In the Company of SparkPeople Heroes

By Bob Dawson

On Saturday, March 27, 2010 I had the opportunity to meet up with some fellow SparkPeople members in Pittsburgh who were participating in the Just a Short Run. This was a series of races comprised of six events all going on at the same time. There were four running events--5k, 12k, half marathon and a 30k and two walking events-- 5k and 12k.

Eleven SparkPeople members joined over 2000 other runners and walkers on a cold 23 degree morning all set to have a great day. We had all events covered and the members who finished earlier cheered alongside family members, until the last of us crossed the finish line. Each member finished their race with a renewed spirit.

Below is a recap of how we did as a individuals.

Listen to Great Fitness Tips from Coach Nicole

Editor's Note: The dailySpark has partnered with Lisa and Chris from SkinnyScoopers.com to bring you a monthly podcast related to healthy living.

Their first dailySpark contribution, an interview with the queen of quick cleaning, the FlyLady, was a huge hit among our readers. Now, Chris and Lisa are back with an interview I just know all of you are going to like: Coach Nicole!

By SkinnyScoopers.com

Click here to listen in as we chat with "Coach Nicole" from SparkPeople. She's full of energy, great tips and is down right adorable. If you don't like going to the gym, why not bring the gym to you? Nicole's got a few great DVDs and we're chatting about those too!

Ignoring the Haters, Learning to Love and Live Life at Any Weight

By Beth Donovan, ~INDYGIRL

Sometimes people who feel uncomfortable with their weight or those who have more than 100 pounds to lose feel embarrassed to exercise or sometimes find it hard to even go out in public. It is indeed difficult to combat the negativity that people might express because of someone’s weight. We’ve all seen the talk shows and experiments where a celebrity or their assistant puts on a “fat suit” and is treated differently, usually poorly, in everyday situations. We who are overweight cannot just take off the “fat suit” and need to know how to love our bodies the way they are now, despite what others might say or do.

I used to be a firm believer that overweight negated being pretty. I was told that I had such a pretty face and such a great personality, if I would only lose weight. Be it kindergarten or college, the popular crowd usually judged me on looks. I stuck with a crowd of eclectics until I finally found a niche, being the smart, odd girl who hung around with other smart, odd people. Having found a source of support, also known as friends, I began to grow and see myself through their eyes. Soon I found that I had other things I liked about my personality besides being smart. Odd wasn’t the word for what I was anymore, I was original, funny, spontaneous… and my list grew. As it did, I stopped hanging around the people who judged me or made me feel bad about myself.

10 Ways to Survive the Carpool

By Debi Silber, MS, RD, WHC, the Mojo Coach

Although it may be hard to believe, spring’s really just around the corner. And along with spring come baseball, softball, soccer and all kinds of other after-school activities. If it seems like you’re going to spend the season trapped behind the wheel of your car, don’t despair. Here are some great tricks to make the most of your carpool time and get through the season happier and healthier than ever!

1. Pack some healthy snacks for the road: Keep a little baggie of nuts, some fruit, or a granola bar in your purse. Bring something to keep you from visiting the vending machines or the snack bar.
   
   

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Solutions to the Challenges of Living Large or Less Mobile

By Beth Donovan aka ~Indygirl

People of size or those with limited range of motion have special challenges when trying to get fit. Not only do they have a longer way to go or a harder time getting there, but they have trouble finding equipment and products made for their special needs. Unlike with people in a normal weight range or with normal range of motion, typing what you want into a search engine can yield false results. You have to know the right words and the right places to look for these special needs items.

Good general terms for a search engine are:

Reflections from a Mirror

By Nina Shildeck, NINALEE35

As I stepped out of the shower this morning, I glanced in the mirror. I usually don’t do that. I guess it was my frame of mind today. Pensive, primed to take some positive steps, ready for some new beginnings. Ready to go out and conquer the world!

Well, I was shocked by what I saw! There, staring back at me was this big body with folds of skin hanging in the front beneath a large abdomen and hips sticking out in the rear. My first reaction? "I hate this body!"

But you know what? The more I think about it, the more I realize that I really love this body. It isn't a food magnet. It didn't scarf up a single bite against my will. It handles the food I put in it without complaining, even when I overload it. Whatever its problems, I caused it. It didn't do a thing all by itself. And this body walks wherever I ask it to, thinks for me, and talks for me. It has two good arms and hands to handle work or hug a child, and it has two feet to take me wherever I want to go, it has a heart that just never quits.

Envisioning Your Future with a Collage and Some Friends

By Sue Gelber (SOULCOLLAGESUE)

When I joined SparkPeople last May, I stumbled across its One Time Challenge to Create a Vision Collage.. In the context of my personal and professional experience, I was impressed by the sophistication of a website that would include a process that might seem "out there" for some.

Fast-forward five months. During a mid-October storm, SparkGuy posted by flashlight (to The Spark Pilot Program team) a message inviting us to create a Vision Collage. I love collage! I thought, "Someone must have started a Vision Collage team." (After all, using tools to envision your future is an early building block of The Spark's 28-Day Program, right?) So, I set out to find it; I searched SparkTeams for a Vision Collage team.

...and came up empty?

SparkPeople's Vision Collage One Time Challenge was important enough to be prominently linked on everyone's SparkPoints page, yet it comparatively received little attention. The irony is that both SparkPeople.com and "The Spark" rest on the bedrock of SparkGuy Chris Downie's own Vision Collage, made in the cut-and-paste tradition shortly after he'd graduated college. Chris was sparked to make a Vision Collage--not because he knew what he wanted for his future, but because he knew what he didn't want: To become like his co-worker, older, unfit, and counting his days to retirement. Key to Chris' contentment and living a meaningful life was this awareness: "It wasn't that being an accountant in a large corporation was a dreadful future; it just didn't feel like my future." (emphasis added)

Spark's "Garden" of Vision Collages

Undeterred, I started looking for individual Vision Collages and related posts. We needed a team! A SparkPeople Vision Collage is too powerful! It's too fun! Chris Downie's own Vision Collage certainly played a catalytic role in SparkPeople history. I have similarly experienced the transformational power of collaged images.

One of the things that most impressed me in my SparkPeople Vision Collage quest was the individuality of each Vision Collage I found, in both images and choice of artistic medium. This means that there is no right or wrong way to make a Vision Collage and blows apart the best excuse you can conjure. I've seen (successful) Vision Collages so simple that a child could have cut-and-pasted them together, detailed cut-and-paste works of art, and online Vision Collages made with PowerPoint and digital collage websites.

Two patterns began to emerge:

1. Most SparkPeople members add to or update their original Vision Collage, in step with their own self-discovery and evolving desires; and,
2. Everyone who made one shared benefiting from the process, in ways both small and large, subtle and overt.

Your Chance to Be an 'Expert,' Help a New Member

One morning, Saunya woke up, readied herself and her young daughter, and headed off to work. She was tired, and she was frustrated.

She was overweight and tired of being tired and unhappy. She searched for diet and workout ideas for busy people and found SparkPeople. She immediately joined.

So far, she has been a member for less than two months, and she's already making changes. She's walking during her lunch breaks and trying to say no to food when she's not hungry.

Still, she says she needs help. She saw a call for tips and ideas on the dailySpark, and while she didn't have one to share, she was desperately in need of one. She wrote:

"I honestly really don’t have a tip or idea. I need some help.

Inspirational Stories: The Cab Ride

By Dr. Kent Nerburn

Twenty years ago, I drove a cab for a living.

It was a cowboy’s life, a life for someone who wanted no boss.

What I didn’t realize was that it was also a ministry.

Because I drove the night shift, my cab became a moving confessional. Passengers climbed in, sat behind me in total anonymity, and told me about their lives. I encountered people whose lives amazed me, ennobled me, and made me laugh and weep.

But none touched me more than a woman I picked up late one August night. I was responding to a call from a small brick fourplex in a quiet part of town. I assumed I was being sent to pick up some partiers, or someone who had just had a fight with a lover, or a worker heading to an early shift at some factory for the industrial part of town.

When I arrived at 2:30 a.m., the building was dark except for a single light in a ground floor window.

Under these circumstances, many drivers would just honk once or twice, wait a minute, then drive away.

But I had seen too many impoverished people who depended on taxis as their only means of transportation.

Unless a situation smelled of danger, I always went to the door. This passenger might be someone who needs my assistance, I reasoned to myself.

So I walked to the door and knocked. “Just a minute,” answered a frail, elderly voice. I could hear something being dragged across the floor.

After a long pause, the door opened. A small woman in her 80s stood before me. She was wearing a print dress and a pillbox hat with a veil pinned on it, like somebody out of a 1940s movie. By her side was a small nylon suitcase. The apartment looked as if no one had lived in it for years. All the furniture was covered with sheets. There were no clocks on the walls, no knick-knacks or utensils on the counters. In the corner was a cardboard box filled with photos and glassware.

4 Secrets of Calorie Counting from a Top Food Blogger

Tina Haupert is one of the nation's most popular food bloggers. At Carrots 'N' Cake.com, she blogs about her life as a health writer, wife and mother to one adorable pug named Murphy. She lets readers inside her home, her cupboards and her fridge, sharing workouts, recipes and meals. Tina lost 20 pounds about five years ago--and has kept it off. Now she's sharing some of her best tips with the dailySpark.

By Tina Haupert of Carrots 'N' Cake

Until about five years ago, I really didn't pay attention to what I ate. I didn't weigh myself. I didn't count calories. Basically, I ate whatever and whenever I wanted, so, not surprisingly, all of those extra calories caught up with me, and I packed on the pounds--20 of them.

When I finally decided to lose those 20 pounds, I started to count calories. At the time, I worked a full-time job where I sat at a desk for 40 hours a week, so tracking calories online was convenient for my lifestyle. The Type A personality in me also liked the organization and easy-to-understand tracking and results.

For the next two years, I counted calories every day and learned quite a bit about the way I eat as well as how to better incorporate nutritious, not just low-calorie, foods into my diet. Here are just a few of the things that I learned from calorie counting:

I ate too much: I knew that I was eating too much, but I didn’t realize just how many calories I was consuming until I started tracking them online. After a few days of counting, I was surprised to learn that I was eating more than 3,000 calories per day! I had no idea! Counting calories online helped keep me aware of what I was putting in my mouth-- and made me realize why I had gained weight in the first place. I reduced the amount that I ate each day, and slowly, but surely, the weight came off.

FlyLady Dishes on How Less Junk Means a Smaller 'Trunk'

Editor's Note: The dailySpark has partnered with Lisa and Chris from SkinnyScoopers.com to bring you a monthly podcast related to healthy living. For our inaugural collaboration, we thought we would venture beyond the realms of health and fitness.

When it comes to spring cleaning (and keeping your life clutter free), no one knows better than the "FlyLady," Marla Cilley. We knew our members would love this interview, especially the FlyLady: Peace is Mine SparkTeam!

From SkinnyScoopers.com

Could a cluttered home and disorganized life be adding to your struggles with weight? Did you know that dropping a few pounds could be as easy as picking up a few good habits? Just in time for the spring cleaning season, Chris and Lisa bring you a dailySpark podcast that will have you racing to the store for a personal planner and crockpot.

5 Secrets to Staying Trim from the One of the World's Healthiest Countries

Japan has one of the lowest rates of obesity in the world--less than 5 percent, compared to nearly 35 percent for the United States. How do the Japanese stay so slim? Journalist Alice Gordenker (USAGITWO) blogs in from Tokyo to share Japanese diet and health secrets – ones you too can use!

Japanese Secret #1: Eat 30 Different Foods Every Day

In Japan, the standard nutritional advice is to eat 30 different foods every day. The idea is that building a diet of so many different foods pretty much guarantees that you’ll get a balanced diet and all the nutrients you need.

For someone building a meal the Japanese way, with many dishes in tiny portions, this is an achievable goal. A typical Japanese dinner at home might be a small serving of protein like teriyaki chicken or grilled fish, two or three vegetable-based mini-entrées, salty pickles made from seasonal vegetables, a bowl of rice and miso soup with two or three goodies like little cubes of tofu, a clam or two, chopped scallions etc.

On a standard Western diet, however, it’s tough to clock in 30 foods a day. Let’s see: Muffin for breakfast, ham-and-cheese sandwich with lettuce and tomato for lunch; steak, potatoes and broccoli for dinner--why, that’s only 9 items! To build your way to 30, try adding two mini-sides of vegetables or fruit with every meal, even breakfast! There’s no reason you can’t add a little salad to your morning. Japanese people do, all the time.