Robyn Spurr

Personal Health and Weight Loss Coaching For Women

Self Acceptance

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You Can’t Hate Yourself Healthy

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I thought I could use hate as fuel.

To create the body I wanted.

A thin body.

But it didn’t work.

I’d hate the pounds away.

And they would come right back.

Every time.

 

A friend told me I needed to LOVE my way healthy.

I laughed.

And thought to myself.

I just need to hate a little harder.

“Stupid ugly body”

“Look at that cellulite”

“Lazy, disgusting, FAT”

 

Then one day I considered…

Maybe my friend is right?

 

So I taught myself how to love my body.

It was hard at first.

Like learning a new language.

 

But I practiced.

Relentlessly.

“Hello body.”

“This is the body I need to be me.”

“Judging myself hurts the world.”

“I can and I will.”

 

Sometimes the old thinking still shows up.

But I don’t believe it anymore.

I let it go.

And get right back to living life.

 

It took time to love myself healthy.

To stop dieting.

To stop punishing myself with exercise.

To stop using food to stuff down the emotions.

But it was worth it.

I was worth it.

And so are you.

 

Robyn Spurr is a Certified Health Coach, Weight Loss Coach, Personal Trainer and founder of Chickadee Weight Loss. She helps women reach their healthy, natural weight and stay there without all the diet craziness.

For more information, click here.

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What Anxiety Can Teach Us

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“You’re the most positive person I know.”

These words were spoken to me not once, but three times in the past few weeks.

I wasn’t always a positive person. I was immersed in a world of worry and negativity for most of my life.

My acceptance into the “gifted” Kindergarten class crippled me with fear. I didn’t think I would be able to keep up with the other kids. Yes, Kindergarten. Ask my Mom. Some major self-esteem issues at 5.

I refused to go to school for a week in 4th grade because I failed my first test. A history exam.

My sister Lynda’s math homework sent me into a state of panic. I was sure I’d never be able to master the same concepts when I was her age (she’s 9 years older me).

I drove my Dad crazy in the car – asking if we had enough gas and if he knew EXACTLY where he was going. On one trip up to the Catskills in New York, my family pretended the map flew out the window and laughed while I had a meltdown.

Clearly, they didn’t recognize the severity of my anxiety. I was just a quirky and “nervous” kid.

I worried. I cried. I complained. I agonized. I denied. I stuffed it down. I ate. I drank. I was obese.

And I was miserable.

I tried desperately to check out and disassociate from the noise in my brain.

After a bout of debilitating panic attacks, I finally saw a therapist. He prescribed meds. I was filled with horror and shame because I couldn’t handle it myself. I was always the “strong” one and I had failed.

I developed a rare side effect from the drugs – lymphocytic colitis. I chose to stop the meds, dive into CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) and deal with the withdrawal symptoms. Brain zaps anyone?

I discovered a new form of treatment. To fully embrace all that I am. To manage my emotions with my mind not food. To dance with the anxiety when it shows up. To acknowledge it, talk to it, feel it and learn from it.

Running and hiding and using food to numb our emotions doesn’t help. It only makes things worse. When we push against a negative feeling, it pushes right back – with a vengeance.

So, yes – I am a positive person. But it’s only because I decided to accept all of me, not just the pretty parts. It’s because I recognize that worrying is a waste of my precious energy. It’s because I know that I’m not alone – that so many other people suffer from anxiety. And it’s because I was willing to say shut up to my ego (now everyone will KNOW you’re crazy) and get help.

This “disorder” that so many of us are ashamed of. In times where death from starvation was always a threat, where animal attacks could happen at any moment and where strangers could kill you or your young, anxiety was one of the principal survival tools.

As I told one of my clients a few days ago – we would have kicked ass on the Savannah!

You’re not broken. You’re not damaged. You’re not a failure. And there is hope. XO

Robyn Spurr is a Certified Health Coach, Weight Loss Coach, Personal Trainer and founder of Chickadee Weight Loss. She helps women reach their healthy, natural weight and stay there without all the diet craziness.

For more information on Weight Loss Coaching, click here.

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Reclaiming Your Sparkle

On November 26th of last year, I had foot surgery. My second in two years. I’ve written about it quite a bit, because you know – surgery is a kind of a big deal. Especially when it renders you unable to walk for a month.

But this post isn’t about surgery, it’s about sparkle. Losing your sparkle and reclaiming it.

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Let me begin by clarifying my definition of sparkle…

  • A spring in your step
  • Your inner light
  • Effervescence
  • Feeling vital and vivid and in technicolor
  • Your bam, boom, kapow and razzle dazzle (like Superman meets Bob Fosse)

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When you’ve lost it, things feel a bit of grey and blah. I’m not talking about depression – more like a lack of pizazz.

So, I have a theory. On that cold and gloomy day in November, the anesthesiologist didn’t just put me in a deep state of sleep – he extinguished my sparkle. Bad anethesiologist!

Here’s the thing about sparkle or mojo or whatever you want to call it – it’s easy to lose. Kind of like a power outage – the lights go out “poof” and then they may flicker on and off for awhile before shining brilliantly again.

We all lose our sparkle from time to time – but how do we get it back?

The golden rule of reclaiming your sparkle is that you can’t force it or will it to come back. I know, because I tried. I really, really tried.

Sparkle is a finicky little bugger – it’ll come back when it’s good and ready. However, there are a few things you can do to coax it along.

Don’t disconnect. Feeling a little blah tends to make us want to tune out and disassociate from ourselves and from others. This is a sparkle killer! Spending hours in front of the TV with your face in a bag of chips is anti-effervescent. Even though you may want to sit on the couch in your flannel jammies for days on end – this will not help. I repeat – this will not help.

Create a delicious list. A what? A delicious list. Write down all of the things that make you feel delicious. The things that energize you and fill you up. My list includes goodies like singing loudly to my favorite tunes, cooking, getting massages, doing nice things for others, chatting with my Mom and being around or listening to people who inspire me. Stuck in an unsparkly funk? Go and do something on your list right now – and tomorrow – and the day after.

Be patient. You can’t force your sparkle. The more you try to force it the more discouraged you’ll become. Your sparkle WILL come back. Maybe not today or next week, but one day.

Don’t lose hope. It’s easy to become hopeless – to think that you’re destined to live in a world of feeling fizzled out forever. Try this – think of a time you landed in this state before. Did you stay there indefinitely? No, of course not.

This too shall pass.

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Of Course We Crave Cookies

I had a lightbulb moment a few years back that provided a monumental sense of inner peace. It went something like this…

Of course we crave cookies and french fries. Our desire for sugar, salt and fat is the reason that humans still exist.

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Let me explain…

None of us would be alive today if some of our ancestors weren’t really good at gaining weight and hanging on to those pounds during times of drought, famine and harsh weather. Truth is, humans who were unable to do this simply vanished from the gene pool.

Today we’re faced with an abundance of processed foods filled with sugar, salt and fat. This creates a bit of a mismatch between our instincts and our environment.

We like to beat ourselves up for craving so-called “bad” foods. In our minds, we replay the following sentences over and over…

  • Why can’t I stop thinking about food?
  • What’s wrong with me?
  • I’m broken.
  • I’m obsessed.
  • I’ll never lose weight.
  • I’m disgusting.
  • I’m a failure.
  • I’m a food addict.
  • I’m bad.

Sound familiar?

Try this – think of someone you love with all your heart. Go ahead and create a mental image of that person. Now imagine telling that person they are disgusting, broken and bad – day in and day out for years. Can you see how beating yourself up on a daily basis may not be the best path to a healthy and happy life?

It’s time to move beyond self-judgement and guilt. It’s time to treat ourselves with compassion and understanding.

Does this mean it’s okay to go and scarf down an entire pepperoni pizza? Of course not.

But, once we stop resisting the truth about ourselves, we can stop the suffering caused by inflicting words of self-hate for a hardwired craving that allowed our ancestors to reproduce. We can stop the negative self-talk and begin to practice forgiveness, compassion and gratitude.

Sugar, salt and fat were not widely available for most of human history. We live in remarkable times surrounded by remarkable amounts of cheap food. It’s why willpower doesn’t work. It’s pretty tough to overcome a survival instinct.

The next time you begin to beat yourself up for eating the cookie, practice compassion instead. I can almost guarantee it will be easier, not harder to step away from the cookies.