the throne before always chose to “isolate” themselves from the remainder of Egypt.  However, Cleopatra had portraits depicting her as traditionally Egyptian made for her Egyptian audience.  She knew multiple languages, unheard of by her predecessors.  She had all of the tools to be the greatness she was, and she used them.

Appears in hieroglyphs as:             

The great Lady of perfection, excellent in counsel

The great one, sacred image of her father

The goddess Cleopatra who is beloved by her father

Oh, Marilyn!

“Do I Look happy?  I should – for I was a child nobody wanted.  A lonely girl with a dream – who awakened to find that dream come true.  I am Marilyn Monroe.  Read my Cinderella story.”

Jean Harlow.  She was Marilyn’s Marilyn: her inspiration, and the stimulation of her passion for the cinema.  Harlow was the idol of the time and she awed everyone surrounding Monroe.   So Marilyn set her sights early on.  She got married very young so as not to return to foster care, however her spouse enlisted with the war efforts and she divorced him upon his return.  During this time, she was considering having children and becoming a housewife.  Instead, she signed with Blue Book Modeling Agency and bleached her hair blonde.  She began experimenting with countless names, none of which she liked.   A short list of her aliases and married names can be found below.

After being discovered by Twentieth Century-Fox, she started developing the look that would later be known as trademark and adopted the name Marilyn Monroe.  She mainly played as an extra, having only silent background roles.  She then signed with Columbia and her overbite was corrected.  She returned to modeling after acting roles became scarce.

For the only time in her life, Marilyn posed nude for pay.  The release was signed “Mona Monroe” and these pictures later resurfaced; scandal was not far behind.  However, Monroe handled the situation with grace and class, explaining her need as a struggling actress to pay her rent.  She signed again with 20^th Century-Fox for seven more years after being discovered once more.  She then had a slight bump removed from her nose and started making appearances at the Academy Awards (presenter) and magazine covers (in GTech wear supporting women’s rights to enroll and multiple magazines covering her life story in a sympathetic light).  She started dating famous baseball player Joe DiMaggio and overall became very popular in the limelight.  Hugh Hefner used a picture of her in the previously mentioned extremely low-cut dress on Playboys first cover, with a picture inside from her earlier nude shoot in 1949.  (Although Hefner had never met the young starlet, he has reserved the crypt next to Monroe's as his resting place, attributing his magazine's success to its first issue).

Marilyn was one that took risks.  She wore controversial clothing: skintight with plunging necklines.  She posed for nude photos at the beginning of her career.  She bleached her hair in a second and revolutionized the “dumb blonde” persona.  She was a risk-taker that knew the odds before she played the game.  She conquered the industry in a way that granted her a ridiculous amount of power.  For example, when discussing her third (and final) contract with 20^th Century-Fox, she was able to on her terms after Seven Year Itch.  She demanded the right to reject any script, director, or co-star, as well as investments and shares to newly founded Marilyn Monroe Production Company.

Ms. Marilyn Monroe died so young, at the age of 36.  She was just reaching the peak of her career, or at least the highest it had been yet.  She had multiple films lined up, with a 10-year contract overseas.  All deals were again negotiated on her terms; she had become very powerful.  The world lost one of its brightest shining stars.  Monroe never stopped standing up for unity and kinship throughout the diversity in America, and even begged an interviewer to include a closing quote telling her of belief in brotherhood between all people.

After her death, Marilyn Monroe continues to influence the entertainment industry to this day, as many would love to fall into her footsteps and conquer the world as she did.  But it did not come easy to her, and she knew nothing but a life of struggle and loneliness.  Largely unknown, Marilyn (born Norma Jeane) was raised in multiple foster homes, with a mentally ill mother continuously reappearing and trying to kidnap her.  She was harassed and assaulted in multiple familiar homes, and was finally declared a ward of the state and married young so as to not be sent back to foster care.  She conquered more obstacles in her early years than most people come across in a lifetime.  And throughout the remainder of her years, she refused to give up on the entertainment industry.  She sat through bad years along with the good ones, and she never stopped putting her all into her roles.

Monroe is highly regarded as one of America’s most popular sex icons.  She is considered the sixth greatest female star of all time by the American Film Institute, as well as first in Sexiest Women of All Time.  Her image is still widely distributed (via posters, clothing, make-up, jewelry, collectibles, calendars, Instagram, film, inspirational quotes, etc.) and her look is largely emulated (Anna Nicole, Madonna, Christina Aguilera, Gwen Stefani, Michelle Williams, Lindsay Lohan, Nicole Kidman, Rachel McAdams, Paris Hilton, Pamela Anderson, Taylor Swift, Katherine McPhee, Megan Hilty, Kelly Osbourne, Lady Gaga, Scarlett Johansson, Blake Lively, etc.).  As far as the world is concerned, there is only one true Marilyn Monroe.  This is further proved with every new sexy, fiery, seductive actress that surfaces but never surpasses this Pioneer of Beauty.

Some names and aliases used by Ms. Monroe:

Norma Jeane Mortenson (she never knew her father but was born under his misspelled name)

Norma Jeane Baker (her mother immediately changed Marilyn's legal name to match her own)

Norma Jeane Dougherty (name change after first marriage)

Norma Jeane DiMaggio (name change after second marriage)

Norma Jeane Monroe (she followed Harlow's lead in taking her mother's maiden name Monroe)

Norma Monroe

Jeane Monroe (several varieties using "Monroe" were tried &trashed before she was satisfied)

Marilyn Monroe (the name Marilyn was suggested due to her resemblance to Marilyn Miller)

Mona Monroe (she used this name on the release form when shooting the nude series)

Marilyn Monroe Miller (name change after third/final marriage)