Healthy Chicks

{cuddle sesh feet pic!}

I often discuss the importance of self care and making more time for yourself. But almost just as important is making more time for your family. Try as we might to spend ample time with our loved ones, sometimes life just gets in the way. That doesn’t make us a bad person by any means; it actually makes us human.

The beauty of it is that we can always work on improving, on become a better person not only for ourselves but for the people we love most. As my man said last night, “We have our whole lives to grow & improve as people.”

Seeing as though I’m getting married in less than 6 months (eek!) I’ve been thinking a lot about taking care of myself & being the best fiancé I can be. It couldn’t be more fitting that this month’s dare for UnitedHealthCare’s Source4Women campaign is “We Dare You to Spend More Time with Family.”

And what better way to get you to do something than by a good ol’ fashioned DARE? 

To participate, all you have to do is enter here, sharing a picture of you spending time … Read More!

How do you start your day? Take a moment and think about that for a few minutes. Do you rush straight to the coffee pot? Do you check your email on your phone before you even get out of bed? Do you go for a run? Do you hit “snooze” 10 times on your alarm clock?

While I’ve had a pretty solid morning ritual down in the past, I’m not going to lie I haven’t been keeping up with it of late. If I’m being perfectly honest, these past few weeks, I’ve been starting my day with work. And not inner work like meditation or writing, but work work.

There’s nothing wrong with loving the work you do and wanting to jump right into it first thing in the a.m., but if you don’t take the time for your own work (you know, that inner soul work), you’re setting yourself up for disaster. After all, how you begin your day is most likely how the rest of your day is going to pan out.

So if you start by checking your bajillion unread emails (been there!) or rushing to the coffee pot running on empty (totally been there too!), … Read More!

I’m honored to feature a guest post by my lovely friend + yogi Cara Gilman on the blog today. (You may remember her from my “Healthy Chicks in the Community” post a while back.) Aside from being the most genuine, smiley gal I know, she also gives killer advice on mindfulness and looking within your soul to find the answers. I mean, she is a yogi after all!

Today she shares her thoughts on why it’s what is on the inside that matters most. I’ll let Cara take the floor from here.

Growing up we were constantly told to not judge a book by it’s cover. To let go of physical appearances and to look deep within ourselves and others to find love. Even in our yoga practice it can be challenging to not get caught up in the physical appearance of the practice. That’s why it’s essential to remind ourselves that our practice gives us so much more if we open ourselves up to it and let go of self doubt and negativity.

Growing up, I was not the nicest teenager to myself.  I felt so uncomfortable in my physical body that I did not allow myself to … Read More!

Try as we might to keep it all “together” 24/7, sometimes life just gets a little nutty. Whether you’re busy working a full time job you love, chasing your dreams or putting in the hours at a 9-to-5 job you can’t really stand, every now and again we need a little mental breather.

Unfortunately when we lead action-packed work-hard, play-hard lifestyles, one of the first things that tends to go is our self care. You know, that precious time we have with ourselves to feel a little bit more sane, a little bit more you.

This past year, I’ve had nothing but love + luck come into my life including 2 big life events: an engagement, an offer at my “dream job.” While I’ve been full of passion, joy and everything in between, I can’t lie that my self care has been put on the back burner (well maybe not all the way on the back burner, but at least pretty close). When you love the life you are living, it’s easy to forget about the most important person out there, that is yourself.

Heck, I’ll be the first to admit that it can be exhausting trying … Read More!

I have a confession: While I do love eating healthy meals + cooking, sometimes I just don’t feel like putting in the work. Ever since I started working a full-time job, I’ve found it a bit trickier to do as much home cooking as I used to do.

To be honest, sometimes when I come home from a long day, all I want to do is put up my feet, plop on the couch, grab a cup of tea (or a glass of vino) and order takeout sushi. I’m a real girl, after all.

That’s why when I heard about Boston start-up Just Add Cooking (JAC), which delivers pre-portioned meals to your door all ready to go, I was intruiged.

The Scoop

Just Add Cooking is exactly what it sounds like: a meal delivery service that takes the stress out of cooking. Instead of worrying about the stress of prepping and grocery shopping, you can really focus on the fun part, that is cooking.

You get to hand-pick which recipes you + your fam will love, and then the friendly folks from JAC deliver a box of fresh, locally-sourced ingredients directly to your door each week, chock-full of … Read More!

Last week, I took my first yoga class at Om Warrior in Boston with the owner & highly talented yoga teacher Marc McDonald. Before I walked into class, I was feeling a bit off (my mind was swirling with thoughts, doubts & fears) and life just seemed…chaotic. I knew I could resort to my yoga mat to find some answers, some clarity.

During class, the instructor (Marc) was taking us through a tree pose series and encouraged us to find or drishti for balance. Suddenly, I looked up and saw a beautiful, odd little elephant figure by the window with the sun subtly shining in, and thought That’s it. From that point on, suddenly my worries and fears from the outside world didn’t seem to matter. I was here, I was present, I was living in the now to its truest form.

In yoga or meditation,” finding your drishti” is a technique involving focusing on one point or object for greater concentration or balance, in my case the elephant. But if you take it into everyday life, I like to think of it as simply living in the now, experiencing life to its finest.

It’s finding peace with the … Read More!

It’s no lie I have a love affair with fitness, particularly group fitness and boutique classes. Actually, I’m kind of a serial fitness fanatic, bouncing around from studio to studio. Hey, a girl has her needs.

So when I was informed that NYC-based fitness startup Class Pass was launching in Boston, I was immediately intrigued!

What is Class Pass, you ask? It’s exactly what is sounds like: a “pass” to various fitness classes near you. Essentially, they’re a gym membership but for boutique studios. With the membership fee, you have access to 10 classes a month, up to 3 classes at any given studio. Pretty cool, huh?

This week, I attended their Media Launch Party at Flywheel Sports in Boston, and completely fell in love with the brand (and the girls behind it). Such a fun-loving, cheerful bunch! Plus, who doesn’t love a good sweat session at Flywheel, I mean c’mon?

After class, we all enjoyed tasty goodies from sweetgreen and bolocco, and mingled with the group. Plus, we were given little goodie bags packed with a water bottle, natural energy drink, muscle rub sample from mio scincare, and an adorable tee that I may or may not … Read More!

One of my favorite quotes (& one that I go back to often) is:

“The reason we struggle with insecurity is because we compare our behind the scenes with everyone else’s highlight reel.”  – Steve Furtick

Think about that for a second, and I mean really truly deeply think about it.

To me, it’s pretty much saying we’d be a whole lot more happy (and confident) if we simply quit comparing so darn much. Take Facebook for example. You’re having a crap day so you decide to go peruse social media (worst decision ever). Within seconds of logging in, you find that Susie just got the job of her dreams, Mary’s about to start her own business (the same business you wished you started 2 years ago), and Lisa lost 15 pounds with that new diet she’s been trying. Oh, and Jane got engaged. Great, well isn’t that just dandy, you think as you pour yourself another glass of red, tears streaming down your face.

But then again what do you expect when you’re comparing your shittiest of shit days to everyone else’s spotlight moments? You’re setting yourself up for the worst.

You see, happiness comes from the inside, … Read More!