HealthyLoserGal FIVE POUND Club... are you IN?

Where will you be a year from now?  What are the fitness and/or weight loss goals you'd like to achieve in the next twelve months?  Do they seem achievable to you today?

I'd like to have you join me in a journey to lose five (5) pounds.  Just five pounds.  A month. : )  Every month of this new year of 2017 or until you've reached your healthy weight!

I know the overwhelming feeling it is to face having to lose a great deal of weight.  I was morbidly obese once and know the fatigue the weight puts on your body and your self-esteem.  You think there is NO WAY you'll be able to lose the weight.  But I'm betting on you - believing that you can set your sites on losing five pounds and that you'll be able to achieve it.  And then we'll do it again.  Five pounds at a time.  Before you know it, we'll have lost 20 pounds and then 35 and then 50 and, finally, next Christmas or Hanukkah time, we will be 60 pounds lighter and so much healthier! 

Tomorrow is the 3rd of January and will be Day 1 of the Healthy Loser Gal 5 Pound Club Challenge. The January #HLG5lbClub challenger will end on January 31st when we'll celebrate out 5 pound losses!  On February 1st we pick back up again and set another 5 pound goal for that month.

So how do you lose the weight in a month?  Science has long held that if you decrease your food intake by 500 calories per day times seven days of the week, you'll have a 3500 calorie deficit which adds up to one pound lost.  Sometimes this works for people and sometimes it doesn't.  I, personally, will be walking more and exercising with weights to help boost the calories I'll be reducing through cutting out sugary soda and meal-end sweets.  

There are tons of apps to help you count calories burned and log your food which I suggest you give a whole-hearted try! : )  Logging helps you realize the food that you casually may snack on during the day or evening without giving much thought to but that add up quickly when you log the amounts!

I will be on Twitter and Instagram and hope to see others use the #HLG5lbClub hashtag so we can offer support to one another as the challenge starts and continues!  Relying on friends to help you through a difficult day is a great way to realize you're not the only one craving chocolate or not wanting to go out to walk in 30 degree temps! 

If we truly COMMIT to the challenge and set our sites on only five pounds at a time, I know we can do this!

I hope you're in the Club with me!!


Dream. Believe. (Work hard!) Achieve! 
Jan / HealthyLoserGal

A New Year, A Clean Slate...

If you've read the blog over the years (phew! "over the years"!! I've been working on my health for YEARS now - yay, me!!) you know that I'm not big on New Year's resolutions. I am, however, big on new starts and I believe the 1st day of a new year offers just that:  a time to start anew.  And so, on January 1, 2014 I rededicate myself to.... well... myself! : )

The year of 2013 was not my best.  It may have been my worst in my 50+ years.  First and foremost, my Mom died and while it was expected, it still has been very hard emotionally.  I had one minor and one major eye surgery.  I moved and had to pack the house and all my belongings on my own, and even though the movers pulled away on the 7th of November, I am still in the process of unpacking. I had severe poison ivy spread across my face and down my neck. I am in the process of cleaning out my Mom's home and dealing with all her estate issues which included her oil tank spilling 100 gallons of fuel onto her basement floor, damaging everything in the basement and causing an environmental disaster that included Haz-Mat teams there to gut the basement and all the belongings within.  2013 was a heck of a year and one of the major things that happened during this time was: I gained 40 pounds.  Forty.  Back.  Good Lord!

Reflecting back on the year I realize that I always felt my best when I could get some sort of activity into my day.  When I'd walk the dog for longer than a typical walk, when I could swim laps in a lake, when I could leave work for a 15 minute power walk in the middle of a hectic day and just concentrate on my breathing and restore my balance a bit.  Those were the moments when I realized that exercise, movement, putting my health first HAD become part of my daily life in the year before this one.  I knew what to do, I just wasn't doing it!

I have been looking forward to rededicating myself to my health.  And I hope you'll consider joining me as we head into a new year.  My plan to lose 50 pounds (the 40 I regained and 10 more to hit my goal weight) is not complicated at all.  It involves counting calories, staying away from fats, walking, and weight training.  I shouldn't say "weight training" because that sounds so rigid and my weight regimen (isn't there another word besides "training" or "regimen" I can use?! lol) is simple enough for anyone to do. I'm a novice, too, remember! I believe there is an athlete within me that occasionally pops up her head and says to me in this exhilarated voice, "Yay! You found me... I'm right here... let's DO this!"  One of the emotional moments for me when I first started training with a personal trainer a few years ago (for six months) was when he said to me "we're going to find the athlete within you again"...  I cried.  No, I bawled.  Right there in the lobby of the YMCA in Waltham.  My trainer had tapped into what I had not dared dream yet:  that I COULD become the person who played tennis, and rode bike 20 miles without thinking of it, and played softball, and had a college scholarship offer for field hockey.  I had been a fit, active person who LOVED being outdoors and hiking and biking and playing.  I'm ready to go back to that person again and it starts today.

Want to join me?  Stay tuned and read on for the January challenge post! : )

Here's to a clean slate in 2014 to write a new, healthy story!

Dream. Believe. Achieve.

HealthyLoserGal / Jan

Believe in YOURSELF!

From quotablecards.com

As the New Year begins, these words above are never more true. I believe in setting goals, not making resolutions.

 

Write down three goals you have for this month.  Put those goals somewhere you'll see them everyday... your frig, your bathroom mirror, write them, take a photo and make them your phone's screensaver! And then - every single day - work toward your goals.  Push yourself beyond  your own comfort level.  Sweat.  Sweat a lot.  Reward yourself with little trinkets (not food!) when you've achieved a significant milestone. Break up with your couch! ; )  Have a personal mantra while you're striving toward your goal.  Say to yourself throughout every day "I am awesome.  I can do this.  I am proving to myself how much I can do."  

 

I believe we're going to have a GREAT 2013.  I believe in YOU... now it is your turn to believe in YOURSELF! :)

 

Here's to our health!

Dream. Believe. Achieve!

Jan / HealthyLoserGal

How Whole, Unprocessed Foods May Save Your Life

I have long believed that the more whole, unprocessed food we can eat, the better off we are, the better we feel, the better our bodies will 'work'.  Friends on Twitter know that I often use the #Farm2Table hashtag to promote both farms and whole foods. When I read the following article from Dr. Dwight Lundell, a cardiac surgeon who practiced in Arizona, it all made perfect sense to me, so I am passing along his article for you to think about, too.  I contacted Dr. Lundell and asked his permission before I posted this and he said he'd be honored. : )

We physicians with all our training, knowledge and authority often acquire a rather large ego that tends to make it difficult to admit we are wrong. So, here it is. I freely admit to being wrong. As a heart surgeon with 25 years experience and having performed over 5,000 open-heart surgeries, today is my day to right the wrong with medical and scientific fact.

I trained for many years with other prominent physicians labeled “opinion makers.” Bombarded with scientific literature, continually attending education seminars, we opinion makers insisted heart disease resulted from the simple fact of elevated blood cholesterol.

The only accepted therapy was prescribing medications to lower cholesterol and a diet that severely restricted fat intake. The latter of course we insisted would lower cholesterol and heart disease. Deviations from these recommendations were considered heresy and could quite possibly result in malpractice.

It Is Not Working!
These recommendations are no longer scientifically or morally defensible. The discovery a few years ago that inflammation in the artery wall is the real cause of heart disease is slowly leading to a paradigm shift in how heart disease and other chronic ailments will be treated.

The long-established dietary recommendations have created epidemics of obesity and diabetes, the consequences of which dwarf any historical plague in terms of mortality, human suffering and dire economic consequences.

Despite the fact that 25% of the population takes expensive statin medications and despite the fact we have reduced the fat content of our diets, more Americans will die this year of heart disease than ever before.

Statistics from the American Heart Association show that 75 million Americans currently suffer from heart disease, 20 million have diabetes and 57 million have pre-diabetes. These disorders are affecting younger and younger people in greater numbers every year.

Simply stated, without inflammation being present in the body, there is no way that cholesterol would accumulate in the wall of the blood vessel and cause heart disease and strokes. Without inflammation, cholesterol would move freely throughout the body as nature intended. It is inflammation that causes cholesterol to become trapped.

Inflammation is not complicated — it is quite simply your body’s natural defense to a foreign invader such as a bacteria, toxin or virus. The cycle of inflammation is perfect in how it protects your body from these bacterial and viral invaders. However, if we chronically expose the body to injury by toxins or foods the human body was never designed to process, a condition occurs called chronic inflammation. Chronic inflammation is just as harmful as acute inflammation is beneficial.

What thoughtful person would willfully expose himself repeatedly to foods or other substances that are known to cause injury to the body? Well, smokers perhaps, but at least they made that choice willfully.

The rest of us have simply followed the recommended mainstream diet that is low in fat and high in polyunsaturated fats and carbohydrates, not knowing we were causing repeated injury to our blood vessels. This repeated injury creates chronic inflammation leading to heart disease, stroke, diabetes and obesity.


Let me repeat that: The injury and inflammation in our blood vessels is caused by the low fat diet recommended for years by mainstream medicine.

What are the biggest culprits of chronic inflammation? Quite simply, they are the overload of simple, highly processed carbohydrates (sugar, flour and all the products made from them) and the excess consumption of omega-6 vegetable oils like soybean, corn and sunflower that are found in many processed foods.

Take a moment to visualize rubbing a stiff brush repeatedly over soft skin until it becomes quite red and nearly bleeding. You kept this up several times a day, every day for five years. If you could tolerate this painful brushing, you would have a bleeding, swollen infected area that became worse with each repeated injury. This is a good way to visualize the inflammatory process that could be going on in your body right now.

Regardless of where the inflammatory process occurs, externally or internally, it is the same. I have peered inside thousands upon thousands of arteries. A diseased artery looks as if someone took a brush and scrubbed repeatedly against its wall. Several times a day, every day, the foods we eat create small injuries compounding into more injuries, causing the body to respond continuously and appropriately with inflammation.

While we savor the tantalizing taste of a sweet roll, our bodies respond alarmingly as if a foreign invader arrived declaring war. Foods loaded with sugars and simple carbohydrates, or processed with omega-6 oils for long shelf life have been the mainstay of the American diet for six decades. These foods have been slowly poisoning everyone.

How does eating a simple sweet roll create a cascade of inflammation to make you sick?

Imagine spilling syrup on your keyboard and you have a visual of what occurs inside the cell. When we consume simple carbohydrates such as sugar, blood sugar rises rapidly. In response, your pancreas secretes insulin whose primary purpose is to drive sugar into each cell where it is stored for energy. If the cell is full and does not need glucose, it is rejected to avoid extra sugar gumming up the works.

When your full cells reject the extra glucose, blood sugar rises producing more insulin and the glucose converts to stored fat.
What does all this have to do with inflammation? Blood sugar is controlled in a very narrow range. Extra sugar molecules attach to a variety of proteins that in turn injure the blood vessel wall. This repeated injury to the blood vessel wall sets off inflammation. When you spike your blood sugar level several times a day, every day, it is exactly like taking sandpaper to the inside of your delicate blood vessels.

While you may not be able to see it, rest assured it is there. I saw it in over 5,000 surgical patients spanning 25 years who all shared one common denominator — inflammation in their arteries.
Let’s get back to the sweet roll. That innocent looking goody not only contains sugars, it is baked in one of many omega-6 oils such as soybean. Chips and fries are soaked in soybean oil; processed foods are manufactured with omega-6 oils for longer shelf life. While omega-6’s are essential -they are part of every cell membrane controlling what goes in and out of the cell – they must be in the correct balance with omega-3’s.

If the balance shifts by consuming excessive omega-6, the cell membrane produces chemicals called cytokines that directly cause inflammation.

Today’s mainstream American diet has produced an extreme imbalance of these two fats. The ratio of imbalance ranges from 15:1 to as high as 30:1 in favor of omega-6. That’s a tremendous amount of cytokines causing inflammation. In today’s food environment, a 3:1 ratio would be optimal and healthy.

To make matters worse, the excess weight you are carrying from eating these foods creates overloaded fat cells that pour out large quantities of pro-inflammatory chemicals that add to the injury caused by having high blood sugar. The process that began with a sweet roll turns into a vicious cycle over time that creates heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes and finally, Alzheimer’s disease, as the inflammatory process continues unabated.

There is no escaping the fact that the more we consume prepared and processed foods, the more we trip the inflammation switch little by little each day. The human body cannot process, nor was it designed to consume, foods packed with sugars and soaked in omega-6 oils.

There is but one answer to quieting inflammation, and that is returning to foods closer to their natural state. To build muscle, eat more protein. Choose carbohydrates that are very complex such as colorful fruits and vegetables. Cut down on or eliminate inflammation- causing omega-6 fats like corn and soybean oil and the processed foods that are made from them.

One tablespoon of corn oil contains 7,280 mg of omega-6; soybean contains 6,940 mg. Instead, use olive oil or butter from grass-fed beef.

Animal fats contain less than 20% omega-6 and are much less likely to cause inflammation than the supposedly healthy oils labeled polyunsaturated. Forget the “science” that has been drummed into your head for decades. The science that saturated fat alone causes heart disease is non-existent. The science that saturated fat raises blood cholesterol is also very weak. Since we now know that cholesterol is not the cause of heart disease, the concern about saturated fat is even more absurd today.

The cholesterol theory led to the no-fat, low-fat recommendations that in turn created the very foods now causing an epidemic of inflammation. Mainstream medicine made a terrible mistake when it advised people to avoid saturated fat in favor of foods high in omega-6 fats. We now have an epidemic of arterial inflammation leading to heart disease and other silent killers.

What you can do is choose whole foods your grandmother served and not those your mom turned to as grocery store aisles filled with manufactured foods. By eliminating inflammatory foods and adding essential nutrients from fresh unprocessed food, you will reverse years of damage in your arteries and throughout your body from consuming the typical American diet.

Here's to our health!

Dream. Believe. Achieve!Jan/ HealthyLoserGal

This New Year: don't feel the guilt of unkept resolutions...

A repeat from 12/31/11 but just as true today as a year ago! : )

I'm not one to make New Year's resolutions... I am more likely to make a resolution in the Fall when the pressure to make them is off since I often feel like the Fall is when New Year *should start*.  :)   And when I do make a resolution, I don't make a lofty one any longer that I know I won't be able to keep.  I have kept journals and diaries since I was in my early teens and looking back on past resolutions is both funny and sad.

"I will lose 80 lbs. by the first week of June", I wrote in 2004.   I didn't.  I gained weight that year.  That was the year of my son's high school graduation.

"I will lose 100 lbs. by May 1st of this year" I wrote on January 1st, 2008.  I didn't.  I lost 12.  That was the year of my son's college graduation and I still wince when I look at the few photos of me on that joyful day.

In March of 2009 I wrote.  "I am going to reclaim myself.  I have 100 lbs. to lose.  I am going to lose 5 lbs. this month.  I am going to begin to walk again.  I will do this."  I lost 18 lbs. that month, I believe.  I began to walk 1/4 mile around the local high school track and was darn proud of doing it.  After the first five pounds were lost, and then the next five pounds, I celebrated 10 lbs. here on the blog.  And then the next ten pounds.  And then the next five when I hit 25 lbs. gone.  The small changes, the small goals, the rewards for small achievements gained worked for me.  I believe they will work for you, too, friends!

This year consider making just a small change.  Don't make a HUGE resolution.  Join me and my friends over at MeYouHealth and sign the Anti-Resolution Pledge.

Whatever your weight, health, or fitness goal is... I know you can achieve it this coming year if you believe in yourself and go for your goal by making small, sustainable changes and setting realistic milestones. : ) 

If you need help along the way staying the course, I'm only a tweet away and MeYouHealth has a great community of support at their Daily Challenge site and on Facebook. I joined the Daily Challenge community a year ago and have loved the small daily positive suggestions in my life. They're all about small actions making to attain big changes in the long run! :)

Happy New Year and New YOU, my friends!

Dream ~ Believe ~ Achieve!
Jan /
HealthyLoserGal

"All In!" August Challenge

In a little more than a month, I will be flying to Ireland for 17 wondrous days as I start a six week sabbatical from work.  I am so grateful to my employers for giving me this paid sabbatical and so excited to explore Ireland for that many days and see sites that I have not been to before, revisit places I love and experience my favorite place on this beautiful planet on my own time schedule.  I leave on August 31st.


Between now and then, I have a month... the month of August to get back on track and where I want to be. To rejuvenate both my fitness routine and my health... and myself.  I will regain me again.  No excuses. No reasons that I can't do something.  I can regain my fitness and my positive energy and I will.  I am ALL IN for AUGUST!

Five days a week I will be in the gym.  I am fortunate that Fisique Fitness is in the Financial District in downtown Boston and right down the street from my relocated office. No excuse there.  I will be there daily during the work week and should be able to get 45 minutes of intensity in during my lunch hour or before the work day. I will be walking every day with my dog, Rauri, and on my own for a power walk.  Every day.  Rain or shine.  


I will continue to monitor my foods and try to eat whole foods (nothing processed) whenever possible. I will journal daily every meal and plan my foods in advance which is key for me because when I do not plan out my meals, I tend to grab whatever I want to grab.  My food will be low fat and low carb... and I won't be drinking my calories.  As much as I love Nantucket Nectars, they're high in calories and out the window for August for me. 


I'm hoping that you will join me in this intense month.. this month of ALL IN! You can do it, too.  You have some goal that you've been putting off - - maybe this is the month to commit to yourself, as I am committing to myself, and say "Yes! I can do this! I am worth this effort! I will succeed!"  And mean it.  And do it.


Let me know if you are 'in'.  You can set your own plan but to be in the challenge for August you need to do three things:  1) commit to 5x week of some sort of exercise that will get your heart rate pumping for at least 30 minutes 2) journal (your food and your emotions, your day food plan.. something) and 3) check in here through the Comments or on Facebook or Twitter with the hash tag of #hlgAugAllIn.


I will not going to Ireland feeling like I could have done more.  I will not have flabby arms in the photos I take. I will not be out of breath hiking up Croagh Patrick. I will try new things. I will be confident of how I look.  I will be satisfied with the effort I put in during August.  


Here's to our health, friends!


Dream!
Believe!
Achieve!


Jan / HealthyLoserGal

Setting SMART Weight Loss Goals

FROM 2 YEARS AGO, BUT SO PERTINENT FOR NOW!

So my vacation is over and I had a great time visiting my sister in Florida.  We hadn't seen one another in a year and a half so it was long overdue.  I'm proud to say I stayed completely on plan - even counted calories on St. Patrick's Day for Guinness (I don't like it but feel obligated to drink it on St. Patrick's Day as I am, afterall, of Irish descent!) and corn beef & cabbage & bangers & mash.  I made wise, thought-out choices of airport food and even made certain I was online on Tuesday night for my Vtrim class.  And I'm soooo glad I made time for the class as it was all about one of my favorite things in the world this past year:  Making Goals!

Not just any goals...

Sure, my goal a year ago was to lose 100 lbs. but - in all honesty - that wasn't a very realistic goal as I had no idea how I was going to do it nor was I a contestant on The Biggest Loser! *grin*  Losing 60 pounds in a year was much more attainable for me but I would have been happy with 50 pounds,  honestly, as in June I was stagnant at 35!  It was only then that I started breaking down my goal(s) into 5 pounds lost at a time... THEN it began to work! Then I was making smart goals!

Now, with the help of the Vtrim classes and exercising at the YMCA, I'm learning what is a SMART goal for me now.  This week coming up, for instance, I committed to myself and my fellow classmates that I would have the following goal:

I will walk (specific) for a mile (measurable & achievable) on Saturday, Sunday, and Tuesday (time limited) and then try something new for exercise that I haven't done before for 30 mins on Thursday (realistic). 

Now, for many of you, that goal may seem easy-peasy, huh?  But - for me - it is achievable and just enough out of my comfort zone to make it a true goal.  I'm not setting myself up for failure.  I've already walked the Saturday and Sunday portion of the goal and know I can get to the YMCA at lunch hour on Tuesday.  The Thursday part I'm not sure of what I'll do... but I'm going to do it!  

I learned in the online class that we need to ask ourselves "what hurdles do I need to overcome to lose weight?” and then use the smart guidelines to set 1-2 goals a week to help get over those weight loss hurdles. It makes such sense when it is pared down into smaller, achievable goals and I, personally, like writing the goals on my calendar and checking them off when they're completed!!

Between Friday and today, I have walked six miles.  SIX MILES!  That is a record for me over a weekend except when I did the five mile walk back in the fall, but that was with a few stops along the way.  This was really power waking (well... a 17-20 minute mile is power walking for this gal!) and I walked with a determined gait!  I built my first ever play list for my iPod and hit the pavement and LOVED IT!  And I felt incredible... empowered... thankful... full of LIFE! :)

This morning I got up (sore as sore can be because of my second meeting with my trainer yesterday- this week we did not continue assessing!!) and got on the scale and I am at the lowest weight I have been in about 8 years!  I pushed the scale around the bathroom floor... and every place I stepped on it, I was at the same weight.  It wasn't a fluke... I'm DOING this! :)

BRING IT ON WORLD, YEAR TWO OF MY JOURNEY HAS JUST STARTED & I'VE GOT YOUR NUMBER!

More tomorrow night on my first real encounter with personal training!  Parker (my trainer at the YMCA) said "remember this day, Jan, because in a month you will look back and see how very far you've come". 

This New Year: don't feel the guilt of unkept resolutions...

I'm not one to make New Year's resolutions... I am more likely to make a resolution in the Fall when the pressure to make them is off since I often feel like the Fall is when New Year *should start*.  :)   And when I do make a resolution, I don't make a lofty one any longer that I know I won't be able to keep.  I have kept journals and diaries since I was in my early teens and looking back on past resolutions is both funny and sad. 

"I will lose 80 lbs. by the first week of June", I wrote in 2004.   I didn't.  I gained weight that year.  That was the year of my son's high school graduation.

"I will lose 100 lbs. by May 1st of this year" I wrote on January 1st, 2008.  I didn't.  I lost 12.  That was the year of my son's college graduation and I still wince when I look at the few photos of me on that joyful day.

In March of 2009 I wrote.  "I am going to reclaim myself.  I have 100 lbs. to lose.  I am going to lose 5 lbs. this month.  I am going to begin to walk again.  I will do this."  I lost 18 lbs. that month, I believe.  I began to walk 1/4 mile around the local high school track and was darn proud of doing it.  After the first five pounds were lost, and then the next five pounds, I celebrated 10 lbs. here on the blog.  And then the next ten pounds.  And then the next five when I hit 25 lbs. gone.  The small changes, the small goals, the rewards for small achievements gained worked for me.  I believe they will work for you, too, friends!

This year consider making just a small change.  Don't make a HUGE resolution.  Join me and my friends over at MeYouHealth and sign the Anti-Resolution Pledge.

Whatever your weight, health, or fitness goal is... I know you can achieve it this coming year if you believe in yourself and go for your goal by making small, sustainable changes and setting realistic milestones. : ) 

If you need help along the way staying the course, I'm only a tweet away and MeYouHealth has a great community of support at their Daily Challenge site and on Facebook. I joined the Daily Challenge community a year ago and have loved the small daily positive suggestions in my life. They're all about small actions making to attain big changes in the long run! :)

Happy New Year and New YOU, my friends!

Dream ~ Believe ~ Achieve!
Jan /
HealthyLoserGal

Gift of Fitness Challenge: Week 6 Check-In

Apologies for getting the check-in posted a day late.  I didn't have any power at my home from Saturday night until last night (Monday) due to the freak Nor`easter than blanketed New England with snow and then with fallen trees and power lines!  I did a little happy dance and yelled out 'woohooo!' when the power was restored last night.  I think sleeping in a room that is below 50 degrees is not exactly my cup of tea.  At one point I wondered how many calories I was burning from shivering! ; )

So we're into week six now.  I'm down 8 pounds since the challenge began which I'm happy with.  I know other challengers are doing incredible on their goals and have far exceeded my 8 lbs.  But we need to remember this isn't a competition against one another but a challenge to meet our own expectations and goals that we've set.  And it isn't all about weight loss, fitness is key, too. 

Are you walking, moving, biking, Wii'ing (lol...sounds funny that way, huh?) so you can Move It to Lose It? Check-in below and let me know how you're doing... remember there are incentives coming up for those of you who keep up with the challenge and continue to check in and support and encourage one another.  Also, friends... if you're struggling -- shout out to us and let me and others know you need support.  There is power in numbers.

Here's to our health!

Dream.
Believe.
Achieve!

Jan/HealthyLoserGal

Gift of Fitness Challenge Check-In: Week #1

Sometimes the first week of the challenge can be the easiest (because we're all fired up to make changes) or the worst (because we're pushing ourselves outside of our comfort zones), so no matter which it is for you, let's support one another by using the Comments section to check in. 

How are you doing?  What changes are you making?  What are you learning that you can share with other challengers?

Dream.
Believe.
Work hard.
Achieve.

We CAN do this, friends!  Nothing is in our way but ourselves! :)