Friday, November 30, 2012

My shoe mania

The Hyper rocketgirl pink, blue & white spikes

The saucony grid kilkenny xc4 spikes
My shoe mania
November 30, 2012
By: Gina Yoryet Roma






The finger shoe
The women's Newton distance
The women's Newton gravity



A Tarahumara runner in Mexico's Copper Canyons - running only with sandals








They can be, black, white, blue, brown, pink, red, purple, green, you name it! The color is the least important detail to anguish about as long as they are the perfect fit and they provide enough comfort.

Women's shoes are very beautiful and sexy and I can spoil myself with many flaunting pairs but I have always automatically inclined towards running and training shoes rather than stern high heels  because they get much better use, I utilize them until the average 350-550 mile span (depending on one's body weight, running style and surface when running) dissipates. 



Someone told me once that spending so much money on workout gears is a waste of money but I strongly disagree. I am beguiled by them, my feet, back and calves deserve it. I don't dislike stilettos, I really like them as well but I will always stick with the simplicity of workout shoes.Someone told me once that spending so much money on workout gears is a waste of money but I strongly disagree. I am beguiled by them, my feet, back and calves deserve it. I don't dislike stilettos, I love wearing them when I go out or I'd wear them all the time when I used to work as a demo girl. BUT I will always stick with the simplicity and comfort of workout shoes.

Amongst my favorite are:

The finger shoe - it is the closest to running barefoot which according to some running sites and research, it is not as harsh on your feet.
http://running.competitor.com/2011/01/trail-running/baring-your-soles-is-barefoot-running-right-for-you_20539The women's newton distance - they're very light. 
The women's Newton Gravity - they make you feel like you're floating as they reduce the shock of each step.

The wonen track spikes are also on my must haves, I still have my running spikes basics that I used in Track & Field
when I was in college.
Since I've not been running I only own about 6 six pairs of running shoes but in 'the good 'ole days' I had about 10 of them in one season, plus my power walking and my gym ones. I never liked to wear the same pair two or three days in a row AND I  still love matching them with my workout outfit, my timer, my knee brace and band (if I wear them) and even with my water bottle/container.

I've never been a fashionista but when it comes to my workout shoes and clothes, I am very particular. My girly side takes over in that aspect but when it is about getting down and dirty and playing rough, I am definitely game!
Once a Brazilian friend of mine invited me to workout at his gym and he told me, "You train harder than they guys!"

NO PAIN NO GAIN!




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Thursday, November 29, 2012

Facing my fears


Facing my fears
November 29, 2012
By: Gina Yoryet Roman



What if I can't be as strong as in my pre-surgery state? What if I can't walk as fast? What if it's too painful too drive and I lose control on the road? What if my body doesn't respond the same way? Will I be able to run pull off a 20-30 minute jog on the treadmill at some point? What if my muscles don't develop as they did before? Will it some day be the usual me on a fitness level? Will my right calf ever release the tension from the strain of my weight?

'La loca de la azotea' (the crazy lady upstairs, meaning my mind) has haunted me every night for the last fourteen days because I feel like a stranger in my own body. Since day one of physical therapy I've been aghast to foresee what tomorrow and the day after will portray awaiting to reach the light at the end of the tunnel.

My therapist repeats time after time that everything will be ok but I have to insist, resist and persist to reach my goal.
I tell her, "Ok, I trust your skills and experience and I commit to doing my part to reach the summit (Physically) sooner."

Thus fear holds me tightly in his arms, I am getting mentally prepared to bounce back even more reloaded, considering what my body can handle. What bewilders me the most about my temple is my crazy fast metabolism taking into account that the weeks prior and the week post surgery I splurged on everything and performed zero physical activity whatsoever and I only put on two kilos!! Unlike this week, more veggies, less bread and tortillas and hardly any junk food have descended upon my plate. 

When I face-off my first day at the gym, I will be eager to do a high intensity routine but I must NOT forget that even by starting out slowly, my numb muscles will react immediately and give me the desired results. That's why I won't force or pressure it until it is 100% ready. 

Another fortnight and I'll be on my way to a smooth start.  So who cares that I haven't worked out for more than four months! Absolutely no one! Do I care that 90% of my muscle is long gone? I do but my engine will respond almost instantly! Does it really matter that I've been eating very low quality food for weeks? It does because I could have less flab now had I eaten cleaner but binging was ONLY momentarily. Did my body need a (forced) break? Most definitely!

For the time being I will keep flipping the hourglass and reading my fitness blogs and other ones to boost me and reencounter the Cuaima waiting to be awakened. 





















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Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Small things make a BIG difference


Small things make a BIG difference
November 27, 2012
By: Gina Yoryet Roman


Martha Debayle, a Paraguayan and very important female figure and one of the highest professionally achieving women in Mexico says a catchy phrase in one of her many commercials. "Me gusta ver, pero más me gusta ser vista, me gusta regalar, pero más me gusta que me regalen, me gusta halagar pero más me gusta ser halagada," Meaning, "I like to admire others but I'd rather be admired, I like to give presents to others but I'd rather be gifted, I like to compliment others, but I'd rather be complimented."

That scenario befits 100% of the population worldwide. We like to be admired, gifted, complimented, and acknowledged yet many times we dislike to reciprocate.

I reckon that being treated nicely by others is a wonderful feeling but more so, to receive presents from everyone. All my life I have received more than what I have ever given. With so much idle time lately this random thought has knocked on my head, which leaves me in awe because I'd need two or three life spans to make up all the love, affection and kindness that I've been received.

By chance I've been the spoiled one (not the youngest) of all my siblings. As far back as my mind can travel, everyone in my family has gone out of their way to make me happy that I could never pay back all those materialistic and spiritual gifts. 

Pondering upon all those deeds and goodies, I've come to the realization that it is like they say, "It is not  the trips to New York, the ridiculously flashy jewelry, the brand shoes or clothes, the costly perfume, or the outrageously exotic weekend home, the VIP I know, the luxury cars, the moments at the spa or the high maintenance beauty products."

The real significance of life is the small things that make BIG things. Nothing beats a serene chat with one of my sisters or with a close friend. It is priceless meeting someone and them becomin a part of your life disinterestedly. The small thus BIG things that make a strong impact in one's existence.

For instance throughout my moments of physical pain (as much as I always complain of the lack of friends in Guadalajara), several friends, work colleagues, clients and family members have visited, called to wish me well being. This sense of loneliness and emptiness had been lingering around for a rather long time for not having "enough" friends but I was proved wrong. 

Another big deed with a HUGE meaning was last week when a friend of mine went with me to IMMS (Mexico's Social Security Institute) to claim my disability. She arrived at 6:30am sharp. Who is detached from their bed at an early just to go sit at a clinic all morning long? Once we arrived, I couldn't go upstairs to see my doctor, therefore my friend kept running up and down to check that they didn't skip me. After awaiting for three and a half hours and after the tenth time M. G. had gone up and back down, my doctor finally came down.

What I appreciated the most was that M. G. speaks very little Spanish, even with this communication issue she was able to convey  my message to my doctor and vice versa.

That warm act was the highlight of my day!
And other generous and caring actions others have done for me without asking for anything in return are what give my existence a real meaning.

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Monday, November 26, 2012

The greatest wealth is health


The greatest wealth is health
November 26, 2012





The trouble with always trying to preserve the health of the body is that it is so difficult to do without destroying the health of the mind.  ~G.K. Chesterton

There's lots of people in this world who spend so much time watching their health that they haven't the time to enjoy it.  ~Josh Billings

The greatest wealth is health.  ~Virgil

I reckon being ill as one of the great pleasures of life, provided one is not too ill and is not obliged to work till one is better.  ~Samuel Butler, The Way of All Flesh, 1903

Life expectancy would grow by leaps and bounds if green vegetables smelled as good as bacon.  ~Doug Larson

Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.  ~World Health Organization, 1948
Eat right, exercise regularly, die anyway.  ~Author Unknown

Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying of nothing.  ~Redd Foxx

As a people, we have become obsessed with Health.  There is something fundamentally, radically unhealthy about all this.  We do not seem to be seeking more exuberance in living as much as staving off failure, putting off dying.  We have lost all confidence in the human body.  ~Lewis Thomas, The Medusa and the Snail, 1979

In order to change we must be sick and tired of being sick and tired.  ~Author Unknown

A sad soul can kill you quicker than a germ.  ~John Steinbeck


The best six doctors anywhere
And no one can deny it
Are sunshine, water, rest, and air
Exercise and diet.
These six will gladly you attend
If only you are willing
Your mind they'll ease
Your will they'll mend
And charge you not a shilling.
~Nursery rhyme quoted by Wayne Fields, What the River Knows, 1990
If I'd known I was going to live so long, I'd have taken better care of myself.  ~Leon Eldred

Be careful about reading health books.  You may die of a misprint.  ~Mark Twain

Poor health is not caused by something you don't have; it's caused by disturbing something that you already have. Healthy is not something that you need to get, it's something you have already if you don't disturb it. ~Dean Ornish

Red meat is not bad for you.  Now blue-green meat, that's bad for you!  ~Tommy Smothers

Physical ills are the taxes laid upon this wretched life; some are taxed higher, and some lower, but all pay something.  ~Lord Chesterfield

If the pain wanders, do not waste your time with doctors.  ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960

The... patient should be made to understand that he or she must take charge of his own life.  Don't take your body to the doctor as if he were a repair shop.  ~Quentin Regestein

I drive way too fast to worry about cholesterol.  ~Author Unknown

Joy and Temperance and Repose
Slam the door on the doctor's nose.
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Sickness comes on horseback but departs on foot.  ~Dutch Proverb, sometimes attributed to William C. Hazlitt

Like everybody else, when I don't know what else to do, I seem to go in for catching colds.  ~George Jean Nathan

Diseases of the soul are more dangerous and more numerous than those of the body.  ~Cicero

If you have health, you probably will be happy, and if you have health and happiness, you have all the wealth you need, even if it is not all you want.  ~Elbert Hubbard

People who are always taking care of their health are like misers who are hoarding a treasure which they have never spirit enough to enjoy.  ~Laurence Sterne

To feel keenly the poetry of a morning's roses, one has to have just escaped from the claws of this vulture which we call sickness.  ~Henri Frederic Amiel

The longer I live the less confidence I have in drugs and the greater is my confidence in the regulation and administration of diet and regimen.  ~John Redman Coxe, 1800

A good laugh and a long sleep are the best cures in the doctor's book.  ~Irish Proverb
Fresh air impoverishes the doctor.  ~Danish Proverb
Water, air, and cleanliness are the chief articles in my pharmacopoeia.  ~Napoleon I

The I in illness is isolation, and the crucial letters in wellness are we.  ~Author unknown, as quoted in Mimi Guarneri, The Heart Speaks: A Cardiologist Reveals the Secret Language of Healing
When it comes to eating right and exercising, there is no "I'll start tomorrow."  Tomorrow is disease.  ~Terri Guillemets

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Friday, November 23, 2012

Grateful and blessed Nov 22


Grateful and blessed Nov 22
November 23, 2012
By: Gina Yoryet Roman

For:


1) My faith
2) My family
3) My job
4) For being healthy and whole
5) My friends
6) My abilities
7) For pulling through my first surgery (and hopefully my last)
8) For the angels in my life
9) For the ability to write
10) For being completely bilingual, bicultural and biliterate
11) For being able to acquire more knowledge day by day
12) For being able to work with people from all walks of society
13) For loving and being loved
14) For having more than what I can deserve; a decent car, a challenging job, excellent work equipment, a vast collection of butterflies
15) For being a professional athlete for a long time
16) For my imperfections 
17) For the opportunity to do charity work
18) For being able to express myself through writing
19) For being asked to give advice in writing, health and fitness, and spiritual matters
20) For being able to be my own provider
21) For the sunshine and sunset
22) For being able to see the beautiful colors of nature
23) For being able to share my knowledge with others
24) For having many positive and motivational people in my life
25) For the many opportunities life has given me
26) For the people who have come to my life and for the ones who have vanished
27) For having a lot of food and water to nourish myself
28) For the moon, the stars and the moon
30) For my memories
31) For the sweet and tender pets I've had 
32) For life and freedom
33) For the priests and seminarians at F. S. S. P. who are so given and devoted
34) For the things to do, places to go and people I have yet to meet
35) For life's challenges
36) For the promise of a new day
37) For all the good and bad in my path
38) For my mind
39) For finding God again
40) For being able to see, walk, feel, smell, breathe
41)  For ABSOLUTELY everything and everyone that has influenced me to be the woman I am now

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Thursday, November 22, 2012

Never Worry about the numbers


Never Worry about the numbers
November 22 2012
By: Gina Yoryet Roman


M. G. M. told me the other day that she doesn't want to take advantage of my generosity when we had lunch today.
"I have received more from you in the last two months since I've been in Mexico than I have in the last twenty years. I had never felt so welcome and relaxed as I do here with you and your mother, you are very giving."

"Ha, ha! Come on, it is not all that." I responded. 

Giving, sharing and helping has always been in my nature because I was taught that by my mother and older siblings. As generous as she thinks I am, my selfish gene comes forth and I tend to only focus on my needs; even when I pray "I" is the protagonist of my petitions more frequently as I get older. Sometimes I try to fight it (at no avail) and look at others' needs and it works momentarily.

In reality I am not as giving as she said I am. The other Romans are TRUE givers, they not only give their unconditional love and support but they give everything they possess without a limit or questioning. 

There's a vivid memory of a particular time long ago when my second oldest brother had just bought a brand new leather jacket he fell for as winter approached. A few days later, while roaming the streets of San Francisco, he bumped into a homeless man who was shivering about to turn into a popsicle in that freezing winter in January. He went past the man, about to vanish in the crowd when suddenly he turned around and walked towards the man. Without hesitating he took his jacket off and covered the man with it. That stranger must've thought my brother was an angel sent. 
On the verge of tears he gazed at my brother and thanked him endlessly. 
That story is engraved in my soul and when I tend to get a little egocentric, I reflect on that moment and try not to get attached to the materialistic and vain aspects in my surroundings. 

Sharing and helping others is very self-fulfilling and I do a lot of self-talk. I tell myself to not fret on giving despite not having a hefty bank account nor possessing a whole lot because first and foremost) GOD ALWAYS PROVIDES. And number 2) I trust my abilities and knowledge that I am certain that I will never lack the bare necessities. 

And I as well have witnessed that what comes around, goes around. There are many kind souls from all levels of society who give lovingly and willingly. 

For example, Chuck Feeney, an Irish-American businessman and philanthropist and the founder of The Atlantic Philanthropies, one of the largest private foundations in the world, handed out a $350 million donation for a massive project to build a new house of graduate learning on New York's Roosevelt Island. The new high-tech science learning center will be part of Cornell University. 

The Forbes Charity Foundation started by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett donates billions of dollars to different causes and their wealth keeps getting multiplied.


Then the town of Rushville Illinois is very blessed with the '$5 doctor' who practices medicine. Doctor Russell Dohner who's worked there since 1955, back then only charging $2 unlike his $5 current fee, is not about to go anywhere because he truly loves his job. 

He was quoted in yahoo news, "I always just wanted to be a doctor to help people with their medical problems and that's all it's for .," the 87-year-old family physician says. "It was never intended to make a lot of money."

This tenderhearted doctor even sacrificed his one and only marriage after refusing to leave the miniature town of 4,300 inhabitants. 
Yahoo news.
"It was a sacrifice, yes. His young wife didn't want to stay in such a small town, he says, and so their marriage ended. He never remarried and instead dedicated his life to his work, only leaving this small central Illinois town for medical conferences over the years, never taking a true vacation."

There are many other philanthropists who don't hesitate to share their wealth with those in real need and make a positive change in our society. One of my dreams is to some day open my own charity foundation and take in orphans, single mothers  and elderly people, and help them have more and better opportunities. I want to show them that 'otro mundo si es possible.'

So why distress about the number in my pockets or the number of people I can help?



"Never Worry about the numbers.
Help one person at a time, and
always start with the person 
nearest you."

Mother Teresa

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Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Daily Affirmations

Daily Affirmations
November 20, 2012
By: Gina Yoryet Roman



One of my students and now a good friend of mine were discussing our physical limitations a few weeks back. She attended ritmos Latinos dance lessons regularly until she pulled a ligament. She complained about being so out of shape but she looks great to me. It is easy for women to overlook our
internal/external beauty and appreciate our body. I told her that day, just like I try to tell all the wonderful ladies I meet that the female body is the most powerful engine so we have to embrace it and accept the changes we have to face at every stage in life. 

We talked about all the benefits of doing what we like brings. In the midst of our pain we felt the support and camaraderie of just being there by talking and sharing our down moments. 

To boost our mood we read a little of 'The Mind, Body and Soul Diet,' by Jennifer Nicole Lee and another book by Louise Hays called, 'You Can Heal Your Life,' which talks about the cancer phase Louise Hays went through and she pulled through it without a problem with the powerful force of her mind. 

'You Can Heal Your Life,' is on my Christmas shopping book list as I try to feed my mind, body and soul with positive readings, people, environment, actions to help me assuage the daily chaos. 

H. R. also shared a very beautiful video of a little girl called Jessica,  "Daily Affirmations."
I am trying to soak myself with videos like this one which impact me greatly and I really enjoy.


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Monday, November 19, 2012

Momentum


Momentum
November 19, 2012
By: Gina Yoryet Roman


When my hotmail account was hacked almost two years ago, I cried because I lost a lot of highly important information. A sense of loss lingered within the entire time I was on denial. Amongst all that priceless information,  there was a fitness quote called, 'momentum,' which helped me stay motivated and get closer than ever to my fitness goal earlier this year. 
I've been looking for that quote in google at no avail. Right now my mind is in desperate need of a boost to get my flojo going. I am only on day four of recovery but I want to take giant leaps to get going because it hasn't felt like me for almost five months!

So here I am really struggling with staying still, my leg is resting covered with ice packs and I am, calling out, "Georgie, Yo-yo, Yuyito, gorda, Yuyo, Georgita, Yor, Yo', Gina, Ginita, Gio, don't ruin your momentum. You are one step away from reaching wholeness, don't you dare go crazy!
These idle moments are not easy at all for such a hyped up person like you but some day sooner rather than later, they will pay off every single suffering moment. Wait for the right moment to build your momentum. BUT! Once you get going, don't let go until you've have gone over your last goal."

A few days ago, I was on a countdown to put a halt to physical pain, now I am on the road to re-starting my momentum...


"I sat down with my trainers to check my past seasons and to see what could be done to keep me motivated and in good shape. I had to find a new motivation…
a new momentum."
Hermann Maier

"Most of life is routine - dull and grubby, but routine is the momentum that keeps a man going. If you wait for inspiration you'll be standing on the corner after the parade is a mile down the street."
Ben Nicholas

"For an hour every day, I did something. I was on the elliptical or the treadmill, and if someone asked me to go to a class - whether it was spinning, boxing, yoga, you name it - I went. By the end of the month, I felt so good, I just kept going. I didn't want to lose my momentum."
Molly Sims




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