Summer is just around the corner and it is getting warmer and warmer. That means here In Canada we can start exercising outside.
So here are my: Top 5 Benefits of Exercising Outdoors
Sorry gym rats but there are more benefits of exercising outdoors than indoors. Summer weather is upon us and there are so many activities you can now take outdoors. Running, swimming, park workouts, beach workouts and cycling are amongst the activities you can do outdoors when the weather cooperates. There are a vast number of benefits to taking the workout outside and here are our Top 5:
1. Sun exposure increases vitamin D levels in the body and helps optimize hormones.
2. Oxygen levels are higher in the fresh air outdoors than indoors.
3. Exercising outdoors has been proven to make you happier and lower rates of depression.
4. Outdoor greenery can raise serotonin levels.
5. There is more sensory stimulation with exercising outdoors than indoors.
VITAMIN D
According to the Vitamin D Council, the sun is a good source. Vitamin D is also especially important for good overall health and strong and healthy bones. I also helps fight infection by helping your in the muscles, heart, lungs and brain work optimally. According to the Vitamin D Council “a lack of vitamin D has also been linked to some other conditions such as cancer, asthma, type-II diabetes, high blood pressure, depression, Alzheimer’s and autoimmune diseases like multiple sclerosis, Crohn’s and type-I diabetes.”
OXYGEN
Outdoors air has more oxygen than the air we breath indoors. Indoors the air can be destroyed by tobacco smoke, city smog fumes, re-circulating air in buildings, improper ventilation, exhaust, and other pollutants. Aqua 4 Balance states that ome of the bad side affects from a lack of fresh air are caused by a lack of oxygen to the brain include, fatigue, drowsiness, dullness of mind and irritability.
DEPRESSION
Nature increases positive thoughts and feelings of happiness and well-being. Exercising outside has been shown to reduce depression or symptoms of depression. Research has shown that exercise is an effective treatment for mild to moderate depression.A current study, published in the Journal of Affective Disorders, followed a similar method to one from 2008 that showed that a one-hour walk in a woodland park improved memory and attention. Web Md states that endorphins that are released during exercise trigger “a positive feeling in the body, similar to that of morphine. For example, the feeling that follows a run or workout is often described as “euphoric.” That feeling, known as a “runner’s high,” can be accompanied by a positive and energizing outlook on life.” Regular exercise has been proven in studies to reduce stress, ward off anxiety and feelings of depression, boost self-esteem and improve sleep.
SEROTONIN
Serotonin levels are increased when you exercise outdoors or in green spaces. What is serotonin you ask? According to Australian Lifestyle serotonin is a neurotransmitter that is important in appetite control, sleep and our general metabolism.
SENSORY STIMULATION
The outdoors is constantly changing. You see birds, as you walk terrain changes, people you walk by have different faces, there are sounds and smells. Exercise is beneficial for physical and mental health and sensory stimulation can improve the quality of life for the average person and especially people with mental dementia according to Alzhemers.Org.
We hope that these 5 benefits of exercising outdoors motivated you! Don’t you just want to grab a pair of runners and hit the park for a workout session. Get up, get outside and get active!
Online Coach
As you have known I have been taking an extended period of time off from stage. There are a lot of things that I have learned about the sport from an outside perspective. In addition there are things that I have learned about life during this time as well.
1. When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time. 2. Absence diminishes mediocre passions and increases great ones, as the wind extinguishes candles and fans fires. 3. If you love someone, set them free. If they come back they’re yours; if they don’t they never were. 4. Truth is everybody is going to hurt you: you just gotta find the ones worth suffering for. 5. How people treat you is their karma; how you react is yours. 6. The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them. 7. Sponsorships don’t care about your health…they will drop you on a dime. 8. The power is in consistency. 9. Good coaches are worth every bit that they charge. 10. The sport of bodybuilding is very narcissistic and self serving… don’t take it too seriously because esp as a female it does not pay well and you should have a backup plan.
Taking on clients now 💪🏾 serious inquiries only! Let’s work fam!
——————————————————— 💻 All links are in my bio ——————————————————— 💪🏾 Online coaching
I am going to make blogging a daily thing from here on out. Since pre covid I have been inattentive to this blog and my own passions for helping people become the best version of themselves. And that is partially due to the fact I wasn't being the best version of myself. I was in a bad place after a bad relationship and a bad breakup and multiple unhealthy competition preps.
I am making 2024 my mission to find myself again and get in control over everything in my life:
Personal
Professional
Passions
Bodybuilding
Blogging
Vloggng
Podcasting
Re-building my brand
I wan to show up as the best version of myself. But not just for me but for others.
What does that mean for this blog?
It means content in blogs, reviews, news and all things health and fitness. I love it - even if no one is reading this or seeing my content this platform, YouTube and my podcast are more like journals/documentation of things I love and enjoy. And if I can positively impact anyone while sharing then that brings me joy.
This post is to keep me accountable. So thank you to those who made it this far.
Alicia
Well it is February 14th. Time doesn't feel real. How is it February already. I am currently sitting at the cafe at the w hotel in Toronto near my house enjoying a great cup of peppermint tea doing some reflecting and I decided I should check in with my blog that I have been neglecting.
What's new?
I am still single (but talking to someone)
I have to move again
I still have not started a prep
I do have a lot to be thankful for but I also have a lot weighing on me. Life is hard alone. But this isnt a negative blog. I am going away to Punta Cana with my friend in March, I an off work for a week and will reset, reorganize and figure my life out, goals, moving etc. My work life is ok but not at all what I ever pictured it to be...but is even any of my life what I had pictured it to be at this age....hell no. I really want to rebrand my fitness content, regrow my online business and sort everything in my life out. In addition I want to also compete and just get back to a happy place.
Other than that I am sorry to anyone who actually reads my blog that I haven't been consistent. I truly just haven't had the motivation to be creative like I use to be. But I am determined to find myself again. So thanks for sticking with me during this process/over the years etc.
If you are alone on Valentines Day like me - Pour yourself a nice glass of your fav sugar free beverage, take a relaxing epsom salt bath, put on a show or if your like me the Cavs vs Bulls game and enjoy. I am also going to be doing a lot of goal setting, gratitude and journalling. I think that those things will keep you In a positive mood and on a good path to self love. <3
Even if your night doesn't look like mine - make it a night where you do positive things that you yourself love and it will be a great valentines.
Hello to anyone who follows this blog or knows I even have one. I actually have been blogging since around 2009-2010 on and off. Usually reviews and fitness things. Kind of the same on and off as my vlogs and my socials. It always feels like the same things on all of my platforms at times. Im literally doing all the same things as many others but never break through - never really reach the viral content or quite see the success that I want from it. So I take time away. I get fixated on whatever new path or challenge I take and then always find myself back to try again.
Now that 2024 is here my goals are:
Compete again
Weekly Vlogs
Blog/Reviews
Open myself up to love
Pay off debts
Advance my online coaching business
Advance in my career at work
Journal
Basically I just want to work on the higher version of myself.
Hoping to keep with it and just work on my scheduling out everything to be more organized.
My French bulldog Sampson passed away suddenly on Thursday morning. It was shocking and unexpected.
What I didn't do: fall off my plan, binge.
What I did do: Morn, loose sleep and took rest days.
Although I am heart broken and no frenchie or dog of that matter could replace my baby/sidekick/shadow and Adonis' brother. He truly was one of a kind. I have taken the days since to reflect and member him as he was. The most loving baby ever. However my life is still filled with love from Adonis.I have come to the realization my household and my family is meant to have 2 dogs. It is too quiet and lonely without another dog.
If you met Sammy or know me you know how much that dog meant to me. Im truly heartbroken and devastated. I don't have family and my dogs were/are my family. I was not prepared to lose Sammy at all nor am I in a financial position to purchase a new frenchie right now. But I will be saving up to get a new baby.
With that said I will be sending training programs and or guides to everyone who donates to my new puppy fund. Anything truly will help fill my lonely void and empty house.
Hey guys! Its Alicia here. I am not to sure who reads my blog these days or if any one who use to checks back here. BUT if your new my name is Alicia and I am an IFBB Pro.
My blog use to be aliciabellelite dot com where i posted about training, fitness topics, health etc. I also use to do a lot of product reviews. Life got the best of me and I stopped. But I actually love it and would like to get back to it. I use to love sharing...until one day I got in a horrible relationship that prevented me from being me...prevented me from sharing and took me away from everything that I loved. But im back now. Healed (i think) and ready to be my opinionated, sharing self.
I use to have all sorts of PR companies that I worked with and dud influencer things with (before influencing was cool). And to be honest I would like to get back to that! Anyway the hardest part is always starting...So this is day !!
Stick it out and keep checking back because I cant wait to share products, apparel, training and life with the world again.
XO - Alicia
Blown Into Now Bridges the Worlds of Life and Loss
San Francisco, Calif., October 12, 2022― Mylo Schaaf’s new book, Blown Into Now: Poems for a Journey, takes readers on an odyssey through shade and light, offering glimpses into the stages of grief Schaaf went through when her son died suddenly at age 24. She offers the profound manifestations of his presence that she witnessed following his passing.
“Poems demanded to be written,” Schaaf said. “They brought relief and healing, as did hills warm with grass, tree spirits and arms of sky.”
Blown Into Now offers 45 remarkable poems, each paired with a striking photograph taken by her late son, Alex Lowenstein, who was a mountaineer, world traveler and adventurer, and veteran.
“The path is not all sadness,” she said during a recent interview. “It goes sort of up and down as you suppose any path would, but it eventually heads toward joy and toward understanding.”
In Blown Into Now, Schaaf carries readers from deep sadness and loss to comfort and support, finally edging toward joy. Her melodic words become a guidebook, allowing those who grieve to witness a spectrum of responses, to understand what might give relief, and to know how to look for the signposts that will guide them down the path toward healing.
To those who must endure such a shocking new reality, she aims to bring compassion, beauty and spiritual connection.
Her poems reveal a mother’s great heart and the love she shares with her son for granite peaks and untracked desert. Each photograph provides a pause from grief and allows us a glimpse of something we want and cannot name.
About the Author
Mylo Schaaf trained as a journalist, editor and physician, before taking a left turn into poetry. Before everything changed, she was a faculty member at the University of California, San Francisco, mentoring and teaching students in international, low-resource settings. Her commitment to global health grew out of her work and connection with India, the Americas, Liberia, Haiti and China. Then one day, a shocking phone call revealed her son’s death and collapsed this pursuit of engagement and action. Each long day would slowly disappear, and Schaaf found understanding and release when she began to write. Over the years poems have continued to emerge, as the tangles of days slip into light.
For more information, please visit https://www.myloschaaf.com, or follow the author on Instagram at writermyloschaaf.
Blown Into Now – Poems for a Journey
Publisher: Blue Light Press
ISBN: 979-8-9864093-0-6 (soft cover, available now)
