Are you being the best version of yourself?

Everyone agrees that fitness is good. It boosts your health, brightens your soul, calms your mind and allows you to do more with your life.  But how do we incorporate this into our everyday lives, realistically? That is the question that I asked myself for 4 years.

I danced, competitively, for most of my life and never really had to think about “working out.” Once I started college I didn’t have an iota of knowledge of what I should do in terms of personal fitness, so I just didn’t.  Do anything, that is. I started college with hardly any body fat, was 115 lbs. and 5 ft. 6 in- Basically a walking twig. After freshman year, I gained 5 lbs and probably lost a ton of muscle. By the time I graduated, I weighed in at 145 lbs. and I did not look fabulous in a bikini. Once I started wanting to buy cover-ups for the beach, I realized that I needed to make a change.

I joined a gym and tried doing my own thing, with little progress. I did Insanity (completed 1.5 months of the program) and lost a whopping 10 lbs! That is what really kicked off my new ideals and motivation. Soon afterwards, my mom and I tried Jazzercise for a couple of months. Having a dance background, it was fun but definitely not a challenge. I would sweat during the hour-long session, but I never really felt like I saw results. Now enters- CrossFit.

My mom and I were introduced to the CrossFit program by hearing about a free workout (WOD) on a Saturday morning at a local gym (box). Let me just add that we had NO IDEA what we were getting ourselves in to. We completed the workout. However, we were last and I thought I was going to die. It was the most intense thing that I had ever done, and that’s when I knew that I needed to sign up. I was looking for something that was unlike anything that I had ever done and that was extreme enough for me to see results. I welcomed the challenge.

We started doing CrossFit in October of 2012 and have been going 3 days a week, on average. I am just now starting to RX some of the workouts (definitely not all of them) and my friends and family are noticing the changes in my body. I feel great!

So, now my box (CrossFit Great Bridge- Chesapeake, VA) is going to be involved in the 2013 LuRong Living Paleo Challenge (http://www.lurongliving.com/challenge2013/). I have incorporated the Paleo diet into my life; however I am by no means “strict Paleo.” I still enjoy sushi, margaritas, IPA’s and chips and salsa (among other things). But, when presented with a Challenge, I could not pass it up.

I plan on using this blogging platform as a way to take you through my experiences of the LuRong Living Paleo Challenge- start to finish. I will be posting my workouts, meals (and recipes), progress and some tips and advice on how to incorporate this into your daily life. Also, being that this challenge lasts 2 months, I will be sharing my downfalls and struggles (should I have any). 

***This program/challenge starts 9/16/2013, so stay tuned!

Now, are YOU being the best version of yourself?! If not, what are you waiting for?!

CrossFit Term Definitions [from this post]:

WOD- Workout of the Day

Box- CrossFit gym

RX- as prescribed. You do the workout with the weight that it says, exactly as it says.

Paleo- A diet program that is based upon eating wholesome, contemporary foods from the food groups our hunter-gatherer ancestors would have thrived on during the Paleolithic era, the time period from about 2.6 million years ago to the beginning of the agricultural revolution, about 10,000 years ago. These foods include fresh meats (preferably grass-produced or free-ranging beef, pork, lamb, poultry, and game meat, if you can get it), fish, seafood, fresh fruits, vegetables, seeds, nuts, and healthful oils (olive, coconut, avocado, macadamia, walnut and flaxseed). Dairy products, cereal grains, legumes, refined sugars and processed foods were not part of our ancestral menu. (Source: thepaleodiet.com)

xoxo Jessica