The more you add to your life (even fun, awesome, healthy things) the less time you have for “chorey” type things like washing your dishes and cooking.  One of the potential side effects of scheduling several workouts per week after work is a nasty little word called “hangry” which Urban Dictionary defines as “When you are so hungry that your lack of food causes you to become angry, frustrated or both.”

I was born hangry.  I can remember my Mom always kindly suggesting I eat something right before my major melt down/hissy fit/emotional outburst/sob story/pity party/fall on the floor and cry episode would begin.  Of course I would look annoyed and use my hangry tone to express to Mom that actually, “I DO NOT NEED TO EAT“!  Fast forward a decade or so and you now have a fully formed human adult (ME!) and my poor Mom can rest assured that I control my hangry tendencies and at about 3 pm each day (when I start to become easily irritated, shaky, and just plan hangry), I hear my Mom’s voice reminding me to grab a snack and chill the f*ck out.

So, now that you have the back story, I will get to the ACTUAL point of the blog.  Wednesday has traditionally been the day that I  meet up with my lovely friend Kelly and do some sort of workout.  The awesome thing about Kelly is that she has this knack for finding new, (99% of the time FREE!), tough, cool, workouts all over our rad city.  We frequent the workouts that Athleta hosts.  The people who work at the store on Fillmore are super sweet, friendly, and always have a little snack and water for us when we are done with our kick butt workout.  Tonight the class at Athleta was “Beach Booty Workout” taught by the amazing Kelley Heye of Motion Starved.  Here is Kelley in a nutshell: infectious laugh, killer attitude, outdoor fitness queen, who uses the word “trundle” when she really means walk/jog.  I have never laughed so much during an awesome workout.  You can’t leave Kelley’s class feeling defeated or “out of shape” because she teaches (and encourages) every level of fitness, or “physical funness” as her website calls it.

This morning, knowing that I had this Beach Booty workout after work, I planned to completely avoid the potential hangry Hali after working an 8 hour day, working out for an hour and a half, and then taking a 45 minute bus ride home…. to be greeted with NO DINNER/NO PLANS/NO LEFTOVERS.  So, I prepared a delicious  turkey chili to cook in the crock pot all day long.

The more I pack into my life, the more I find the need to plan things out or I set myself up for failure.  For example, some Wednesday’s I don’t think about dinner until the second I get home from a tough workout at 8:30 PM and by that time, I am so ravenous I eat whatever I find first (i.e.- chocolate chips straight from the bag).  Not such a great “fuel my body for that tough workout” plan.  Another thing I did this morning besides making breakfast, lunch, and dinner (literally, haha!) was put some protein powder into my new shaker cup so that I would have a perfect snack after my workout, which I drank on my commute home.

Even though this morning’s prep work took me a little time, it worked like a charm.  It was smooth sailing for me after my workout and no hangry Hali.  I guess my long-winded point is, Set yourself up for success.  Then, celebrate.  Meaning, when you find something that worked REALLY WELL (crock pot dinner on LONG/high hangry potential day) give yourself a gold star/a cookie/ internet wasting time/pat on the back and store that tid bit of knowledge in your mind for the next time you need it.

Don’t make getting healthy and being active even more challenging for yourself by skimping on sleep, not planning your meals/snacks, and by neglecting your “chores”.  Instead, create ways to nurture yourself as you add more to your life.

How do you set yourself up for success??

What is your easy go-to or crock pot meal of choice?  (I am thinking my turkey chili could become a fav)

Do you schedule your workouts each week, or do you fit them in when you can?

Xo,

CS

P.S.  Yummy crock pot turkey chili recipe will be under the recipes tab soon.