BONUS: What I Came Away with from the Womens Strength Summit

Hey fancy seeing you here. I know you usually enjoy my shenanigans on Fridays but welcome to a bonus post! 

If you follow the blog on Instagram or if you’re friends with me on Facebook I posted about the Women’s Strength Summit. I wanted to do a post to recap the summit and share what I learned. 

If you had a chance to check out some of the speakers from this year’s summit I would love some feedback on what you learned, if you had any “Ah-Ha” moments, what you liked, what you didn’t like etc. 

So, I have recently gotten into Podcasts. I know, everyone and their brother seems to have a Podcast these days. My first Podcast I got into was Just Sayin’. One of the hosts is Sammi Sweetheart from The Jersey Shore. Did you ever watch that show? I boycotted it for the longest time and then the husband and I (before we were married) came across Jersey Shore on Netflix. We decided to watch the first episode just to confirm how stupid we thought it would be. Well, we were hooked and binged watched the shit out of that show. ::Sigh:: MTV……that was television gold. Then one of my favorite paleo bloggers, Julie Bauer from PaleOMG started a Podcast. It was great to put a voice to the blog. On one of her recent Podcasts she featured the hosts from Girls Gone WOD. I really liked their personalities and what they had to say so I started listening to them as well. It was through their Podcast I was introduced to Steph Gaudreau. She is the host of the Women’s Strength Summit. After hearing a little bit about the Summit, who some of the speakers were going to be and what it encompassed I decided to take a listen. 

The topics of the summit ranged from health and wellness, to how to achieve your goals whether they be in the gym, in your career or in your personal life, how to detox your body on a daily basis, and how to be your best self. 

The overall theme centered around taking care of yourself. To take care of others in your life and be present for any type of relationship you must take care of yourself first. You have to improve your mind, body and spirit to give your all to your relationships and your goals. 

Some key points I took away from the summit are as follows:

Take small steps to achieve your goals. Set micro goals to achieve your ultimate goal. 

-I recently presented this technique to one of my nutrition clients. She eats fast food for a meal or two throughout the day. She is looking to lose weight and asked for my assistance. I know from experience how difficult it can be to start and stick to a completely different way of eating. You feel overwhelmed and like you can’t eat anything! I advised her to start with just giving up fast food. The rest of her diet can remain the same right now but she should start with just getting rid of the fast food and drinking more water. This definitely seemed more doable and a goal she could achieve. We also talked about alternatives she could have for breakfast as opposed to the fast food. 

This is also something I have started implementing in my day to day with a new goal I have. I tend to overwhelm myself with the big picture and feel so defeated by the small hiccups along the way. So, as difficult as it is, I am trying to focus on each step as it comes and accomplish that first before focusing on the next goal. 

Surround yourself with positive people, when you leave time with them you should feel energized and positive. 

-I have been practicing this more and more over the past few years. I purged my close friends list of those who caused ciaos, stress and just overall negativity in my life. I had a best friend for over 13 years that I just had to let our friendship go. She was a very judgmental, selfish person. When we first met, we served a purpose in each other’s lives. We were both outcast and shamed because of our weight so we clung to each other for friendship and support. For many years, she was my person to talk to and share everything with. As we got older and our lives went in separate directions we would get together and I felt like I couldn’t share much with her anymore for fear of judgment. I had a lot going on in my personal life I kept bottled up because I feared her opinion.  Our time together was spent discussing things going on in her life and I just felt inferior. I finally had to break away from that friendship because it was no longer having a positive impact on my life. It as a one-way street. It was difficult after so many years spent by each other’s side but ultimately it was the right decision and I have become a more positive, accepting person.

Look for any good or lesson you can learn from a situation

-Life is about taking risks. If we fear failure or strive for perfection all of the time we cannot grow. This is a big hurdle for me. I am big on playing it safe but I have missed opportunities because I have always stayed on the road most travelled. This year I have decided to take some risks with my career path and listening to several speakers during this summit made me feel empowered and more comfortable In my decision to pursue what I really want to do with my life. 

Be aware of your inner dialogue “We don’t get a choice of what happens to us but we get a choice of how we respond.”

Self-talk- don’t say things to yourself you would never say to anyone else, especially the person you love the most.

-These topics play off of each other I feel. For many years, I have had an issue with my self-talk. I have not been my biggest fan for a very long time. Over the past couple of years, I have made an effort to be more of my own cheerleader. I have to. Because really, why would I say things to myself and about myself I would NEVER say to someone else. That isn’t fair to me or my wellbeing. Plus, I need to continue to work on how I internally respond when others say things to me or about me I perceive as hurtful. If you catch me on the wrong day I can feel very insecure about how I look and can take any comment to heart. I have been working on taking time to stop and think before I react in my mind and continue the negative self-talk.

-This also goes back to taking risks. I may fail at some of life’s endeavors but do I give up or pursue an alternate path to get to my goal? 

Stop shamming yourself into thinking you always have to do more.

-This one really rang true to me as it does for the majority of women. We always think we need to do more and be more. We run ourselves into the ground trying to be everything to everybody. We feel bad if we can’t juggle it all, health, family, fitness and a career. We wear too many hats. For me it’s the fear of asking for help. I don’t want to seem weak or like a “girl” because I need help. But really there is nothing wrong #1 with being a girl and #2 asking for help. In the end, I’m only hurting myself and stretching myself to thin if I do not delegate tasks, ask for help once in a while and cut myself some slack. This is very hard for me and I work on it a little each day. 

Cardio is not the be all end all for women and weight loss

We will not become beasts as regular gym goers. That takes multiple training sessions per day

-I have heard each of these statements time and time again but it wasn’t until recently when I ventured into weight lifting that It really rang true. It was a difficult transition for me because cardio was life! I was stuck in the cardio=weight loss. While cardio serves its purpose, and has many benefits women will see more results if weights are included in their exercise regimen. This isn’t to say that every woman needs to squat 300 pounds but adding a little resistance can go a long way. As women, we tend to fear looking like a man because that is not what is typically on the cover of a magazine or seen as desirable but I feel the second statement sums it up best. As a typical gym goer that spends between 30 min- 1 hour at the gym 5-6 times per week we aren’t going to look like men. If we want more muscle and want to compete that takes additional time and effort in the gym. 

Eat intuitively- if your body needs more carbs eat more carbs, if you need to eat more eat more. Eating more one day and eating less another is not going to wreck your body.

-This is another area I have been working on and will continue to work on. In my day to day life I just kind of set my eating on cruise control while I try to accomplish what I need to for the day. Often times I do not take the time to be present when I eat which can lead to overeating or undereating. During dinner, when I am actually sitting down at the table, I try to pay close attention to when my body feels satisfied, not full, but satisfied. If I have left over food I can take it for lunch the next day. I especially try to do this whenever we eat out. It is not fun to stuff yourself and try to go to bed. It makes for a terrible night’s sleep and you just feel gross the next day. It takes some practice and a conscious effort but I’m going to keep trying to incorporate that into each meal so I can eat more intuitively. 

Practice daily detox to ensure all areas of the body are helping get rid of toxins and waste in the body.

-I found this topic to be very interesting. With so many fads out there in the detoxing community it was neat to hear that I can do something small each day to help rid my body of toxins and start anew. I have incorporated drinking a glass of warm lemon water with apple cider vinegar in the mornings before my work out to help with digestion throughout the day and wake everything up. Once I get a grasp on that I plan on trying other daily detox methods to keep my body running as it was meant to. 

These are just a small batch of the topics that were discussed during the summit this past week. I feel so fortunate that I stumbled upon this event and was able to listen each day and gather little bits and pieces to add to my daily life. 

If you weren’t aware of or didn’t have the opportunity to listen to the summit make sure you keep it in mind for next year. There will be a whole bunch of new speakers to learn and grow from. You can even sign up at womensstrengthsummit.com so you will receive updates for the next summit. Its FREE!!!

Again, if you were able to listen to any parts of the summit I would love to read your feedback and continue the discussion! Please comment below with any take aways you may have. 

Have a great week!