People, it's November. We need to have a serious talk about the eating season creeping up on us. But first... an analogy.

Weight management is a lot like money management. Your weight can get away from you just as easily as your finances can. One minute you're cruising along, enjoying life - eating, drinking, shopping and being merry - and then next thing you know you've racked up piles of credit card debt. Gaining the debt was easy; getting rid of it is the hard part. You make tiny payments, barely chipping away at the debt. The number never seems to go down. It takes months to make a dent! And all because of a few weeks of good livin'.

I'm not a big fan of credit. I don't think I ever have been. When I was 20 years old, my parents suggested I buy a house. I was making my first full-time salary, and I got pre-approved for a small mortgage. I bought a small house with my small mortgage, nowhere near my dream house. But, dream house or not, it was "important for me to build equity," I was told.

I came to learn that all equity got me was piles of credit. And when you have piles of credit, you can get into trouble.

To be truthful, I've never struggled with being very overweight like millions of Canadians do - although I have struggled with weight management in my own way. But I have struggled to repay financial debt. The financial struggles I had in my youth have made me the cash-junky I am today. If I don't have the cash, I don't buy the item. I know it's not the most luxurious way to live, but you have to admit it makes a lot of sense.

Why not apply the same logic to weight management?

Mmmmmmm.. I love Turtles
So here we are. Early November. In Canada, we've already had Thanksgiving. The sound of that electric knife carving the turkey was like the starter's pistol for the Big Eating Season.

Life becomes more festive as we cruise through the last couple months of the year: companies and acquaintances hold "holiday parties," workplaces become rife with home baking and boxes of chocolates, friends invite friends over for egg nog and appetizers. It's dietary mayhem... but it's also incredibly fun. It would be a shame to miss it.

Turn on the radio anytime in December and you'll hear some cheesy radio personality spewing the same tired statistic: "Hey-heyyyyyy! Did you know that the average person gains between 7 and 10 pounds over the Christmas holidays? Uh oh!" (Look, it's really hard to convey the "cheesy radio personality" voice in a blog. Cut me some slack...). But it's true. The big eating and the resulting weight gain are anticipated, almost joked about. But it's no joke when the bill comes in the mail in January.

We spend the early part of every year trying to work off all the pounds we gained over Christmas, with varying degrees of success. We spend that same amount of time paying off our Christmas credit card bills. For months after one of the happiest and most festive times of the year, we slave and struggle to repay all that fun we've had. Talk about a buzz-kill.

I'm a pretty big fan of the You Only Live Once/If It Feels Good Do It line of thinking, so I'd rather enjoy my holidays with reckless abandon. That's why this month, I'm overpaying my credit card so I start with a debit on my account before I start Christmas shopping. Even though I'll still spend a grotesque amount, it will seem less horrible.

And I like to do the same with my holiday eating. Because if I enter a room with egg nog in it, you can bet I'm drinking some of it. 18 grams of fat per cup be damned (I do not advocate "Light" egg nog; if I wanted egg-flavoured water I'd have stayed living on the farm and drinking out of the well!).

Egg nog has a very high, er... interest rate, but I have no problem adding that to my debt-load. Life's too short not to.

Your Q4 Fiscal Action Plan
November is your last chance to prepay your dietary credit card before the crazy eating season really starts. Start making smarter diet choices now, and see if you can cruise into the holiday season with a "debit on your account." If you were to lose even 2 pounds before December rolls around (no pun intended), you'll still be slightly ahead of the game in terms of the 7-10 pounds the average Canadian gains each Christmas.

But here's the other half of the puzzle: exercise. They say diet contributes about 75% of the work to a weight management program, and exercise makes up the other 25%. And I agree with that. But where earning calories is concerned, I suggest putting your emphasis on exercise starting right now in November. Here are a few reasons why:

November: With diet alone, you'll be able to make a nice small prepayment on your dietary credit card for the holidays. Exercise will help to increase the size of that payment. Imagine if you exercised enough in November that you waltzed into December with a 5 or 6 pound pre-holiday weight loss? Even after you gained the typical 7-10 pounds that Canadians pack on over Christmas, you'd come close to breaking even! Not only is that good for your physical wellness, but it's a great mental and emotional boost, too, to know that you've remained in control of your exercise and nutrition during the most challenging time of the year.  

December: The work you put into your exercise in November will not only afford you a dietary credit card overpayment, but something else will happen behind-the-scenes too: you'll have been establishing a habit. Not only will this habit help you earn even more treats during the big eating season but more importantly, that habit will hopefully continue on through the month of December - a.k.a., the month when all dietary hell breaks loose. Studies have shown that it takes 21 days to make a habit; that's what November was for. Once the calendar turns to the month of December, that habit will already be engrained and you'll be more inclined to exercise to earn or burn all those delicious Christmas calories. Go ahead. Envision yourself saying 'Yes' to a second glass of full-fat egg nog WITH rum, knowing that you spent 30 minutes earlier that day having a brisk incline walk on a treadmill. The few hundred calories you'll be racking up by drinking a few glasses of rummy egg nog will have already been paid in advance by your exercise habit. 

January: Cut your fitness-related New Year's resolutions off at the pass. Gyms bust at the seams with Resolutioners in January, February... March? Not so much. But chances are very good that you'll make a similar resolution. Will you stick to it? It's a heck of a lot of pressure to be one of the hundreds or thousands of new members at a gym trying to get inspired to build a fitness habit. But you could already have your habit built by then. Listen, you've got two months before you have to make that resolution, and you KNOW you're going to make it, right? So start your exercise plan now. Get the habit started early and beat the resolution crowd to the punch. By the time all those nervous, wide-eyed Resolutioners hit the floor in January, you'll already be on auto-pilot.

Ka-Ching!
If you start right now, and vow to exercise all the way through the holiday season, three times a week for 30-60 minutes at a time, burning an average of 500 calories each time, that's 1500 extra calories you can consume each week and still break even - because the holiday season is no time to try to lose weight, just as it's no time to try to save money. You can drink full-fat egg nog, you can have an extra heap of stuffing and gravy with your turkey dinner and you can have Turtles for breakfast, as long as you've made a little room on your dietary credit card.

When the New Year rings in and the holiday season finally starts to fizzle out on January 1, 2010, aim to be the same weight you were in October before all this eating madness started. And even if you do gain a few pounds, at least you've taken great strides toward creating your fitness habit. You've been making your minimum payments. And it's easier to avoid going into debt than it is to pay it back once you've gone into the red.

Building or continuing an exercise habit through the month of November will set you up to continue the habit through December, and into 2010 and beyond. Even with all the parties and the Turtles and the nog, as long as you've got a regular exercise habit under your belt (no pun intended) you'll come closer to ending the Christmas season in the black.

 

Yoga is many things – restorative, peaceful, ancient… and intimidating. There are so many benefits to a yoga practice, but it can be overwhelming for a beginner. What do I wear? Where should I set up my mat? What if I can’t bend the way they want me to bend? What happens if my cell phone rings? 

Believe it or not, all those people you see strolling around with their yoga mats casually tossed over their shoulders on their way to or from a yoga class went through this exact same learning curve. Nobody told them how yoga studios work – they just mustered up their courage to try it, and figured it out as they went along.

But many of us aren’t that courageous when it comes to trying a brand new, totally foreign activity. Here are some quick tips that will have you waltzing into your first yoga class looking like a pro.

Class levels and types
The types and levels of yoga vary from studio to studio and instructor to instructor, so your best bet is to venture in to your local yoga studio and pick up a schedule, or see if they’ve got one posted online. Almost all yoga studios’ schedules will describe what each of their classes is like.

Restorative yoga – sometimes called Hatha yoga - is a great place to start if you’re brand new to yoga and feeling nervous about any physical limitations you may feel you have. These classes typically move you into poses more slowly, and you’ll spend more time enjoying each pose, working on improving your flexibility and reducing your stress.

Power yoga classes – often found under the category of Ashtanga yoga - can be an incredibly demanding muscular workout. If your studio has an Intro to Ashtanga class, give that a whirl. If not, an Ashtanga Level 1 class is pretty doable for most people – you just have to embrace the fact that much of the terminology will be new and foreign to you.

Hot yoga is a much newer branch of power yoga done in a studio where the temperature is turned up high. The resulting hot workout gets your heart pumping and your sweat flowing like almost nothing else. This sweat-fest is said to help eliminate toxins from the body, and the heat of the room may help enhance flexibility – warm muscles tend to be more bendy than cold ones. 

Studio Etiquette
In yoga studios, there is one big rule: please be quiet. Other classes may be in session when you arrive, and loud noises can disrupt the experience. Turn off your cell phone before you walk in the front doors of the studio, and try to remember to speak in a soft voice while you’re there.

Try to be on time for the start of class, and stay right until the end. Coming into and out of the studio is often disruptive to the meditative experience of a yoga class. 

Necessary Gear
Yoga is a pretty gear-light activity. A yoga mat is really all you need for the average class. These mats are just cushiony enough to keep you comfortable on the floor and just sticky enough so that your hands and feet stay firmly planted during poses.

Some classes may have you use additional equipment like blocks, bolsters and straps to help ease you into more complex poses. Many yoga studios have these items available to borrow.

As far as wardrobe is concerned, wear a comfy top and long shorts or pants, and bare feet! Don’t worry too much about the state of your pedicure – honestly, nobody is looking.
 
Yoga Vocabulary
Your instructor may intersperse some Sanskrit language into his or her class. Don’t let this trip you up – you are not expected to memorize these words. Other instructors may use English words to describe the poses. Either way, try not to let the terminology intimidate you; eventually you’ll start to learn what some of the words mean.

In addition to the poses, there are a lot of breathing (“pranayama”) and posturing (“bhanda”) terms that your instructor may toss out during practice. He or she should explain what they mean during class, but if not, just hang in there and do your thing. Eventually you will begin to catch on.

The good news is, yoga hasn’t changed much in the last few thousand years, so once you start getting the hang of it, you’re golden.

Honour the Body
There is a strong focus in yoga on “honouring the body.” This means checking in with how your body feels during your practice, and taking positions and challenges that work for you and you only. Let go of judgments and ego and just accept that your body will tell you when it wants to push hard and when it wants to rest. If your instructor ever takes the class into a pose that you really feel you’re not ready or able to try, you can absolutely choose to skip that pose.

Allow for a Big Learning Curve
There is a lot of poses in yoga, and you are never expected to know them all. Allow yourself the opportunity to learn, and give yourself a break if your instructor asks you to take a pose that you’ve never heard of before. Every single person in the room has gone through the very same learning curve you are experiencing. After four or five classes, some things should start to make a little more sense to you. Hang in there!

After the Class
The very end of a typical yoga class involves a few minutes of relaxation and meditation. Meditation is yet another daunting aspect of yoga practice, as many of us feel that we are too busy and important to shut off our minds and just sit quietly for a moment.  In fact, truly letting go of your physical, mental and emotional struggles will leave you feeling refreshed, renewed and at peace.

Some yoga studios do not allow participants to leave during the meditation, so if you are pressed for time or aren’t feeling in the mood for relaxation, be sure to pack up your mat and quickly and quietly leave at the very beginning of the mediation. You’ll know when it’s meditation time, because everyone will be lying on their backs, resting. Your yoga instructor may refer to it as “savasana” (shav-AH-sah-na), which is a Sanskrit word meaning “corpse pose.”

The instructor might guide you through the meditation, or leave you to rest quietly on your own. Some people fall fast asleep during meditation and, yes, some people even snore! It’s all good – anything goes in savasana.

After a few moments, the instructor will start to “bring you back,” waking you up from your relaxed state of mind and body.

Namaste
At the end of class, typically the instructor rand all the participants share a Namaste – or ‘thank you’ in Sanskrit. It, like everything else in yoga, is not mandatory; it’s simply a sharing of all that good energy you’ve created within yourself.

Yoga will challenge and invigorate you like almost no other workout can. The intimidation element of the yoga studio should never deter you from doing something so restorative and so positive for your body and mind.