Well hello there!

How are ya? I hope all my Canadian friends are feeling well-rested after our long weekend, and that nobody is too sunburned! I slathered on a bucketload of sunscreen for our hike on Sunday, but still managed to catch a little bit of sun on my shoulders. It’s nothing serious, but enough to make me enter a hot shower with caution!

I’m already a little late on reporting back about my June goals, for without further delay, here’s this month’s goal check-in.

Overall, it was a pretty spectacular month with no abysmal failures. The two main highlights were the launch of my health coaching business and my return to running, but we’ll get to those in a minute. Let’s start with this one:

This one was almost finished this one in time! I totally completed the design and music for the first class around mid-month, and my class has already had the pleasure of riding it with me. It was a workout full of powerful surge intervals (moving your legs as fast as you can under a higher-than-average resistance), and if I do say so myself, the tunes were pretty great as well. I even included my featured tune from the most recent Fit Bit Friday post. As for the second ride, I’ve got all the songs, but still need to piece the workout together. I was hoping to get to it this weekend but with our gorgeous weather, in front of a computer wasn’t really where I wanted to be! To my cycle ladies: Have no fear… I’ve got another good one comin’ at ya soon!

Done and done!! If you haven’t yet, check out my snazzy new site for Spin 360 Health Coaching, and while you’re at it, sign up for my monthly newsletter (coming out this week!) It’s totally free, and each month, I’ll send you a dose of motivation, nutrition tips, and a roundup of recipes, including exclusive ones that haven’t been published on the blog yet! You don’t have to be interested in actually buying a health coaching package to subscribe to the newsletter, but in the event that you are, feel free to mosey over and check out My Services. I’m absolutely LOVING the work I’m doing with my clients right now, and currently have a bit of space to take on a few more. If you’re interested, let me know!

It’s definitely better than it was, but just not 100% yet. I’m not sure if it actually was Achilles tendonitis that I had, but whatever it was, I am so glad it’s almost gone! After 5 weeks of physio, acupuncture, ice massaging, ice bathing, and anti-inflammatory cream rubbing, I’m actually able to run which was totally impossible when I first started having problems.

I have to admit – sometimes having an injury that stops you from doing something you do on a daily basis can be humbling. Rather than run, I switched over to cycling on the upright stationary bike, the Step Mill, and the Precor cross trainers at my gym. The pain in my ankle was never bad enough to prevent me from teaching spin classes, so thankfully I didn’t have to give those up. When I wasn’t teaching, the upright bike (not to be confused with the recumbent one) gave me the best bang for my cardio buck. I’d do tabata intervals, as well as slightly longer all-out sprints (this workout was a favourite that never got easy), and by the end of a half hour cycle, I was totally drenched in sweat. A lovely mental picture, right? But if you’ve ever sweated that hard, you’ll probably know how glorious it feels. It also helped me to prove to myself that I don’t have to pound out mile after mile on the treadmill or pavement in order to stay fit.

Last week, I ran for 15 minutes on Tuesday, 30 on Wednesday, a whopping 45 on Thursday, and 15 on Friday. (All of these treadmill runs were in my Skechers GOruns, which I went on and on about here. Check them out if you haven’t already!) Although my ankle is still a bit stiff, it felt amazing to let my body move like that again. I didn’t let myself do any more running over the weekend because I don’t want to land right back where I was a month ago, but I’m feeling more confident that I’ll be able to run the Sea Wheeze half that I’ve registered for in August. It definitely won’t be my fastest race, but I’m not going in with that expectation. If I can do it pain-free, that’s all I care about.

I did it – all except for the first week when I was too sore to do anything other than my daily essentials! Other than that, I did do one each week. However, I’ll admit it would have been nice to do more. Walking after dinner seems to help a lot with my digestion, and this lovely summer weather isn’t going to be here forever so I really need to take advantage of it!

This was the goal that I enjoyed working on most this month. I said I’d journal it every day, but unfortunately I missed a couple, hence the B+. As most of you know, and as I’m sure many of my fellow Type-A readers out there can identify, I am a fan of to-do lists and have at least a few going on a daily basis, either in my head, on my phone, or on paper. But these daily intentions weren’t supposed to be things like “get xyz done at work” or “write x number of posts for the blog” or “respond to emails from 8 bazillion people” – although all three of those things are often part of my daily to-dos. Instead, these intentions were more mindset-related. A few examples:

• Think only positive thoughts. And re-frame any negative ones into positive ones.
• Look for beauty in everything.
• Practice gratitude.
  
• Eat every bite with a calm mind and body. Next time you eat, take 3 deep breaths, relax your shoulders and neck, then take your first bite. This felt amazingly different the first time I tried it!

My favourite of them all (which is quickly becoming a mantra for my day-to-day) is this one:

(Source)

I kind of want to frame it and stick it up on a wall in my house.

So tell me…

• How did you do with your goals for June?
• Have you ever been sidelined with an injury that prevented you from doing an activity you do daily? Did you learn anything from the experience?