Coach Laura’s program is based on four essential components of health, fitness, well-being: Nutrition, Movement, Sleep, and Managing Stress.

Nutrition

Let’s ditch the diet mentality and learn how to eat to nourish and pamper the body and mind you want to have. It’s a mindset shift from “diet” which implies a short term plan to reach a short term goal, versus “nourishment” which means to provide the necessary building blocks for growth, health and vitality. So many of the women I work with have been on multiple diets in their lifetime that left them feeling deprived and restricted. Some have done some real damage to their metabolism. Together we will use food to feel good, lose weight without feeling hungry all the time, and have the energy you need to do the things you need to do and be the person  you want to be. We will focus on:

• Adequate protein to support healing, growth of lean tissue and recovery.
• The right carbohydrates for you that provide nutrients, not just calories. 
• Healthy fats to make your food taste good, support your brain, and balance your hormones. 
• Foods that you love that make you feel amazing and you will enjoy eating for a lifetime. 
• A way of eating that feels effortless and sustainable. 

Movement

Can we please stop exercising to burn calories? And for the record, you can’t out exercise a bad diet, so forget that notion too. Let’s ditch exercise for weight loss and focus on training…..training for the life you want to have now and 20, 30, 40 years from now. Rather than exercising away from something you don’t want, let’s try training for something you do want.  I promise, if you focus on strength training to build lean muscle you won’t “look bulky” but supple and toned, and oh by the way, a stronger and more capable person that ages at a slower rate.  We’ll add in cardio where appropriate, mobility to avoid injury and find ways to just move more throughout the day. 

Sleep

You will learn to sleep like it’s your job. Sleep is the most underrated tool in our arsenal. Proper sleep will make everything else we do together all the more effective. Lack of sleep leads to cravings so it messes with your nutritional choices. It drains you of energy so it disrupts your training. It actually causes additional stress, suppresses your immune system, ages you faster, and so many more of the common complaints my clients have. Adequate restorative sleep actually aids weight loss, allows your muscles to recover and get stronger, supports your immune system, provides the energy and motivation to train and be productive, and so much more! So, no, you don’t need 2 hours of Netflix to “unwind” at the end of the night, it actually does the opposite. You need low light, maybe some blue light blocking glasses, perhaps a cup of tea (not alcohol), a good book or better yet good sex, and a bed time that gives you 8 hours of sleep, 7 at a bare minimum. I know, sounds like a pipe dream, but we WILL get there.

Stress

Boy this is a biggie and the toughest one to tackle. Chronic stress is the number one reason folks have a problem executing on all of the above. Most of the women I work with have this issue in spades. Stress comes from all areas of life and it is not completely avoidable. Some kinds of stress are actually good, and totally normal. But when it increases and remains too high for too long, then we have a problem. And unfortunately, the lifestyles most of us are leading today are the source of the problem. You will not fix this issue if you aren’t willing to make some changes, learn to say no to things that don’t serve you, learn to ask for help when you need it and finally realize sometimes the biggest source of stress is coming from our own negative thoughts. 

The  good news is that your body isn’t broken. The human body hasn’t fundamentally changed in thousands of years. But what has changed dramatically and rapidly is our environment. What we eat, how we move, our sleep patterns and the stress we are under are all very different from what our human genes expect. Your body is just responding to the environment you give it. In order for your body to express itself as lean, healthy, energetic, and happy, you need to give the tools it needs to do so. Together will work toward doing just that in a way that isn’t overwhelming, at a pace that works for you and starting where you are at today.