(My well-loved trainers)

In the last two years, I've somewhat become a "closet" health enthusiast. Even though it was the documentary Food, Inc. that put my health awareness on full blast, long before viewing that film I was always painfully aware that the discipline involved in working out and eating healthy would have a profound effect on my ability to accomplish other things in my life. It has taken me about 6-8 months to get into a consistent routine but since working out has been so beneficial to my life, I want to officially introduce the subject of heath and fitness to Think & Grow Chick by sharing my personal fitness journey:I suppose this started "back in the day" when I got my first taste of athleticism by running track and field in high school. I wasn't a track star by any means, but I was relatively fast and good enough to enjoy second or third place in most of my events. When I first joined the team, I was shocked to find that the coaches fully expected the girls to not only lift like the boys in the off-season, but lift with them. I distinctly remember wondering if someone had made a mistake when I was told that my workout partner for the day was one of the members of the boys wrestling team! Having never lifted weights or done strength training before, I was slightly intimidated but definitely curious to learn about bench pressing, hang cleans, plyometrics, agility drills and other exercises I thought were reserved for football players only. Within a few weeks, however, all of the intimidation dissipated as I found that I not only thoroughly enjoyed weight training, but I was actually pretty good at it. As an added bonus, it did wonders to further tone my already lean frame as I gleefully sported every shoulder and arm-bearing top that I could find that summer.

Unfortunately, like most young adults, when I got to college I pretty much fell off. The gym was but a distant memory since I was no longer involved in sports and my diet pretty much consisted of cafeteria food, $3 Jamaican chicken patties, and McDonald's sweet tea. Even though my diet was bad, because I was always broke, food became scarcer so I didn't really gain any weight. I also didn't (and still don't) have a car, so the constant walking helped me miraculously mitigate the dreaded "freshman fifteen."

(Me in a friend's dorm room, freshman year 2006)

For the next few years, I tried to get back in the gym but I couldn't get on a consistent routine. On days where I felt particular determined and motivated, I would energetically go to the gym, only to put myself through a workout from my track days that was clearly too intense for my out-of-shape condition. Discouraged by the difficulty of the workout, I would take a "break" the next day that would inevitably stretch out into months and months of avoiding the gym. The same thing happened when I tried to jog regularly or even do floor exercises in my dorm room. No matter what I did, nothing seemed to stick.By the time I was a junior in college, I had completely abandoned any sort of healthy lifestyle. I was still slim but totally out of shape and unconcerned about it. I figured since I had a "fast metabolism" I could get away with ignoring exercise and eating unhealthy foods.My turning point came the summer of my 21st birthday. After looking at various pictures from birthday celebration, I realized that I gained a little bit of weight in my face. It was definitely nothing major and probably completely indiscernible to most people, but my vanity was strong enough to make me reconsider my stance against the gym.

(Me at 21)

Even though I had mentally committed to getting into better shape at the end of that summer, it still took me a few months to actually make any consistent changes. The only thing I could really stick with in the beginning was exercise DVDs. After reading reviews for the most effective home workouts, I discovered Jillian Michaels from the Biggest Loser and started doing her 30 Day Shred and No More Trouble Zones DVDs. This was easy for me to incorporate because it only took 20 minutes and I could do it without any fancy equipment right in my living room. The first time I started 30 Day Shred was around Thanksgiving 2010. By Christmas of the same year, I had lost ten pounds, which was huge given how recently I had started doing the workouts.

Right around that time however, a new tenant had moved into the apartment in the basement of the house I was living in, which meant I wasn't free to do my living room workouts anymore because of the jumping and noise. Since I didn't have a TV in my bedroom (which wasn't big enough to workout in anyway), my new-found fitness routine became very inconsistent again.Even though a fork had been thrown in my workouts, around the same time I watched the movie Food, Inc. which totally revolutionized my eating habits. Overnight after watching that documentary, I became very conscious of what I ate and tried my hardest to eat organic and unprocessed foods whenever my college budget would allow it. In fact, because I was so broke, I began eating less meat in order to save money. I also began reading a ton of books on healthy eating, further educating myself on the American food system, the dangers of processed food, and the long-term impacts of having a poor diet.

(Salmon with a homemade blueberry sauce over rice pilaf...this was one of my better healthy creations)

Learning all of this information totally changed my perspective; for the rest of the school year (Spring 2011), I cooked myself healthy meals, blocking out a few days in the week where I would “go meatless.” I also tried to get in workouts whenever I could, but these were generally limited to the Comcast routines available OnDemand at my boyfriend’s place. Nevertheless, I was happy to get into a groove where I was improving. I then understood that my health was more important than just looking good and I become very serious about living a health lifestyle. It wasn't until the following summer, however, that my fitness journey really started to accelerate…

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...to be continued in part 2...