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Find a healthy dose of motivation, inspiration and education.
Blog
Find a healthy dose of motivation, inspiration and education.
Guiding Principles for Your Health
Here are a few principals that shape the foundation of the work that I teach:
=> Health is multifaceted (it is so much bigger than the diet and exercise conversation it has been boiled down to)
=> Improving health is not an exercise in self-love OR self-discipline. It requires BOTH…
Reset your brain and body health daily by doing NOTHING.
What if the thing that could improve your health, in the most profound way, required you to do NOTHING? (Quite literally!)
Well, it does…
Dear Body of Mine…
Over the course of your life, your body is bound to do some weird shit that you don't entirely understand. (I am currently rumbling with this in a big way). Your body will fail to meet the “expectations” you had for it in some ways or all the ways. AND… When you...
Do you have the courage to be disliked?
No one LIKES being disliked but the truth is NO ONE is universally liked. What over a decade of coaching women has taught me, is this: Spending your precious life energy trying to get other people to like you comes at a very, very steep price. What is that price?...
Diet and exercise are just two parts of the health equation.
Of course, eating a nutrient-dense dense diet and moving your body often and much can have tremendous health benefits. But… Diet and exercise are just two parts of the health equation. Putting your focus on those skills alone is just the tip of the iceberg. I have...
A healthy relationship with discipline includes ebb and flow.
I do not have a sexy sales pitch for my clients.
I don’t sell them meal plans (though I do teach them a lot about nutrition).
I don’t sell them exercise programs (though I do teach them a lot about physiology).
I don’t sell them on false promises they can’t sustain like: lose 10 lbs in 10 days.
What I teach my client is how to come home to themselves.
I teach them to…
Alignment: the process of YOU getting straight with YOU.
Whatever has happened over the past 5 months in terms of your self-care…
Regardless of what you have eaten…
Regardless of how many workouts you have skipped…
Regardless of any weight gain…
You have not…
Will you be fighting for your limitations or your possibility this week?
Will you be fighting for your limitations or your possibility this week?
It’s definitely something worth considering.
Having been in the coaching industry for well over a decade, I think fighting for limitations is the default mode for most people.
Fighting for your limitations looks like searching high and low for all the reasons why you won’t succeed.
7 steps to approach behavior change with more ease and grace.
A habit is a behavior that you have executed so many times, you can literally do it without having to think.
In other words, a habit is a REACTION.
And reacting is your brain’s way of conserving energy.
Which is awesome… unless it’s not.
If your habits aren’t serving the life you said you wanted to live…well… those reactions are hurting you not helping you.
To adopt new behaviors you have to teach your brain how to respond NOT react.
Entertaining OVERWHELM is a surefire way to keep her around.
Overwhelm is a terrible houseguest.
She talks constantly, creates a lot of unnecessary drama, consumes massive amounts of time and energy, exhausts you, and does not actually help at ALL when clearly a bit of help would be welcomed.
When she shows up at your house this week (and she likely will b/c she is notorious for showing up places uninvited) DO NOT entertain her.
Are you really ready to do the work?
Health coaches won’t make you healthy.
Doctors won’t heal you.
Physical Therapists won’t fix you.
Personal Trainers won’t make you fit.
Teachers won’t make you smart.
Gurus won’t make you calm.
Ultimately, YOU have to take responsibility for saving yourself.
I had a very wise mentor once tell me, “Courtney, the day you start working harder than a client on changing their life, is the day you should consider a different profession.”
When Eating the Cake or Skipping the Gym Can Actually Be a Healthy Choice
Whatever you are planning to do this week to take better care of yourself, I am curious WHY you are intent on doing those things?
This is why I ask…
Women have been conditioned (largely by the diet culture) to focus on WHAT they should be doing along their health journey (what to eat, what exercises to do, what supplements they should take etc), regardless of their reasons for doing those things.
What if the roots of deep health are nourished by the intention behind the behavior as much as the behavior itself?
Personally, I believe they are.
Perfectionism is for scared people.
“Perfectionism is for scared people.”
I will never forget the moment I heard those words spoken by one of my mentors, Brooke Castillo.
For years, I fooled myself into believing that things had to be done perfectly or there was no point in doing them.
I was wrong. So very wrong.
Knowing When to Push and When to Pull
When was the last time you stopped to consider what success actually meant to you?
If it has been a while, I’d like to encourage you to take a few minutes to consider it.
Why?
Because knowing what success means to you very well may help you slow down a little, get a bit more rest, and spend a bit more time with the people you love without feeling guilty.
That has certainly been the case for me because achieving success in one isolated area of my life is not, I realized on closer inspection, how I define success.
Fitness and Health Are NOT the Same Thing
Just because someone has 6-packs abs…
Just because someone can do incredible things with their body…
Just because someone has accumulated trophies and recognition…
DOES NOT MEAN THEY ARE HEALTHY.
Fitness and health are NOT synonymous…not by a long shot.
Some of the most unhealthy people I have ever worked with have also (sadly) been some of the fittest.
Value of Strength Training During the Menopausal Years w/ Amanda Thebe
Menopause is one of those topics that doesn’t get the attention it deserves, so most women have no idea of what lays ahead for them. There are things you can proactively do to reduce the likelihood of these diseases occurring and to ease some of the more challenging symptoms.
Women of Grace & Grit: Featuring Kristy O’Donnell
I am a mother of 4, we live on a small farm and run a small business. Often my day would start being awoken by my children and usually end with me falling asleep on their beds in the evening. I felt I had no space and that my days were not on my terms. This is not an uncommon story. I hear mothers detailing the same story often. I felt there had to be another way, surely this can’t be the only way to live life with children?
I was already passionate about healthy eating but was not particularly active anymore. I came across Courtney’s work through a health professional in my area of Australia. Courtney’s work spoke to me on so many levels and offered me what I was looking for.
Tips For Developing Your Motivation Muscle
The crazy thing about motivation is that we expect it to be waiting by our bedside every morning we wake-up, but motivation is fickle – sometimes she shows up, sometimes she doesn’t.
So, you would be doing yourself a huge favor if you developed a practice of cultivating your own motivation each day rather than waiting for her to magically appear because she likely won’t.
The REAL shifts that need to happen to improve your health this year.
It’s that time of year again… the dawning of a new year! May I be among the first to welcome you to it.
You may or may not be a fan of declaring New Year’s resolutions, but I am willing to bet you have done a little contemplating about how you would like to elevate your life in 2019. Am I right?
Whatever means you use to improve your health this year, I’d like to toss you a few nuggets that I think may help you create more meaningful change this year.
The Case FOR Expansion
I’d love it if you’d take a few moments out of your day to consider EXPANSION as a means to improve health, because I, for one, don’t think it is a topic women are making enough time for.
And I understand why… For decades women have been sold the message that “smaller is better” but, sadly, that very message has created a world of hurt (quite literally).
The pursuit of being smaller (eating less, weighing less, fitting into smaller jeans and sculpting that bikini-ready body) is getting us nowhere fast (not convinced? just do a quick google search of the failure rate of the diet industry).
We are more psychologically and physiologically dis-eased than ever before which goes to show that pursuit of being smaller isn’t improving our health, it is depleting it. So, what is a girl who does want to improve her health to do?
How To Dissolve Resistance in an Instant
A few years back, I was running around like a maniac trying to get myself out the door on time for work. My husband asked me a question and I reacted by saying, “Not now. I HAVE to go to work!”
He gently put his hands on my shoulders, looked me square in the eyes, and replied, “No, babe. You GET to go to work.”
As much as I hate to admit it…he was right (as he so often is).
I was referring to the job I LOVE in a way that was making my morning WAY harder than it needed to be. I was looking at my job as a hardship rather than the privilege it is. I see women do this ALL of the time along the path to improved health…
Finding the JOY in Discipline
There are a lot of things in your life that you are probably NOT going to want to do but you ARE going to want the benefits on the other side of doing those things.
Personally…
I don’t love paying my bills.
I don’t love going to the gym at the crack of dawn every day.
I don’t often want to cook dinner after a long, stressful day.
However…
I DO want a roof over my head, running water and electricity. So, I do pay my bills.
I DO want to feel vibrant, strong and capable. So, I do get out the door to the gym.
I DO want to go to bed at night knowing I fed my body food that it can actually use to fortify my family and me. So, I make dinner.
And perhaps most important of all…
An Invitation to Fail
My son started playing soccer when he was 6 (he just turned 9 last week).
The first few seasons were frustrating for me as a parent because he was on a team that literally won EVERY game.
While my son thought that was awesome, it was clear that the teams were VERY mismatched in terms of the player’s abilities.
My son was not challenged, and so of course, he did not improve as a player for two years.
Worse yet, he thought the winning streak was an indication that he didn’t need to improve his skills. (insert loud sigh here)
This year, I am happy to report, the teams were better matched in ability and my son’s team lost their first game (which had me secretly celebrating on the inside).
My son was challenged, he failed a lot AND he became a much better player for it.
Skill, strength & resilience reside on the other side of failure (IF you are willing to get up and keep playing the game after a defeat).
So let me ask you…
Something vs. Nothing
If you are looking for a reason to NOT to do the thing you said you would do for yourself today… you will most certainly find one.
Probably many.
You’re busy.
You’re tired.
You’re stressed.
You don’t have groceries in the house.
You forgot to pack your gym clothes.
You had to pick-up your kid early from school.
You had to work late.
You’re out of alignment with the stars (just making sure are you are paying attention).
What if…
It doesn’t matter why you think you can’t. You absolutely CAN.
This is not just health coaching—it’s a personalized road map to the prime of your life. It’s coaching that will make today feel like the best days of your life are ahead of you, no matter where you’re at right now.