I had a great discussion the other day with a client with whom I have a tremendous amount of respect.  We got to yapping about women and their goals and we hit an impasse.  We ended with us agreeing to disagree in a very respectful manner, but it got me thinking:  how honest are you about your goals?  And not just with other people, more importantly with yourself?

Let me give you what are discussion was about and then I’ll give you some quick background so you can see where I am coming from, and then I REALLY want you to weigh in on this matter.

My client, who I will refer to as Ethel (what? You don’t have a GF named Ethel? Sheesh!), believes that women set performance goals for the challenge.  She trains many of them for endurance events and for her they are driven by the goal.  When they come on to her team she warns them that they are going to gain weight while training for the event—not lose—and she says they are cool with that because it is all about the goal.     

Now I have a thoroughly different opinion.  Honestly, I have been dieting (men and) women for almost 12 years now.  I have a pretty good idea of the human psyche and what women are really like but more importantly, I know what secretly burns within them.  Everyone loves a challenge.  Everyone loves a goal.  Everyone loves a great cause.  And everyone wants to look good.  So to run a marathon for your Aunt Helen to raise money for the “X” Foundation is noble and it is rewarding and in the back of your mind…it is a great way to lose weight.  I feel that no matter what sport a woman plays, participates in or heck, goes to watch (LOL) she is doing it to look good—OH yeah!…and it’s a great challenge. 

Now here’s some background for you so you can understand where I am coming from:  When Ethel (yes, that’s her name!lol) gets a client in, she is their coach.  Her position is one of authority and expertise but it is not what I would call a confidential or confidant-type position.  You could go all the way to marathon day with her and never share much about your personal life with her.  Now does that happen?  Probably not, but hear me out.  My position is also one of authority and expertise, but it is COMPLETELY a position of confidentiality and trust.  Women tell me things they would never ever repeat to another female lest they be judged harshly.  If you have ever met me before you know I am not one to judge and I am not one to talk.  There are items in my house that I may never find again because I won’t tell myself where they are!  So because of this, I have soul bearing conversations with women that I don’t think they would even admit that they had a week later.  All of those conversations center around the fact that at the end of the day, they better look good.

So here are some things that you may hear and I will give you their interpretation:

“I really enjoy the challenge.” 

Or…I would never keep an exercise regimen going on my own to stay looking hot so I chose to do something really hard and tell everyone so I am forced to finish it.  I better lose weight while doing it.

“My girlfriend asked me to do it with her and I said, sure!”

Or…I’ll be damned if that chick gets a head start on me for the summer.  If she can do it, I can too!…Wench!

“I want to see if I can better my time.”

Or…I lost 3 pounds the first time and then gained back 7!  I’m going in for a second time and see if I can’t get rid of it for good!  As long as I blah blah, I’ll lose weight.

“I need a goal.”

Or…I’ll sit my lazy butt on this couch the whole winter if I don’t commit to something.  I cannot gain weight this season!

“I’m doing this for my blah blah.”

Or…and if I can lose a few pounds while supporting Aunt Betty Anne, it’s a win-win for everybody!

“I really need to start and finish something big.”

…other than this bag of chips in front of me.  I better lose at 10 pounds running this race!

“I just want to do it one time to say I did it.”

Or…I am not convinced that I could get hot without it so I am going to sign up for this asinine challenge.  My boyfriend better appreciate what I’m about to go through….bastard!  I better lose cuz I’m only doing this once!

So this is my reality.  Girls will give their friends a lot of good ‘air time’ filled with meaningful platitudes and then they’ll become super intense on me, draw close to me and tell me that if I do not make them hot while they are doing XYZ, that it’s going down!  EEK!

But this all stems from the fact that no one wants to admit to themselves—never mind some total stranger—that they are about to do a life changing event for aesthetic reasons.  The desire and want is there, but why admit it when you can hide behind the noble cause.  Now why does it matter you might ask?  What’s the harm in hiding behind a goal?  A lot.

First, it sets the tone of your training.  So if you really were about your body and not your overall goal of doing well in the event, no matter how well you do in the event you will always be disappointed if you come out heavier than you went in.  Second, you may begin to change your behavior or eating habits to facilitate an unrealistic physique goal thereby jeopardizing a solid performance goal.  Lastly, you may begin to lose sight of rational thinking and have a one track mind that is not setting you on a good path of health and beauty.  No matter what, a goal built on dishonesty is no goal to have.

So I want to know.  How honest are you about your goals?  Seriously.  Are you participating in a sport for the sport or for the hidden benefits like a hot body?  Have you ever thought this much about it?  Would you do an event if it meant that you would gain weight or would you pass on it?  LMK what you think!  Am I off track?  Talk to me!!  Ethel wants to know too!

So far in this menu series we have laid out proteins, fruits and veggies using a simple system of color coding.  Color is tremendously important in the world of food because the more colorful the food, the nutrient packed the food is.  Keeping your plate looking like the Rainbow Coalition is a great way to stay on the healthy side of life. 

But unlike protein, fruits and vegetables, starchy carbohydrates are not easily broken down by color.  A perfect example of that would be potatoes.  You have red potatoes, sweet potatoes, white potatoes, Yukon gold potatoes—and I would recommend that you eat them all at the same frequency because none is more nutritious than the other (ok, sweet potatoes have a slight edge;).   

Starches are also *not necessary* to be in your diet the way that fruits and veggies are or any other food source for that matter.  Yes whole grains are healthy, but they are not necessary.  For one thing, we just started eating them as a species.  We never ate grains on a regular basis thousands of years ago.  We were more meat based and plant based.  Also, no matter what grain you choose, it will require some level of processing just to be palatable.  When’s the last time you went wheat berry picking? 

So going strictly by color might not be the most prudent methods of choosing a starch.  But what about a starch’s texture?  I would venture to say that a starch’s texture is far more important than any other aspect of its composition.  There are 3 types of texture:

Shards of fiberglass:  This starch is the mainstay of any person’s diet who honestly says they are serious about looking good naked.  Fully represented by cut up gums, acquired taste buds and hard core chewing, this starch is all about health.  Do not even THINK of giving this to any family member who has not been thoroughly sworn into the “I care how I look AND feel club” or you will never hear the end of it.

Barley, quinoa, couscous, shredded wheat, millet, brown rice, steel cut oats.

Pass me the water, please:  This starch is characterized by a thick, smooth feel on the palette.  Nowhere near as intense as the shards of fiberglass family, but not an easy sell either.  Family members may not hate you after these, but they are still not party favorites. 

Lentils, beans, oatmeal (slow cooked), Ezekiel bread, oat bran, whole grain, brown rice

Flashbacks of Sade:  That’s right, these are Smooth Operators.  Eating these guys makes you forget about the 3 molecules of water that you’ll be holding on your butt for every gram of starch in them.  To be honest, you don’t care.  If you could slap a stick of butter on these and hum while eating them—you would!  These guys make ya wanna holla every time you eat one.  Family members will eat most of these starches but typically they bathe and dress them in things that would make you do double cardio just knowing they were in the house.

Potatoes (sweet, red, white, gold), Squash (acorn, butternut, spaghetti), pumpkin, root veggies, bananas

There are some foods that are missing off of this list on purpose:  peas, corn, lima beans, tortillas, pasta etc.  They just are not worthy of any good press.  Try to limit them to one time per week or less if possible.

Here are the rules:

1)       VARY YOUR TEXTURES!  Because we are creatures of habits and eat oatmeal like it’s our jobs, we deny our palettes the fun of pumpkin!  Texture is AS important as color when it comes to variety and beating food boredom.

2)       Try to have at least one from each texture every week.  If you are not eating starches on a regular basis, try starting with the Flashbacks.  They are easier to get down and chock full of vitamins.

3)       Do not repeat a texture in a day.  Most people have 1 to 3 starch servings per day but may find themselves eating different variations of oatmeal all day long.  Do not do that.  Vary your starch as much as possible.  Although quinoa, millet and spelt are all very healthy for you, eating them all in the same day may preclude you from any long board meetings for a few days.  Easy on the fiber there quick shooter!  OY!

Ok…we’re getting closer to having all of our foods laid out on the counter.  We have fats next and then we ‘order’ them.  I hope you have been trying some of these suggestions as to how to put some variety in your menu.  Feel free to share some tips in the comment section below if you have any!  I really want to hear about them!:o)

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When I was of college age, I went to Northeastern University for “biomedical” engineering (they did not have an official program at the time) and I remember landing a big co-op job at 19 years of age managing QA for an FDA regulated  manufacturing floor.  I was in heaven.  This wasn’t an internship—it was a contract position.  I was ecstatic but I wasn’t satisfied.

When I was in my late twenties, I worked for a municipality and alongside two other amazing women, determined the sewer rates for all of Greater Boston.  The work we did covered more than 40 cities (including Boston) and was used as the anchor for calculating all household sewer rates.  We felt empowered as women and important to the state of Massachusetts but for me, I still lacked something on my resume.

When I hit my mid 30’s and no longer in engineering, I found myself heading up a group of extraordinary trainers whose “call to service” in the community seemed to come natural to them.  I had enough clients to fill a small commuter jet and I was a mommy.  I was getting closer to feeling accomplished but I never took the time to take stock in that.

Now I am almost 40 years of age, leaving a position that on the “outside” did not have much exposure for me but on the inside of the company had a tremendous amount of exposure… and I have been humbled.

I have been brought to my knees…and then eventually face down.

As fitness professionals, all we want to know is, “Is anybody out there?  Can you hear me?  Am I speaking loud enough?”  For the most part we never really know how much we truly affect others.    People will come and go in our lives and they will say thank you or better yet, refer someone to you (which by the way, is THE ultimate compliment you can give a fitness professional) but it is not a summation of efforts.  It comes as little waves of delight throughout a somewhat hectic day.  And although at the time it feels amazing, the overall impact of it seems to be lost in the shuffle. 

Well over this past weekend I got to truly find out how many people were “listening” and when I say it has turned me inside out, I want you to know that that is an understatement. 

I am leaving a position of 4 years as a Physique Transformation Engineer for a company truly dedicated to healthy training for women who want to compete in fitness-type competitions to enter the murky world of blogging.  Am I scared? OH HECK YEAH!  Am I used to challenges like this, though?  Yes.  I am.  (hanging my head in shame, lol) I think I thrive off of them in some sick way. (No, really?  Ya think? *sigh*)  But I am up to the challenge and meeting it head on like a champ (read “I hope they sound convinced because I am making this up as I go along” in between those lines, ha!)  And honestly, what’s truly fueling me is:

I have arrived.

I have hit “that” place every fitness professional wishes they could hit.

And I am humbled…because I never knew 1) that I could reach it and 2) that it felt this good.

If for some crazy reason I could never work again, I would be ok with that because I feel as rewarded as I could ever be.  I want to thank everyone who has reached out to me and not only said thank you for my time, but took time out of their busy schedules to tell me *exactly* how I have changed their lives.  If you do not know what that feels like, imagine lying in a spa with an endless supply of peanut butter and ice cream (that did not make you fat) getting a mani/pedi by sun kissed hotties in the Fiji Islands while making goo gobs of money with your international conglomerate funneling it into an offshore account with NO TAXES!  Holy moly that sounds amazing!  Focus.  I need focus.  But that’s how I feel!

I FEEL SO BLESSED!

So as I sign off as Jodi Jones and sign on again as Jodiojo, I say from the bottom of my heart:

THANK YOU! 

Thank you for trusting me, thank you for believing in me, thank you for telling me and more importantly:  thank you for meaning it!  Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.  I am going to get up off of the carpet now and take some of the fibers out of my nose (lol) and go back to putting the menu planning series together. 

Please stay tuned to the blog because there are so many things on the way:  pictures, videos, product reviews, give aways, surveys, more series and etc. 

I am really looking forward to my new adventure—no matter how scary it is—and hope that you will come along for the ride. 

Take care today, tomorrow and everyday because if you have not been fulfilled yet in your life, you are surely missing out!

WOOP WOOP!:o)