Healthy Coastal Lifestyle – Coastal Carolina Soap Blog

Why Health is Important

It’s been almost five years since I started embracing the healthy coastal lifestyle. It’s been a little over two months since my family and I started following the Mediterranean eating plan. And it’s been about nineteen hours since my tween and I last did a dance fitness workout together, which is always fun and affords us time for meaningful conversation. She noticed that I’ve gotten smaller, which is wonderfully affirming. We talked about finding her “why.” She likes doing this workout with me, but beyond that, how does it benefit her? What is her “why”?

First I shared my “why” with her. This is part of my story from three years ago:

I quit with the denial. My body was telling me there were some serious issues – my knees, especially. Then I started noticing problems some of my heavier family members were having – sleep apnea and diabetes. (I knew a guy who was a pretty young fella with weight-related heart problems and apnea; he died in his sleep one night.) I’m a big fan of vicarious learning if it’ll keep me out of trouble, and I took advantage of the learning opportunities. Truth for me includes realizing that my family has to take care of me later if I don’t take care of myself now. Why put that on them sooner than necessary? My knees stopped hurting when I dropped weight; my sleep got sounder when I conquered my anxiety and learned mindfulness (which has also helped with weight loss); and since I’ve started yoga, my ibuprofen intake has dropped from 5 tablets on cardio days (2x per week) to fewer than 5 per month.

Now I take turmeric supplements to help with inflammation so can’t safely take ibuprofen. Even so, I’m more likely to take acetaminophen for monthly discomfort than for anything at all health-related. Being active and taking care of my body has made it healthier.

As I state in the quote above (it’s from a Facebook comment on a post I’d put up), part of my “why” is so my family–especially my daughters–won’t have to worry about taking care of me any earlier than necessary. Conversely, I want to be able to continue showing up for them. If I’m healthy and active, then not only will the quality of my life be good, but so will the quality of our family life. They are my “why.” This is a choice I’ve made completely on my own. None of them said I was fat/obese/overweight, and none of them told me I need to lose weight. If I were doing it for them, then I’d have no motivation to stick with it. Instead, I do it ultimately for me. My choices just happen to benefit them, too.

As my daughter and I danced like no one was watching and talked, she shared her “why”: “I’m building up stamina for soccer.” She’s a phenomenal goalie and defender, but she had the opportunity to play forward last season and loved it. Defenders run in sprints; forwards have to be able to run up and down the pitch continuously, which requires stamina. Since she’s hoping to play offense again this season, she has to be ready to run. Her “why” is to better her game, and that’s a darn good reason to me.

What’s your “why”? What motivates you to stay with your healthy lifestyle choices? Could you use some help and motivation to get with it or stick with it? Let me know in the comments below. I’d be happy to cheer you on!

Taking the Healthy Coastal Lifestyle to Another Coast

Even before the humbling and irritating doctor’s appointment, I knew I needed to make some changes to my life and diet. Four days before my appointment, we had returned from our teenager’s senior trip and a truly epic family vacation to Florida. Since it was VACAY!!!, I was pretty careless about my eating. I didn’t overeat, but I also didn’t make the best food choices. My teen challenged me not to log my food for the week, and I was okay with that. You may remember that I’m a lazy dieter, and as opposed to trying to figure out how to add a new food or its components to my nutrition log app, I’ll just not eat it. I vaguely remember eggs a couple of mornings, three (gasp!) cheeseburgers, a cinnamon roll, and a large banana fritter during the week. Suffice it to say, I’d butchered my cholesterol-vulnerable bloodstream!

After a trip like this, I eat a lot of whole grains in the weeks following, especially oat-based products, like oatmeal. Then again, I usually eat six burgers a year, so eating this many in such a short amount of time was really out of character for me. I ate my whole grains, but I also thought that we needed a reset on our diets to get back to our lean meats and fruits and veggies. Something led my mind to the Mediterranean diet.

You know me, and you have heard me say that I don’t do “diets.” I don’t do restrictions and eliminating certain micronutrients (e.g., carbs) from my life just for the purpose of losing weight. Friends and family members have done that, and I’ve seen that fail them over and over as their weight has yo-yo’ed down and back up with no lasting results. Before even entertaining the ideas of adapting our diet to the Mediterranean diet, I researched. And researched and researched and researched. I didn’t and don’t need anecdotal evidence of success: “I lost 18 pounds in one week!” or “I went down five dress sizes in a month!” In fact, I doubt either of those is a realistic expectation of this food plan.

From all that I’ve been able to ascertain, the Mediterranean food plan is more about long-lasting health and increased longevity and quality of life just from, well, pretty much eating as Jesus ate. Research shows that those who adopt this eating plan have lower cholesterol, less chance of cardiovascular events (i.e., heart attacks and strokes), and are less likely to develop certain dementias. A deeper plunge into studies based on this way of eating substantiates theories that eating Mediterranean can decrease depression and anxiety.

Wha-a-at??? Sounds almost too good to be true, doesn’t it? And yes, I know I’m beginning to sound like a late-night infomercial (“But wait! There’s more!”). Let me pause right here and say–promise–that I’m getting absolutely no kick-backs off this blog post at all. This is all me sharing with you some things I’ve learned. The American Psychiatric Association did this study where they looked at the effects of the Mediterranean diet on people’s moods. Apparently, magnesium as an important dietary mineral is prevalent in fish, whole grains, almonds, and a few other foods that are key components of the Mediterranean diet. I have no problem believing the science, but I also believe how fabulous I’ve been feeling of late! I feel stronger, healthier, fuller, and happier.

That’s the another thing I like: I feel full all the time. Not bloated or anything, just pleasantly satisfied. The amount of fruit I’ve been eating has taken care of my desire for sweets, and we have found alternatives to things we had enjoyed. Plain nonfat Greek yogurt that I can stir honey into has replaced my lowfat vanilla American-style yogurt with added sugar.

Another thing about this way of eating that I’ve really enjoyed is the creative inspiration to change up old stand-bys. Instead of chicken salad with mayonnaise (even though we use light), we have discovered chicken salad with a delicious olive oil and lemon dressing with veggies hidden in it. That was amazing in whole grain pita bread! Steamed broccoli has stepped aside for much more flavorful roasted broccoli drizzled with a little lemon juice and sprinkled with feta cheese.

The sheer variety of food options thrills us, too. Are you aware of how many nations and cultures border the Mediterranean, each with its own flavors? Yet, the basic foods of the Mediterranean eating plan overlap them all. Seafood, lentils, fruits, vegetables, and grains, all set apart by robust seasonings and herbs. This means dinner never has to be boring, but we can also stay with our plan while exploring different tastes and textures.

With the Mediterranean diet, we have only had to cut out the few bad fats we were eating, processed foods, and refined sugars. With easy substitutions, this has hardly caused a blip for us. I’ll admit, we’re not 100% on this thing, yet. A surplus of fresh broccoli after our teen’s graduation party over the weekend left me wondering what in the world I was going to do with it before it went bad. My dad suggested broccoli casserole. It’s not at all “Med-friendly,” but I made one, anyway. We’re having it tonight with baked salmon. My older daughter suggested fruit with honeyed yogurt for dessert to go with it and further offset the unhealthiness of the casserole while adding a bit more protein and a fruit serving.

Keep your eyes here as I share some of the delicious recipes I’ve discovered, including ones for all the dishes I’ve mentioned here (but not the broccoli casserole).

Have you tried the Mediterranean eating plan, yet? How has it worked for you?

Medical Fat Shaming Needs to Go!

If you are carrying a bit of extra weight, you’ve gone to the doctor, only to hear them make a comment about your needing to lose weight. Some doctors just tell you you need to lose x number of pounds to improve your health. Other docs are a bit more passive-aggressive about it.

Early last fall, my right knee was giving me problems, so I went to my orthopedist to see what was going on. He said, “You could stand to lose some weight. I was having knee issues, lost fifteen pounds, and that took care of it.” I replied with, “I lost twenty-five pounds and wrecked my knees in the process.” Suffice it to say, that shut him right up.

My teen suffers from migraines, and her doctor was telling her about one of her medications. He said, “It may suppress your appetite, so that’ll be good for taking a little weight off, eh? [chuckles]” My teen has curves backed by muscle and fierce soccer thighs with curves that were common among 50s pin-up girls.

The final straw came week before last, though. I went for my annual physical because part of the healthy coastal lifestyle is making sure everything is working as it should. I always get a full blood panel done to monitor my cholesterol (which tends to run a little on the high-normal side–darn genetics!). The family nurse practitioner came in and immediately started talking about my weight and addressing my cholesterol. Her advice ranged from cutting out most of my carbs, eating just egg whites, and not tracking what I eat. I pointed out to her that there is a huge difference between carbs from Grape Nuts and carbs from potato chips. Keeping my micronutrients in balance and tracking my food have been two things that have helped me.

Two things are true, though. I keep an eye on my cholesterol every year and am mindful about eating foods and living a lifestyle that will keep it within normal range. I also knew going into this appointment that my cholesterol would be higher due to pre-vacation stress and the food I ate on vacation. I wasn’t wrong. I also thought that, given the walking I’d done while on our vacation and that I was weighing in on a fast, it seemed that my relationship with gravity that the doctor’s office scales were reporting was off by more than a few pounds. The next morning, I hopped on our bathroom scales first thing and concluded that either I’d miraculously lost seven pounds overnight or someone’s scales were off. Maybe it’s ours, maybe it’s the doctor’s. But given that my eight-pound barbell weighed exactly eight pounds on our scale, I have concluded it was the doctor’s.

I would wager that everyone who is carrying a little extra weight is quite well aware of it. This has always been my truth, partly due to genetics, partly because I’m short, and partly because of my enjoyment of food. I’ve struggled with my weight my entire life. When I was younger and my pediatrician would give my mom the stats–“She’s in the 98th percentile for weight”–my mom would always say, “That means only two percent of girls your age are bigger than you.” It was always “bigger,” never “fatter” or “heavier,” but I knew exactly what she meant. The fat shaming didn’t work then, and it certainly doesn’t work now.

What if, then, instead of doctors blaming everything that ails us on our weight (except for, of course, those diseases that are directly related to weight), they addressed it more proactively and positively? Instead of doctors assuming we are idiots who aren’t aware of our proportions, they could instead ask patients what we know about our weight. That FNP I saw could have asked, “What steps are you taking to lose weight?” Then she’d know that I monitor what I eat and what my activity level looks like. If she’d asked me about my cholesterol, then I could have told her things like my genetic predisposition, how stress can make it go up and what stress I was under, and the very out-of-my-usual foods I’d eaten the week prior. Instead of assuming I was both ignorant and careless about my cholesterol, she could have instead learned that I’m both mindful and careful with it.

I have since made arrangements to switch providers. Our family has also started introducing elements of the Mediterranean diet into our lives. With its heavy emphasis on fruits and vegetables, summer is the most fabulous time to start this. I’ll be speaking more about that in posts to come.

Have you ever had a doctor fat-shame you? How did that feel?

Investing in Good Health

You’ve probably heard that good health is an investment in your future. Maintaining a healthy lifestyle can increase your life expectancy by decreasing your chances of developing illnesses related to poor health such as heart disease and type 2 diabetes. Additionally, certain lifestyle choices can also impact your odds of developing certain cancers. Those are most definitely the long-term benefits to investing in a healthy lifestyle.

However, most people want to see some small return on their investments, too. After all, you get monthly or quarterly statements showing you the health of your financial investments, be they savings funds, retirement accounts, or stock performances. When it comes to our physical health, we like to see some progress. We don’t want to have to wait until we’re decades older to see the return on our investment in our health. We can enjoy it then, and our families, I’m sure, will be happy to share in the benefits.

Because I like to see smaller improvements and dividends. I choose to think of my calories as debits and credits, and I invest those. Each day, I burn a certain number of calories, and I ingest a certain number of calories. The calories I ingest are my “debits.” The calories I burn are my “credits.” My goal each day is to finish with more credits than debits, just as we want to do with our financial investments. When I’ve earned a lot of credits through exercise, then I feel comfortable expending some of them in a sweet little something.

There are those days, though–and admit it, we all have them–when it’s cold, grey, and rainy outside, and all I want to do is curl up with a good book. There are also those days when it’s blazing hot, and I just want to lie under a fan and move as little as possible. If I eat too much on those days, then I’m going to wind up with more debits (calories consumed) than credits. The trick is, on those days, to know about how many calories my body will burn with no help from me (just over 1400) and eat fewer calories than that.

Other days, though, I’m killing it. I’m weight training and doing cardio and practicing yoga. I’m burning calories like a spoiled rich girl burns her dad’s credit card at the stores. Some exercises, like weight training, has the added benefit of burning calories even after the workout, as sore muscles heal and repair themselves in the day or two following. Those days, I happily end up in the black, calorie-wise.

I’m far from perfect; just motivated. There are those days when food is too good, lava cake calls me, and I haven’t been motivated to do much all day. These days aren’t the best, but I don’t let them get me down or discourage me. I accept them for what they are and resolve to get back on track the next day. At the end of the week, my report shows I’ve been burning more calories than I’ve consumed, and over time, that helps with the weight loss and strengthening that has helped me be healthier, get stronger, and become fit enough to do mission work and a 5K. Down the road when I’m decades older (hopefully), I’ll still be here and healthy enough to be active with my children, grandchildren, and maybe even great-grands.

These little investments now will lead to long-term benefits down the road. Thinking about that helps me stay motivated and show extra kindness to myself. After all, it’s about the healthy coastal lifestyle, not the healthy coastal “this week” or “this month.”

Subtract to Add

The healthy coastal lifestyle is more than just right eating and moving our bodies. It also involves keeping our minds, hearts, and spirits healthy, too, and that’s what I want to speak about here.

I love people. I’m called to minister to people and enjoy being around them. Caring for people isn’t much of a hardship for me. However, since I can discern spirits, it’s important that I protect my own spirit from getting overwhelmed.

And it was getting overwhelmed. You know how some people just put off negative energies? That’s what was going on. Then you realize that, though you may have liked someone and genuinely cared for them, their energies were beginning to be more than your heart, mind, and spirit could tolerate.

Last semester, I welcomed a friend of my younger daughter into our homeschool. By midterm, this was starting to feel like not the best choice. By the end of the semester, the Spirit told me loud and clear that things had to change. I had been neglecting a lot of things in my life–my daughters, my exercise disciplines, and my sleep. My poor husband was suffering, too, because he wanted to talk to me at night, and try as I might, I couldn’t sell him on the advantages of getting up with me at 7:00 a.m. to talk to me in the mornings instead. I functioned on six or seven hours of sleep for months.

When I subtracted this something that started off as a good thing but turned bad, I became liberated. I reclaimed myself and my time. My family got my spare time again. Shoot, I had spare time again! With no morning alarms, I could catch up on my sleep, luxuriating in the sheer joy of snuggling in bed just a little longer on cold winter mornings. Now I’ve reclaimed up to an hour a day most days to exercise and have gotten back into a fitness regimen with cardio, weight training, and two types of yoga with a day or two rest days a week.

As time has ticked on from those days, I’m noticing even more positive changes in me. I’m sleeping soundly, often sleeping eight hours straight without even getting up in the middle of the night. I have tons of energy to get things done, including sewing and exercising. Probably the best benefit, though, is having so much extra time with my girls. School days fly by, leaving time to spend with either or both of my girls and sometimes a friend or two. My stress level has dropped, my anxiety-related facial tic has gone back into hiding, I feel light, often dancing freely around for no reason at all.

I have often spoken of gaining things to add to the healthy coastal lifestyle–adding exercise, sleep, meditation, or healthy foods. This lesson has taught me that subtraction is also necessary to living the healthy coastal lifestyle because we can’t find room to add good things until we subtract some other things, perhaps things that create mental, psychological, and spiritual clutter in our lives.

As we embrace whatever this year holds for us–and who in the heck knows at this point, am I right???–let’s be willing to let go of anything that’s not serving us. Maybe it’s an activity, maybe it’s a relationship, maybe it’s a habit. We need to be willing to ask ourselves, “How is this benefitting me?” If it’s not, then we need to give it the Elsa treatment and just let it go. If you’re like me, you’ll find greater gains will replace the loss.

The Mentally Healthy Lifestyle

Truthfully, I wasn’t sure whether to place this on my spiritual blog or this one, but since this does have to do with an aspect of the healthy coastal lifestyle, I opted for here. (Not to say I won’t share it on my author/minister page.) Often I have highlighted the interrelationship between physical health and mental health, believing–and the research backs this up–that maintaining a strong mental health will have a positive impact on one’s physical health. Yes, you read that correctly. So frequently do we hear about how exercise helps combat a plethora of mental health issues–everything from anxiety to depression to ADHD–but we don’t often learn about the converse of that.

I am finding myself in a situation where I am helping someone while they tend to other things. The understanding is that there is a time limit on this arrangement. Recently, however, I have become concerned that this person isn’t tending to those other things. I was sharing this with my Sunday morning Bible study group, and one of my friends there suggested this time limit may extend. I replied with a firm, “No, it won’t.” Another friend chimed in with, “But what about ________?” I said, “This is going to sound cruel and callous, but that’s not my problem.”

My friends get me. You see, in my battle against my anxiety, I’ve had to say about certain things, “That’s not my problem.” I have my own problems–anxiety, arthritic knees, entrepreneurship during a global pandemic and an economic recession–and I have those things that I may list under “problems” that aren’t problems at all (family, managing the household, homeschooling, revisions on my book) but are things that require my time, energy, and attention. In these respects, they’re responsibilities. It’s enough to keep my plate pretty full all the time without adding someone else’s problems or responsibilities to the pile. It’s just simply good boundaries.

Along with setting and maintaining these boundaries on my time and energy, I have also backed away from negative and/or toxic people, as well as negativity in social media and the main stream media. That negativity and toxicity builds up like arsenic in the system. For a while you may feel fine. Then you start feeling a little sick, a little off. Then you get really sick and die. Even if it’s not physical death (though sometimes it is), too much negativity and toxicity can kill a part of our mental or spiritual health.

Yesterday, I decided to polish off my week with a walk. This also marks around the 4th anniversary of the beginning of the Healthy Coastal Lifestyle. (Yea!) It was cool and comfortable, just a titch cooler than the tank and shorts called for, but… Myeh, whatever. I’d build up my own heat, I figured. The purpose of the walk was two-fold: (1) cardio exercise, and (2) knee strengthening work. The screenshot above shows a pretty embarrassing average speed; it’s usually a bit higher than that. Some of the loss of speed was warming my right knee up. But that wouldn’t account for much. Then I remembered Dave. And John and Amanda. And… well, let’s just say that half the neighborhood was outside and I’m an extrovert.

I only chose to avoid negativity and toxicity to preserve my mental health. Like so many things we do, though, there were unintended side benefits. In liberating myself of those things and by refusing to take on other people’s responsibilities, I have freed myself for absolutely marvelous positivity to enter my life. In choosing not to allow extra responsibilities and negatives to burden my life, I have created space for unmitigated joy and happiness. This became glaringly apparent to me yesterday evening while I was walking.

I was on my second lap through the neighborhood when I saw a familiar little dog with a couple. We thought the male half of this couple–a nice guy who’d lived down the street from us for 11 years until last week–had moved away. Yesterday I found out he’d reconnected with a lady who lives on another street in our neighborhood and moved into her house after getting married three weeks ago. I spoke to an older neighbor whose grass had gotten uncharacteristically long, leading me to fear either his wife or he had had some health crisis. He assured me they were fine after I assured him I wasn’t at all being critical of his lawn, that I had been worried.

I felt more than just an endorphin rush from this walk. I felt the buzz from seeing and speaking to people. More, though, I felt joy. When I saw my neighbor with his new bride and dog (just the bride is new), I felt genuine joy for their happiness. I don’t know this guy for more than just a casual hello and a brief chat, but they were both radiating bliss. It wasn’t hard to pick up on that, and it spread. Because I had purged negativity and toxicity from my life, and because I choose not to add to my responsibilities, I had so much room in me to feel this positive interaction, as well as all the others in which I’d engaged during my walk.

I returned from my walk nicely warmed from the exercise and the interactions. When I told my family about our neighbor and his big life change, that happiness spread throughout our home. That experience really brought home for me how much one person’s mood affects the entire rest of the family.

So, to recap… I make choices that affect my mental health in positive ways. Those choices leave me open not only to feeling less anxious or depressed, but also all the way happier. These wonderful feelings spread to my entire household. They then also feel happier. It looks like my choices not only help me but indirectly help others as well, and that’s a solid win.

You’ll Topple and Poot

It’s no secret that I enjoy yoga and have incorporated it as part of my healthy coastal lifestyle for many reasons – relief from anxiety, flexibility, strength, and balance. As everyone who’s ever practiced yoga knows, other things come out of a yoga practice.

Our adorable little town offers free exercise classes – cardio and yoga practices – and this time of year, especially, people want to explore these classes. While cardio is pretty new user-friendly, yoga is a lot more intimidating. There’s the image of lithe, flexible, young bodies contorting and moving in smooth, fluid ways while incense burns and New Agey music plays in the background. So often, people are scared to try yoga, because they think they’ll be the klutzy elephant in the room full of swans. I was like that one time, too.

One May, I was working an event and happened to be almost right across from the local yoga and wellness booth. During a lag, I scooted across and chatted with the ladies working the booth, and they told me that the classes are friendly for all levels and there are modifications available. Their words gave me the assurance I needed to dare to try the class, and it’s been a good choice ever since.

There was still the fear that I’d make a total fool out of myself. Early on, I toppled over. Another time in my first year of practice, I was coming out of a deep yoga squat and went head-first to the hardwood floor surrounding my mat. People look at you when you fall, but mostly it’s out of concern. I’ve seen far more experienced yogis than I topple over. Once you accept the fact that it’ll happen – that you’ll lose balance and topple over – you’re free to focus only on your flow.

Another thing that makes people give up on yoga is not having consistently perfect practices. It is very common for someone to be able to balance better on one side than the other within the same practice. It is also common for a yogi to balance great on one side but not have that same balance during their next practice. And sometimes, there’s just no balance at all on either side during a practice when you were nailing it perfectly in your previous practice. Being aware that this is normal keeps newbies to yoga from dropping out, thinking they’re failing at yoga. It is called yoga “practice” for a reason.

The other thing that drives new yogis away from practice in fear and embarrassment is the inevitable gas passage. This exchange from Bridget Jones’s Baby sums it up perfectly:

I think of that last line every single time I’m in yoga practice and getting that feeling. The fact of the matter is, sometimes, in certain poses, it’s just impossible to clench your sphincter while holding the pose. Perhaps, though, yoga allows for the body to do what comes naturally to it. With standing twists, sitting twists, and lying twists, the intestines get massaged and the stuff in them moves as it should. One evening, I was just finishing up the final stretching segment of a cardio/pilates workout. We’d been flat on our backs as it ended, and as I rocked up to a seated position… Yep. And it was loud. Thankfully, the workout flush hid my blush, and I apologized. The teacher quipped, “Better out than in.” It’s true, though. While we think of passing gas as uncouth and most definitely not lady-like, our bodies aren’t supposed to hold gas. This is why we come equipped with mechanisms for burping and pooting.

As you ponder your fitness goals for 2020, they may include yoga. In fact, I hope they do. It will improve your physical and psychological health and is a key component of the healthy coastal lifestyle. Remember some key ideas, though. (1) Everyone’s a beginner at some point. (2) Everyone at every level of experience topples over and falls or, at least, loses their balance. (3) Some practices go better than others. (4) Everyone poots during practice. Remember these and give yourself some grace, and you’ll be able to relax completely in the no-judgement-zone that is yoga practice.

Accomplishing a HUGE Goal

This truly wasn’t one of my goals when I started embracing the healthy coastal lifestyle a little over three years ago. I had no idea at the time that I’d push my body to the lengths I would, trusting it to take me all the way to the finish line.

A little over a week ago, I completed my first 5K. That may not be entirely accurate. I participated in 10Ks when I was a tween/teen for charity, and I took part in the Walk for the Cure 5K fifteen years ago, again for charity. This was my first “official” 5K, complete with bib and medal.

It was a sultry, humid day in the Bahamas. Our cruise ship had been delayed arriving in port, so we didn’t get as early a start as hoped. We were truly hoping to be done with the walk by 10 before the heat really set in. That didn’t happen. We couldn’t even dock until 9:30. Half the ship’s guests were disembarking down the same gangplank as we were, and then there was the half-mile trek from the ship to the starting line, again amongst hordes of fellow travelers that slowly thinned as we passed each beach spot.

By the time my younger daughter and I got to the starting line, it was nearly 11:00 in the morning and the 5K was already twenty minutes underway. It was a warm and humid 84 degrees with a heat index in the 90s (I didn’t look, because I didn’t want to know). My tween and I were set, right down to the bibs safety-pinned to the backs of our shirts.

The track was mostly sun-exposed with just scant pockets of shade. We were lucky to have intermittent breezes to help cool us down. I had my phone’s fitness app to track my progress. I’ll spare you the details (We passed a pink flower. We passed a sign warning people to stay on the trail, etc…). Although my daughter and I ended up getting separated, I waited beside the trail when my app said we had just under a half mile to go so we could finish together. When we finished, my app didn’t show the 3.1 miles I was expecting for that distance, but instead, 3.4 miles – and this was on top of the half mile or so we’d had to walk to the starting line, not to mention the trek from our room, using the stairs, of course.

At the 2/3 of a mile left (WOOHOO!!!) mark, I announced it to my fellow walkers. One responded, “You sound excited about that.”

“There’s a big, beautiful, blue sea just over there, and it calls me!” I sang the last part from the song from Moana. They’re Disney people, so they got it.

I’d seriously considered finishing the walk, ripping off my shoes, socks, and phone, and plunging, fully dressed, into the Caribbean Sea. I practiced the modicum of restraint required to resist doing that. Instead, we went into the bathroom to change into our bathing suits. This was a feat in balance and coordination. You know how hard it is to put a bathing suit on, anyway? Well, imagine that but add in sweat-dampened skin, a decent-sized bathroom stall, and standing on sport sandals; additionally, being solitary, my daughter and I couldn’t help each other make the necessary adjustments. Once properly changed, we stepped around to the side of the building to the showers and flushed all the sweat and salt off of our skins. The rest of the day was a smorgasbord of delightful flavors and carefree frolics in the sapphire blue sea.

At the finish line. My smile is looking a bit manic here.

I never planned or expected to participate in and finish a 5K. With my knees giving me so much trouble, including having a blood vessel burst behind my right knee the first day of our cruise, I wasn’t sure how the 5K would go. We had been active all week with stair-climbing, swimming, walking, and exploring volcanic caves. Yet, all that activity kept my knees moving. (A body in motion tends to stay in motion. Basic physics.) Even though I found myself wishing I’d heat-trained throughout the summer, I was still proud of my time – under an hour with an average speed of 3.6 mph – and proud of the fact that I did it. Even being a little slack, I’d kept myself in good enough shape to meet this new goal.

Getting Exactly What You Need

I have learned so much in the past year about taking care of myself as I pursue the healthy coastal lifestyle. One of the key things I’ve learned is the importance of making sure I get exactly what I need. What I need may not be what I want or what I think is best, but it’s what my body needs.

This past weekend was my teen’s and my mom/daughter weekend away. We always go to this one beach, stay in the exact same room at the same resort, and eat at the same places both nights. We like the routine, we’ve made our mark in our room (to make it helpful for us and others who stay there), and at no time have we ever been starving on a Saturday evening and playing the “Where do you want to eat? I don’t know. Where do you want to eat?” game. It’s easy, because we can also be flexible in what we do as need be. This past weekend was a miracle in and of itself, because the island had shut down ahead of Hurricane Dorian and just reopened to the public two hours before check-in time.

As a result of the hurricane causing so many to cancel plans, my daughter and I were only two of five people Friday night and into Saturday morning, and throughout the weekend, we had the entire back half of the resort to ourselves. There was no fighting for seats at breakfast or crowded beaches (though the beach usually isn’t bad). The concierge said it could be a little eerie. To us, it was just fun.

The things we did this past weekend were just what we needed. They may not look like “typical” weekend vacationer things, but we’re not typical vacationers. Instead of a heavy dinner Friday night, we were satisfied with a shared appetizer and chowder. We opted for movies in the room when the sun or mosquitoes got to be too much. And in a rare moment, we grabbed late afternoon naps before dinner on Saturday. So many times previously, we would’ve pushed through our fatigue, but we didn’t this time.

We obeyed our bodies. We took hold of exactly what we needed for optimal health. It seems like a silly thing to have learned, but I’m not very good about allowing my body to dictate my activities. I push through, force myself to keep going, to perform, to take care of everyone and everything. However, when my head is pounding from being tired or when the anxiety begins to creep in, I can’t keep going, I can’t perform, and I can’t even take care of myself, let alone others. Because I have started doing this, my teen has been able to give herself permission to do it, too.

My favorite rest moments come in savasana naps. Savasana is final resting pose in a yoga practice, and practitioners are supposed to hold the pose for five minutes per hour of practice. When I grab a savasana nap, I lay down across my bed in savasana, drop my tongue from the roof of my mouth, and focus on something mindless – rain on the roof, the whirl of the ceiling fan, my own breathing. My mind stops thinking, stops racing, and simply rests. After twenty minutes and a good stretch, I feel like I’ve just slept for eight solid hours.

A minor version of this is simple meditation. It allows my mind to rest without going all the way into a nap. Today, for example, I could breathe into the headache pounding away behind my forehead and breathe that discomfort out. I came out of it refreshed, headache-free, and ready to tackle work. A year ago, I would have pushed through the work and the headache, but now I’ve learned that I need these moments to be my healthiest and best.

What are some tricks you’ve picked up to be the healthiest and happiest you can be? Where do you see yourself needing to give yourself permission to take moments for rest? Drop your strategies in the comments.

Hopping Back on the Fitness Wagon

Yoga poses — Yoga has been a constant for me in living the #healthycoastallifestyle.

This blog hasn’t been the only area in my life where I’ve been slacking off in the last few months. It’s like everything I’d been grooving on in my life that I’d been neglecting really gelled in the past few weeks. Whether it’s slaying the cleaning, developing new soap creations, or exercising, I have reclaimed these things for my life with boldness and renewed energy.

The #healthycoastallifestyle has been one area that has suffered the most in the past months, and that has had the most significant impact on my life. Spring should’ve brought gorgeous weather for getting out and walking, but temperatures climbed quickly, as did the humidity. When I went for my annual check-up, my vitamin D levels were low, which is suprising, given how much I’m usually outside. Early summer brought scorching temps, though low humidity levels. It was simply unbearable being outside for more than a few minutes. I kept up with my yoga practices; they’re essential to my physical and mental health.

We spent a lot of time being active as we focused on cleaning. While my phone didn’t acknowledge my progress (it generally stayed on a table), I felt it. This week marked a new energy in my lifestyle. Cooler morning temperatures leave me no excuse for not lacing up first thing in the morning to walk. Yesterday morning I dug out the weights for the first time in months and did some upper and lower body training. Then, yesterday evening, I embraced every masochistic tendency I ever thought of having and did a half-hour core-strengthening pilates workout. I’m pleased to say that I can actually move, laugh, breathe, and bend over.

I am a little achy but I’d forgotten how glorious it feels feeling strong again. When I was at my peak, I moved in confidence and strength, and the months of being lax on my cardio and weight training had taken some of that from me. But now I’m back and it’s back! I felt it this morning as I’ve moved around the house.

In the intervening months, I maintained my weight by watching what I ate and keeping my calorie intake lower than my calorie burn – for the most part. I messed up some days, and that’s OK. There were also many days in there when it digitally looked like my numbers were flipped, but I knew I’d burned way more calories than my fitness app thinks I did.

While it would be so easy to just give up now, to admit defeat, that isn’t a happy place for me to be, and I’m not a quitter. While I may get lax attending to things in my life that are important to me, I never give up on them completely. That mindset and attitude has breathed new life into my healthy coastal lifestyle, my home, and my business.

What do you do when you’ve gotten slack on meeting your life goals? How have your turned your momentum back around? Let us know in the comments below.