Hi Kids!
For our Thursday Theater, here’s a video clip about how to safely and gradually increase your fitness until you are doing just enough!
Love,
The Fat Chick
Getting Just Enough Exercise: Increasing Gradually
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Dieting: How Never to Feel Full Again
There is no doubt in my mind that there are few things as expressly designed to make you lose the gift of sufficiency as going on a diet. You may not lose weight, but you will lose perspective in a New York minute. And that makes me sad.
I have found few pleasures in life as wonderful as being sated from a wonderful meal. Not over full. Not stuffed. Not “I need the stretchy pants and a lie down”. But it’s so wonderful to have eaten just enough of something delicious.
In order to achieve this balance of “just enough” (by any means other than dumb luck) you have to be in touch with your body’s satiety signals. You have to know what your body wants to eat. You have to know when your body has had enough. And then you need to stop eating. Seems simple, right?
In some ways it is simple. Babies only a few hours old can manage it. Baby wants to eat. Baby cries. Baby gets fed. Baby lets you know he’s had enough. Baby stops eating. We are born knowing when we are full. It’s a miracle of nature.
And then we start messing with it by going on diets.
Diets aren’t about listening to when your body is hungry or full. Diets are about eating what’s on the diet when the diet tells you to eat it. Diets tell you to have a piece of wheat toast and a boiled egg for breakfast. It doesn’t matter if this is what you want to eat. It doesn’t matter if you really only want the egg or if you want two pieces of toast. It doesn’t matter if you eat the toast and the egg and are still hungry. It doesn’t matter whether or not you really want to eat leftover salad from last night’s dinner. Youwill eat a boiled egg and a piece of wheat toast. So you tell your tummy and the rest of your body to shut up and simply refer to the chart in your brain that says, “boiled egg and piece of wheat toast.”
You know what happens next. You get hungry. You ignore it. Your body gets mad. You ignore it. You want a cookie. You ignore it. You decide not to think about cookies. Which makes you think about cookies a lot more. You finally break down and eat a cookie. Except it’s not one cookie, it’s two dozen. And you go to bed feeling overstuffed, nauseated, guilty and angry. Then you get up the next day and eat a boiled egg and a piece of wheat toast.
I’m not just saying this. There is research to back this up. In the famous Minnesota Starvation Experiment, men were observed eating normally, then intentionally underwent severe calorie restriction causing them to lose 25 percent of their body weight and then started eating again. The results were astonishing. Subjects suffered prolonged significant increases in depression, hysteria and hypochondriasis. The majority of subjects experienced periods of severe emotional distress and depression (even self-mutilation). And during and long after the starvation period, the subjects were obsessed with food. And many of the subjects found that they no longer, ever again, felt they had enough to eat.
A successful relationship with our bodies is like any other successful relationship. It relies on communication, honesty and trust. When your body gets hungry and you ignore it, your body stops trusting that you will feed it. Your body makes you think about food all the time just to make sure it will get some. And your body stops sending you the signals that you are happily and pleasantly full.
Which again, robs us of the gift of sufficiency and the joy of satiety. Which kind of sucks.
So my little chicklettes, if you are on a diet or thinking about going on a diet or are recovering from a diet, take a moment and listen to your body talking to you. It is asking you to listen. It is telling you what it wants. It is begging for your trust. And it is saying it has had just about enough of this dieting business.
Love,
The Fat Chick
The Gift of Sufficiency
There is no doubt that our country has been through some tough economic times lately. Many of my friends are without work. And many of my friends are working hard to make ends meet. But I am continually astonished about how large a discrepancy there is among people I know who are struggling. Some people, who seem to have plenty to get through today and probably tomorrow are in a deep panic about a slight economic downturn. While some of my friends, some of my best friends, seem cheerful and at peace even when they have very little. Those friends, who remain calm as they sell off the furniture and slap together another PB&J seem to know a special secret to happiness. I call it the gift of sufficiency. This is the gift of looking at what you have, atwhatever you have and calling it enough.
Now let me start by saying that the gift of sufficiency is truly a gift. It is a privilege that not everyone is able to enjoy. Not everyone in our world has enough to eat or to pay the mortgage or rent or to buy school books or doctor visits for their kids. But that’s what makes it so vexing that some of us, who have so much, still don’t feel we have enough.
Now I’m not going to lie. The gift of sufficiency is something that I’ve struggled with my entire life. Not because I want a lot more stuff. I have plenty of stuff. And those closest to me can probably tell you, that I relentlessly get rid of stuff that is just taking up space in my life. No, I struggle with the feeling that I won’t have enough to last through tomorrow. I worry that I won’t have enough to help me deal with any financial emergency. But I work diligently towards this gift of sufficiency. Because when I look at the happiest people I know, they all share this gift.
So my little chicklettes, this week is “Basta” week. We’re going to talk about having enough money, enough food, and how to cope when we’ve decided we’ve had just about enough of people trying to harsh our mellow. But just for this moment, I invite you to take a little breath and be grateful for all the amazing things you have. And just for this moment, thank the universe for giving you just enough.
Love,
The Fat Chick
Stuff that Weighs More than Me: The Hollywood Sign
In honor of our week of stepping out into the limelight, I thought I’d test the weight of a Hollywood Icon. I wasn’t able to find exact verifiable statistics on the weight of the Hollywood Sign, but I was able to get enough of an estimate going to state definitively that the sign falls into the “weighs more than me” category.
When you see the sign on television or in pictures, it’s difficult to imagine just how BIG this thing is. (Unlike most things that look awesome and large and fabulous on TV and seen in real life make you say, “meh.” I’m talking about YOU Mann’s Chinese Theater.) But seen up (relatively) close this thing is jumbo sized.
The back side of the Hollywood Sign, showing supports.
Each of the letters is about as tall as a 4-story building. The letters are 50 ft. tall and are drilled 20 ft. into concrete in the soil. Each letter is backed by 140 feet of steel I-beams with about 100 feet of crossbeams. I-beam of that type weighs in at about 150 lbs. per foot. Then you have to add in the weight of the facing material and other supporting materials. This gives us enough for a basic, back of the envelope computation:
Letter Height: 50 ft.
Letter I-beam supports: about 20,000 lbs.
Letter I-beam cross beams: about 10,000 lbs.
Other materials: about 10,000 lbs.
Estimated letter weight: 40,000 lbs. or about 20 tons.
Number of letters: 9
Total sign weight: about 180 tons
Conclusion: The Hollywood Sign weighs more than me.
P.S. The Fit Fatties are contemplating a hike to see this amazing icon. Any interest in going? Comment below.
Love,
The Fat Chick
Thursday Theater: Exercise for People of Size
Steppin’ out can include stepping into an exercise program. In this week’s video I talk about how to maintain physical and emotional safety while exercising in a big body.
So my dear feathered friends, find some exercise birds to flock with and shake your collective groove things!
Love,
The Fat Chick
Haters Gonna Hate
When you’re THIS awesome, some people just can’t handle it!
Yesterday, in our talk about stepping out, we discussed the notion that often you don’t know what’s in a person’s head, so you might as well imagine they are thinking well of you. But what happens when you think somebody is mean spirited and nasty and then they open their big mouths and remove all doubt?
In our not so genteel society, sometimes people are going to say nasty things. If they don’t say them to you in person, they will certainly say them online in comments or on Facebook. They may moo as you walk past or yell something like, “Just put down the cheeseburger!” At some point in life it happens to all of us.
And that’s really the first step to recognizing that it happens to all of us. Short, tall, round, thin–everybody gets something nasty yelled at them at some point. Heck you can’t even be the president without worrying about somebody throwing a shoe at you. The amazing Ragen Chastain gets so much nastiness thrown at her, she created a separate blog to contain some of the more ridiculous comments. And even if you were model thin, and rich, and drove a fancy car, people would find reasons to hate on you. Maybe they would find even more.
That’s because, believe it or not, the actions of haters really have nothing to do with you. It’s about them. It’s about them feeling jealous or inadequate or lonely or insecure. It’s about them desperately trying to recapture their lost mojo by peeing in your pool. And since you can’t fix the whole world, sometimes you just gotta accept that haters are gonna hate. Bless them, and move on. Sometimes I talk to them and give them a piece of my mind first if I’m feeling feisty. But ultimately, after I’ve had my talk with them, I say, “Bless their hearts” and then move on.
Is it easy? Oh my goodness, no. It’s really hard. And I know sometimes all I want to do is curl up in a ball and cry. But then, from a practical standpoint, I really don’t want to let that hater win. I don’t want to reenforce that crappy behavior, and I don’t want to give that creep that kind of power over me. So when I feel down, I go read Ragen’s hate mail and realize I’m not alone. I call a good friend, get dressed up and go have coffee or an adult beverage somewhere fabulous. I pull out my positive artwork and read some of the great things my friends have recently said online.
Because at the end of the day, my little chicklettes, you can only control your reaction to the world. You can only focus on being fiercely and completely yourself. Because at the end of the day, haters are gonna hate.
Love,
The Fat Chick
Stepping Out: Sharing Your Hotness with the World
The Fat Chick and her fabulous husband on the red carpet at the New Media Vault Event at the W Hotel at Hollywood and Vine.
Last week my hubby and I went camping. We got really dirty and had to boil hot water for dishes. Then we came home, took baths and went to glitzy red carpet event at the W Hotel in Hollywood. Such is the life in LA LA Land. Last week we addressed the joys of camping and getting back to nature. This week we’re going to address the other half of our crazy week and talk about stepping out.
I think many of us have learned to hide our big fat lights under a bushel barrel. Many of us were taunted and teased as children. As adults, some of us are still taunted and teased. And just recently the situation of NY School Bus Monitor Karen Huff Klein demonstrated that it can be tough out there for people of size. (At least the school imposed a harsh penalty on those boys for their awful behavior.) When you have spent your life being singled out and taunted and teased and harassed and called awful names it’s human nature to want to make yourself less noticeable. It’s easy to see why we would try to make ourselves small and fade into the background.
While this sort of blending in is perfectly understandable, it’s also a little bit sad. We are big, bright, beautiful shining stars and we are meant to SHINE baby! It’s hard and it’s scary, but it just needs to happen. So this week we’re going to be talking about moving out of the shadows and into the light–starting with my appearance at the event pictured above.
I’ve been working in the film and media industry in Hollywood for over a decade now and have been in the public eye for even longer than that, but let me tell you a little secret. I still get nervous every time I go to a public event. I still wonder if people will judge me. I keep waiting to be “found out” and hear some body shout, “Hey, who let that short, chubby chick from Wisconsin in here?” You know it’s never happened, but I’m always aware that it might.
When I get nervous, I play a little game. As I’ve said before, I don’t really know what most people are thinking about me. So I begin the evening by imagining they think I’m awesome. It’s all in my head anyways so I might as well imagine good things, right? So I grab my husband’s arm and a bracing (and ridiculously overpriced) glass of pinot grigio and jump right in. And most of the time, I have a lot of fun. But in order to have that fun and to shine in the light, I first have to overcome that moment of existential angst in my bathroom at home, gather my courage, put on my big girl Hollywood “playah” panties and get out there.
So my little chicklettes, this week we’re going to talk about donning some sequins and rhinestones and hopping out of the nest of your little comfort zone. Because to deprive the world of your basic awesomeness for even one more day would be a terrible, terrible crime.
Love,
The Fat Chick
The Zen (sort of) Art of Camping
Sometimes I joke that the best part of camping is how relieved you are not to be camping any more. Seriously. You know, like when you say to somebody, “It hurts when I do this!” They invariably dutifully ask, “Well, why are you doing that?” You reply, “Because it feels so good when I stop!” Yeah, camping is a little like that.
When I told one of my good friends I was planning on going camping, she said that for her, camping seemed to be mostly about cooking and cleaning up after cooking and getting things ready for sleeping and sleeping and picking things up after sleeping. And I agreed. Camping is kind of like that too. But for me, that’s sort of the point of camping.
For me, camping takes me out of my routine at home and slows me down. Everyday things like making a meal or doing dishes are more challenging when you have to pull everything out of a cooler and make a fire and heat your own water. But I also find that the slower and more challenging nature of doing these things in a more primitive way causes me to live in the moment. While I’m making dinner, I’m not also on the cell phone and figuring out what I’m going to wear today. While I’m doing dishes, I’m not also watching TV and thinking about what my last client said to me. I find that I can be absorbed in what I’m doing and achieve a state of flow.
For me, a state of flow is a condition where for a few, brief, blessed moments, I’m concentrating completely on what I’m doing while I’m doing it. It’s rare and elusive but supremely relaxing. It’s living in the now without reflection and without worry. It’s just a matter of doing stuff while you’re doing it. This is something I also feel whenever I teach an exercise class. There’s so much to keep track of while teaching–from how my students are doing to the temperature in the room to the beat of the music to what step I’m supposed to be doing right now to making sure that everybody is being safe and not getting hurt. Whenever I start thinking about what I’m going to have for lunch or whether or not I should buy that shirt I saw at the mall last night, it all falls apart. I stumble. I lose my place in the music. And I find I have to shake my head, march us all in place for a little while and begin again. But when I’m just thinking about my students and the beat and the dancing, it’s calming and joyous and maybe a little teensy bit zen.
So my little chicklettes–I want to ask you to think about what activities allow you to achieve this sort of moving meditation. What allows you to live completely in the “now”? Is there something you love to do? Something during which you can be completely absorbed and time seems to just “fly by”? I encourage you to find your thing. Maybe you could even try camping. Because, when you stop camping and take a bath and slip in between clean sheets on a real bed, it feels soooooooo good.
Love,
The Fat Chick
The Fat Chick Unplugged: Back to Nature
The Fat Chick and family get back to nature
I often talk about balance on The Fat Chick Sings. My husband just finished up a pretty intense gig and I knew he needed a break. So the minute he told me the date of his last day, I announced that the day after his last day, we were going camping!
Now I love technology as much as the next chick. Possibly even MORE! And my husband works as a high level technology consultant. But sometimes my little chicklettes, you need to unplug and get away from technology for a little while. So we go camping.
We have a funny rule on our camping trips. We only check cell phones/email one time per day and we only check our spouses email/cell phones not our own. We know each other well enough to know what constitutes a real emergency and what can wait. And then neither of us gets sucked down the rabbit hole of emails and electronic love that pulls us out of the moment.
So we unplug the technology, stoke the campfire, pour some wine into our plastic camp cups and sit. We feel the breeze on our faces. We trace the patterns in the stars. We talk about everything and nothing. We breathe.
I wonder sometimes if feeling the sun on our faces is something that we need for health. Some casual googling reveals many folks believe that spending time in nature helps deal with depression, helps us heal, makes us feel more creative and may even help us live longer.
Now I’m not saying that camping and/or being outside is always awesome. There are challenges (more on this tomorrow). And I admit, it’s a whole lot easier to spend time outside when you live in Southern California than in many other places in the world. But it seems like getting outside for just a few minutes each day might be a good addition to our list of healthy habits.
So my little chicklettes, I invite you to spend just a teensy tiny bit of time today feeling the sun on your beaks and the wind ruffling through your fluffy little feathers. Take two deep breaths and call me in the morning.
Love,
The Fat Chick
Gone Fishin’
Don’t worry. The Fat Chick will be back soon!
Hello my dear chicklettes. I don’t want you to feel neglected. I’m out with my family for a much-needed recharge! New blogginess coming soon. In the mean time, gone fishin’, bisy backson.
Love,
The Fat Chick
fatchicksings.com 