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The Former Couch Potato’s Guide to Embracing Exercise

As a couch potato and irregular exerciser, I was in a painful place. One of the hardest things to do is taking those first steps on the way to regular exercise. Because I continually started and stopped exercising, I was often taking those first steps. Then a few weeks later, I’d notice that I was no longer exercising again and the cycle would repeat itself.

One day, the mantra was interrupted with the thought ‘What if I changed my thinking?’ Maybe I could just accept exercise as ‘something that I did’, a bit like cleaning my teeth. That was the beginning of the end of my love affair with the couch.

How to Change Your Body: An Interview with JC Deen

By Peter Clemens 5

Today it’s my pleasure to share with you an interview I recently did with one of my good online friends, JC Deen.

Back in June 2011 I published a guest post from JC titled How Extreme Focus Can Change Your Life. Given the continued popularity of the post I thought it would be a good idea to catch with JC and see what he has been up to. Enjoy!

How Cartooning Healed Me

By Sheila McCann 20

I was down and anxious. It was only a few months after our move when I started feeling like a shell of my former self. I had never experienced anything like this. I had no appetite and no energy. I was in a dark space devoid of life. Lethargy met me at every turn. I was circling the drain. The best I could do was to get my kids off to school and climb back into bed.

After a few weeks, I began to wonder what was going on. Being an independent stubborn person, I decided to ride it out on my own. In retrospect, this was probably not the right way to go.

How Training in Martial Arts Can Further Your Career

By Andrew Griffiths 6

Learning martial arts – not the most orthodox way to gain a promotion I know, but martial arts can change your life in a variety of ways. Martial arts can turn you into a fighter in all elements of life and it will give you respect for yourself and others, and improve your health and well-being.

If you’re not the athletic type consider this: Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is often referred to as a “human game of chess” and is renowned for attracting computer geeks, accountants and all other types of intellectuals. Still not convinced? Okay, well consider the following eight benefits to training in martial arts.

How to Keep From Becoming a Meditation Dropout

By Richard Crown 8

I talk about meditation with nearly everyone I meet. It just comes up naturally when they ask me what I do. “I teach meditation,” I always respond. A common reply is, “I tried meditation.” “What happened?” I ask. “Oh, it was really good. Really helped me. But I lost it somewhere. I really should get back into it.”

Almost everybody knows that meditation is beneficial. Many have tried meditating. Even more have vague plans to meditate “some day.” So why do people fail at meditation?

The Free Resource that Can Help You Cope With Anything

By Wendy Aron 9

When I had my comic memoir published by an award-winning independent press in 2008, I thought it would be the pinnacle of my professional writing career. But after my publisher went bankrupt one year later, taking with him most of my dreams, that celebratory moment turned into one of despair.

Standing in our basement, looking at the five big crates of unsold books we were left with after the experience, my husband wondered aloud what we were going to do with them. I said to him: “We can always make a bonfire and toast marshmallows.” Suddenly, the tension seemed to lift.

What is Your Body Telling You?

By Noch Noch 40

Last week I started getting the sniffles. I felt a cold coming and knew I had to take it easy for the next few days if I didn’t want to get sick. But I carried on writing, thinking that I was only sitting at home and not doing much.

The next morning, however, I came down with a full-blown cold and fever and was bed bound for the next few days. As I laid in bed nursing my head and going through boxes of tissues, I tried to decipher how I had caught a cold.

Changing Your Body Image

By Anne - Sophie Reinhardt 28

For most of my life, my happiness depended on the reflection I saw in the mirror.

I was convinced that the way I looked and the number I saw on the scale determined my worthiness as a daughter, sister, girlfriend and later a wife.

This completely ridiculous notion led to more than 2 decades of misery. During those years I felt trapped inside my body, without any hope to ever be able to find relief or a way to free myself. I lived in a state of oppression and despised everything about myself and my appearance.