Not Exactly Run of the Mill

My inbox (e and snail) is full of all kinds of stuff--the latest products ... new diet books ... you name it. It never fails--people are always trying to figure out creative ways to get the general public off its collective duff. Case in point: the Aquabilt underwater treadmill. For a mere $1,299 (and FREE SHIPPING!), proud pool-owners can purchase this revolutionary gadget for water runners. Now--I did water-running when I was pregnant with my son, after I decided that, at 7 months in, I was done with the treadmill and trail. But I didn't have a treadmill to do it on--I simply ran the length of the pool, treading water in the deep end. It's a great work out ... but ... do you NEED to blow big bucks for a treadmill? I think not.

Also in the file right now is the treadmill desk. Yes, it's a way to work (as in, at a job) while you work out. Or the other way around. Now, I love multitasking, and preach getting the most activity you can in your day. And we have talked about somehow setting up my old treadmill in an empty cube here, so we could take walking breaks. But ... again ... there are better things I can do with $4,000. Like, um, pay my mortgage for three months.

What do you guys think of these gadgets? Am I the only one who doesn't get it?

Lisa D

Hello, Again!

Hey, FFGs and Future FFGs!

Welcome to all of you who read my essay in the May issue of Runners' World. I have heard from so many runners, beginning runners, wannabe runners since the issue came out. And running has been on my mind (and feet) a lot lately. Several friends just ran or ran/walked the Nashville Marathon and Half Marathon a couple of weeks ago. I didn't do it because I was closing on my house--yes, it finally sold!--in Birmingham! But I was thinking about all of them as it was in the 80s that day. Scary-hot for a marathon, let me tell you. But everyone I talked to did OK, paced themselves, and got through. Which I guess is a good lesson for all of us. When you're trying to stay healthy and fit, you can't just be a fair-weather exerciser. Heat, cold, rain (wait a minute, isn't that that the mailman's mantra?) ... you've got to find a way to get moving. I think about first snowstorm after I moved from balmy humid Texas to Allentown, PA. It started coming down thick in the early afternoon, so our bosses let us go early. My office mate at the time was big into cross-country skiing, which I had never done and was dying to try. She was heading to the hilly park near her house to for her first x-country session of the season. So what do I do? Head home and snuggle up with a vat of hot chocolate and the remote? No way. I practically four-wheel it to a sporting goods store to buy a beginner x-country ski package. They were about to lock the place up and head out (probably for their own impromptu ski sessions!) when I showed up. We skiied until it was too dark to ski--and THEN snuggled with our mugs of cocoa.

That's part of what I mean when I talk about embracing the adventure of healthy living ... making the commitment to living a life full of activity (body AND mind), and adjusting our expectations and plans along the way. Sometimes it isn't easy. Sometimes it isn't all that fun. But I always find that it's worth it afterwards, feeling like you've conquered the elements, like you've made it work (to quote the great Tim Gunn).

Share your stories about coping with bad weather, dashed plans, making it work in general!

Lisa D

We Are What We DO

Hi--

One of the so-called problems with being a magazine editor is all the reading you have to do. I've got stacks and stacks of books, just waiting for me to get through ... on top of the three newspapers, numerous monthly magazines and many websites I check out daily. I say this is a "so-called" problem because it's not really a problem at all ... reading is one of my favorite favorite things to do. My appetite for reading always rivaled my appetite for food ... and thankfully, reading is a no-cal activity!

Anyway, I have finally gotten to a book called Too Soon Old, Too Late Smart, by a psychiatrist named Gordon Livingston. I think it came out in hardback a couple of years ago, and was issued in paperback this summer. I have to admit right here ... I'm not a huge fan of self-help books. I like stories with messages, sure, but out of context advice? Not so much. Maybe that's why I wrote my book the way I did ... I felt like who would listen to my advice without knowing my story, where I'm coming from?

But I have found some nuggets in this book that resonate. One especially: We Are What We DO. Dr. Livingston (I presume! Sorry, couldn't resist) basically says that at the end of the day, our intentions, our justifications, our excuses, our words don't matter--our actions are what make us who we are.

As someone who walks around with a head full of ideas, only a fraction of which are ever executed, this hit me hard. It's not like I didn't know it before I read that passage, but the reminder came at a good time, I suppose. For instance, I think about this blog all the time ... but you all (if there is anyone out there!) know how rarely I post. YOU don't know that I think about blogging, that I actually compose posts in my head that never make it to the page. Just like my sister doesn't know that I have a card sitting here, waiting to be addressed, congratulating her on being pregnant with her third child. Nor does my friend Kim know that I've been thinking about emailing her to tell her where I am now since I've moved.

What is stopping me from following through? My son's homework, the housework, my workouts, my job, Project Runway, all those books and newspapers I read, I guess. It's not that I'm beating myself up about all this ... the book has just caused me to take stock, to look at WHAT GETS ON THE PAGE, and figure out from that if I am acting, in reality, as the person I want to be. If I am expressing what is inside.

I think not.

So ... what will I do with all this? I will DO. I will stop cogitating so much, and DO. Yes, I have a full life, and this doesn't mean I will be blogging every five minutes, or every day even. But I will try to DO more, all around. I will try to THINK, THEN DO, instead of THINK, THEN DELAY. Because time's a-wastin'.

Thanks for listening.

Lisa D

The Flip Side

Hi, all--

I just returned from a short long weekend (you know what I mean ... they're always shorter than you want them to be!) at our house in Bham. My son was down at my inlaws, so my husband and I had some nice adult time in a REAL home ... not that temporary space in Nashville. Although according to my feng shui expert friend Ellen Whitehurst, to finally sell our house I need to let go, and start thinking of it as "that living space." Hey, I'll try anything.

So we spent the weekend in that living space in Bham. And during that time, I got to talk to my mother-in-law, who was recently diagnosed as pre-diabetic. Now, the woman has been through a lot--she had breast cancer several years ago and is doing well, thank goodness. But I think she is having a really hard time dealing with the idea that she isn't as strong as she used to be. And I can certainly get that. And she has always (or since I've known her) been on the heavy side, and has at various times asked me for help. She had started walking and kept it up for a while, but quit. And now this. She was so depressed this weekend, feeling nauseated and sounding really tired and discouraged. So I am trying to help--sending her cookbooks, offering her suggestions, giving her my rah rah speech. It just so happens that I am working with a really great writer named Jon Katz on an essay about HIS diabetes problem, which, at age 60, he kicked by exercising and learning how to eat. I love Jon's take (I won't reveal much because the piece will be in the November issue of Spry). He was actually in a pretty dark place emotionally when he got the diagnosis ... but he saw it as an opportunity. It's almost as if, he says, he needed this excuse to finally get off his butt and start doing right by his body, and so he did.

I love that--I love that he just jumped on it and took charge of his own health. But as someone whose purpose in life and career is to help others find their way to good health, there's still the question: how do you get someone to flip that switch? To go from OH, NO! to OH, YES! I went through it myself ... hit my own bottom (well, you know what I mean!) and I can't get you there. I think the answer for me, anyway, is to continue to find and tell the stories of people who have turned it around, in the hopes that maybe reading those stories--mine, Jon's ... my mother-in-law's (thinking positively here)--will help someone, anyone, turn it around.

And, again, I am always looking for stories. It's amazing how many successes there are, if you only look for them. Drop me a note at lisa@formerfatgirl.com if you have one to share!

Salude!

Lisa D

The Pepper Principle

Hey, all you FFGs and Future FFGS!

First, a word from our sponsors:

I just put a little note on the home page about my appearance on Samantha Heller's Sirius Radio show on Doctor Radio tomorrow (Friday!) from 1-2 EST. If you have a Sirius subscription and want to hear me blather on ... please listen in! Also, you'll be able to call in and/or email questions. The phone # (NOT A TOLL-FREE, SO USE YOUR UNLIMITED MINUTES!) is 1-877-698-3627; email is docs@sirius-radio.com.

Just kidding ... I don't have any sponsors. Unfortunately. If I had sponsors, maybe I could just blog all day and not have to actually work ... because this is not really work for me. Too much fun to be work.

Anyway ... I have been working lately on something I call "The Pepper Principle." As you faithful blog readers know, I have been in major transition for a while now ... and as you may not know, I haven't been handling it very well. One of the reasons I have been so absent from the blog is that I've given in to that old perfectionist's flaw ... the whole thing about hiding when you're not at your best. I can't be the perfect friend, perfect employee, perfect blogger? Well, then, I'm just going to disappear. Not sure if this is just something I do or if you guys can relate. But there it is.

I have been worried about EVERYTHING. Questioning EVERYTHING. What if it wasn't right to move my family to Nashville? What if my magazine isn't everything I want it to be (or at least doesn't suck?)? What if my husband isn't happy here? What if my son hates his new school? What if my dog misses her back yard? What if Michael Phelps doesn't win gold tonight?

This isn't typical of me, really. I have moved several times in my life, but never with a family. I guess I feel like the stakes have never been higher, and that's made me even more likely to obsess about everything.

But I have been working to quiet my mind, quiet those doubts and questions that are keeping me up at night and threatening to make this time ... what should be the best time of my life ... miserable.

You know that whole thing about being "in the moment"? I have never really understood how to get there or even what that means, until lately. But I was reading a book by my friend Ali Domar, "How to be Happy Without Being Perfect," and came across this little thing about of all things, a dog. She makes the point that dogs are the perfect (! there's that word) example of being in the moment. They don't worry about what they're having for dinner, whether they're going to get to work out today, how they might have screwed up a conversation yesterday. No. They are just sitting there, taking in life, their little eyes sucking up the scene in front of them.

I thought that was interesting. And then a couple of days later, I looked at my cute little Pepper (check out her mug, above), sitting on a chair in our APARTMENT, just staring out into space. And I actually said out loud, "I wonder what she's thinking." and then I realized: SHE IS NOT THINKING ABOUT ANYTHING. There is no running commentary in her head. She's not running down the list of what she should be doing today, tonight, tomorrow, yesterday, next month, last year. She is just sitting. Waiting for the next thing. Not judging every moment as good, bad, and spinning out to the next.

And I thought, I want to be like that. I want to stop letting my expectations of this life get in the way of actually living.

That, my FFG friends, is the Pepper Principle. Whenever I start spinning, ruminating, worst-case-scenarioing, I think about Pepper's eyes. That kind of blank stare behind which there's no complicated set of machinery, twisting and turning forward and behind in time. And it's really been helping me, I have to say. Helping me move on when I screw up. Helping me not to lie awake, thinking of all the to-dos.

Anyway ... I would love to hear if you connect with this at all, or if it's just me. And if it's just me, well ... that's ok.

Thanks for reading!

Lisa D

Hi from the Land of I Don't Know!

I apologize for my unexplained absences, my impromptu hiatus, my complete and utter disappearing act for the last several months (I can't bear to look at the date of my last post for fear I will drown in the waves of guilt that I'm just barely surfing on right now). Anyway ... I want to hear all about what's up with you. But I will start with what's up with me ... as usual ... and hope that the one or two of you still out there will drop me a comment.

To keep from going on and on, I'm going to do this in a list.

The Top 10 Things I Did (and Did Not Do) on My Summer Vacation

1. I did not have a summer vacation.
2. I uprooted my family and moved them ... with the bare minimum possessions (flat-screen TV, running shoes, assorted Transformers and various other pieces of molded plastic that pass for toys for Johnny, an IPod shuffle loaded with my husband's favorite Johnny Cash tunes) ... into an APARTMENT in Nashville. I have not lived in an apartment in 25 years. Nothing against apartments, but I feel like I'm in an alternate universe.
3. I did not sell my house in Birmingham (yet), a major source of consternation.
4. I rediscovered how much I love cycling thanks to the parks and the Natchez Trace near my APARTMENT.
5. I put out the first issue ... a sneak preview mini version ... of my new magazine, Spry. And I am in the process, right now, of putting out the REAL first issue, which will be published the second week of September.
6. I realized that all that fear I've been working so hard to banish--that self-doubt, that perfectionism, that all-or-nothing thinking--was just waiting here, under the surface, for the smallest opening to emerge. And that it has the potential of undoing this dream ... the dream of having my own magazine, of making the most of a platform where I can spread the message of positive, inspirational healthy living to 9 million people (!). BUT ONLY IF I LET IT.
7. I got lost going to and from work almost every day for three weeks after I moved to Nashville. (And still do, some days.)
8. I re-experienced the power of It's Not an Option. As in ... INO to give up and go home, to Bham. INO to let my perfectionism close my mind to input and criticism. INO to not speak my mind when I need to, seek clarity when things are fuzzy, push the issue, ask questions, risk looking like the fool or the bitch or the trouble-maker.
9. I reconnected with my husband. This move has not been easy, no, but it is bringing us together in a way that we really needed. We're talking more than ever, cooperating more than ever. We're more of a team than we have been in a long time.
10. I figured out how important friends are in my life ... my "running friends" in Birmingham, in particular. I miss my little group so much ... even though I was barely coherent during our 5 a.m. runs, they were always there for me, a great sounding board. I am not the easiest person to get close to ... I am always holding a piece of myself back--a bigger piece with some people than with others. So it is not easy for me to replace friends. All I can do now is be myself, let my true self shine, with all of its flaws and imperfections, and see what (and who) that brings to me.

So ... that's what's up with me. The short version, anyway.

I do want you to know that I am launching Spryliving.com, a companion site to Spry magazine. It is up and running in betaish form right now. I would LOVE it if my FFG friends would follow me there. One of the things I'm trying to do with Spry is help people achieve good health for a good life--health, as you all surely know, is not an end in itself. It's what allows us to reach for what we really want in life--it's the platform from which we can spring forward, take a leap of faith, and chase the dreams that we've always had inside.

On the site, we're launching something called the Dream It, Do It Diary. Here's the idea: You sign up, and choose a dream: have you always wanted to play guitar? Do ballet? Take a trip to the Andes? Walk a 5K? Lose a bit of weight? Anyway, choose from the menu of dream categories, and you'll have your own little diary on the site. You'll be able to update daily (if not more often) and get comments from others who share your dream.

I'm counting on you guys to make the Dream It Do It Diary break all kinds of traffic records!

I promise I will post soon ... see you on Spryliving.com.

Lisa D

Wish You Were Here

Hi, everyone!

I am writing from deep in the heart of I Don't Know, on the precipice of The Scary Thing, somewhere east-northeast of Reinvention. It isn't my first time here, but it's been a while.

It's also been a while since I have written. You know, it's hard for me to admit this ... as much as I preach against perfection and for reality, I still tend to hide when I'm out of sorts ... or sorting out. It's like I know that I Don't Know is where I need to be ... I am just still afraid of not seeming so damn SURE of myself all of the time. Even to you, my FFG friends.

Anyway, I want to tell you first that reading the guest book brings tears to my eyes. It astonishes me every day that more and more women are claiming what is rightly theirs ... their health, their time, their bodies, their power and confidence ... and that I might have something to do with it. Little ordinary me. It shows me every day that massive change is possible, even on a grand scale, if we just take some chances. Because (like I said in the book)--if I can do it, anyone can.

I am rambling a bit (so what's new?), but I just can't tell you how much your posts mean to me ... that I am somehow making a difference. I am hearing your stories of real change, and am so grateful for them.

Back to the point already!

So ... the actual, physical locale I'm writing from is Nashville Tennessee, soon to be my new home. I am moving here to be editor of a new magazine called Spry ... that's launching in September.

Spry is a monthly magazine distributed in newspapers to 9 million people! That's the same number of copies of Elvis's Christmas Album ever sold, and tops Michael Jackson's Bad by a rather embarrassing million!

So what the heck is Spry about? Living every day better than the last. Seeing life ... and age ... as an opportunity, an adventure (not as an endurance race). It's about the glass-half-full, the new door opening, the next phase of our lives where we have the confidence, the power and the wherewithal to explore new things, to reach new goals ... to live the life we have always wanted.

Yes, it's about health and wellness and fitness and nutrition and all that, mostly for women ages 35-64 (but hey, I know you youngsters and "maturesters" will love it too!). But it's also about inspiration ... being inspired to take healthier actions in your life, and reading inspiring stories about women who are achieving, bouncing back, taking risks ... and helping others to do so.

For me, it's a chance to create my own thing from scratch and to reach a bigger platform than I ever have before. I am so excited about it ... but it is a huge risk and responsibility. Selling a house (have you HEARD about the current real estate market?). Starting a magazine. Moving a family (son, husband, dog). Moving away from family (my inlaws). No one ever said I had perfect timing.

But this IS the year of I Don't Know, right? I am trying to remember that, as wonder where we will be for the summer ... when Johnny is out of school ...

Anyway, I wanted to let you all know about my new thing. I promise I won't abandon you ... and I'm hoping I'm more connected than I have been over the last several months.

Also, I am looking for stories about women who are what you think of as Spry: someone who has reached a life goal (like ... losing weight? hint, hint), someone who has conquered a health issue, or started a charity, or just looks damn great for her age (and makes us all wonder how she does it!). Tell me about all the Spry women in your life (or maybe it's you!)!

Love you, all of you wonderful friends--

Lisa D