It’s the little moments in life that usually end up being the best memories. The best part of my day is coming home to my family. Most parents say that, but how many of them truly mean it? Who knows and I don’t care because coming home to my little monsters is my cherry on top. I’m fortunate enough to change people’s lives on a daily basis. Yes, that may seem like a strong statement but I absolutely believe it. There’s not many feelings that can top those that you get after a client reaches their ultimate goal but coming home to my two boys makes a great day epic. That’s my cherry on top. Coming home to my two boys. Last night was extra special because I got home early enough to go on a long walk with the family. While on the walk we got to see an epic Colorado sunset. That’s like a cherry on top of a cherry!
Trying out Cold Showers
Lately, I’ve had so many ideas but no time to write. Here we sit watching Lion Guard, Carson’s favorite cartoon, while I feed Will. I’m asking myself…what would it look like if it were easy? What would it look like if I could just sit down and put my thoughts to paper? For perspective, I was up twice in the middle of the night feeding Will who’s just over two months old. The last thing I want to do is write because I’m exhausted. All I really want to be doing is exactly what I’m doing, watching cartoons with my boys. That got me thinking, man I wish I had something to fire up my creative voice. Fire up my nervous system. I wish I could do something to wake up my mind so I can write. I know what I could do if it were easy. Think about your life, is there something that you’ve been wanting to do that you haven’t started? Why haven’t you started? Are you like me and overthink things? Is the planning process taking too much time? I’m sure that doesn’t sound like you, or does it?
I’m thinking about how great it would have been this morning if I could have taken a cold shower. A cold shower you ask? Yes, a cold shower. 
It’s one of the best ways to fire up your nervous system in the morning. Especially when you haven’t been getting regular hours of sleep per night because you have a newborn. It was an idea that was brought up to me through my internet musings, the idea of taking cold showers early in the morning to wake up my nervous system. Sounded kind of crazy to begin with because who wants to take a cold shower? On the other hand, I had heard of the benefits of cold showers while listening to podcasts and other smart fitness people. The idea here is not to lower inflammation like you may think, but goes way back to years when we were bathing ourselves in cold water such as rivers or lakes because that’s all we had around us. There is something very primal about taking a cold shower in the 20th century.
The hardest part is just starting to do it. Trying it out is the first real roadblock. When I take showers in the morning the best part is standing in nice hot water. I always thought it was the heat that woke me up but in reality, the cold showers really wake me up. I didn’t even think about trying out cold showers until one of my employees brought it to my attention and told me to find the lowest effective dose. What does that mean? Lowest effective dose in the simplest form is where you can see the most benefit with the least amount of effort. In this case, what would be the shortest amount of time under the cold water to cause the greatest amount of benefit? I have tried to do two minutes of cold water at the end of my hot shower in the morning. Just two minutes. You can do anything for two minutes.
I asked myself when would be the best time to start an experiment like this. Don’t we all ask ourselves that? We look for the perfect time to start. Is there ever a perfect time to start? The quick answer is no! Since I like to contradict myself sometimes and I procrastinate with the best of them, I decided to look for my perfect time to start. I knew that coming up would be the most trying time of my life because we were about to embark on raising a second child, so I knew that I was going to be exhausted all the time. 
The best time to see if this truly worked would be the first few months with our newborn son and that’s how I convinced myself to try two minutes at the end of every shower. Sometimes trying something new is more difficult by us thinking about it and not doing it. We build up the new habit in our head so much that we don’t even try it. If you find a reason to try it, then more than likely you will give it a try. This reminds me of one of my favorite ways to look at the world, a good system that you will do is better than a perfect system you never start.
So day one after we came home from the hospital, I decided to try out cold showers. Today was going to be the day I’m going to do it. At the end of the shower, I turned down the water where it got fairly cold. I squeezed every muscle to try to stay warm and it was hard to stay under the water for two minutes. Fortunately, for me, I was trying out another breathing technique where I counted to four breathing in and counted eight breathing out. I cycled through that 10 times which I figured was about two minutes, and then jumped out to grab the towel, easily the worst part of this experience. The cold water is bad but getting out freezing is even worse. Once the shivering stops it feels like you’re alive. No matter how tired you were before the shower, now you’re wide-awake. What sold me on it was the fact that I didn’t need my second cup of coffee after getting out of the shower. I even realized that the cup of coffee that I depended so much on to get my day started was turning into more coffee in my to-go mug. Did I lose you there? I know, sounds crazy right? Who wants to get out of the shower totally freezing and shivering. If I lost you that’s OK but bare with me a little longer. Once I got over feeling like a dripping wet ice cube, I could recognize how great this experiment was and how much it affected my morning routines. Now let’s look back at when I started this. I used to just stand in the water, but now I let the water pour over my head and my shoulders. It’s much more intense, but the benefit is that much greater. I don’t do the breathing technique anymore either. All I do is hang out under there until I really start to get cold and I know that it’s been two minutes.
Fast forward till now and it’s been eight weeks of doing this. It’s one of those things that you get used to and now I couldn’t live without starting my day with a cold shower. All I had to do was try it once. I’ve even tried it on a Saturday afternoon after working outside all day when I’m totally exhausted and it wakes me up for the evening. To think I wouldn’t have even found the benefit if I hadn’t tried it. If all I did was try to plan this experiment, to make it perfect, to try and fit it in my life, I’d still be planning. I would still be thinking about it. Think about what’s in your life right now that you’ve been wanting to try but for whatever reason haven’t tried it yet. This is where I always tell myself you should’ve started yesterday. Don’t wait for tomorrow because you could feel the benefit today. Don’t get me wrong, some things take a long time to see the benefit. However, two minutes under cold water at the end of your shower is not one of them. Now you may not want to try this and I get that. But this is about what you’ve been thinking about trying. You’ve been thinking about that new habit that could change your life for the better. You’ve been thinking about climbing that mountain of good habits. Stop thinking. Start climbing and jump in that cold shower.
Always looking at the Clock
Anyone who has had a newborn baby knows that most of your time is spent looking at the clock. Time seems to creep by like it does on a cold winter day. Where it seems like life has slowed to a crawl. That’s what it’s like when you have a brand new baby. Every time the baby cries it’s because he wants or needs something. As a parent, that’s the game we play every hour of every day. What could the baby need? That’s where the clock becomes our compass that guides us to the answer. If the baby is crying after a two or so hours then he is most likely hungry. If he’s crying and the clock tells you he just ate then you know it’s his diaper. This is the game we play as new parents every hour of every day. The clock becomes our compass that guides us to a smiling happy baby boy.
Seasoned Shrimp and Spiral Zucchini Pasta
We love to cook and that’s why we’re sharing our wins and losses when it comes to our meals. For us, most of the time we have dinners that we would love to cook again. We find a recipe, cook it and then decide if we want to keep it. Usually, the next time we cook that meal it’s from memory, which is really where the greatness happens. Since we’re cooking it from memory we forget exactly how we made it the first time so things change. This meal though is completely free-lanced. I say that because I have never seen Liz actually read a recipe for this specific meal. I have a feeling she saw this type of recipe somewhere on a food network show or something like that, then she logged that recipe in her memory until we eventually made the meal. The first time she threw this together we used spaghetti squash as the pasta and this time, we used a spiralizer to make zucchini pasta. I honestly like both versions. Another part I like about the recipe is it’s incredibly easy to customize. Sometimes this meal may have fresh garlic, no bell peppers or onions. You can do whatever you want with it. Don’t like onions? Then don’t include them. Don’t like zucchini? Use spaghetti squash. Never used a 
spiralizer? Check out the instruction video on how we used it (Click Here).
If you don’t like either of those options and you want to just have regular pasta? That’s fine, do that but remember the calories are much higher with regular pasta. That brings up something I hear all the time when I’m explaining this meal or meals where we use spaghetti squash. Yes, we’re using it instead of pasta. Yes, it’s not only because it has fewer calories, but for us, it has to do with how we feel. Don’t get me wrong. I love pasta just as much as anyone else does. The difference? I recognize that I love it so much that I always overeat pasta. Then I feel absolutely horrible. Sound familiar? Is it a gluten intolerance? Maybe, but more than likely it’s gluttony intolerance. So, for us using a vegetable for the “pasta” works better and to be honest, we love it. Also, this dish is so good that we ate the whole pot. All of it guilt free.
What’s the macronutrient breakdown?
Like I mention in the instruction video (Click here). We love this dish so it’s not surprising that we ate the whole thing. When you look at the macronutrient breakdown it makes sense that the most calories come from the protein. This dish breaks down to shrimp and veggies. The overall calories were perfect and came in just under 450 k/cal. 
Some may say 40 grams of protein is on the high side for a meal, but that’s how it worked out. Those are things that I used to care about but no longer do because I don’t have the time to worry about it. The carbohydrates came in at 30 grams which may be low for some. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. If you feel you need more carbohydrates the best way to do this is to add more fruit with this and any meal. The 20 grams of fat came mostly from the sauteed veggies.
What would we change next time?
Honestly, this is one of those meals that we wouldn’t change any of the ingredients. The one thing that you could change is the spice blend. We chose a spice blend from Savory Spice called the Coastal California Fenn
el Pollen Rub. We added it on a whim and it turned out great. The next time we make this recipe we may or may not use it, but I wanted to point out how good it was for this dish. Not only that but you can use whatever spice rub you prefer. The one thing that we have not figured out with the spiralizer is how to have shorter lengths of zucchini. When using the spiralizer you can make too long of “noodles” that become hard to eat. We even tried to make them smaller this time around and they came out better but not quite short enough.
From YouTube!
Here’s the recipe:
This is one of our favorite dishes to make and the best part? It’s super easy to make. All you have to do is shred the zucchini, chop the veggies, and then cook the shrimp. Just try it!
Here’s what we used:
2 chopped bell peppers
1 onion chopped
3-4 small zucchini made into pasta like noodles
Bag of de-veined previously frozen shrimp
1 tbsp of olive oil
1 tbsp of butter
2 tbsp Coastal California Fennel Pollen Rub from Savory Spice
1 tsp salt
Pepper to taste
1. Heat up big pot adding butter and olive oil
2. Sauté onions until they become translucent
3. Add bell peppers
4. Stir until soft
5. Add zucchini and sauté for 5 minutes
6. Add shrimp
7. Sprinkler Coastal California Fennel Pollen Rub
8. Stir ever so often to evenly cook the shrimp
9. Once shrimp are pink and cooked through
10. Serve in a bowl
11. Enjoy!
We were so hungry that we almost didn’t get any shot of the finished meal! It was so good we didn’t have leftovers.
If it were easy, what would it look like?
This idea popped into my head about how hard it is to get back to working out after a long amount of time spent off. More specifically the idea about how our good habits go by the wayside during a long layoff. What’s a long lay off? I have no idea what that means to you. For me, it’s ten days to be specific. I had every excuse in the book to skip the workout. I’m too tired, I have too much catch-up work to do, I feel stretched thin. Going into my first workout I was nervous for how I was going to perform being so tired but after yesterday I realized it wasn’t as bad as I was expecting. Did the workout suck? Oh yes, it did. But why? Was it the week off? Probably not because a week off most likely allows our body to relax. Was it the lack of sleep? Maybe. Or was it something else entirely? Was it drinking 4 plus drinks every day last week? Most likely. The time away from my normal routine allowed those bad habits to creep back into my life and could be the same for your as well. Why is it we take a week or more away from our normal routine, pick up all the old bad habits because we can and then we drop the good habits? What’s with that? Well, it’s mostly bullshit, to be honest. What would it look like if it were easy? Ask yourself, what would it look like if it were easy to get back to the gym? If it were easy, you’d stop reading this and get your butt to the gym.
We live on that cliff edge with keeping good habits. We hang on by our fingertips and with one little slip up we’re falling all the way down the mountain. All the way back to all those habits we thought we changed. The habits that we spent days, weeks and maybe even years trying to build our routines around. How can we stop this? Well, we don’t fall down the mountain of bad habits again. I know, back to the whole if it were easy. Think for a moment of those mountain climbing movies where the hero is sliding down a sheet of ice and can’t stop. You’re right there with him, feeling their fear, knowing that the end is in sight. Then BAM! They throw their ice axe into the ice and stop the free fall. That’s what you need. You need to find your ice axe. That’s how it looks if it was easy.
I’m fortunate enough to have many ice axes but my main one is my competitiveness. Most people I meet or train don’t have this gene so I’ll choose another one. Another ice axe I already mentioned is the team of trainers I train with. They are my buddies so it’s hard to be away even when I don’t want to workout because I’ve been up all night with a crying newborn. Now I’m sure at this point you’ve thought about what you could use for your ice axe. I’m sure you’ve visualized how to build your good habits again if it were easy.
The cool part is after you’ve stuck that ice axe in then you get to climb back up that mountain. Yes, you have to rebuild those good habits again, but aren’t you glad you stopped yourself before you hit the bottom? For me hiking back up that mountain was super hard because I walked into max week. Again, could have easily let those good habits go and just started the following week. Instead, I used my ice pick and I had one of the best workout weeks I’ve ever had. Kinda crazy, right? I went from being exhausted, trying to use every excuse in the book, sliding down the mountain of bad habits and then at weeks end it was one of the best weeks I’ve ever had. Not only did I climb back up the mountain. I conquered it in record time and now I’m looking for the next mountain to climb. The next bad habit to conquer. The next lifestyle change I want to make. Don’t forget your ice axe the next time you’re climbing the mountain of good habits because you never know when you’ll need it.
Originally posted on Fitness Together Wash Park’s Blog
Grilled BBQ Pork w/ Spicy Cajun Sweet Potato Fries
We seem to have picked up a pork tenderloin habit recently. I say that because we’ve been eating more of it for some reason. When I start looking at why we’re eating more pork a few things jump out at me. First, pork tenderloins are easy to cook and if done right taste fantastic. Second, they are lean protein so they allow you to customize the meal to your dietary goals. Finally, seasoned pork tenderloins are easy to find. Yes, that’s right sometimes we make our sauces and rubs for our meals and then there are times when we just don’t have the time and we grab a pre-seasoned one. That’s what we used for this dish. Before you go and start yelling about how these may have preservatives and crap that we shouldn’t put in our bodies. Let’s look at the nutrition facts. 
Before we do, I have a confession. I didn’t look at this until after we made this meal. I didn’t really care what was in it. Why? Sometimes you need to eat and it doesn’t matter. Why doesn’t it matter? Don’t sweat the small things. Back to the Mesquite BBQ pork tenderloin nutrition facts. What do we find? Nothing of much concern that I see because we use most of the same ingredients in our own dry rubs. The only thing that I wouldn’t use the soybean oil. If you pat dry the tenderloin, most of the oil will be absorbed anyway. So, now that we’re on the same page that these pre-seasoned pork tenderloins are great, then let’s move on to why this meal was on fire! Check out the instruction video here.
What was the macro breakdown?
At first glance, this meal had uneven macros, which is not the goal for every meal. The goal is to have a consistent macro breakdown, but we usually do not plan ahead. We make the meal and then figure the macro’s after we eat. Seems backward, right? That’s the point when you eat whole food, that you made at home, it’s tasty and usually, it’s good for you. Yes, I’ve said that before but I want to keep reiterating it until it sinks in. 
This meal, however, had 475 k/cals for me because I ended up going back for more sweet potato fries, even though they were on fire! Eating sweet potato fries always seems like you’re cheating the system. Since I ate more than I should have that brought the grand total to 39g of carbohydrates. The fat grams were well below where they usually are coming in at 25g and most of that came from the olive oil that we baked the fries in. Finally, the part we all care about, or at least us meatheads, this meal had 21g of protein.
What did we like about this meal?
The sweet potatoes fries are always a great addition to any meal but the ease of the pre-seasoned pork took the cake. It actually tasted better than we thought. Since all I had to do was trim the fat and pat it dry this meal was done in under an hour. Remember all good things in life take time. Again, this goes without saying but you almost can’t eat too many sweet potato fries when you bake them in the oven.
What would we change next time?
After I took the picture of the final presentation I noticed that all the colors were the same, down to the plates we use. I wish we had added a salad, fruit or some kind of color other than orange. That’s the unseen side effect of doing a food blog and videos. You see what your meals really look like and this allows you to see your food for what it really is. While this meal wasn’t bad in that regard, it could be even better. There’s always room for improvement. Another point is when I patted and trimmed the fat from the pork I forgot to spray the grill with cooking spray. The pork stuck a little after the first flip. That’s something I had to adjust on the fly and the pork still turned out great. Finally, the one thing that really was not good was the cajun spice on the fries. In the recipe, I talk about the cajun spices being too hot, which prompted me to add brown sugar. Needless to say, the brown sugar did not help. The fries were like biting into a fresh jalapeno. I couldn’t stop eating them but wifey thought they were way too spicy. Next time, less spice and less brown sugar. Way too much sweet and spice! Live and learn.
Did you miss our last recipe? Check it out here…
Watch the YouTube Instruction Video Here!
Quick Recipe Breakdown:
Cut sweet potatoes into fries
– Soak in water 4-6 hours
**we only let them soak for 1hr because we’re busy people but longer is usually better!
– Pat Dry
– Bake 20-30 minutes @ 450*
– Flip and rotate halfway through
– 5 minutes under broiler for extra crispy fries
Heat Grill to 450*
– Pat Pork Dry
– Trim fat
– Have pork tenderloin at room temperature
– Sear all sides (6-8 minutes)
– Cook another 24 minutes (off direct heat & covered) or until pork hits 145* internal temp
– Flip after 12 minutes
– Let it rest 5-10 minutes
– Slice and enjoy!
Sage-Lemon Cornish Hens w/ Watermelon Spinach-Arugula Feta Cheese Salad
This meal actually took more than 24 hours to make. Yes, to answer your question, these meals are about empowering you to cook great food at home. Then, why would I make such a complicated meal? Well, it’s not complicated it’s just time-consuming because I made the brine from scratch. With all of these meals, you can easily augment the recipe to your lifestyle. For instance, you could grill or bake these cornish hens in 45 minutes and they’d be a great dinner. The key here is the brine takes the cornish hens to a whole new level. The brine is super easy to make when you follow my instruction video (Click here). Perfection takes time but it’s worth it every time. Once you’ve put together the brine and let it cool, then really the rest of the recipe is simple. Brine the Cornish Hens, let them sit overnight uncovered to let them dry out in the fridge, then grill them for 45 minutes (Click here, it’s that easy). Or bake them. Don’t make this harder than it needs to be. The salad is one of our favorites and it does not need any dressing. The juices from the watermelon are enough. This salad is also super easy to make for a BBQ or a dinner party. Stop telling yourself you can’t make this meal and just try and make it!
What was the macro breakdown?
Cornish Hens are like little chickens so they are a lean protein, which means you can eat a whole one without blowing up your calories. Then you couple that with a Watermelon Arugula Spinach salad you have not only a nutritious meal but you can eat more without a guilty conscience. When we make Cornish Hens I usually eat a whole one where my wife likes to eat just half. This meal breaks down like this, 447 k/cal which is a pretty substantial dinner. 
The macros are 14 grams of Carbohydrates, 19 grams of Fat and 53 grams of protein. If you were to eat only half the cornish hen then the fat goes down slightly and the protein changes to 29 grams. When looking at the break down this meal is not as balanced as the other ones, but that’s ok because of what I ate the rest of the day. That’s what matters most. What does the whole day look like? Since this was a day I worked out most of my carbohydrates came around my workout, therefore I did not need more carbs for dinner. If you need more carbohydrates than this I’d add more watermelon on the side.
What did we like about the meal?
The Cornish Hens were so juicy and tender. The key is cooking them off direct heat on which is essentially baking them. The other part was how good the meat tasted. You could taste the sage and lemon. It takes a really good piece of chicken for me not to add sauce to it. This was the epitome of well seasoned. What we really loved about the meal was the salad. Yes, it’s that good. Every time we bring this salad to parties people raves about it. Just try it.
What would we change next time?
A cup of watermelon is the perfect amount for one salad but after looking at the macros you could add another cup for more carbohydrates. That’s only if you needed more for that day. In the video, I said to brine for 4-6 hours but in reality, the hens were in for 12 hours. Why were they in that long you might ask? We have two kids and I fell asleep that evening before I could take them out. This may or may not change next time because the hens still turned out great. I took them out in that morning and they still dried out in the fridge for 8 hours before they hit the grill. So, even when trying to be perfect, life happens and gets in the way. That’s the reality of life with young children, but you can still make the best of it. Don’t talk yourself out of it before you try it.
Watch the YouTube Instruction Video Here!
Watch the YouTube Instruction Video Here!
Find your inner super power!
Do you want to become a Super Hero? I know that’s an odd question to ask, but consider the possibilities for a minute. Growing up, most of us idolized a superhero. This could be a star athlete, a cartoon character or maybe just a mere mortal with special powers. Those superheroes all embodied characteristics that we all can identify with or want to identify with. What does being a superhero mean to you? Does it mean you can fly like Superman? Does it mean you can be something greater than yourself like Batman? Do you want the super power of resilience to bounce back from near defeat to win the big game? It’s fun to think about how life would be different with a super power like flying or super strength, but are there superpowers that are attainable by us mere mortals?
That’s a fun question to tackle because super powers are usually reserved for the movies and comic books. Obviously, I’m not here to tell you I can teach you how to fly or anything crazy like that, but I am here to show you that there are lifestyle changes that we can all make that can change our lives for the better. Things that we can change to make us a better father, mother, brother or sister. I’m not sure about you, but for me, lifestyle change is an overused statement that most don’t really know what it means. So ask yourself, what does it mean to you? To me, it means I’m making a change for the better. It means I’ve evaluated certain parts of my life and want to change them. Or even better, there are things that I want to add to my current lifestyle to make life that much more enjoyable. About six years ago, the trainers at Fitness Together CCWP chose to start walking the walk. We started to train five to six days a week. Now that was one of the best things we could have ever done. We changed our lifestyle to allow us to work out that often. Seems simple, doesn’t it? Don’t worry this post is not about getting more consistent with our workout, although that is one of the best changes to your current lifestyle, but I digress. Lifestyle change to me is about adding something positive that will make the biggest impact on your current lifestyle.
Making any change can seem daunting. We make these excuses that we do not want to change just yet or our spouse doesn’t want to make the same change. Whatever the excuse is, it may seem easier to put off change until later. What if I told you I have a way for you to find your superhero within? Are you at least interested in your super powers within? Or do you think I’m crazy? While you might be thinking this entire concept is crazy and that there is no way that anyone has super powers lurking beneath the surface, I firmly believe we all have that power within us. One of the easiest ways to channel the superhero within you is to control your own thoughts. Yes, it’s as simple as that. Your own thoughts. Are you wondering how you can control your thoughts? Let’s take a step back. First off, are you aware of your thoughts? Right now are you reading these words or have I bored you so much that you’re daydreaming? Got ya! Now before you continue to read on think about those thoughts. What are you thinking about?
What’s for lunch? Maybe I shouldn’t have yelled at the other driver on the way to work? Did I forget to tell my child to have a great day today? Were you aware of those thoughts before I pointed them out to you? That’s the point right there. We’re so overstimulated these days from our busy lives and all of our devices that our minds never slow down. We never slow down. Our minds are very good at multitasking. No, I’m not saying that you are good at multitasking but your brain is. Now, what does this have to do with awakening your inner superhero? Well, sometimes those thoughts are so simple that we can just brush them off and move on with whatever we were doing prior to recognizing those thoughts. Other times those thoughts can be negative and side track us. They may sidetrack us from our work, our family or our life goals. These negative thoughts can be so bad that they may stop you from getting out of bed. They may stop you from reaching your weight loss goals. The point of writing this has nothing to do with positive self-talk. Although positive self-talk is one of the easiest ways to become motivated and reach your goals, that’s not the point. The point is recognizing those thoughts. Evaluating those thoughts. Then taking action on those thoughts. This can include tying our emotions to those thoughts. For example, we think about how we’re craving a donut. Before we go eat that donut, we realize we are not actually hungry, but in reality we’re anxious. Our anxiousness is the cause of the craving. Will we give in to the anxious craving or better yet let those thoughts leave our minds just as quickly as they came in.
That sounds easy, right? See the thought, be the thought, let the thought go. Boom! You’re done! Here’s to the better you! Sorry, it’s not that easy. I wish it was but it’s not quite that simple. If you know me I’m always trying new things and yes, I’m trying to channel my inner super powers. Yes, I’m trying this out for me but really I’m trying this out to help you as well. Let me answer that question brewing in your head, yes I can control my thoughts and yours. Well maybe just mine but at least I like to pretend I can control yours. Do you know how I control my thoughts? Meditation.
STOP thinking! Whatever thoughts just jumped into your head about meditation, let them go. Meditation conjures up all these images of monks sitting quietly humming ohmmm. My version of meditation and your version can and will be different than their version and that was the hardest part for me to accept. I’m not good at meditation. I have so many thoughts that it seems impossible to clear my head. I’ve tried mantras that you repeat. I’ve tried to sit silently and not think. What happens? You guessed it. More thoughts. So, how can you control your thoughts with meditation?
Just do it. That’s all. Find 5-30 minutes per day and just do it. I use a guided meditation app that has cues ever so often to bring you back to your breath. The biggest change for me was to accept that this isn’t about being the best meditator. This is a practice that is about sitting down and disconnecting for 15 minutes a day. I noticed a direct benefit to this practice after less than a week. I started to notice my anxiety before I tried a new task in life. I was able to recognize that I’m anxious and then I was able to understand the root of my anxiety. I started to notice my anger. I was able to recognize why I was angry. I started to notice my thoughts before I would say what I was thinking. So, how is this a super power? If you’re able to recognize your thoughts before they become actions then you will have more power over your actions. Then you’ll be able to control your reactions to others actions. This will improve your social interactions with other people which will allow you to live a more fulfilling life. Think about those moments in life when you lose your cool. Why did you lose your head? Like most of us, I’m sure it was just a reaction to the guy cutting us off on the highway or our children screaming NO, in our face. We lost our cool because we just reacted. Now if you have the ability to see those emotions a split second before you act on them, you can also learn to control these emotions. How different could those moments have been? The guy cuts you off and you recognize that anger and then just let it go. Then you’re not yelling at him through your windshield. Then that one interaction doesn’t ruin the rest of your day. How different would your reaction be to your child screaming? I bet it would go a lot better when you’re able to control your emotions which in turn affects your actions.
Yes, there are still moments in my day that I lose control and just react, but that’s because I’m still working on it. It’s a skill that one must work on for years. The coolest part, you can see the immediate impact of just trying to control your thoughts. Get over all the roadblocks, all those reasons why you haven’t started yet and all those excuses. The sooner you start the sooner you will realize how you can control your thoughts and emotions in a way you didn’t think was possible. When you begin to get better at meditation and recognizing your thoughts then you’ll start to see what I’m talking about. How this new control really is a super power. We all have super powers within us we just need to tap into those. Once we do that we will have a much more fulfilling life.
Originally posted at Fitness Together Wash Park’s Blog
Apricot-dijon mustard glazed Pork Tenderloin
Hey honey, what’s for dinner? 
Apricot-dijon mustard glazed pork with a cheesy cauliflower side dish. How good does that sound? I bet you that your mouth is watering right now. That’s what we had for dinner last night. The apricot-dijon mustard glaze was so good and it was made from scratch. This meal was much more time consuming to make than the last meal but that’s ok because it was worth it.
My wife found this recipe in the Cooking Light magazine and it did not disappoint. This meal reminds me of why we like to cook. We had the whole family in the kitchen while I made this dinner. When you put your heart and soul into a dish it tastes so damn good. That’s the definition of comfort food to me. When you can taste the love in the food. People always say they crave biscuits and gravy as their comfort food, which has never really appealed to me. That probably has something to do with growing up in Colorado and not the south, but you see what I’m getting at. You can check out the instruction video and see how easy it is to make a dinner from scratch. I know most of us say we do not have time to cook like this, but I’d argue that you just do not have your priorities straight. Corral all your family and get them into the kitchen while you or your significant other cooks. It’ll make for a better family, I’ll promise you that.
What’s the Macro breakdown?
This meal had more calories because of the cheese and most likely the apricot preserves we used in the recipe. The cheesy cauliflower was most likely to be blamed for the fat content in this meal. We are not scared of fat so we loaded it up. Each serving was about 494 k/calories. Each serving has about 37g of carbs, 29g of fat and 43g of protein. I say about because we do not really measure or weigh our foods. I’m sure some of you are screaming at the screen, “but Dusty how do you really know?!”.
The truth is I don’t, but I learned a long time ago that you need to focus on the 20% that creates 80% of the difference. In the past, I’ve weighed each and everything I ate. I tracked every calorie to the T. Do you know what happened? I ended up falling off of my diet plan. I’ve learned to be flexible with what I’m eating. I roll with the idea that I need to eat protein that is the size of my open palm and my carbohydrate side is the size of my closed fist. If you feel the best thing for you to do is weigh and measure your food then go right ahead. Just don’t let it cause you to fall back into your bad habits.
What did we like about this meal?
We loved the scratch made apricot-mustard glaze that went on top of the pork. It was the highlight of the meal. When you make something from scratch it tastes different. It’s a great metaphor for life. Anything that’s time consuming is worth your time and the end product always reflects your time and effort. The cheesy cauliflower was a great side dish and it was almost good enough to get Carson to eat it. He loves his green trees (broccoli) but he wasn’t so sure about the white trees with cheese.
What would we change next time?
We had a great debate about how long to cook the cauliflower. Liz thought the 25 minutes in the oven was perfect while I would have liked the cauliflower to cook longer. Either way, there weren’t leftovers of the cauliflower. We ate it all. That’s also what we would change next time, save some for leftovers. Secondly, we cooked the pork for 33 minutes in total even though the video said 18 total minutes. We didn’t have our instant read thermometer so we went extra time to make sure it was done. Lucky for us the pork was not over cooked, only a little past perfect! Finally, if you need to limit your calories you can cut the amount of cheese we used in half or even leave it out altogether. Roasted cauliflower is awesome by itself.
Watch the YouTube video here!
Cooking with the DeGroff’s #1
My wife and I do not have the “Honey, what’s for dinner?” conversation as much anymore…now it’s changed to how should we cook what we pulled out of the freezer. We had pulled out boneless chicken thighs, which by the way is my new favorite cut of chicken. Chicken breasts are the easiest for most people to cook. The problem is you can over-cook them way too easily. We all know how bad overly cooked chicken breasts can taste. That leads most people to like thighs better because they have a little more fat and dark meat, which makes it harder to overcook. Not sure about you, but my least favorite part of chicken thighs is picking around the bones. Wifey comes through again and finds boneless chicken thighs at our local grocery store. That’s what we started with for this dinner. Thawed chicken thighs. That’s it.
We decided to use our favorite cajun spice mix that she stole from her bosses cupboard. At least that’s the story on how this stuff showed up. It’s great for corn on the cob, fish, and apparently chicken thighs. The time-consuming part of this was waiting for the oven to heat up and then actually cooking the chicken. Watch the quick youtube instruction video on how we made this awesome dinner. This blog post is not about the actual making of the dish, but how you can modify this dish to fit your dietary goals. How can you change a meal you see in a magazine or on a cooking show to fit your diet and lifestyle?
What is the Macro Breakdown?
For many of us, we try to plan out our macronutrients so that we are eating the healthiest as possible. Many times when I was meal planning I would try to plan out the macros first then determine how much of the meal I could eat based on that. Here we just made the meal. It wasn’t until after we were done eating that we figured out what was in the meal. The breakdown surprised me because it was so even and it matched the balance I want in my family’s meals. The breakdown looks like this: 
461 k/cal total, 32g of Carbohydrates, 27g of Fat and 29g of Protein (retrieved from myfitnesspal.com). It’s amazing when all you focus on is eating good food and not what makes up the meal, you can really have meals that are satisfying and nutritious.
What did we like about the meal?
I always tell people I’m a meat-a-tarian and don’t really like the food that my food eats. I usually say that in jest. I do love a good salad, but I never eat enough greens. With everything, I know about how we should eat and I still don’t eat enough vegetables! When we started adding fresh fruits to our salads, roasted almonds, and a tasty dressing all of a sudden I was craving salads again. The combo of the blueberries, strawberries, and crunch of the almonds really sets up for a great splash on your palate. The cajun dry rub was great on the chicken and it was great without any sauces, which is huge for me because I like my side sauces.
What would we change?
This is less about what we would change and more about how you can change this meal to match your dietary goals. First and foremost is the salad dressing. Since I didn’t plan out this meal beforehand, I never looked at the salad dressings label. What I found there was a ton of sugar and preservatives. What’s the best way you can rectify this? Make your own dressing with some great balsamic vinegar and olive oil. Maybe add some salt and pepper to taste and you’re good to go. One of our favorite custom dressings is apple balsamic vinegar, olive oil, salt, and pepper. You might be asking yourself, that sounds great, why didn’t they do that for the video? Easy answer. We just didn’t think about it. Again, this meal was on the fly. Second, the other easy modification is to leave the almonds off the salad. That’s where you can reduce the calories because you can lower the fat intake. Finally, now I don’t recommend this but the other modification you can make is to use chicken breasts instead of thighs. That will reduce the fat some, but like I already mentioned chicken breasts are just not that tasty.
I hope this blog post and video has shown you how easy it is to cook for yourself and your family. Don’t make this more difficult than it needs to be. We started with chicken thighs and ended with an awesome nutritious (and delicious) meal. Before you start making excuses on why you cannot make this meal. Just try it. Watch the video and see how simple the recipe is and try it out. Let us know what you think! Now get cookin’.
Watch the YouTube video here!
Three Pillars for Your Best life 