How to Stretch: 5 Must-Try Stretches for runners, cyclists, kick-boxers, and dancers

How to Stretch: 5 Must-Try stretches for after a run

So, I recently started running.  I’m not a runner.  At all.  In fact, I’ve always been critical of running as an exercise because I feel it shortens your muscles and puts stress on your joints.  My goals in exercise have always been to lengthen my muscles, while toning and sliming.  But fast forward to my current reality which is being a mom of a very busy, very active 15 month old and I’ll tell you, what you’ve heard is true…it is very difficult to find time to exercise while taking care of a little one.  Sure, I do 15 minutes here and there.  When she’s asleep I try to do an hour.  But that’s at the end of a long day and sometimes I don’t have as much energy by then.  I recently was gifted a jogging stroller.  And my first thought was “but I’m not a runner!”  My second thought was “don’t look a gift horse in the mouth!”.  So I’m teaching myself to run!   The pros are that it’s something I can do for a little extra cardio on top of all my Enlightened Moves toning and lengthening for a great well-rounded workout.  And I can do it with my daughter.  The cons are that yes, it does shorten your muscles and put stress on your joints.  So, I thought I’d talk about the stretches we think are important to do for a runner! 

Here are a few classic Pilates and Yoga stretches designed to create length for anybody.  They are particularly useful if you run, walk, cycle or kickbox.  These are stretches to be done AFTER a workout.  So they are static stretches on warm muscles.  Try to hold each pose on each side for 3 to 5 full, slow breaths.

1.     Pigeon Pose (it’s also called…wait for it…the runner’s stretch!)

Start kneeling on all fours and bring your right foot in between your hands closer to your left hand…let your thigh open outward, aiming your knee to the ground.  If you can, straighten your opposite leg out on the mat behind you. More advanced stretchers can bend the arms down to the ground, or stretch them long out on the mat in front of you as you lie on top of your leg.  Come up and switch legs.

2.     Pilates Front Split on the Mat (don’t worry you’re not doing the ‘splits’) Start kneeling on all fours.  Bring your right foot exactly in between your two hands on the floor.  Lengthen the left knee off the floor so your left foot is still on the mat but your leg is straightened.  Keep your right  leg bent for 3-5 breaths.  Then straighten it for a breath, then bend it for a breath.  Repeat a few times then hold it so both legs are straight, your neck is long, eyes are looking down to the ground but you’re not rounding your head it.  Lower your knee to the ground.  Switch legs and repeat.

3.     Figure of Four Stretch

Lie on floor or mat with knees bent, feet flat on floor.  Cross one leg over the other so that your right ankle is on your left knee.  Reach with both hands behind your left thigh and gently pull your left leg in as you exhale.  For a deeper stretch as you pull your left leg forward with your left hand, place your right hand gently on your right knee and gently, gently, gently push your right leg out, creating a little opposition.  Switch legs.  You could also try this sitting up or even in a chair if it’s more comfortable.

4.     Forward Bend with Arm Circles

Start in a standing position with feet hip width apart.  Slowly peel each vertebrae forward starting with chin to chest, then your upper back and lower back til you can place your hands or finger tips on the floor or on your shins.  If you need to, it’s okay to bend your knees.  Yes, this is great on the backs of the legs but it’s really for your back.  Hang here for a breath or two then roll up slightly so that you’re “hanging” from your waist, arms are dangling long but not touching the ground.   Slowly start to make gentle rotations with your arms, circling 5 times.  Then let your arms stop naturally, then let them circle in the other direction 5 times.  Let them come to a stop.  Bend your knees slightly and roll up one vertebrae at a time to standing.

5.     Child’s Pose

Start kneeling on the mat, press your but back to your heels, stretching your arms out forward on the mat for 3 breaths then bring your arms around so that your finger tips are behind your but and relax breathing slowly for 5 restorative breaths.

Enjoy!!!—Carolyn

5 foods with surprising nutritional value you should be eating now!

5 foods with surprising nutritional value you should be eating now!

Hmmm ok so we all know it’s best for our health, beauty, and waistlines to be adding more vegetables, fruits and healthy fats to our diets right?  But, which ones?  Well, when it comes to the above, you can’t really go wrong but you can go very, very right.  Plus, we know you’re busy!  You need quick nutrient-dense foods that pack a punch.  Well here you go! Five foods you can ADD to your day now that can have a quick and lasting impact on your entire wellbeing!

Five foods you may be surprised to learn how great they are for you!  In fact, whenever I bring foods like these up to our clients they’re usually shocked as they were always led to believe these were empty foods that were not really doing much for them when in reality it’s the complete opposite.  If you’re a fan of these foods…now’s the time to find delicious ways to add more of them to your meal plans!

First up: Watermelon!  Yes that’s right! This is one of those foods that almost everyone loves and it’s not hard to convince any of our clients to eat more of them.   They are all over the place right now at your local farmer’s market and you can find some pretty heirloom ones but even the regular watermelons found at your supermarket will do (just be sure to wash that melon before cutting into it, you don’t want dirt and germs from handling spreading from rind to knife to fruit).  Why eat more watermelons?  Lycopene!  There’s actually more of this amazing antioxidant that has been shown to help fight several cancers in watermelon than even in tomatoes! Vitamin A and Vitamin C rank high in this fruit for eye health and immunity support respectively.  There’s tons of potassium to help balance those electrolytes and B6 for brain functionality.  Plus it’s delicious and fun to eat!  What’s my fave way to eat watermelon?  Straight up!  But that doesn’t mean that you won’t often get served a salad of watermelon, olives, chiles, parsley, and pistachios (feta cheese optional)…with a drizzle of olive oil at my house!

Next up: The amazing Cucumber!  We have one client who was shocked (and thrilled) to learn that I was asking her to add more cucumbers to her diet.  They are that good for you!  Like a lot of Enlightened Moves food faves, cucumbers are good for beauty as well as your health…and not just by placing cucumber slices on your eyes (although that is a great eye relief!).  Magnesium, potassium, and silicon are all beauty inducing minerals that are found in cucumbers, great for skin, nails, and hair! The vitamins A, B, and C are all found in abundance here great for immunity and overall health.  Cucumbers are often touted as helpful in fighting cancers.  They are 96% water and therefore not only keep you hydrated, they can help flush out toxins and help relieve water retention (as does watermelon).  The sterols found in cucumbers help lower bad cholesterol.  Many people find that eating cucumbers helps with weight loss.  Cucumbers lower the uric acid levels in your body, helping the kidneys function better.  And cucumbers contain a hormone needed by the pancreas to help produce insulin, therefore making it helpful in the fight against diabetes as well.  How do I eat cucumbers?  Often I’ll add cucumbers to my water and sip on it but lately I’ve been absolutely addicted to slicing cucumbers and drizzling my favorite hot sauce on them and eating them just like that (so weird I know!).

Mushrooms:  okay, okay I’ll admit that in my studies of nutrition that I love to learn and dissect what all the celebrities are doing for their diets to get ready for roles and to maintain their beautiful skin and bodies for red-carpet events.  But even I was surprised to learn that there is a diet called the M-plan!  Now I’ve known for years how great shiitakes and certain other mushrooms are for you in building immune support and warding off cancers but apparently they are also high in protein and fiber.  Adding raw shiitakes to her diet is how Katy Perry claims to have slimmed down her butt and thighs while keeping her bust line feminine.  We at EM cannot verify this to be a valid bonus of eating mushrooms but we DO know that yes, the other things are true!  Adding mushrooms to your diet can ward off cancer as they contain a compound that’s known to slow tumor growth, they reduce inflammation and improve elasticity in skin, and eating shiitakes, specifically, will help fight tooth decay!  I love adding sautéed mushrooms to eggs and I try to add raw mushrooms to salads as often as possible!

Seeds!  Seeds are everywhere these days and for good reason; their health benefits are many and mighty.  I was tempted to avoid mentioning them here because I think we’re all starting to know they’re good for us but maybe we don’t quite understand why exactly. So I thought I’d try to sum up a few points on my faves!  Did you know sesame seeds are extremely high in calcium?  Or that chia seeds have 5 grams of fiber per tablespoon?  Hemp seeds actually contain ALL of the essential amino acids, which is uncommon for a plant source of protein.  So, if you’re vegetarian you might want to start adding these guys to your smoothies and oatmeal!  Flax seeds and pumpkin seeds are just two more types of seeds that along with the others are high in heart healthy omega 3’s and antioxidants and vitamins.  I keep raw organic seeds in my freezer to prevent rancidity and I add random mixed handfuls to my salads everyday or top my tacos with them and have recently started playing with different seeds as bases for my “pesto” type sauces!  But they’re also great on yogurt or just straight out of your hand or blended as a spread (tahini or sun butter anyone?) as a great snack!

Onions are perhaps the most surprising of all these foods.  I mean, I think we all have a love/hate relationship with these guys…so delicious but they’re hard to peel, and make our eyes water!  We use them to add flavor to our soups and roasts and sautés, sure we might top a burger with a raw slice, or enjoy them in our greek salads BUT did you know that onions are the richest food source of quercitin, which is a powerful antioxidant known to thin blood and help lower cholesterol, help fight chronic bronchitis, asthma, diabetes, and many cancers?  Or, that onions have a high amount of sulfur containing amino acids that help detoxify the body of heavy metals? Not to mention all the vitamin C, folic acid, vitamin B1, B6, K, chromium and calcium…what? What? What?  Yup!  All true!  I personally love to sauté my kale with onion AND garlic and a little drizzle of my favorite vinegar of the day, olive oil, salt and pepper of course.  But, of course, onions are so easy to add to everything!

FROM VAMPIRE'S BLOOD TO BEE VENOM

FROM VAMPIRE’S BLOOD TO BEE VENOM

Carolyn, my friend and partner in Enlightened Moves wrote me a funny email suggesting that “we have to dispel the rumors that you drink Vampire’s Blood to still look so young and that I have had butt implants to defy gravity when in reality it’s all Enlightened Moves and Enlightened Moves Lifestyle.”

It sounds so cool to say “I’m drinking vampire’s blood” but sadly I am not.  But may I begin with a little bit of history.  My maternal Grandmother was the daughter of a Head Gardener who in his lifetime worked at one or two Royal Palaces and Stately homes.  He grew exotic fruit (or at least it was in those days) and vegetables for the Aristocracy and he would bring home to his family the fruits of his labors (forgive the pun).  My Grandmother was brought up exclusively on organic produce from the land.  This Gardener’s daughter as a teenager would open the gates to let in the carriages and my soon to be Grandfather, a minor Aristocrat, spotted Grandma and her beautiful skin.  He was much older than her but he fell in love with my Grandmother and her healthy looks which probably encouraged the thought that she would bear an heir and a spare.  The rest is history and I could, of course, pad this out and sell a new TV series along the lines of Downton Abbey, but I will stop here.

It is true, what you put into your body affects your health, your longevity, your looks and how you age.  And it is never too late to start to change your nutrition if you feel you are perhaps not doing yourself any favors.  I come from several generations of fruit and vegetable eaters but I am not a food fascist.  Anyone who knows me knows I am rather fond of large gins and tonics and sticky toffee pudding with custard, in fact anything that has “sticky, gooey and pudding” in its name.  But good nutrition does not have to be a torture or a prison sentence and easy changes are possible.  As an experiment, Carolyn, the Nutritionist half of the Enlightened Moves Duet, suggested I drink a green smoothie for breakfast or, in fact, all morning if I was hungry.  This is a simple concoction to make and it is famed for detoxification and to promote a youthful skin and glow. See Recipe and a picture of the green smoothie on its way to the freezer!

Yes, I said, I will add this to my morning routine which also includes a cup of hot water with lemon, first thing – which helps flush out the liver, stimulates your digestive track, and helps the body become more alkaline.   And as I am English, I have to have two cups of Empress Grey Tea.  I began to drink the green smoothie every day and because it has fruit in it, it tastes sweet and fun.  I make a large batch and freeze it until I need it.  I noticed a difference immediately.  I was less puffy and the skin around my eyes seemed to improve, I thought.  After two weeks I happened to be taking an elderly client to Bingo as part of my Care Giving Work.  While standing in the queue to collect sheets of numbers for him to play, I found myself chatting with a number of people.  We were all trying to guess each others’ ages.  They all thought I was 32 or 34.  Yippee!!  I am 54.  I was so thrilled, I told everyone I know. 

Now I sometimes alternate the green smoothie with a hot calming, green soup - the ingredients I am told are good for joints, bones, osteoporosis, rickets, mental health nervous system and anxiety.  I like hot soup for breakfast.  I make a lot of healthy soups for my elderly Mother, and this is so delicious and very seasonal - it uses a lot of fresh mint that we have growing in abundance in the garden. These are two easy, cheap, drinkable meals to promote youthful, beautiful skin and health and I can testify that they work.  We've included the recipe for the soup and a picture below as well!

It is never too late to use nutrition as an anti-aging component for the skin and body.  I do not spend a lot of money on fashionable face creams.  I would rather eat to make my skin look good, but perhaps another time I will write about my topically applied skin care - mine does include Bee Venom! – ö-Sel (picture of me above after am exhausting 15 hour care-giving shift...not bad 'eh?)

Recipes:

Glowing Green Smoothie from Kimberly Snyder “The Beauty Detox”

Ingredients

2 cups water, ½ head organic spinach, 1 head organic romaine, juice of ½ organic lemon, 3 sticks of organic celery, 1 organic banana, 1 organic pear, 1 organic apple

Pour water into blender, add spinach and romaine…blend until smooth.  Add celery, apple, and pear blend again until smooth.  Add banana and lemon juice give one final blend…to create that smooth, creamy shake texture.  Voila!

** Carolyn’s notes: make sure to keep the skins of the apples and pears on…that’s where a lot of the vitamins and minerals are!  This recipe makes about 2 1/2 – 3 pints a serving size is at least one pint.  But drink more if you like.  It will keep for 3 days with the enzymes intact in the fridge or for 2 months in the freezer.  Just pull some out to thaw in the fridge the night before you want to drink it.  Feel free to experiment just don’t add any ‘high sugar’ fruits like orange or grapes, don’t add and grains, dairy, or protein as this is a smoothie that is meant to be digested quickly for optimum absorption of vitamins and for ‘quick exit’ ;-) (more on that later)! - Carolyn

ö-Sel’s Hot Green Soup

olive oil for cooking and drizzling

1 white onion finely chopped

1 garlic clove finely chopped

2 cups fresh or frozen peas

1 large zuchinni, chopped

1 sweet potato, peeled and diced

2 cups vegetable stock or bouillon

1 cup baby spinach

small bunch fresh mint leaves

sea salt

freshly ground pepper

Saute onion until breaking down, add sweet potato and cook until soft.  Add other vegetables and broth…cook for 30-45 minutes.  Blend in batches or with a hand held blender…add more fresh mint, s & p and a drizzle of olive oil for serving.

Enlightened Moves in your Kitchen Part 1

Enlightened Moves In Your Kitchen

I don’t want to date myself but…I vividly remember reading a lady’s magazine in the 80’s, featuring Christie Brinkley discussing her post-partum workout and dieting tips to stay in Supermodel shape and ready for swimsuit modeling season…her exact quote I’m not sure of but it was something like “now that I’m in my 30’s and I’ve just had a baby, I have to work out twice as hard for half the results.” To be honest I was very young when I read that but old enough to already feel the pressure of looks and weight in our society.  And here was the most beautiful woman of my childhood admitting how hard it was to look that way.  The quote should have been liberating but really it was terrifying.  To me women who looked “that way” just naturally looked that way.  I had no idea the lifelong effort that went into “it” or that “it” was an industry unto itself.

Fast forward many many years to earlier this year…awards show season and a very post-partum yours truly sitting on the couch watching one celebrity mother after another work the red carpet looking fabulous after having given birth a mere hour earlier it seemed in some cases…thin, glowing, put together, standing tall and happy…themselves.  And here I was sweating profusely, wearing torn yoga pants and a nursing tank top, still a good 40 pounds away from my pre-pregnancy weight, eating anything in my sight as I was constantly hungry from nursing my gigantic baby every 30-60 minutes it seemed for about 40 minutes at a time…you do the math…I don’t know, it seemed for a long time that’s all I did.  I certainly didn’t sleep.  And worse, I didn’t eat…well okay I did eat and I ate a lot but really I could only eat at very inopportune times. And I only had enough time to eat something that was already prepared.  Anyways…at this exact moment, I was trying to remember the last time I took a shower let alone really worked out or put on a real outfit, or looked amazing on a red carpet (ok, you caught me), or, more importantly; made myself dinner.

I recently read the accompanying handout for an online nutrition course given by my good friend and soul sister Amy Jo Gengler.  She’s an acupuncturist and nutritional counselor in Boston, MA (Amy Jo is the owner of Flourish Boston www.flourishboston.com) and along with being good friends for a long time…we’ve both always shared a love of talking food wine, recipes and nutrition.  For fun I read her handout she made for her students which was beautifully laid out and well put together and the part that struck most home with me and brought me right back to that horrible self-actualizing moment on the couch staring in shock at Claire Danes’ in a red dress was my friend’s fear of being unable to cook for herself…having someone else cook for you and losing that control of knowing what’s in your food and what’s being put in front of you at all times. There’s real power in cooking for yourself.

I too had that moment…sitting there in my stretch capris…doing “ab-work” a la o-Sel and Enlightened Moves Method during commercials because that’s literally all I had time for, crying because I couldn’t believe that I, of all people, hadn’t lost all the baby weight yet!  And I was remembering that Christie Brinkley quote as I was trying to increase my workouts and I came to and realized that I had to make my own food, I had to be in control.  It might sound silly but it is my absolute number one health, vitality and beauty suggestion to you: COOK FOR YOURSELF!  And I don’t mean making sandwiches!

Nothing is more nuturing than a home cooked meal, especially when it’s made with love. This phenomenon is otherwise known as the new popular quote we see all the time nowadays, “Abs are built in the kitchen”. 

I was so convinced that this was the key to me looking fabulous again that I was determined to find ways to be able to cook for myself.  Now, unless you’ve been a mother or prime caretaker of a very spirited infant this may not sound realistic to you but my baby literally would not sleep unless she was on me for the first 7 months of her life.  And even at night when she would lie down in her bed, next to mine…she’d wake up every hour like she was still a newborn for the first 9 months of her life.  Apart from this being very exhausting, it just doesn’t leave a lot of free time.  I would get her down to sleep and immediately run to the kitchen and chop veggies and onions and garlic and have them prepped and ready to go.  Then I would do my Enlightened Moves workout for the day for as long as I could before the baby would wake up then I’d go nurse her and rock her and about an hour later I’d have her finally back to sleep, I’d then run back out and saute my veggies and eat them with brown rice or quinoa or along side something leftover in the fridge.  Eventually the baby started sleeping more and my workouts became longer and my ability to start cooking something more interesting than a 5 minute veggie sauté increased. 

But that’s what I think about when I hear people say they can’t lose weight.  There’s a change that WE must be willing to make in ourselves, for  ourselves somewhere along the line.  Yes, we all need to exercise and eat right to be healthy and feel wonderful and fully ourselves.  But if you are trying to lose weight it’s quite simply math in a lot of cases…you have to expend more calories than you ingest.  There’s no magic…unless you count math as magic, which I most certainly do not. Trust me, you don’t even want to know what celebrities do to look a certain way on the red carpet during awards show season!  We mere mortals, without our 3 hours of personal trainers a day, without our multiple nannies and housekeepers, we who work our real jobs and have all our responsibilities…where’s our solution?  It’s in our kitchens and our living rooms!  And all it takes is a decision to take charge!  You can work out all day long and if you’re eating nothing but crap you’re workouts won’t be doing you much good.  And you can eat beautifully all day long and if you never exercise you’ll never have the proper energy to support yourself in this busy world let along look toned and hot!  We really do need to do both.  The good news is that you can do it all in your home!

First of all, the obvious thing you need to do is have a custom-designed fitness regime by Enlightened Moves.  This workout will be just for you and your goals be they weight loss post baby, toning up for a wedding, or just being your bad ass fabulous self! 

Then you need to commit to cooking for yourself most of the time.  If you have a job where you are away from your home a lot and have to eat at work or eat out all the time…poor baby we don’t feel bad for you and your glamorous life at all!  Just kidding!  OMG!  I know first hand how hard this is as my job used to be just like this! But it’s really quite easy to at least once a week make a big batch of something (like roasted veggies) you can keep in the fridge and scoop into a container and take to work with you.  A girl can’t live off prosciutto and wine alone, trust me!  At least not past the age of 23!

The easiest advice I can give you right here and now is to avoid processed foods when and wherever possible!  The hardfast rule used to be if it comes in any kind of package then don’t buy it but that’s not realistic anymore now is it?!  But try your best to buy whole foods, things that don’t actually require ingredients because that’s just what they are.  And try to eat this way as much as you can.  It may not always be possible but it will slowly start to become more and more possible as you start to allow it in your life.  Plus you’ll begin feeling better so quickly that when you do have a night of food decadence you’ll enjoy the treat as you should but you’ll long to return to your cleaner way of eating in the morning..

So yes, eat clean unprocessed WHOLE foods for as many meals as you can.  Drink tons of WATER.  If you’re prone to getting sick of the taste of water try adding lemon or lime or cucumber or mint etc to your water for extra flavor.  Eat SNACKS…and if you have to bring snacks with you.  I always have an apple or a baggie of carrots or something like this on me at all times.  I’m one of those people who is almost always hungry no matter what my diet is like so I’ve learned that I have to keep healthy food around me because I’m going to eat…there’s no stopping that so I’d rather eat a bunch of healthy snacks and not feel so terribly about it.  TREAT yourself!  If it’s your best friend’s bday and you want cake…eat a piece of cake.  You have to live your life.  But just be careful that you aren’t finding an excuse every day to have that little treat for yourself…this is my personal challenge.  I could rationalize sitting down and eating dirt for an hour if I really wanted to but I know myself so I give myself Mondays…I eat whatever I want on Mondays and I don’t think twice about it.  It’s a night off with my husband, we make dinner or order out or dine out.  We almost always have dessert and way too much wine and there’s all sorts of things being eaten that someone on a diet would shudder to think of eating but I do not even think about it.  This allows me to say no to cake every day when I’m out in the world being offered cake every day (what kind of life do I live?  One with toddlers and playgroups and clients working out and…cake) And I don’t feel deprived because I know that once a week I eat whatever I want. And try to have your last meal three hours before bed.  I personally always hated hearing that ol’ saying of don’t eat past 9pm.  For 20 years, I worked nights in a restaurant…life didn’t start til 9pm.  Rules don’t apply to everyone…but if you can avoid eating within that 3 hour zone then try to do so as it will help you digest more speedily the foods you’ve eaten without disrupting your beauty rest!

You’re probably thinking one of two things:  1) all of this sounds impossible!  It’s not…just think of your fabulous red-carpet walking celebrity friends drinking gross smoothies in the morning before working out for half the day…I’m not really asking you do to too much here!  Or maybe you’re thinking 2) is that really it lady?  That’s your weight loss secret?  Hmmm…mostly.  I can tell you other things too.  And I will.  But you’ll have to stay tuned. And read my more in depth foods to eat, foods to avoid post coming up and how to deal with cravings… But I will say that MOST of the general public experiences a lightening that they are shocked about from cooking and shopping for themselves and eliminating hidden sugars, salts, and starchy fillers that are found in processed foods.

Try it and you may be able to stop using the diet word yourself and just start eating real food while watching the belly fat and layer of pudge melt away.  Then when you want to tone and sculpt your new sexy self contact us and we’ll design a workout JUST for you and help you stay motivated in your living room as well as your kitchen!  And if you really do want to know how the celebrities look that amazing on the red carpet stay tuned as the next few blog posts will cover eating and exercising for Beauty!

-Carolyn