Supernatural Botanicals

Ab Exercises That Work

If you want to literally carve an inch (or more!) off of each side of your waist, the Woodchop move will be your new best friend.  The Woodchop, as demonstrated in the video below, targets all of your abdominal muscles.  With slow, controlled movement, the woodchop is one of the most effective abdominal moves of all time.  Not only does the Woodchop target abdominal muscles, but it also works the glutes, hamstrings, calves, arms, shoulders, and tops it off with a good cardio burn.  In short, it’s a total body move that burns fat, sculpts muscles, and turns you into the brick house you’ve always wanted to be. 

Old-School Hand-Stands

Did you know that simple old-school hand-stands like these are super-beneficial for you? 

Hand-stands are fantastic to strengthen your arms, shoulders, and wrists.  Once you get comfortable with hand-stands, you can go further into the move by bending your elbows and attempting to lower your forehead to the floor. 

It also helps stretch the abdomen and improves one’s concentration, coordination and balance.

Through focused effort, it helps calm down the brain thereby helping relieve stress and tension and mild depression through the meditative effort involved.

When you feel like you have midday “fuzzy-brain”, where you’ve been over-stimulated and cannot focus, try doing a hand-stand to alleviate stress and get blood flowing to your brain again.  Don’t worry, you don’t have to be a gymnast to attempt a hand-stand.  Use a wall to put your feet against in the beginning.  As time goes on, you can inch away from the wall.  And as you do, you’ll be building your abdominal muscles (try it now…you’ll feel it instantly.) 

When I’m feeling unfocused and overloaded with stress, I simply do a hand-stand for a minute or two to regroup and get my mind flowing again.  The stretch in the shoulders, back and arms feels so good.  And talk about instant results…you feel it immediately.

Triceps Stretch

Stretching is to exercise as dessert is to dinner.  It’s the icing on the cake.  It’s the feel-good part of both exercise and dinner.    After a great workout, be sure you are stretching every muscle that you worked.  This is one of the best stretches for the tricpes, the back part of your upper arm.  Place arm up and behind your head, as shown below, and slightly push the elbow back with your other hand.  Stretch and breathe into the movement.  Take your time.  Hold the stretch from 30 seconds to 1.5 minutes.  When you feel like you can’t go any further, take a deep breath and stretch just an inch more.  Toned tricpes look gorgeous in a cute summer dress or bikini.  Lose the giggle and get your arms looking hot.

Three miles to burn one donut

According to SparkPeople.com’s Fitness Tracker, a 150-pound woman who walks briskly at a 15-minute mile pace (4 mph) will burn 5 calories per minute.  To burn off a strawberry frosted yeast doughnut, you’d have to walk around the office (at this quick pace) for 48 minutes, which is just over 3 miles!   Worth it?  Only you can make the call.  Do you have 48 minutes to spare today? 

Yoga Mats Help Your Workouts

Professional yogis don’t use yoga mats just to keep their feet on a soft surface during yoga postures, they use yoga mats because they are incredibly beneficial to help you stretch further.  Yoga mats, sometimes called sticky mats, are thick rubber-like surfaces, about 4 feet wide, designed to be under foot while you are doing yoga or Pilates workouts. 

When you place your hands and feet on a yoga mat, they almost stick (and sink) into the soft mat, keeping your hands and feet securely firm, with no worry of slipping out of your posture.  They are also fabulous for doing stretches, enabling you to stretch deep into your stretches with your feet and/or hands essentially glued to the mat.  It truly makes a difference in your workouts. 

Also great to stimulate the spine.  How to:  Lay on your back, hold your bent legs to your chest, wrapping your arms around your bent legs, and rock in a boat pose from head to feet.  The thickness of the yoga mat keeps it comfortable for your spine.  It will feel like a back massage!

Kiss the carpet goodbye, and try using a yoga mat during your next yoga/Pilates/stretching session.  It increases your flexibility by 25% to even 50%.  (Those aren’t scientific percentages…it’s just what I can feel in my own workouts.) 

Make Your Body Rock!

Go ahead and prepare yourself to be envious and/or inspired.  Want to see what it takes to have a rockin’ body?  Check out my girl, Zuzana, and her grueling workout.  That’s what it takes.  Arms and abs like Zuzana’s doesn’t come for free.  But, if you look at it in a different perspective, it’s a relatively small price to pay to feel and look so amazing.  I love Zuzana’s workouts!   Check out her site at www.BodyRock.tv

Manufacture Your Own Natural Stress Relief

Working out is one of the most effective stress relievers.  Researchers recently found that after spending 30 minutes on a treadmill, their subjects scored 25 percent lower on tests that measure anxiety and showed favorable changes in brain activity.

If you only have time to do one thing for yourself, make it sticking to your workout routines. If you can’t hit the gym or trails, even a brisk 30-minute walk at lunch or getting up several times a day to stretch and walk around will help relieve stress.

Five Minute Stretch

If you only have five minutes for exercise today, try this five minute yoga stretch with Tara Stiles.  She’s beyond flexible….and ultra-inspiring!  A great stretch will not only elongate your muscles to give you a long, lean look, but it also relaxes your mind and recharges your batteries. 

How Much Should You Work Out?

Factoid:  If you don’t rest enough between hard cardio or strength workouts, you’ll stop making progress and may even lose some of the fitness you’ve gained. You’re also likely to burn out on exercise.  Additionally, don’t marry your fitness routine.  Nothing will bring your workouts to a screeching halt like a  repetitious workout routine that offers no change up or fun. 

Be sure to alternate shorter, tougher cardio workouts (for instance, 20 minutes) with longer, easier days (40-60 minutes).  Don’t go all-out more than twice a week (how happy does that sentence make you?)  Keep in mind that the more intensely you train, the more time your body needs to recover.  

It’s a good idea to do a couple of tough workouts and take 1 day completely off each week.  On the strength-training front, take at least 1 day off between sessions that work the same muscle group.

Fish Oil (Omega 3) May Help ADD-Type Symptoms

Ever feel like you’ve got a bad case of ADD?  Or do you feel so unfocused at times it’s interfering with your job and productivity?  The word on the street is that Fish Oil is working wonders on ADD-ish type behaviors.  Fish Oil (Omega 3) has been know to be extremely beneficial in lowering high cholesterol and protecting the heart, but new studies are showing significant improvements in mental clarity and alertness.  It’s worth a try, as there are virtually zero side effects from taking Fish Oil.  If you want to step up your game, try Fish Oil caplets and see if you notice a difference.