The Secret…

The secret to becoming thin and fabulous is not really a secret at all, but a way of life. There are a few things you have to figure out about yourself to become thin and fabulous.

First off – why are you overweight?

I had a baby, I’m an overeater, and an emotional eater.

Secondly – conquer these problems.

Eat only until I’m full, get over my emotional problems by putting my energy into something rather than sitting on a couch and feeling sorry for myself – which is so not fabulous anyway.

Thirdly – stop being lazy and become a food snob.

Make your own lunches, eat only fresh foods (fruits, veggies, home-made sandwiches). Eat organic, eat home-made, don’t eat things that have preservatives. Think logically. Eat more fiber.

And enjoy life.

You will see with these easy changes that you will become thin and more fabulous. Stop eating junk food. Stop eating fast food. Only eat the most delectable deserts you can find – Grand Marnier Chocolate Cheesecake. It’s so rich you can only have a few bites anyway, pair it with an espresso for a European style dessert and everyone will think you’re ultra chic.

It’s as easy as that. So stop making excuses.

Don’t eat the pop tart or Cheerio’s for breakfast – stop eating bagels and full-fat milk, think about what you’re putting in your body.

That’s the secret.

Can you keep it?

Skinny Secret #6

Work in the Yummy “Forbidden” Stuff

That’s right. Eat bad sometimes. If you are a huge cookie monster, please work in a cookie every other day or so. If you know you can’t live without a Chips Ahoy or a Double Stuf Oreo – eat one. But ONLY one.

Depriving yourself of a naughty food puts a certain mindset in your head that you’re not allowed to have it, and instead of forgetting about it, it turns out that that’s all you can think about. Example: It’s lunch time and your coworker is eating a KitKat chocolate bar, offers you some. You say No! Of course not! I’m on a diet. Everyone else in the lunch room has a piece of the chocolate bar. You keep denying yourself even though you really want it. (Again, this is only if you really want it, if you can say no and not think twice about it, go for it.)

All afternoon you think about chocolate. You’ve set yourself up for failure because on the way home, you might buy yourself a whole Kit Kat bar and eat the whole thing instead of a piece that you were going to eat.

See where this is going? Binge eating because you denied yourself a small piece. Next time, if you know you’re going to crave something, have a tiny piece. Usually it satisfies the craving, and you can easily work it off by taking some extra stairs or riding a bike for a few minutes.

Skinny Secret #5

Discover New and Healthy Tastes!

If you write down everything you eat (try it for a week, it’s interesting!) you’ll probably notice you’re eating the same things over and over. Chicken, shrimp, chicken, shrimp, salmon. That makes up the most of my protein anyway. Now is the time to try something new and healthy and delicious! It’ll spice up your eating wardrobe, make you feel like you’re almost ‘cheating’ because it’s something new and exciting. Like beets – I absolutely adore beets, but I rarely eat them, really cus I don’t know how to cook them properly. So when I go out for lunch at a posh restaurant, I will sometimes get the beets and goat cheese salad because I rarely eat it, it’s delicious and good for you!

Try something new – eggplants, tofu, or a new spice – and you might find something you really like. Try curry or learn to cook your vegetables in a new way, it beats boredom and encourages you to keep doing good things for yourself.

Bitch in the Kitch

First off, let’s just say me and the kitchen are not good friends… I would even say we were faint aquaintances but visiting maybe once a month does not an aquaintance make – maybe like an old granny in a retirement home or something.

I just got Skinny Bitch in the Kitch, and I’m pretty excited to finally have some quick and easy and hopefully yummy recipes to make to help inspire me to a vegetarian lifestyle – I doubt I’ll ever go vegan because I love cheese and eggs way too much.

Tonight I’m making my own stirfry, but perhaps tomorrow I’ll try this tasty recipe featuring pumpkin basmati rice… mmm… sounds tempting. And if all else fails I’ll get takeout sushi. California style

Skinny Secret #4

If it was Made by Man – Don’t Eat It!

This is a really good and easy rule to live by. It might not make sense to you, but if it does, congratulations – you’re on your way! The healthiest foods to eat are fruits, vegetables, fish & light meats (if you’re non-vegetarian), anything that comes from the earth basically.

Mostly everything that humans have created involve ingredients you can’t pronounce (can’t say it? don’t eat it!), molecules, chemicals, and food that’s been so tampered with it has lost most nutritional value.

What’s a bad food? Take white fluffy bread that everyone loves as a kid and hates that it’s a big no no on diet plans. Why, you wonder? It’s techically made from the earth, but the wheat has been ground so fine, and mixed with sugar, salt and other chemicals before it’s baked.

The more refined a food is, the faster it is absorbed into your bloodstream, and the faster you are hungry again!

Read nutritional labels, buy more organic food, and try to steer clear of things you can’t pronounce!

Skinny Secret #3

Concentrate on how eating well and exercising makes you feel.

Do you ever notice how good it feels when you spend a week eating healthy and working out a few times a week? It honestly feels great, you notice a little pep in your step and your day seems brighter. And then you hit a couple of rough days, no time to work out, things come up, you have to grab some crap food to keep your day going, and you don’t feel as good. One day turns to three, and you realize that you’ve become depressed and almost physically sick because you’re eating like crap and not working out.

So whenever you feel like NOT working out, or grabbing that extra muffin, think about how GOOD it feels when you’re finished your run, how good it feels when your jeans zip up so perfectly.

Skinny Secret #2

Find Yummy Replacements for Forbidden Food!

After years and years of not watching what I eat, and eating a whole load of sugar, sweet, salty, and other bad treats, I do get the odd craving for just something, ANYTHING bad to get a quick fix. Lately I’ve been eating Jello Light (5 cals!), and sometimes I’ll eat a handful of strawberries with fat-free whipped cream (it tastes ALMOST like strawberry shortcake). We need to create low-cal, low-fat, or low-carb versions of the foods we can’t live without in order to keep with our diets.

Instead of:   A medium chocolate ice cream cone (340 cals)

Eat:  A Skinny Cow chocolate ice cream bar (100 cals)

Instead of:   A slice of apple pie (356 cals)

Eat:  One apple, sliced and baked, topped with Splenda and crumbled with one graham cracker (140 cals)

Seriously, and it tastes just as good! Make a list of your top fave *bad* food of all time (whether it be pizza, pasta, desserts) and figure out the calories and find substitutions. Look online, it’s your best bet. And at first it may not do it for you, but try and try again. You will retrain your brain into craving these healthy substitutions!

Skinny Secret #1

Adopt a NO EXCUSES mind-set.

 Skinny chicks don’t make excuses. When they have to go to the gym, they just do it. When it comes to eating well, they stick to it. Decide on your own workout and food plan – how many calories you’ll eat a day, how many times you’ll work out a week, etc. And then – STICK TO IT! Being tired is not an excuse to quit, being tired is a REASON to go excercise, go for that walk, knowing that you’ll become more energized by moving rather than just by sitting.