Learning lessons from a 6 year old

So it’s the end of 2011! I hope it’s been a good year for you?...

I enjoy this time of year as I use it as an opportunity to reflect on the past years successes and failures and plan out how I’m going to make the next 12 months even more productive and successful.


On Christmas day my sister came round with her partner and little Henry who’s six and just a bundle of energy! After shooting at each other with guns, teaching him tricks from his magic set and playing for hours with game after game, it’s amazing to see how much he hated losing at anything!

It got me thinking that maybe we should try to be more like kids in this respect! Why do so many people lose the desire to succeed so easily?!



Kids have very little fear, they say what they think, they just want to have fun and they want to win!

Now that’s a pretty good outlook for anyone’s life in my eyes!

What happens to us as adults though?

When do we stop wanting to win?

Why do we accept we don’t want to get the best from our relationships, from our jobs and from our health?


Life doesn’t have to be this way. We CAN win at everything! We can have great relationships, a great career, great health and fantastic fitness levels. We just need to decide to do it and then make a plan to get there.

2012 is going to a very good year, I’ve decided this already! ;-) We’ll see the country come further out of recession and more opportunities for growth will be available for us.

As for our health and fitness, The Olympics is coming to town and we’ll be inspired by the performances of Mo Farah, Dai Greene, Ben Ainslee and Jessica Ennis to get out there and move a bit more!

If you want to win in 2012 then forget what you may have been told by others, lose the fear and the inhibitions, and decide that you want more…

Write down your top health, relationship, business and personal goals for next year, get out and make it happen and don’t give up until you win!

Contact us at the studio to find out how we can help you with your health and fitness goals.

http://aayou.co.uk/contact/

Stressed? What a joke!

Its Christmas time and no one really wants to read about what exercise they should be doing when all they want to do is crash out on the sofa and watch Deal or No Deal Christmas special! Or, what organic, locally farmed, grass fed produce they should be consuming on Christmas day – it’s that time of year when everything goes out of the window!


We WILL all over eat, we WILL have a few too many Bailey’s and we WILL do very little in the way of movement and it’s OK to do this, you need to listen to your body, give in and let it rest up from time to time.

PLUS – guilt is a wonderful thing for getting the studio’s busy in January!!

We all get caught up in the busy-ness of life, our work schedules become almost unmanageable, the stress of family and home life can get a bit too much, we realise how expensive this time of year can easily become and we forget about actually having some fun.

I was talking to one of my client’s this week about his work Christmas party and he told me he is hosting a laughter workshop!

Now, I’m open to a lot of weird and wonderful ideas, but this sounded a bit “out there” to me! Then the more I thought about it, the more I realised what an amazing idea it was. Laughter really is the best medicine...

GOOD FOR HEALTH
Laughter has been proven to relieve pain and enhance the immune system.
It reduces stress hormones like cortisol and dopamine and increase endorphins, the feel good chemicals.

GOOD FOR THE MIND
Laughter brings focus away from negative emotions like anger, guilt and stress and brings a positive outlook on things.

GOOD FOR A SIX PACK?!
A good belly laugh exercises the diaphragm, it contracts the abdominals and even provides a good cardio workout!

Simply put it provides a fantastic stress management tool, I’m sure we all enjoy sitting down to watch Only Fools and Horses on Christmas day to relieve the stress of the inevitable Christmas day family arguments?!!


It allows you to be in the moment, feel good, give you a different perspective on life and create a positive re-framing of your current situation.

The simple fact is that this year has been a tough time for a lot of us. However, with a New Year approaching I think we need to re-assess our priorities and make a conscious effort to laugh more and have fun in every aspect of our lives. This should be a priority of anyone who wants to live a more healthier life. So cheer up! It’s Christmas!!