Nice to know I am not the only one struggling with boredom eating

The following is today's  post from a new blog I am reading: Badass Fitness.  It's by Spinning instructor and trainer Shannon Colavecchio, and I am so hoping it will give me that added umph! I need right now to kick things up a notch and keep plugging away at healthy eating.  So far I like her (and the contributors) approaches -- they seem like real people to me, not super humans.  The part I particularly liked is about boredom eating -- I've highlighted it. Enjoy.

Monday Mailbag: Keepin' it real, as you keep me going: "

Happy Monday! As you trek into work and think, Ugh, Monday already!?, consider this: Monday means you are embarking on a brand new week to reshape your Badass selves.
And what better way to kick off the new week than with a mailbag reminder of what the Badass Army and the journey are all about?

Last week I introduced you to Kim Bibeau, a lifeling yo-yo dieter who finally, at age 30, found her path to Badass and took it all the way to the mountain peaks of the Tour de France. Awesome!

Your response was just as awesome. It reminded me, once again, that the best motivation out there is to witness real people figuring out -- after plenty of stumbles -- this whole healthy and fit thing.

Carolyn wrote: What an awesome story. I hope my story will turn out like this too....

Hilary wrote: Kim, you are amazing! Your story inspires me to think that just maybe someday unathletic old me will be brave enough to try something I'd previously ruled out as impossible. Thank you for sharing her story, Shannon.

Well, Hilary and Carolyn, I believe your journey will end in success, too! It won't be a walk in the park, and it will take determination, but Kim and Badass Jenn Bertsch are proof that it CAN be done. So keep at it!

This past week we also started the Friday Confessional, and based on the enthusiastic, funny, honest responses from so many of you, I am excited to make this a regular feature. As I had hoped, it made many of us feel comforted to know we aren't alone in eating peanut butter or almond butter out of the jar or making a 'dinner' of ice cream or peanut butter and crackers with wine. We sinned, but so what? We're still Badasses, "keeping it real," as one blog reader put it.

Stacey read the Friday Confessional and wrote to say that just knowing it was coming at the end of the week helped motivate her. Is that like reverse pyschology? C'mon, I know you're going to eat a bag of Cheetos or skip the gym. Oh, no? Prove it, then! Well, Stacey did. Here's what she said:

Just wanted to pass a note about how great the Friday Confessional was for me this week. You put the call out for confessions on Wednesday. I sent you one. But it got me thinking - what do I NOT want to have to confess by Friday? So I made 2 healthier than usual choices at lunch (salads are not my thing but I ordered them instead of the burger and fries). And Thursday morning I did my first run/walk in over a couple of years!!!! AND...Thursday night I made it to hot yoga. So - asking us on Wednesday to confess actually helped motivate and focus me for a few better choices at the end of the week. Thank you!

Julie totally dug the confessional. For her, it was a welcome change from seeing "perfect" bodies in fitness magazines but never reading about their stumbles:

This was a great idea. I read Oxygen magazine & Fitness and they always make me feel like those folks are perfect and I'll never be, so why try. This confessional is strangely movitvating. I feel like I can have a little "food fun" and still reach my fitness goals. All of you have shown me that it's possible!

Paula read my Wednesday reminder to send in confessionals and replied with this:

The one thing I have been thinking of ever since you posted your reminder is how often this week I have eaten because the sheer act of putting something in my mouth keeps me from being a little less bored. Many of these times I am not hungry at all, just incapable of staying awake and/or focusing without the act of putting something in my mouth and chewing. If workplaces could condone 10 minute catnaps I could cut a lot of this out. Afternoons feel like a marathon!

Paula is so right about eating from boredom. That is a big danger zone. So here's my suggestion. The next time you've got a lull at work, or you're waiting for an appointment, or the professor's lecture has you thinking about M&Ms instead of social theory and the principles of economics, whip out a sheet of paper and write down any of the following. It will pass the time, make you reassess your fitness and health, and it won't add any junk to your Badasses:

• 5 healthy foods you will try out over the next week
• 5 new exercises you will try at the gym
• 5 new songs you want to put on your iPod to fuel your energy at the gym
• 5 personal indulgences you can give yourself that DON'T involve food or calorie-laden drinks (Think manicure, a new fitness or healthy cooking book, 30 minutes away from the kids to go for a calming walk or invigorating run, etc.)

So here's to a new week. And let me just end this Monday Mailbag with an open letter to all of you:

Dear Badass Army,

Thank you, thank you, thank you. I started this blog in November not knowing if anyone would even care to read it. But steadily, more and more of you have joined and -- more importantly -- encouraged me to keep this going and make it something even bigger.

Every time you comment on a post or send me an e-mail or post something on our Facebook group, Badass Fitness (join if you haven't already!), I smile and feel more certain that this is what I am meant to do. When you tell me about your healthy weight loss or that first 5K you ran or that Spinning class you started taking regularly, I get as much of an endorphin rush as if I had done it myself! Because I feel like, in my own little way, I am helping you. And that is all I want to do -- to help all of you find your strongest, fittest, healthiest, happiest selves.

In many cases, I have never even met you or it's been years since we spoke. Yet I feel like we are building not just a Badass Army here, but a family. That means we will push each other with high expectations, but we will support each other through junk food days and clean eating days, and through sloth Sundays and marathon-practice Mondays. We won't judge. We will build each other up. That, dear readers, is the most Badass kind of army/family I can think of.

With love and a Badass fist bump,

Shannon, Badass Fitness CEO

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