Rebooting a Life

I'm getting a late start kick-starting the new year with new resolutions. After three weeks of being sedentary post-op, it's time to unblock, to reboot my life. Yesterday, I started a cleanse using the Master Cleanse Lemonade detox regime. No food, no medications or supplements, no beverages other than pure water for 6-7 days. Day 2 and I'm doing great. Not a bit hungry. More energy.

I also want to start this year with more positive changes in my life than just cleansing my body. Changes that will cleanse my mind and spirit. I'm doing some personal housekeeping, sweeping out the cobwebs in my mind and dusting off some of my previous resolutions, reactivating or ramping them up for 2010.



Here is my list of 18 positive ways I'm rebooting my life.

1. First thing I do when I wake up is to greet God and thank Him for whatever immediately comes to mind. Invite Him join me as I embark on a new day and ask Him to reveal to me what He would have me do to share His love.
   
2. Drink a large glass of room temperature water to hydrate my system.
   
3. Shower and dress (although a nice luxury, no more working from my home office in my PJs unless feeling under the weather).
4. Continue to eat clean eat raw, drink more water and abide by the one o'clock rule - breakfast like a king, lunch like a queen and dinner like a pauper. No starchy "super sugars" (breads, potatoes, rice, pasta or beans) after 1:00pm.
5. After breakfast is my time to read in my Bible and pray. Update prayer journal daily with requests and answers to prayers.
   
6. Set regular "work" hours and take regular visual breaks, as well as break to move around and stretch.
7. Review and revise work priority-list and track progress, daily and weekly.
   
8. Take a break late morning or in the afternoon to write something in my journal.
9. Make life easier - make daily entries into bookkeeping system and do more menu planning.
   
10. Write a handwritten letter or call a friend or family member I've been out of touch with for a while.
11. Find new educational opportunities to avail myself of - cooking, writing, photography, and videography, software.... schedule more time, more often for sketching, painting, textiles....
    
12. Spend time outdoors EVERY day. Walk to the post office rain or shine.
    
13. Sign up for new volunteer opportunities to serve others in my local community.
    
14. Exercise or walk prior to my last meal of the day.
15. Take at least one photo or make one video every day - life is made of moments.
    
16. Continue to live simply, use less, recycle more and reduce energy consumption at home.
    
17. Watch movies less. Spend more time reading in the evenings.
18. Print out my Reboot Agenda and post it in my office and on my refrigerator. Carry a copy with me. Add to or revise my list as needed.

What kind of changes or re-commitments have your made when you've rebooted your life?

Fit to Serve Basics

My friend Brad Bloom, publisher of Faith & Fitness Magazine, posted a fitness challenge for 2010 inviting readers to submit an application to be considered to be one of five participants in a yearlong fitness challenge to reduce their overall body mass, while being personally coached by Coach Tim Powers.

Click on image to read the Faith & Fitness article about Coach Powers' book Fit to Serve.

Here is an excerpt about the 2010 Fit To Serve Challenge from the Faith & Fitness article Read, Set, Engage! by Coach Powers:

THE FIT TO SERVE BASICS

"... I want to share with you common strategies that I am having all (the "fab five") of them integrate into their daily and weekly physical fitness workout programs:

- All five on our team believe that they need to reduce their overall body mass, i.e. Body fat percentage. So, I have invoked the “one o’clock rule” for each one them. This rule states that they are not to ingest any starch carbohydrates after lunch. Starchy carbohydrates are considered a “super sugar” and include grains, flour, breads, cereals, chips, pasta, rice, beans and potatoes. They have been encouraged to have as much starch as they want for breakfast and lunch, but not after that. If you want dessert, have it for breakfast.

- The five will all be on an eating modification system where they will eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a queen and supper/dinner like a pauper. God created the human body to have its highest metabolic rate of burning calories from three o’clock in the morning through approximately eleven o’clock in the morning. By one o’clock in the afternoon physiology starts to ramp down. Supper is still a significant meal, but only in terms of actual hunger and not appetite and the enjoyment eating good tasting food.

- The team will be eating as organic as possible in terms of finances and convenience. The biggest concept will be to not eat any genetically modified breads and cereals and meat and poultry that have been shot up with growth hormones and antibiotics. Additives, preservatives, color dyes, pesticides, fungicides and herbicides are considered toxic and unsafe to consume for your 75 trillion cells. God has hard-wired them to recognize danger, so they encapsulate these poisons with body fat to protect the body.

The team will for the most part be engaging in two exercise sessions per day five days per week – 90 to 120 minutes in aggregate duration. The morning is the best time to train in resistance exercise such as weight-training and run sprints. Most our five will be weight-training three days per week and running sprints three days per week (trust me, they will all be easing into these protocols). The best time to train aerobically is at the end of your day and before your last major meal. Our goal to achieve an arterial blood cleaning and strengthening of the heart and lungs with a non-competitive workout such as power walking, light running, cycling, swimming or any other workout that they can sustain a “steady state” of 70% to 75% of their maximum intensity."

Great tips! Meet the team and join me to take the fitness challenge at home. Read more.

Faith & Fitness Magazine is a lifestyle resource to build physical and spiritual strength. It helps readers make connections between the Christian faith and their fitness lifestyle. It is your tool for powerful, healthy, and passionate living.

New Year's Resolution - Eat Less, Walk More

Walk along with our Erickson-Bisch shadows as we chat about our New Year's Resolution to eat less, walk more. Drop in on a short segment of our conversation as we walk 3.5 miles through King Estate's vineyard on a beautiful, crisp January 3, 2010 afternoon. Wait for the winery to come into view.

If you don't own a pedometer, I highly recommend you get one and start walking with us. Read the stickK Experts Word on Getting from Resolution to Real Change and visit Wonders of Walking for inspiration. I took a 12-week contract out on myself last year with stickK to exercise/walk 3 or more times a week. My daughter was my referee. If I didn't met my weekly goals, I set up my contract commitment to send money from my checking account to a non-profit I did not want to support... if I failed. Worked like a charm; I met every goal for 12 weeks. I just renewed my commitment for 2010.

A note about weight control: While at the used bookstore the other day, I picked up a 10-year old booklet Amazing Apple Cider Vinegar, which happened to be sitting on top of a pile of books I was passing by between bookshelves. An odd coincidence, as earlier in the week I was thinking about adding cider vinegar to my daily regime to aid digestion and weight control.

The recommendation is to drink a teaspoon of apple cider vinegar in a glass of warm water before each meal to melt away excess pounds. The author Earl L. Mindell claims that it works, although no one really knows why. He suggests that it either (1) really does burn calories, (2) takes the edge off of the appetite or (3) just fills the stomach. No matter what the science proves to be, the effect is the same - weight loss. I'm willing to give it a try, besides, apple cider is known to have many curative benefits to our health... to numerous to mention here, but there are many publications and online resources out there dedicated to the subject of apple cider vinegar.

If you are thinking about adding another cookbook to your library, I recommend The Sustainable Kitchen published in 2004 by Stu Stein, Mary Hinds and Judith H. Dern to share their passionate cooking inspired by local and regional farms, forests and oceans. At one time, Stu Stein was the executive chef at King Estate Winery.