Healthy with Shani

As of early last week I began incorporating just a smidgeon more cardio into my routine and I am always HUNGRY! I did already feel like I was shorting myself about 2-300 calories daily (probably more) because eating dinner by the time I get home is an exhausting process and motivating myself to cook usually doesnt work.  So I end up grabbing an assortment of "macros" and eating everything raw (except the chicken).  Yet I know with this "pick and go" I was coming up short of calories for the day. Now I'm feeling the shortage but it's OK because I am feeling like a fat burning furnace again now that I am eating more. And my body already feels tighter.   Perhaps what I will do is throw in a low calorie day twice weekly to keep this process going.  I have found that when I try to do refeeds I dont tend to plan things very well and I end up overthinking everything.  Until more fat falls off my frame, I will do calorie "cycling" (which pretty much en...

Ewewew I can't clear the phlegm outta my head from being sick earlier in the week. One thing I've been realizing the HUGE importance of is proper recovery. "DUH" you may say. But when I don't get enough antioxidants/glutamine/vitamins and minerals to restore what was lost during my workout, it shows up in my eyes. My eyes become red and inflamed and I could risk another emergency visit to NY Eye and Ear. And I've been off of all meds for about 3 months now, and doing well. Find some wood. POUND it please. :( Being medicated the way I was scares the SHIT outta me. I talked of suicide. I was delusional, depressed and so so empty inside. But my inflammation was tamed. Last night, after the leg session of a lifetime I greeted my smile in the mirror with blood red eyes - and felt/saw that unsightly and too eerily familiar blood spot on my left sclera (the white of the eye) just outside my iris (the colored part of the eye). Time to increase ...

Hahaha Stupid My new fave food in the whoooole world (this week) is cauliflower. I fill a giant bowl and nuke it until its soft and "grain-carb like." I get the same satisfaction eating it as I would rice or pasta. I think I should keep some Mrs. Dash at work. Today I had to flavor with packets of black pepper and iodized salt. It had a very artificial yet yummy taste. I felt naughty eating it. Like a cheater.

I never really realized how "behind" being sick makes me feel from training.  Before, I used to push through it and would leg press four plates while coughing chunks of my lungs out...so pumped on the adrenaline that I didnt care if it meant I wouldn't be able to talk for a few weeks. I know better than to do that anymore.  A baby sized bit of congestion Saturday night turned into a full blown stuffy, achy, cold shivering, phlegmmie (ewww) body by Sunday and I missed leg day yesterday.  I even considered making it in to train.  But my honey convinced me otherwise and dressed me in scrubs, made me chicken soup, parked me in front of the TV, tucked me into an electric blanket, and sent me dreaming with Theraflu pm. Being sick ain't so bad <3.

Sometimes I am the most restless and impatient person I know. But I guess that's a good thing when you have goals and high aspirations. If you let yourself get too complacent, you may soon forget HOW to take action. If you chill out too much over everything, you lose your passion and fire for what you're doing. I put my pants on this morning and am pretty tired of the "give in the waist and no give in the ass" thing. My booty is pretty 'licious (ugh yeah I just typed 'licious)....well, kind of.  Keeping/sculpting/tightening/lifting/solidifying that THING has become my life's mission. I am so used to my assets, that being without one or with a poorly shaped one makes my heart sink.What I am currently trying to figure out (rather, be patient about) is how to lose it without "losing it" or "losing it."I wanna lose the fat and I dont want to lose my mind freaking out that I have no booty anymore. So I squat squat squat and eat f...

Three years have passed since the day I made up my mind to get fit and never look back. Two years ago I posted this: http://blog.bodybuilding.com/shaniariel/2010/03/21/it_s_been_one_year/ . I definitely got a kick out of looking back and listing the things I had learned. I figured, in celebration of my third year, I’d do it again. What I’ve learned as a third year “bodybuilder”: Top 25 mistakes I made and learned from since 2010: 25. Crash dieting for a competition means your body becomes a sponge for nutrients –and post show binges WILL balloon you (and are hard to bounce back from). 24. Eight weeks is NOT enough time to prep for a show if you have more than ten pounds to lose. 23. Do not wear a bikini with white trim if you just got a spray tan. 22. I do not NEED to eat a meal every two hours, on the dot. 21. Running in the morning on an empty stomach SUCKS for muscle growth. 20. Three empty jars of peanut butter in one week may mean I have severe problem. ...

Hmm so what's new lately.... Well, I dropped off my blog for a bit because I was having issues with my eyes. It was a bit too tedious to update when it was too hard to view the screen. I rid my life of a bad relationship. I tried to make it work. It didn’t – over and over and over again it just didn’t. He and I couldn’t get along as one unit any longer, so I had to go my own way again. And I decided when I did move on, that I was going to dedicate myself to fitness. No matter how long, seemingly impossible, painstaking the process would be, I would dedicate myself to achieving the perfect physique. So for the last few weeks, I have been honoring that promise to myself and seeing remarkable changes. I tightened up my eating habits and have decided that the competitive stage, which I originally swore off, gives me a goal – something big to aim for – and gives me an outlet for all of the work I put into my body of art. The decision made me evaluate what I was doing before. T...