Fit Villains: Selfish, Shameless, Sassy, Fitness.

Even WITH arms & legs, this would be quite a story. Let it serve as inspiration to overcome your own challenges, whatever they may be!

Via Gizmodo

Philippe Croizon lost his arms and legs in a terrible accident 18 years ago. Since then, he has trained to become a world class athlete. This summer, the Frenchman is going to swim between every continent in the world.

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This video will make you laugh, inspire you, and make you want a fun pass at Caine’s arcade.

Ah-mazing!Laughing, crying, truly touched by this little boy with a BIG imagination.

On repeat. Wow. :)

Caine, I want a fun pass!

xo

Caine Monroy is a 9-year old boy who spent his summer vacation building an elaborate DIY cardboard arcade in his dad’s used auto parts store.

He’s about to have the best day of his life.

Caine dreamed of the day he would have lots of customers visit his arcade, and he spent months preparing everything, perfecting the game design, making displays for the prizes, designing elaborate security systems, and hand labeling paper-lunch-gift-bags. However, his dad’s autoparts store (located in an industrial part of East LA) gets almost zero foot traffic, so Caine’s chances of getting a customer were very small, and the few walk in customers that came through were always in too much of a hurry to get their auto part to play Caine’s Arcade. But Caine never gave up.

Psst- Caine’s got a college fund growing online, and after watching this you may be inclined to donate. Visit the site here for more pics & deets. http://cainesarcade.com

When you stop chasing the wrong things you give the right things a chance to catch you.

Excerpt from 30 Things To Stop Doing To Yourself

As Maria Robinson once said, “Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.”  Nothing could be closer to the truth.  But before you can begin this process of transformation you have to stop doing the things that have been holding you back.

Here are some ideas to get you started:

1. Stop spending time with the wrong people. – Life is too short to spend time with people who suck the happiness out of you.  If someone wants you in their life, they’ll make room for you.  You shouldn’t have to fight for a spot.  Never, ever insist yourself to someone who continuously overlooks your worth.  And remember, it’s not the people that stand by your side when you’re at your best, but the ones who stand beside you when you’re at your worst that are your true friends.
2. Stop running from your problems. – Face them head on.  No, it won’t be easy.  There is no person in the world capable of flawlessly handling every punch thrown at them.  We aren’t supposed to be able to instantly solve problems.  That’s not how we’re made.  In fact, we’re made to get upset, sad, hurt, stumble and fall.  Because that’s the whole purpose of living – to face problems, learn, adapt, and solve them over the course of time.  This is what ultimately molds us into the person we become.
3. Stop lying to yourself. – You can lie to anyone else in the world, but you can’t lie to yourself.  Our lives improve only when we take chances, and the first and most difficult chance we can take is to be honest with ourselves.  Read The Road Less Traveled.
4. Stop putting your own needs on the back burner. – The most painful thing is losing yourself in the process of loving someone too much, and forgetting that you are special too.  Yes, help others; but help yourself too.  If there was ever a moment to follow your passion and do something that matters to you, that moment is now.

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“A compliment is something like a kiss through a veil.”
Victor Hugo

“Do not offer a compliment and ask a favor at the same time. A compliment that is charged for is not valuable.” Mark Twain

Compliments.

Some are sincere. Some are quite the opposite. Some like to get them. Some feel a little uneasy and self-conscious about them. And from time to time I think to myself that there is too few of them.

They are underused and underrated and are often forgotten amongst gossip, negative self-talk and complaints about the boss, the job, the weather and milk prices. Negative observations about reality are plentiful. Positive observations are much less common. So, here are five compelling reasons why it’s a good choice to use more genuine compliments in your day to day life. And a bit further down, three tips on how to give them.

1. You can make someone’s day. That’s a nice thing to do.
2. Increased positivity. Keeping your focus on the positive parts in people expands your own positivity. You’ll notice more positive things about yourself, your own life and other things in your surroundings. What you focus on in your everyday life you’ll see everywhere, not just in other people. 
3. You get what you give. Don’t keep this in the forefront of your mind while giving a compliment. It may make the compliment seem insincere and like you are just out to get something from the other person. But still, people often have a strong feeling of wanting to give what they got. Perhaps not right away, but over time reciprocity and a positive relationship can build. And in general, what you give you tend to get back from the world around you. 
4. Attractiveness. Positivity, appreciation and being able to genuinely express yourself are three attractive traits both in personal and professional relationships. People tend to want to hang around and work with people that have such traits. 
5. It’s fun. When you give a genuine compliment you ignite a spark of happy feelings inside of yourself. Now, here are three tips for sharpening your compliment giving skills.

The compliment has to be genuine

Otherwise you are just trying to take something from the one you are complimenting. And that will not work so well. Your insincerity will often shine through. A compliment delivered with positive words but with a body language and voice tonality - in this case the two most important parts of interpersonal communication - that aren’t saying the same thing may often not go over so well. And the rule that you get what you give still applies. What you feel when you deliver the compliment will come through. So make sure that there is a genuine feeling behind the words.

Cultivate a habit of appreciation.

This will let you discover all the genuinely nice things about people. With this filter closed it will be harder to see the positive things in people and to give compliments that are actually totally genuine. Try to appreciate the things around you - your home, friends, family, co-workers, computer, weather, food etc. - for a few minutes a day to build this habit.

Compliment on something the other person feels is important to him/her.

It may be - at least in some cases - a good practice to not compliment on something that the other person doesn’t have much control over. Or something that he or she has been complimented on a thousand times before. Looks and other more superficial stuff are examples of such things. A compliment that is kinda expected will not be that powerful. And even though your compliment is genuine it may just be lumped together with all those other similar and not so genuine compliments the person has received. Instead, observe what makes this person tick. What are his/her passions, qualities, interests and proudest achievements? What can you genuinely appreciate about those things?

Now, go out and make someone’s day.

Just read an interesting opinion post regarding social media and weight loss. I wanted to know your thoughts!

I’ve mentioned before (and some of you know first hand) that I think social media and platforms like Tumblr are fabulous resources and motivators when it comes to reaching your goals. Letting people in on your weight loss journey provides accountability and encouragement. Not to mention it can help inspire others to make changes in their own lives & provide you with a sense of community and support.

It can be daunting to want to post all that information to your friends and family, but typically it ends up incredibly rewarding & inspirational.  

That’s why I disagree with Dr. Will Aguila’s take on social media and weight loss. He believes that the pressure and anxiety of having ‘all eyes on you’ creates a cycle of guilt and disappointment that leads to failure, and not success. His (slightly paranoid) belief sort of preys on people’s fears about posting their journey’s online: something that I think is more hurtful than helpful.

It’s true, not everyone succeeds the first, second or sometimes third time around. But there’s no shame in keeping trying and doing the best you can. And if the fear of embarrassment motivates you to get closer to your goal (not your only motivation I hope, but one of them), then that could end up a good thing. In fact, you may get over your fear of embarrassment in the process, instead of succumbing to it. 

Read the article below. What do you think? Can social media help or hinder your results?

Article: Don’t Let Your (Facebook) Friends See You Sweat

Thinking about posting your weight loss goals and updates on Facebook? What a great idea. You can instantly give yourself some virtual accountability. You can keep a daily journal that tracks your weight loss triumphs and setbacks. Seems like a no brainer, right? Wrong! Be careful, “caveat emptor” (let the buyer beware), you could be setting yourself up for failure … and a very public one at that.

When we take a closer look at how weight gain and obesity work, we start to understand why the “Facebook Diet” may not be such a great idea. Obesity is a cycle that occurs when we allow ourselves to medicate our feelings of anxiety and depression with food. We learn to overeat to soothe our emotions and eventually, a certain degree of guilt develops — especially if we are gaining weight. As this guilt increases, it adds to the anxiety and depression that we already experience and makes us overeat even more; creating a cycle. The cycle starts with anxiety, but the steam engine that keeps it running is guilt.

Now consider the pressure that you put yourself under by broadcasting your goals to hundreds of your Facebook friends. If your progress is less than stellar, you may feel that the “eyes of the world are looking upon you.” This feeling — whether it’s substantiated or not — increases your feelings of failure. It will fuel the obesity cycle by maximizing your stress, anxiety and guilt, which will in-turn, lead back to overeating.

So instead of creating a healthy measure of accountability for yourself, you’ve actually made matters worse. With every rotation of the cycle the guilt increases more and more. You’re now in danger of spiraling out of control. This is an example of why, when people fail a diet, they gain back all the weight they lost and then some!

Now, consider the possibility of sabotage. Sabotage in weight loss occurs in many forms and the fact that you wish to have others hold you accountable for your own weight loss is a reflection of your past experiences with self-sabotage.

Another form of sabotage which can be just as harmful is “friendly fire.” Friendly fire can occur by well-intentioned family members or friends who believe you may be losing too much weight or that you’re not eating enough. Such sabotage is not intentional and should not be viewed as deliberate, but it may harm you nonetheless. Critique from beloved family members and friends — especially if consistent — can lead to an inevitable downfall if you’re not prepared for this type of disparagement.

Now, consider the flip side of that coin, the “hostile takeover.” This type of attack comes from so-called friends and co-workers that may take a certain amount of delight in your downfall. They may be totally upfront about their attack, criticizing you openly in the social media platform. Or, they may be ninja about it, not making any mention whatsoever of your progress, even when it is undeniably obvious. Such tactics may be meant to crumble the foundations of your efforts for their own amusement — and Facebook puts it all on display.

Therefore, posting a regular journal via social media may cause your weight loss struggle to become a “gladiator sport” and the whole Facebook nation is sitting in the Coliseum cheering your success or hoping for your failure.

I suggest that rather than commit to your friends, you commit to yourself, because after all, this is for you. Minimizing stress, anxiety and guilt breaks the cycle of obesity. If you want to avoid criticism and sabotage so that you can optimize your chances for success, keep your daily diet details out of the public spotlight. Let the results speak for themselves.

It’s your body and no one else’s. The contract that you make with yourself is more valid than anything that you can promise to others. You have what it takes in you to do this! I know, I did it myself. Listen to your inner voice and trust it. If you need to share your plans with someone, then share them only with the people who are closest to you and who will be champions for your cause.

Do what it takes, but don’t be disappointed if you fall. Get up and try again. But above all, beat the cycle!

LOVE this idea! Wanna be gym-rats & procrastinators listen up!

I think this will work wonders to help people stay on track and it’s so simple I’m sad I didn’t think of it first!

I approve. :)

Gym Pact is a application that helps keep you accountable to get your workouts in. How does it work? By penalizing you each time you skip a workout AND rewarding you when you go. You’re in charge of how much you’re penalized and how often you want to work out (and of course, if something comes up, you have safety nets - but you might need a doctor’s note).

The psychology is simple: we’re creatures who react to immediacy: rewards and penalties NOW. We don’t mind putting off working out since we aren’t paying the penalty (or reaping the rewards) immediately. Gym Pact works by creating a system whereby we lose something right NOW by not keeping to our routine (in this case $$).

Where does the money go? To those who made it to the gym! Every week, you earn Gym Bucks from the stakes paid by people who didn’t make it. Gym Bucks can be spent on fitness-related prizes or cashed out.

About Gym Pact

Gym-Pact’s concept stems from a behavioral economics class at Harvard, and helps you overcome your own bad habits to achieve the regular exercise you want.

• Time

  Time-inconsistent preferences – Ever make a fitness Resolution on January 1st only to fall off the wagon by the second week?

  Congratulations, you have time-inconsistent preferences!

  This just means that the You of Today and the You of Tomorrow don’t always agree.

  Because the benefits of exercise happen in the future while the pain of sweating on a treadmill happens today, it’s difficult for most people to get to the gym.

  Gym-Pact clears up this inconsistency by making the cost of not exercising visible today, in the form of a monetary fee that you set on yourself.

  Think of us as a no-holds-barred alarm clock for the gym!

• Money

  Loss aversion – Let’s face it. You might not be very excited if we gave you a water bottle, but if we took away a water bottle you owned, you’d be angry.

  No way, that’s mine! We all hate losing things much more than we like gaining them.

  That’s why with even a $10 motivational fee, Gym-Pact can do what all the free water bottles in the world can’t – get you to the gym.

Read more about Gym Pact on their site and talk to your friends about it!

I think this is an important concept when applied to weightloss and healthy living.. or just living. I’ve explored it before, and TONS of you deal with it EVERY DAY (as far as I can tell from my Ask). The article below REALLY provides the science behind the phenomenon. This can explain why you spend all day as an A+ Health Star then BUCKLE come dinner time.

Decision fatigue is based on the concept of ego-depletion: the more we deny ourselves and the more decisions we have to make in a day, the worse we are at maintaining will power.

It applies to ANY and ALL decisions, big or small, important or non-important, life changing or inconsequential. Everything from deciding what to put on your sandwich to what shoes to wear: the more choices we have & the more choices we have to make can ACTUALLY exhausts our brains.

Excerpt from NY Times

These experiments demonstrated that there is a finite store of mental energy for exerting self-control. When people fended off the temptation to scarf down M&M’s or freshly baked chocolate-chip cookies, they were then less able to resist other temptations. When they forced themselves to remain stoic during a tearjerker movie, afterward they gave up more quickly on lab tasks requiring self-discipline, like working on a geometry puzzle or squeezing a hand-grip exerciser. Willpower turned out to be more than a folk concept or a metaphor. It really was a form of mental energy that could be exhausted. The experiments confirmed the 19th-century notion of willpower being like a muscle that was fatigued with use, a force that could be conserved by avoiding temptation. To study the process of ego depletion, researchers concentrated initially on acts involving self-control ­— the kind of self-discipline popularly associated with willpower, like resisting a bowl of ice cream. They weren’t concerned with routine decision-making, like choosing between chocolate and vanilla, a mental process that they assumed was quite distinct and much less strenuous. Intuitively, the chocolate-vanilla choice didn’t appear to require willpower.

When it comes to weight loss or healthy living, it’s ALL in the planning. Planning helps take some of those on-the-spot daily decisions OUT (hmmmm…. taking the thinking out… sounds like something Ive said before, no? :)

The more you plan & limit the decisions you have to make on the fly, the more likely you are to stick to your goals AND have enough mental energy left over to make smarter decisions during UNPLANNED moments. Planning has more benefit than just knowing what you’re having for lunch: it can actually change how you react to temptation at snack time. :)

For more info about decision fatigue, click on the NY Times article here.

Pssst - If you get a chance to listen to it, I HIGHLY recommend streaming or downloading the ‘Stuff To Blow Your Mind’ Decision Fatigue episode. It will… well… blow your mind. :) Search for it in iTunes, worth it. :)