Curvy Goddess Lounge

Weight Loss for Women – 8 Helpful Tips for the Dieter

Diane — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 17:54:44 +0000

Whole Foods that Feed the Body

Does it seem that any diet plan or method geared for weight loss for women, Curvy Goddess, if the road taken, will lead to inevitable defeat? Are you constantly dieting because you just think that it will fix all of your body problems? I know that I have bought into that delusion.

If I lose weight then I will be sexy and happy.

If I lose weight then I will be popular.

If I lose weight then I will meet my soul mate.

If I lose weight then I will start living my dreams.

What hefty expectations to place on a diet. What hefty expectations to place on yourself if you “succeed” on a diet.

Although this seems to be a lot of pressure you may be surprised how many women place that kind of heavy duty pressure on themselves.

You are not alone, Curvy Goddess.

You’ve tried too many diets to list but when you hear another weight loss for women method, a diet, you’re first on the bandwagon.

You’ve eaten grapefruit to the point where you can’t stand the sight of them. You’ve given up carbohydrates but still crave sugar, potatoes, and bread. Seeing that it was a losing battle, you gave up on every one after a short while.

Or you may have had some great success at losing weight but you gained it all back and then some. It gets discouraging when you go through the whole ordeal of dieting without success.

Weight loss for women; does it matter?

You wonder to yourself why should you even bother?

But you think back to what you believe the weight loss can give you…a new exciting life with all of the other things that you want in your life.

Regardless of why you want to slim down or how many times you’ve dieted in the past, if you want to succeed at losing weight once and for all, you may be better served by following the example of those who’ve achieved their goal and kept the weight off.

The following will help you get off this crazy roller coaster of self-defeat and deprivation.

Effective weight loss for women tactics for success includes these techniques:

Re-frame losing weight as a life change rather than the means to a particular end. Instead of looking at the calories and carbs on the package take a look at the ingredients if you’re going to buy packaged foods. You’re not merely losing weight; you’re making a commitment to change your eating and exercise habits so your health and life can improve.

Discover real food. Think about feeding your body nutrients. Provide your body with the fuel it needs, rather than overfilling it with foods that will make it sluggish and unhealthy.

Learn to work through frustrations, loss, and stress without turning to food. In many cases, those successful former constant dieters have turned to exercise as a means to release the stresses that often cause people to resort to their old eating habits.

Recognize when your body is truly hungry. Discover how to recognize your body’s signals to stop eating when you’ve had enough, rather than continuing to eat until you’re stuffed.

Focus on your health and fitness, instead of dieting to look good. Instead of dieting for a short term goal – getting into a bikini or looking great for a class reunion – be more concerned about how the foods you eat affect your health.

Recognize proper portion sizes. I’m sure I’m not off if I say that most of us eat way too much. I know that I have to always be conscious of my portion sizes for my meals. Before serving the amount you want, serve half of what you want. That’ll get you started with re-training your body on portions.

Acknowledge that you went off-track from your diet. And that is all. Don’t make it mean anything else. You’re not a loser or a failure because you had a couple of ring dings. Rather than giving up when you’ve eaten too much, decide to hop back on with the next meal.

Seek and allow support from others. Getting a mentor who’s a weight loss success, joining a support group, or including a friend who is positive to hold you to your goals will help spur you on to success.

Weight loss for women, using dieting as a viable method; hopefully the above methods will make this so. Re-framing “dieting” as an approach to being healthy and nixing deprivation, calorie-counting, empty calorie packaged “food”.

Until next time Curvy Goddess…Stay Strong and Stunning!

Post from: plus womens

Weight Loss for Women – 8 Helpful Tips for the Dieter

Ask the Personal Trainer in NYC – The Leading Fitness Myth that Women Believe

Diane — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 19:15:44 +0000

Diane Williams, Certified Personal Trainer

Your own curvy and certified personal trainer in NYC is back with more questions from women about exercise. This is a special section where Curvy Goddesses all over the country have the opportunity to ask me anything about fitness.

I’ve been a personal trainer in NYC for over 11 years. I’ve had the unique opportunity of training hundreds of clients from age 16 to 96 years, men and women, with many unique physical limitations.

We’re going to get into probably the #1 leading fitness myth women still believe and because of this, is preventing them from taking maximum advantages for body re-shaping and also causing many to suffer bone loss.

Now more than 70% of my new clients who come to me not only want to lose fat and re-shape their bodies but their doctors are firmly advising them to work with a personal trainer to address their osteopenia or osteoporosis.

I’m finding this to be alarming.

Annette from Queens, NY asks this curvy personal trainer in NYC…

Question: Why are you always emphasizing strength training exercise for plus-size women? We’re already big enough. I don’t want to get even bigger. I don’t like that big muscular look on a woman because if I lift weights, I’m going to look like a man. So I think I’ll just stick to the aerobics and do lots of sit-ups to get by stomach smaller and to lose weight.

I just love Annette’s question and her commentary afterward. It’s a clear indication that she doesn’t know what she doesn’t know and what she thinks she knows…she doesn’t!

But Curvy Goddess, have you made these comments before? Have you prescribed to yourself that kind of workout regimen to no avail?

Have you ever pointed to your tummy or butt and frustratingly thought, “I want to lose weight here.” And then managed to convince yourself that sweating it off is the key to getting rid of it?

So you peddle away on your stationary bike or walk on the treadmill for miles at a time just like a little hamster going nowhere literally and figuratively and then you do crunch after crunch hoping that your belly and the lumps on your butt will disappear not realizing that there is no such thing as spot reduction.

I’m sorry to tell you that you’re on the wrong track. You are way off the track.

This terrible myth of building big muscles on women is creating so much fear in you causing you never to train with weights at your detriment.

There is no way you will build big huge muscles unless you are on special supplementation and a specially designed training system.

Some of those muscle bound women you’ve seen are probably taking steroids which are banned and obviously harmful.

Why is it difficult for you to build big muscles? Well, it’s simply because you don’t have enough testosterone, a male hormone that encourages your muscles to grow.

In fact, you have ten to thirty times less of the bodybuilding hormone, testosterone than your male counterpart.

Women who accept the myth that they’ll build big muscles if they workout with weights will miss out on all of the benefits that strength training exercise and resistance training can offer.

Being a personal trainer in NYC where the gym is my normal environment, I’ve seen it all.

This myth is so ingrained in women’s psyche that even after explaining the facts to many women, they’re still afraid to lift weights and if they do choose to lift a weight they stick to the one-pound to two-pound dumbbells.

When you incorporate strength training exercise into your workout plan on a CONSISTENT basis you’ll start to finally see miraculous results that you could never get from just doing aerobics and 100 crunches or even 1000 crunches a day.

This personal trainer in NYC thinks that you can’t afford not to incorporate it into your life. So, no longer avoid strength training exercise thinking that you’ll get bigger. You’ll more likely tighten up, revealing a curvy firm body and go down a couple of dress sizes without having to go on a crash diet.

Until next time Curvy Goddess…Stay Strong and Stunning!

Post from: plus womens

Ask the Personal Trainer in NYC – The Leading Fitness Myth that Women Believe

The Plus Womens Challenge of Overcoming a Distorted Body Image

Diane — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 15:37:15 +0000

When Will You Start Accepting Yourself?

I, Diane Williams, personal trainer in NYC, former fashion model for the internationally acclaimed modeling agency Wilhelmina, leader and fitness advocate for plus size women also has this plus womens challenge.

Many of us have this challenge. This distorted view of how our body looks. We have a skewed vision of our physical body.

What you think your body should be, could be, and is are a small part of what makes up who YOU are but you spend most of your time attaining and dreaming and worrying and hoping how it should be because irrationally somehow YOU can then finally be WORTHY to the World and to yourself.

If you look to TV, the media, or any form of advertising for validation chances are you’re not going to find it.

The standard scenario is that if you look to TV, media, and advertising you’ll see images of dishonor, disrespect, and down-right loathing of who you are.

At the least, you’re going to view unrealistic images of women.

It’s a given.

Unfortunately, some women feel that, in order to be accepted, they need to have unrealistic weight goals and an ideal body.

It is no wonder why I pig-out at 10 at night alone at home talking to one of my girlfriends who is doing the same on the other end of the receiver.

It is no wonder why health issues like obesity pop up in developed countries.

We are told that thinner is better and we might be tempted to take it to the extreme and then our bodies and minds will retaliate damaging our physiology and state-of-mind.

Listen to me

I don’t believe and never will believe that the “fat” are lazy and are less worthy than those who aren’t “fat”.

It’s far more complex than what is on the surface.

But still the surface is only examined, studied, and seen by the self-professed experts who have never walked in the shoes of plus womens lives. He lectures, prescribes, and advises surgery for her.

Without a sound method for solution the goal is still not attained by the majority of women.

Maybe you may ask yourself, “Are my weight goals unrealistic?”

The Answer to an Unrealistic Body Image

The answer is to accept ourselves for who we are.

I realize it is usually a long and not so easy process but when we learn to love ourselves just as we are, we open up to accept love from others.

Fortunately the plus womens community is growing exponentially and re-defining beauty giving women that are out of the boundaries of the single dress size digits a feeling of acceptance and honor.

Others who love to be around you will stay longer and this is powerful in re-creating your world.

In order to do this you need to change the way you think.

There are certain pieces of advice you can use in order to change your previous patterns of thinking.

Here are some tips for the plus womens challenge of overcoming a distorted body image:

Truly Understanding Imperfection – Not really sure how we started to think that perfection could be attained. Perfection doesn’t belong to us humans. Our beauty is in our imperfections. Everyone is “imperfect”. If you wait until you’re perfect to enjoy your life you’ll never get the chance to enjoy it because PERFECTION DOES NOT EXIST.

Fashion models in fashion magazines are also imperfect. We sometimes forget that. Images are touched up and women are made to look thinner, without blemishes.

What we strive to be from what we see in media is illogical because everything that we see is controlled; from lighting to makeup, to the words in the script.

Don’t Talk About It – One of the important steps toward having a better body image is to talk less about the things you find imperfect. And not being around those who will attend the “Plus Womens Pity Party” helps support you better body image plan.

When you get together with your friends try not to say things like: “I hate my stomach.” or “Look at this. This is nasty!”

This piece of advice also works for your internal dialog. Whenever you catch yourself thinking negative things about yourself, stop!

Focus on the Good – Spend less time worrying about the things you don’t like, and spend more time focusing on what you do like about your body. Your curvy body is an amazing thing.

It can create life and nourish children. It should be loved, honored, respected, and appreciated – especially by you!

Set Attainable Goals – Of course there are certain imperfections that you can do something about. If this is the case, it’s important to set realistic and attainable goals.

If you’d like to lose some fat and/or reshape your body, set a goal that’s challenging yet realistic and attainable.

Don’t overdo it!

Know When to Get Help – Sometimes body image issues will go above and beyond the average problem and manifest itself as a Body Dysmorphic Disorder.

If you think you’re imperfect at all times, and you refuse to go out in public unless you have a great deal of time to spend on your appearance, you may have a problem.

It can help to speak with a counselor about your thoughts and feelings.

Many of us aren’t going to be 100% happy with themselves at all times, and that’s okay.

After all, it’s natural to question yourself from time to time.

However, you have to learn to love yourself the way you are. This should be on the top of the plus womens priority list. Getting too caught up with your body image can make you miss out on the joys in your life which means many will miss out on your Curvy Goddess presence.

Until next time Curvy Goddess…Stay Strong and Stunning!

Post from: plus womens

The Plus Womens Challenge of Overcoming a Distorted Body Image

A Personal Trainer in NYC Shares How to Effectively Listen to Your Body’s Needs

Diane — Sun, 18 Jul 2010 23:05:58 +0000

Listen...What is your body saying to you?

Reading the title to this article you may be wondering how I would know, a personal trainer in NYC. Being a personal trainer for over 11 years and having 100’s of clients I have the unique opportunity to actually understand that integration is important in the success of your physical goals.

The physical is connected to your mind and spirit.

I truly believe that one cannot have a completely fulfilled, happy life without integration.

And being able to truly understand and know your body can be a challenge when you don’t even want to know that it does exist.

But you deserve to know and experience the beauty and miracle of your spectacular curvy body, Curvy Goddess.

Listening to your body’s needs is vital to attaining and maintaining the health you deserve.

Sometimes, you can push your body too far without even realizing it.

When you learn to listen to your body’s cues, however, you can live a happier and calmer life.

Getting in Touch with Yourself

You might think that you’re already in touch with yourself, but ensure that you’re in touch with all of yourself.

Sometimes you might be tempted to live all in the mind and it’s no wonder! There are constant stresses and demands from you every day that sap you of your mental energy. However, it’s critical to listen to your entire body.

If you feel fatigued or frustrated, your body is trying to tell you something valuable. Pay attention and heed the information.

Take a deep breath or two and slow down when your body demands rest.

If you fail to do so, you risk greater physical harm. Your body will get the rest it needs one way or another, so do it the easy – and healthy – way.

I’m not the only personal trainer in NYC or anywhere else in the US for that matter who thinks that you need to fuel your body with proper nutrition, drink plenty of water, and exercise regularly.

Even light exercise gets your heart pumping and increases your energy. Your body will thank you for the effort!

Reducing Stress

If you feel frustrated or aggravated at the circumstances of life, this will affect your body as well as your mind.

When your body is stressed, your muscles become tight and you’ll know that something just doesn’t feel right.

Therefore, one important step in the process of getting in tune with your body is to reduce your overall stress.

One of the best things you can do is to take a break for yourself during a portion of every day.

Even a few short minutes to get your thoughts straight can work wonders for reducing your stress level.

Concentrate on your feelings and see if your body is offering you warning signs of trouble.

If you reduce the “mind noise” in your life, you’ll find it easier to listen to your body.

When you’re hungry, heed your body’s signal that it needs fuel.

Make wise choices to fuel your body for success, and you’ll be rewarded with the vitality and energy to chase after your dreams.

Listening to Cues

Your body is sending you cues all the time. Listen to them. Can your body handle being pushed further at this time, or do you need to take a step back because you’re pushing too much?

If you listen to yourself, you’ll know your limits and avoid burnout.

Ways to Stay in Touch with Your Body

Here are three practical steps to listening more effectively to your body:

Meditation – Meditation is an effective way to get in touch with your mind and body. Take a few minutes alone each day to focus on your breath. Learn a technique and commit to a few minutes each day.

Yoga – Yoga keeps your body in shape while you keep in touch with your mind and spirit. This practice has the power to give you extra awareness about your body that you’ve never had access to before.

Start an exercise routine – This personal trainer in NYC emphasizes strength training exercise but even a light exercise routine can work wonders for your body.

If you get and stay in shape, you’ll be able to push yourself harder when you need to do so. You’ll also be able to recognize your limits in most situations.

Your curvy personal trainer in NYC tells you to remember that your body will tell you what you need. Instead of over-thinking things, simply commit to attentively listening to your body. Choose one or more of the methods above, put a few minutes on your schedule for today, and keep your appointment with yourself. You’ll be glad you did!

Until next time Curvy Goddess…Stay Strong and Stunning!

Post from: plus womens

A Personal Trainer in NYC Shares How to Effectively Listen to Your Body’s Needs

The Cravings Food Log of a Curvy Goddess – The Wanton Food Tart, Part 1

Diane — Sun, 18 Jul 2010 14:12:23 +0000

Roselyn, The Wanton Food Tart

The Curvy Goddess Cravings Food Log section of Curvy Goddess Lounge gives you the chance to actually SEE a glimpse of what Curvy Goddesses consume behind closed doors and in public. You get to see the various personality types pertaining to their food and dieting habits.

My main goal in creating The Cravings Food Log was to communicate to you the understanding that, “You are not alone.”

Maybe I am assuming much. And one of my assumptions is that you have exotic…crazy…insane food habits.

Roselyn is another Curvy Goddess who LOVES food. I met Roselyn from my Curvy Goddess Workout Small Group Personal Training sessions. She is a success story.

Roselyn has lost 23 pounds and went down a couple of sizes being consistent with her workouts with me.

I am thrilled that she is a client and friend of mine that has finally discovered how empowering exercise can be.

Roselyn is not a success story because she lost weight but because she has re-framed fitness, changed her attitude toward moving her glorious body, using her physical temple.

Every time Roselyn moves her body she is reminded how miraculous and strong she is.

Roast Beef and Cheese Sandwich w/Iced Coffee

Going through the “food experiment” by creating her visual cravings food log, she made some shocking discoveries. Food is her lover.

She states, “When it comes to food, I will drop everything for food. There’s no socializing for me unless there’s food involved…Or I will not go out or hang out because I’ve got my own ‘food party’ at home all by myself.”

Roselyn calls herself the Wanton Food Tart because not only is she seduced by food but she will seduce others into convincing them to bring food into the social fun!

Chicken w/Coconut Curry Soup

White Rice w/Bean Sprouts

And if she can’t get them to agree she will drop them like a hot potato and have her solitary food orgy.

It is a privilege to view Roselyn’s craving food log. I’m so excited to be able to watch and cheer Roselyn on her fitness and food adventure.

Until next time Curvy Goddess…Stay Strong and Stunning!

Post from: plus womens

The Cravings Food Log of a Curvy Goddess – The Wanton Food Tart, Part 1

The Cravings Food Log of a Curvy Goddess – The Trend Setter, Part 1

Diane — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 21:14:23 +0000

Aegina, The Trend Setter

The Cravings Food Log section of Curvy Goddess Lounge gives you the chance to actually SEE a glimpse of what Curvy Goddesses consume behind closed doors and in public. You get to see the various personality types pertaining to their food and dieting habits.

My main goal of creating The Cravings Food Log was to communicate to you the understanding that, “You are not alone.”

Maybe I am assuming much. And one of my assumptions is that you have exotic…crazy…insane food habits.

I’d like to introduce you to an amazingly wise and sexy, Curvy Goddess, Aegina. I admire this Goddess absolutely. Aegina is a Curvy Goddess who falls into the dress size of 12 and sometimes 10 on a sodium free day; that borderline, in-limbo land size.

You know those girls who aren’t really accepted into the skinny bitch category but always on the crux of being accepted by the mainstream only if she lost 10-15 pounds.

Boy, would I love to be in Aegina’s shoes. I don’t care about those 15 pounds. I’d wear a bikini anytime I’d stepped out of my apartment, even to the grocery store to buy my apples and melons.

Almond Milk Based Shake

Avocado-Cauliflower Mash & Tilapia

I LOVE Aegina. I look up to this woman because she just puts it out there. And she never apologizes for it.

She shared with me about her consultation to a plastic surgeon to actually get her whole body lifted.

Her intention was to maybe see what an inner thigh lift was all about but if she could get her whole body lifted then what the heck?

Well she didn’t go through with it but she learned so much about herself from that adventure on her path to self-love.

Scallops with Veggies

She is always on this path to discover how to FULLY accept her beautiful body, to learn to accept her Self and recognize her beauty whenever she looks at herself in the mirror.

Her Cravings Food Log reveals this about herself.

Recently after her two week fasting retreat she came back into the real world continuing to learn to feed her body with healthy, “love herself” food.

You are fortunate to take a glimpse of Aegina’s Cravings Food Log. I call her the Trend Setter. You never know. She may take a fork on her path in a couple of weeks. She never knows herself.

Until next time Curvy Goddess…Stay Strong and Stunning!

Post from: plus womens

The Cravings Food Log of a Curvy Goddess – The Trend Setter, Part 1

Ask the Personal Trainer in NYC – Cardio vs. Strength

Diane — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 17:45:09 +0000

Diane Williams, Certified Personal Trainer

Your own curvy and certified personal trainer in NYC is back with more questions about exercise from the Curvy Community. This is a special section where Curvy Goddesses all over the country have the opportunity to ask me anything about fitness.

I’ve been a personal trainer in NYC for over 11 years. I’ve had the unique opportunity of training hundreds of clients from age 16 to 96 years, men and women, with many unique physical limitations.

Whatever the limitation, I get them in the best shape possible and make them feel good about themselves and their bodies.

This question comes from curvy girl, Danita from Washington, DC.

Question: When should I do strength training exercise versus cardio exercises? And are these two meant to be in addition or in place of more calming exercises like walking or yoga?

I definitely think that every Curvy Goddess needs to incorporate strength training exercise and cardiovascular exercises in her routine.

Walking can be a cardiovascular activity with weight loss benefits. It’s all a matter of intensity and frequency.

I would incorporate walking for those who are beginning an exercise program and/or have many physical limitations that prevent them from doing something a little more.

It’s all about progressing to the next level. Learn to walk before you run.

If a woman had to choose between cardio and strength training exercise she’d choose cardio. I’ve seen it time and time again. I don’t really know what’s going on in her head.

When you’re talking about ultimate possibility of transforming a woman’s body from flabby to firm and changing the shape of the body and leaning it out, hands down, strength training exercise does this.

It really can be a miraculous process leading to miraculous, dramatic results.

Pilates and yoga are really great exercise methods but I believe it’s a good supplement.

The following are the recommendations of The American College of Sports Medicine for weight loss called Appropriate Physical Activity Intervention Strategies for Weight Loss and Prevention of Weight Regain for Adults.

To prevent weight gain you must do 2.5 to 4 hours/week of moderate-intensity physical activity. More than 2.5 hours is the amount for modest weight loss. More than 4 hours a week, you’re talking significant weight loss.

Strength training exercise needs to be incorporated 2 to 3 times a week. This personal trainer in NYC thinks that you can’t afford not to incorporate it into your life.

That may seem a lot for those who never have exercised on a regular basis. Some will want to quit before they even start.

Being a personal trainer in NYC for over 11 years I’ve seen this happen time and time again. So you want to be gentle with yourself and commit to two to three times a week then go from there. Hope this helps get you started!

Until next time Curvy Goddess…Stay Strong and Stunning!

Post from: plus womens

Ask the Personal Trainer in NYC – Cardio vs. Strength

The Plus Womens 5 Quick Tips to Being Re-Inspired to Get In-Shape

Diane — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 16:11:52 +0000

Support each other to get in-shape.

One of most plus womens lifelong struggles has been body image and one of the ways to manage and create a better relationship with your body has always been getting into shape.

It definitely is not easy and enjoyable for most Curvy Goddesses but it can be an amazing and miraculous process once you get into the groove. How do you do that?

Here are the plus womens 5 quick tips to getting re-inspired to get back into shape.

Tip #1: Find a friend who is positive and supportive in nature that is looking for someone to get in-shape. Support is one of the ways to help us with achieving our goals. We seem to forget to use this powerful motivator.

Tip #2: Re-frame exercise into a fun adventure or activity. What do you like? Are you into dance? Zumba, Flirty Girl Fitness

Are you into experimentation; a workout that you’re curious about but never tried but want to start? P90X, TRX training or Kettlebells

If you start re-framing exercise as a fun adventure or activity rather than a chore, you’ll soon be inspired.

Tip #3: Who do you look up to that can be a role model in health and fitness? Your role model doesn’t have to be a skinny Minnie. She can be considered beautiful, desirous, and healthy living in the “Plus Womens World.”

Tip #4: Commit to just 10 minutes every single day. That’s so much better than trying to commit to 60 minutes, 7 days/week.

That’s the mistake that most people make. They go all out in the beginning or at least in their minds and are disappointed with not being able to meet such lofty expectations.

Go for 10 minutes a day and you’ll find that you’ll WANT to go longer than 10 minutes since you’ve already passed the 10 minute mark.

Tip #5: Cut yourself some slack. Sometimes when we are too hard on ourselves it makes it more difficult for us to accomplish anything.

Who wants to do things that are always a struggle, a chore, and work?

Not me.

You’ll likely sabotage your efforts if you push way too hard and expect too much.

The plus womens challenge has always seemed to be trying to fit into this world where physical beauty means being skinny. It’s not an easy task feeling inspired with all that pressure. Think healthy, think Curvy Firm.

Until next time Curvy Goddess…Stay Strong and Stunning!

Post from: plus womens

The Plus Womens 5 Quick Tips to Being Re-Inspired to Get In-Shape

The Cravings Food Log of a Curvy Goddess – The Mood Swinger, Part 1

Diane — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 14:54:08 +0000

The Mood Swinger

Maybe I am assuming much. And one of my assumptions is that you have exotic…crazy…insane food habits.

Iced Coffee with Mocha - Chocolate Fix

Bagel w/Butter - Trying not to judge

You, Curvy Goddess see food as more than fuel. Food can mean ‘Love’, so it will comfort. It may be a weapon so it is able to destroy the good place that you may be in.

I sure can vouch for all of these meanings. Food is my Achilles heel. Food is not just food for me. Food has meaning. It has power.

It makes me do things that no man could ever motivate me to do. I would more likely writhe in a huge vat of chocolate pudding than______________________ in the woods with Bob.

Chipotle Chicken Rice Bowl

Artificial Energy - Sweet Liquid

I am the Mood Swinger. My cravings food log will reveal to you that based on my mood at a certain moment I will either eat like a truck driver or eat like a “good girl” SHOULD.

Sometimes the pressure of the “good girl” totally irks me and Mack, the truck driver will stick around for weeks while “good girl” Diane can go in-hiding.

Green Goodness

Fizzy Lemon Essence

Certain cravings food will satisfy but most often it won’t because the cravings are not true cravings with me. There are certain needs that food will never be able to satisfy…Take it out of the gutter. Thank you.

Until next time Curvy Goddess…Stay Strong and Stunning!

Post from: plus womens

The Cravings Food Log of a Curvy Goddess – The Mood Swinger, Part 1

The Plus Womens Deep Desire for Support to Achieve Results

Diane — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 17:12:16 +0000

Talking it out

If you’re like me, Curvy Goddess and I’m sure you probably are, you shun, reject or ignore the support of friends, family, and sometimes colleagues that may truly and genuinely want to help you with achieving your goals. Yes, creating a support system to get what you want, a plus womens challenge.

I’m a hermit ~~by nature~~ ~~by unconscious habit~~ by choice although when I’m around others I keep forgetting how great it feels to get so much support and loving interaction. I definitely was reminded that this Curvy Goddess has issues in the support department on a recent fashion shoot.

Steffy steaming the Caftan

I had two months to get ready for this fashion shoot. I had high hopes for magnificent results…

I was going to workout every single day and hop on a supercharged cleansing fat loss diet protocol. Eight weeks was enough time to totally transform me into a fit, sleek Curvy Goddess for the shoot.

IT WAS ALL UP TO ME! Ahhhh, the pressure!!

Time ticking away…

Seven weeks pass by…

The fashion shoot is a week away.

Just in time for my freakout.

(Below is a copy of my text message conversation with my good friend and confidant, Aegina.)

D. I’m fat! I’m so lame Aegina!!!!

A. My friend!!! No name calling. Lol. What going on? I was thinking about u.

D. I feel like a big fake right now. Trying to model at my age. I still feel fat and inadequate even around plus size models. Oy! Have photo shoot for new shots this coming Thursday. Photographer and friend are making it a bigger deal than I am. Don’t want it to. Just a bunch of pictures. Just make me up press the stupid button “click” and I’ll go on my merry way.

A. I missed it!!! What???!!! Holy shit. I’m so sorry. First of all I want to acknowledge u for showing up. All of this shit, these feelings is why u were scared to do it. Now that they are surfacing, u must release them. U r judging yourself. Comparing urself. Deep breath. U need to connect to ur inner curvy goddess and let her stomp.

D. Yup, I’m still scared. Alright I know I’m judging. Totally irrational. If I wasn’t model material I would not have been chosen. It’s not like I’m a master con artist. It’s alright you missed it. You’re focusing on you and enjoying these times loving you. I’m proud of you Aegina.

A. I totally wanted to c u. I’m really sorry I missed it. Dance ur Curvy Goddess dance alone to music that turns u on and enlightens u. That will shift u into an empowered place. U have to travel there in ur body. Our brain keeps playing games if we let it.

D. Alright, I’ll do that.

Behind the Scenes

The Plus Womens Dilemma…

to keep your guard up for protection and not let others in or risk being vulnerable by opening up and receiving the help you truly would like.

No matter how scary or hard it may be the plus womens desire in creating a strong support team around her is natural and powerful in achieving goals.

After my conversation I was still scared but my act of honesty and authenticity by sharing my fears with someone I trusted enabled me to actually go through with the fashion shoot.

I could have easily bailed, canceled the whole thing or do the classic postponement routine. “Well, I’ll have the fashion shoot when I feel like doing it and whenever I’m good and ready…Whenever.”

So Thursday morning arrived. I had everything I needed and was feeling surprisingly “ok!” Tony Armstrong, the photographer; Tara Taylor, the make-up artist; Aliza Belinda, the hair stylist; my great friend and stylist, Steffany Bready; and behind the scenes, documentary photographer, Tieshka Smith all were part of my fashion shoot team for the day.

Special Thanks to Tieshka Smith for these fabulous shots!

And what a day it was. A full 7 hours of collaborating and creating.

If I hadn’t shown up the end results would not have happened. I have to thank Aegina, Tony, Tara, Aliza, Steffany, and Tieshka in helping me achieve these spectacular images.

One of the plus womens challenges is being able to receive support from people around them. I know it’s a challenge for me and I have to be conscious about not poo pooing those who truly want to come to my aid. With the guidance and advice from others, look at what can happen!

Curvy Goddess Angel

Until next time Curvy Goddess…Stay Strong and Stunning!

Post from: plus womens

The Plus Womens Deep Desire for Support to Achieve Results