My Favourite Books 2020
My Favourite Books 2020
Working from Home Selfcare Tracker
For many of us working from home, rather than in an office sounds fab, but can be quite a challenge to keep boundaries between the two.
The distinction between on and offline gets blurred. Taking the time to work out how to stay active and keep healthy can be a challenge.
Working from Home Selfcare Tracker
3 Ways to Improve Ankle Mobility
Your ankles and feet are often the most neglected part of the body when it comes to exercising. Here are 3 ways to improve ankle mobility
Quitting for Success
Quitting is often thought to be a bad thing. But it gives you some fabulous information and insights to help you do it differently and be successful next time around.
3 Ways to Improve Your Push Ups
Love them or hate them, push-ups are a consistent part of any exercise routine. Therefore improving your push ups is a consistent part of your gym routine.
Exercising at Home & Staying Active During Lockdown
Finding your new normal way of staying active and exercise at home during the lockdown with curiosity, creativity and innovation.
Menopause: Are You Ready?
The menopause is coming, are you ready for it? What can you do to prepare for it? It’s not just the physical symptoms. Mindset is important too!
Tips for Exercising at Home
Exercising at home is a great option during the menopause. I have nine top tips for you to get the most out of your workout sessions.
Rediscover YOU in the menopause
Rediscover YOU in the menopause The menopause is not just physical changes, it can change how we feel about ourselves too. I have some practical tips to feel like your old self again! Click to watch the video below which is 35 mins long
How Journaling Can Improve Menopause Symptoms
Things change during the menopause, and it can take a while for your thoughts and feelings to catch up with what is physically happening in your body. Journaling can help deepen your mind-body connection.
Prepare for the Menopause
We have gone from having very little information about the menopause to information overload. A different approach is to look at ‘what’s the worst that can happen’ for you personally and work backwards from there.
Healthy Eating Challenge
There are 5 challenges in this year’s healthy eating week from British Nutrition Foundation. What I love about them, is that there is nothing new or exotic about them. There is nothing extra to buy for you to buy and you will have heard off all of them before! Because...
Natural Ways to Reduce Menopause Symptoms
We are often so busy looking after other people, running our homes, working long hours that taking care of ourselves is at the bottom of the list.The menopause can appear like an uninvited guest when you don’t have the time or inclination to look after it.Until you have too!
Menogise: Minimising Menopause Malarkey
Looking around at the fitness classes that are available to me approaching 50, there appears to be a big jump from standard classes to silver surfer classes with not much in between. So, I have created a class that I would like to attend! Menogise is a class for women...
Becoming 50
This year (2019) I will be fifty. Half a century. Whichever way you look at it, it's a big birthday. I choose to see it as a halfway point, I plan to live into my hundreds! Personally I don't think it's by accident that such a big birthday happens when you are still...
Yoga and Menopause
I love yoga, but there are also many things that I don’t like about yoga. It is one of the best ways to reduce menopause symptoms but it is not often taught in a way that is sympathetic to 50 year old women!
Exercise Goals That Are Not Weight Loss or Running
Goals are a great way to keep exercising interesting and to keep you motivated. But if you are not interested in running or losing weight what else can you do?
How To Exercise When You Have No Energy
We all know the benefits of exercise but when you are approaching the menopause your energy levels can plummet due to hormonal imbalances making getting up in the morning a struggle, never mind exercising.
Starting To Exercise Again? Find or Make Time?
Starting to exercise again is not just about how you are going to exercise. It is also about finding the time and creating an exercise habit. I think there are two approaches to exercising, it’s either flexibility or fixed. Finding or Making Time Neither is better...
Stages Of The Menopause
Every woman knows she will be menopausal. However, it always happens when we are way to young to be menopausal and at not a very convenient time. As with many things in life that we do not choose, the only thing left is to choose our attitude towards the...
Starting To Exercise Again?
The menopause can shake up your exercise routine and not always in a good way. Lowering hormones can affect your energy levels or perhaps your sleep is interupted and your not getting a good nights rest. It is easy to think about what you ‘should’ be doing, rather than what your body actually needs.
My Favourite Books
My "go to" book when clients are stuck. Lot's of aha moments when reading it. If you don't know where to start with mantra's there are plenty of examples here! The best introduction and explanation of Law of Attraction in a novel. ...
New Month New Moves – July 2018
Monthly Moves Inspiration for July Every month, I like to get the books and manuals out to get some inspiration of what exercises or alignments I haven’t taught for a while. It’s easy to stick with old favourites as I’m sure you will appreciate if you are a regular...
Holidays and the Menopause
How can you use your holidays to help you tune back into your body? And Rest! It’s the best thing for menopause symptoms but hard to put into practice
Why is Pilates Good For You?
What is Pilates good for? There is more to Pilates than just abs exercises, it improves your posture, balance, flexibility as well as strengthen your core
3 ways to improve your Downward Dog
This is one of my favorite poses in yoga.Mainly because it is so versatile. It is a deep stretch up the backline of the body and can also be used to strengthen to your upper body.
Is it time to take your menopause seriously?
The menopause is a phase, and that phase has many phases within. Some you will breeze through barely noticing and others will feel like walking thru mud with wellies on. The truth is we are all busy women, and we often don’t have a lot of time for looking after...
Why is it so hard to lose weight over 40?
Once upon a time, you were able to skip lunch for a few days and easily fit into your Friday night dress. Why is it so hard now? Getting older has many perks and we definitely need to refresh how we look after ourselves to age well.
3 Ways to Improve Low Back Stiffness
Low back stiffness can occur for many reasons, but it is often because we spend so much time sitting. If you are a desk junkie, here are three simple ways to improve stiffness in your lower back.
51 Tips for a Healthy Happy Menopause
Menopause Tips Why 51 Tips? There are 51 menopause tips as 51 is the average age of the menopause! The menopause happens to every women, we don't know when exactly, but it's usually when you are too young and too busy to deal with it! The menopause is more than hot...
How to Keep a Food Diary in your Menopausal Years
You’re a busy lady, me too, it’s easy to keep a tally in our heads of what and how we have been eating. However, if the pounds are sneaking on and not coming off taking the time to keep a food diary is one of the simplest and cheapest methods to help you lose weight.
How To Practice Self-care With Work Deadlines
Is your self-care to do list stressing you out. Does working to deadlines mean your self-care is ditched in order to tick your list? Here are some simple practical ideas for you to try, so you can continue to look after yourself and also tick your list.
End Of Year Reflections
This blog started as a quarterly, then as birthday musings and finally an end of year blog. This perfectly sums up the last 6 months for me. It has been a funny old year; it has not been a bad one. The last 6 month in particular since the August eclipse have had such...
My Favourite Books in 2017
I love reading; it is one of my favourite pastimes along with learning! Below is a list of the favourite books that I read in 2017. They are in no particular order and a mix of fiction and non-fiction. Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance by Angela Duckworth...
Preparing for Yoga Teaching Training
My Yoga Teacher Training course is coming up soon. I have spent a decade attending fitness courses and I do love planning and getting organised for them!
Never Say Never
In the last decade of teaching Pilates I have always said that I would never teach Yoga. So, you won’t be surprised from the title when I say I have booked into a Hatha yoga course! Why now? I have been researching ageing well for the last year and discovered the...
Menopause meh
Meh is a menopause symptom that is not often talked about.
It would not be classed depression but a lack of oomph and love of life. What can you do about it?
Practice Makes Perfect?
Practice only makes perfect if you are practicing perfectly! Is any exercise better than none, even if you are doing it wrong?
Eat What Makes You Happy!
Enjoying your food is an important part of a healthy diet
Young at Heart
Find out how young your heart is and what exercise and activities you can do to keep it as healthy & young as possible. Your heart health may be impacted by menopause as well as any hereditary issues so it is worthwhile to be proactive and minimise any risks.
Lunch Hour?
When I started working over 25 years ago, (eek) a lunch hour was not only an hour, but was respected by team members. No one interrupted you unless it was a real emergency. Fast forward to today and lunch hours are quite different. It is not often an hour....
Grit
Working in the fitness industry has made me curious about why some people give up & why some people show up day in & out. Grit by Angela Duckworth is an interesting read.
Perfect Posture
Everyday life has a big impact on our posture. One of the simplest daily self-care habits you can develop is an awareness of your posture doing different tasks throughout the day. When you are standing waiting in a queue. When you are working. When you on using your...
Daily Self-care Habits
If you are looking for some inspiration for daily self-care habits for Wise Women here is a wee list! As we get older, looking after ourselves can feel like a full time job. However simple, quick daily habits can take us a long way in helping to maintain a healthy...
When You HAVE To Change
Change has been on my mind as it has popped up a few times for me recently where I have had to change because of circumstances out with my control. I think it worth looking at how you react around change as it gives us a good heads up around the changes the menopause...
Carbs And The Menopause
You can become more sensitive to carbs and stress in your menopausal years. Which easily leads to an expending waistline which is hard to reduce. What can you do about it?
Quarterly May 2017
Last quarter was all about learning with three mini courses. This quarter is all about letting that information percolate and sink in. I have also been working on, online course structure and wrote about that here You may have read on my previous blogs about...
Unhurried
Unhurried Unhurried is a word my Yoga teacher uses which sums up where I'm trying to get to just now! I am at the tail end of a summer cold. I can't remember the last time I had one, but it has been fairly stubborn and lot's of rest has been required and taking life a...
Self-care As A Business Metric
You will regularly review your work performance, this does not tell you how your work affects your wellbeing. Measuring your self care and work life balance
Healthy Eating In Hotels
Healthy eating when staying in hotels can be a challenge, here are some healthy tips to stay healthy and only indulge when you want to, not by accident!
Exercising For Health And Ageing Well
Most of us have grown up with the ‘no pain no gain’ mantra and exercising as only a means to manage our weight and to burn calories. As we get older, our thoughts turn to our health and ageing well. Exercise can play a big part in this but it means changing exercise...
What Makes A Healthy Meal?
There is so much infomation available to us these days, but it does not seem to help us to be any healthier. What makes a meal healthy for you?
Business Musings 2017
Building an online business rather than face-to-face one has had a different set of challenges. Most online educators appear to be extroverts, which I am not, I’m a INFJ to be specific! (You can take a free quiz here) I have spent a lot of time searching out people...
Exercise Consistency And The Menopause
We all know the many benefits of exercise, however it can be a challenge to maintain a consistent exercise practice when energy levels fluctuate during the menopause.
Menstrual Cycle Tracker (MCT)
Most of my trackers use the Menstrual Cycle Tracker (MCT) code. It looks like Morse code, but it's just a simple way of indicating on your trackers where in your cycle you are. Each - represents a week, there are four - to represent four weeks. Split by | which is the...
Health And Wellbeing Contradictions
There is a ton of advice on health and wellbeing. It often feel contradictory and finding a balance can feel like a fulltime job. Here are a few ideas of how to navigate them!
99 Wellbeing Tips for Wise Women
99 wellbeing tips to give you a wee bit of inspiration to blossom through your menopause. Eat protein at every meal and with any snacks. Feel fuller for longer. You cannot 'work hard' to balance your hormones. It happens when you sleep well, eat good food and take...
Eating Out And The Menopause-PizzaExpress
Eating out can feel like a minefield in your menopausal years as we are usually watching our waistline as well as our weight. It may sound like it is the same thing but in your menopausal years it is different.
Just one more
Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should! Does technology today help you to be healthier or do you need to change how you use it?
Will a Fitbit help me to be healthier in my menopause?
My Fitbit helps me maintain activity levels such as step count and reduces time when I am sedentary. It also helps to flag up when I am tired and need to rest a little more. We are all very good at keeping going, not so great at knowing when to put our feet up. I find it a useful tool not only as a means to help me be healthier.
Will Curl Ups Flatten My Stomach?
An expanding midriff is the bane of menopausal women’s life & is usually very stubborn to shift. Are curl ups the best exercise to flatten your stomach?
Just For You!
When was the last time you did something ‘just for you’? The more we look after others & take on responsibility the more we need to look after ourselves.
Salt And The Menopause
Salt And The Menopause Salt makes our food taste better, but too much of it is bad for our health. Monitoring our salt intake is one of the simplest things we can do to be healthy, especially during the menopause. We are aiming for a maximum of 6 grams per day. There...
3 Things To Pop On Your Desk Every Morning
Most of us spend a third of our day at our desk. In our pursuit of healthy living, we often need to take the mountain to Muhammad rather than the other way around. I have 3 things to pop onto your desk every day: Timer I use a timer for two reasons. The first is to...
How to start a new exercise programme in your menopausal years
If your thoughts have turned to exercising more when you are menopausal, perhaps your midriff has expanded, and because you are thinking about ageing well. Being active plays a huge role in ageing well. A different approach is required as your lowering hormones can...
6 Things To Do When You Are Feeling Rubbish
The menopause has many symptoms but we can often just feel rubbish – and yes, that is a technical term! We can feel uncomfortable in our bodies; due to menopausal symptoms that are unpleasant, perhaps not the shape we want to be in or fitness levels we want, or just...
Is Stress Always A Bad Thing?
We rarely read anything positive about stress. In the fitness industry, stress is also where growth happens. To become fitter we have push ourselves a little harder, adding either a bit more intensity or length to cardio session. Muscle gets stronger when we lift a...
Quarterly Jan 2017
I am a lifelong learner, which comes in handy as running my own business requires knowledge of a wide range of topics covering business, professional (health and fitness in my case) and personal development. This quarter I attended day courses for all three area is...
How long does the menopause last?
We do not choose when the menopause starts, it is often when we feel way to young for it. Knowing how long the menopause lasts helps with strategies for a healthy life.
Post Holiday Menopausal Blues
I have noticed when I return from holidays and breaks from routines I am a wee bit wider. I have named this 'Post holiday menopausal blues!' Last time it was around my thighs. You can read my blog about it here. This time was around my bra and waistline too. Like most...
New Year, New You? No Thanks.
I am a lifelong learner and believe personal development and growth is important. However, it always feels quite forced this time of year. "New Year, New You" always implies there is something wrong with the old you! The reality is, we are always polishing away any...
How To Manage Portion Control
Balancing enjoying food & watching your waistline is challenging in your menopausal years. Managing your portion size is a massive part of this process.
How To Create A Healthy Habit Using An Advent Calendar
December is one of the busiest times of the year. Having a daily reminder can really help to support your wellbeing.
4 Ways To Improve Your Posture
When we combine sitting for long periods of time with using technology we often do not have the posture we want. People often attend Pilates classes for this, but it is also helpful to do a little everyday to help counteract our lifestyles. 1.Relax your shoulders. It...
Drop in Pilates Classes Versus Blocks
What is the difference between drop in Pilates classes and a attending a block of them?
Quarterly Nov 2016
October was a big month for me as I finished and published my first book. As with any deadline, something's gotta give, and my Tuesday and Thursday workouts were parked in order to finish. In retrospect, I do not think I could/would have done it differently. However,...
How To Be Merry In December And Not Be Snowman Shaped In January
December is a time to eat, drink and be merry. How do you enjoy the spirit of the occasion and not end up feeling snowman shaped at the end of it? The answer is of course planning. Click here for your December’s planner to fill in. (Note: you don't need a Dropbox...
Can I Help You?
Nothing makes a women cringe more than being asked if she needs help. Whilst many of us get a lot of pleasure from other helping people, we often think we are ‘bothering’ people we ask for help or accept it when it is offered.
How to be healthy even if you spend your days sitting
We know that sitting for long periods is not healthy but this it is what most of us are doing for a living. How to counteract sitting all day?
Are You Planning To Get Older?
We plan our retirement decades in advance by paying into a pension. Do you think about your physical health in the same way? Are you planning to get older?
I AM The Greatest
Sadly another giant has left us. Mohammed Ali was known for many things: champion boxer, his religion and racial equality. He was also one of the forerunners to using Law of Attraction (LOA). He is frequently quoted as saying “I AM the greatest; I said that even...
Top 5 Weight Loss Mistakes – Are You Making Any Of Them?
My top 5 weight loss mistakes that most women do at some point, myself included! How to manage and hopefully avoid them in the future
What is the best exercise to help you lose weight in your 40s?
This is one of the most frequent questions I get. I usually flip the question and ask if you have tried exercising before and find out why you stopped. Quick results are important; however consistency is the key to success. There are usually 3 reasons why you may...
Are You Still Wearing Flares?
Are you still wearing flares? Probably not! However the beliefs and values you have around food which were created when you were a child have probably stayed with you. The big one I remember from childhood was to clear your plate as ‘there are children starving’. I...
Is Running The Best Way To Get Fit?
Is running the best way to get fit? What are the benefits and down sides to running in your menopausal years
Is Being Healthy A Titanic Task?
Is being healthy a titanic task? We all know there is a lot involved, how to we make it simple and easy for our everyday lives.
What’s Stopping You?
I was reading about a 40 year old Mum who came third in a 10k with a time of 35:49. If you are not a runner, most people would be happy if they ran a 10K in double that time 1 hr 10 mins. The author was quite dismissive of her time because this lady holds the world...
Why I Took A Two Month Holiday From The Gym
I have been regularly exercising since my 30s so for about 15 years. I am quite relaxed about taking breaks over holidays as I know my fitness and strength levels don’t really drop that much in two weeks. Any longer and I notice it negatively affects my wellbeing and...
How To Avoid Menopausal Weight Gain
On average a women may gain 5 – 7 kilos per decade as they get older. There are a few theories as to why and most relate to hormonal imbalances and physiological changes that occur as we age. Waist measurement is however the best guide to health and unfortunately...
Do You Set The Same Goals Every New Year?
Most of us will take last year’s wellbeing goal, dust it off and roll it out for next year. Telling ourselves that this year will be different and will be the where all our dreams come true. We have missed out one important step though – reviewing why we did not...
8 simple steps from frazzled flyer to fabulous flyer
When does your holiday start? Mine starts in the taxi on the way to the airport. A decade ago it would have been when I arrived at my destination but nowadays I include the travelling as part of the holiday. I have found it takes the stresses out of travelling that...
Stuff I Still Struggle With
“Eat less, exercise more” I have been studying health & the menopause for a number of years now. I know that “Eat less, exercise more” does not work for most women in their late 40s due to hormonal imbalances. Yet any time I feel my jeans a bit tighter this old...
Post Holiday Resolutions 2015
I always think summer holidays are a better time to review and reflect on the past year and make new resolutions compared to New Years. We are usually soo busy getting ready for Christmas we don’t have a lot of time to think about how we would like to next year to...
Post Holiday Resolutions 2014
Holidays are often time for reflection and thinking of changes you would like to make to improve your general wellbeing. I’m no different! During my two weeks summer holiday in France I had the following list: 1. Learn to speak French before the next holiday 2. Learn...
Does Carrot Cake Count As One Of Your Five A Day?
Yes I’m teasing, we all know carrot cake comes under the treat section rather than healthy even if they do include a vegetable! It is often difficult to find healthy meals when you are eating out. I’m sure we have all picked something from the menu that we thought was...
Love Your Heart!
Some of our goals can be challenging to complete, others are challenging in the manner of tracking them. Blood pressure falls into the later. It is one of our Goldilocks goals where we don’t want it to be too high and we don’t want it to be low either. It has to be...
Well Hello Broccoli
Eating cruciferous vegetables is one of those small simple proactive changes I made that I really wasn’t sure if made much difference. I have studied food and the menopause and it always came up, so of course I adapted my diet to include it.
How To Declutter Your Brain
We all have such busy lives it’s hard to sometimes relax when your head is full of stuff that needs to be done.It is easy to be constantly connected to work and the internet it can be hard to unwind and relax.
She Protects Her Peace
Now and again, a quote jumps out at me and makes me stop and think. “She protects her peace” was a quote that did that last week. We often do not protect things that are important to our own wellbeing and we allow ourselves to be talked out of things if it doesn’t...
Chips Or Salad?
When travelling chips or salad are often the staple side options Most people think salad is being good and being bad is having chips. Is this always the case?
