Ain’t it funny how most folks always think that Memorial Day Weekend is the official start of summer when, actually, the summer season doesn’t kick off until June 20 (or 21, based onhow the summer solstice plays out)? This means that if you’re still trying to get your summer body all the way together, you’ve still got some time because (this year) summer doesn’t end until September 22.
Okay, but what do you do if you want to look oh so very right in your monokini, yet you also want to enjoy some of the best that food has to offer during this time of year, too? If that’s your personal dilemma, you’ve come to the right place. I’ve got 10 tips for how you can have a ball with food, remain healthy, and still have a snatched body in the process. Let’s do this.
1. Try Breakfast Salads in the Morning
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If you grew up hearing that breakfast is the most important meal of the day,more research is revealing that if you skip it altogether, it’s not quite as detrimental to your health as we were led to believe. Still, that doesn’t mean that ifbreakfast is your thing, it doesn’t come with some major benefits. It fuels you for the day. It boosts your metabolism. It can also lower your risks of heart disease, diabetes, and obesity. The key is to consume a breakfast that’s as healthy as possible, and two options that are pretty popular right now arebreakfast salads and breakfast toast.
Since a lot of the ingredients that go into both are full of fiber, protein, and essential nutrients, going with a meal that is light and “brunch-able” is a great way to start off your day, no doubt. Check out some easy-to-make breakfast salad recipeshere and delicious breakfast toast oneshere.
2. Make Your Own Smoothies and Popsicles
Speaking of breakfast foods, although breakfast isn’t my favorite meal, I will get down with a smoothie, preferably a homemade one. It’s definitely one of the quickest, easiest, and most convenient ways to get a lot of nutrients into your system while you’re on the go. Plus, if you’re someone who isn’t a big fan of raw fruits and veggies, by combining them into a smoothie, you can get them into your body in a way that is easier to “take in," not to mention the fact that smoothies are great for maintaining gut health and they can even help you to lose weight if that is a summertime mission of yours.
The key is to balance how much sugar you put into them (men only need nine teaspoons a day while we only need six). Oh, and if you’re “smoothie-d out” or you want to try another option, make your own popsicles or slushes. You can put fresh fruits in those as well, and they can help to keep you hydrated while giving you a healthy sweet tooth fix. Check out some summer smoothie recipeshere and DIY popsicle recipeshere.
3. Enjoy All of the “High Water” Foods
When it’s hot outside, you actually need to up your water intake in order to stay well-hydrated. Some health experts say that this means men should consume 15 ½ cups a day while women should have no less than 11 ½ of them.
If water isn’t really “your thing,” one way to still get your fluids in is to eat foods that have a high amount of water content in them. Some of those include watermelon, strawberries, cucumbers, melons, lettuce, tomatoes, and cauliflower — all of which are light and “cool” foods to eat during this time of the year.
4. Have Carbs Before 2 P.M.
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If you can’t see going throughout summer without some ice cream, French fries, or even sushi (rice is high in carbs) — no one says that you have to. The key is 1) to consume high carbs in moderation and 2) try and eat them as early in the day as possible. Since most of us tend to be more active during daytime hours, if you’re worried that some chocolate gelato is going topack on the pounds or cause your blood sugar levels to skyrocket, having it while you’re taking a walk or before your evening workout can make it more of a stress-free delight for you. Science backs it.
5. Support Local Farmers (and Farmers Markets)
Aside from the fact that supporting your local farmers and farmer markets is a fabulous way to financially back your community, there are some health benefits that come from doing it as well. The food is fresher, there is less of a need for preservatives in them (because they aren’t being shipped from state to state), and you don’t have to play so much of a guessing game when it comes to figuring out exactly where your food sources are coming from.
Hmph, let me tell it, a great first or second date is meeting someone at a farmers market early in the day. Then, if things go well, have a picnic with some of the produce that you purchased in a park later that afternoon. Thank me later.
6. Snack Healthy
One of my goddaughters isn’t a big eater; she is a huge snacker, though. If you were raised to believe that is a big-time no-no, honestly, snacking throughout the day has its benefits. It can give you more energy,help to keep you from overdoing it when it’s time to have an actual meal and it can provide you withsome essential nutrients that you might not (automatically) receive at breakfast, lunch, or dinner.
The key to snacking well is eating healthy foods.Some of the ones that are great for this time of the year include nuts, berries, hummus, dark chocolate, cheese and crackers, beef jerky, olives,cherries, Greek yogurt, and guacamole (in moderation on that last one; guac can be a bit onthe fatty side).
7. If You Are Vegan or Vegetarian, Watch that Sodium Intake
Most things in our culture are fads;veganism isn’t exempt. However, if you do happen to be a vegan or vegetarian, it does you no good tolook down on (us) meat eaters if your meat substitutes are loaded with sodium, preservatives, and additives. That said, if you plan on putting some meat alternatives on the grill this summer (more on grilling at the end), definitely read the labels on the packages beforehand. Heart disease continues to bethe top killer of Black women, and too much sodium in your system can contribute to that on a few different levels.
8. Have Water with You Cocktails and Mocktails
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Remember how I said a little earlier that remaining hydrated is super important, especially during the summer season? Adding to that, it always trips me out when I read that a whopping 75 percent of Americans aren’t just dehydrated —they are chronically so. And since summer is when a lot of outdoor parties and vacations go down, I think it would be ridiculous of me not to put on record thatalcohol is a diuretic (which means that it definitely has the ability to dehydrate you).
So, if you’re gonna turn up, try and have (at least) one cup of water for every twococktails that you consume. And what if you prefer the non-alcoholic version of cocktails known as mocktails?Sugar has the ability to dehydrate you as well and since many mocktails are loaded with that, the same water rule for cocktails should be applied.
9. Grill Lean Meats
If you do plan on enjoying your fair share of grilled meats over the next few months, there are a couple of things to keep in mind. One, althoughgrilled meat is certainly better for you than, say, frying it,the smoke and carcinogenic compounds that can come from preparing meat in this fashion do have the ability to increase your cancer risk.For the record, doing things like removing the fat, marinating the meat beforehand, lowering the temperature of your grill, and grilling for shorter periods of time can all help to make grilling a healthier experience. So can eating leaner meats becausethey are lower in saturated fats yet they canstill give you the nutrients that you need.
10. You Don’t Have to Go to EVERY Cookout. Lawd. LOL.
Let’s not sit up here and act like one of the best things about summer is going to somebody’s cookout.Problem is, some of the unhealthiest foods (and drinks) are oftentimes served there, from hot dogs and ribs with barbeque sauce to potato salad (with all of that mayo) and sodas. That said, just make sure that if you are invited to more than a few cookouts, either you don’t attend every one or you eat something healthy before you attend. That way, you’ll eat one hamburger instead of three or one rib instead of an entire slab. Feel me?
Now that you know how to do it responsibly — enjoy the taste(s) of summer, y’all!
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Yeah, I’m not a fan of that because, once you’ve already “locked in” on that level, going to see a marriage counselor or life coach is pretty much only seen as a mere formality. In other words, you’re not really looking to dive deep to see if there are some potential red, orange, or even yellow flags — you’re just going to a couple of sessions because it sounds like the right thing to do.
And because of that mindset, far too many people go into marriage totally blindsided and/or thinking that they can deal with things later and/or believing that love (which usually is some emotional version, not the biblical one — I Corinthians 13) will conquer all — and because of that, divorce court ends up becoming their reality. If not semi-immediately…eventually.
That’s why I write articles like this. Wisdom says that if you want to get into something as serious as marriage and you’re going to look someone in their eyes and vow to be with them for the rest of your lives, you both should know as much as possible about what you’re getting yourselves into…beforehand.
The following eight questions can help to lead the way when it comes to this…
1. Childhood Issues
GiphyA few nights ago, I found myself getting caught up in a movie on HBO Max calledOn Chesil Beach. It drags, so I’m not (necessarily) recommending it. However, it does help to drive home this first point that I’m trying to make because it’s all about the purely excruciating wedding “night” of a couple who waited to (attempt to) consummate their marriage. Although for a lot of it, the wife was pretty annoying, you do get glimpses of her childhood that help to shed light on all of her excuses and hesitancy (and there was A LOT of both).
If you do happen to want to watch the film, I won’t give all of what happens away. What I will say is that one of the main reasons why going to premarital counseling is so important is you and your bae should talk about childhood issues.
Listen, as one of my favorite quotes says, “Adulthood is surviving childhood.” Meaning, a lot of times, marriages struggle because it’s not two healed adults who are in the relationship; it’s more like two wounded (on some level, at least) kids who are trying to make a valiant attempt at an adult dynamic.
I know many people who grew up in hella dysfunctional homes who simply said, “I will never be like my parents when I grow up,” only to turn around and be just like them. How did that happen? It’s because of something that I tell a lot of my clients: we tend to do what’s familiar, not what’s right. The main way to prevent that from happening is by being open and honest about where we come from, how it all affected/infected/impacted us, and then getting help, if needed, before jumping the broom.
2. Greatest Heartbreak
GiphyAlthough I’m not sure that there is solid data on what I’m about to say, I stand ten toes down on the fact that I don’t think that men look to “fall in love” multiple times. If anything, they have a first love, their wife, and possibly someone in between. Why? Because contrary to what social media likes to cram down our throats about men, many men when they fall, they fall very hard and are all in. Case in point, I can’t tell you how many guys have told me how much of an influence their first love has had on them — even to this day. And when something monumental happens, it can totally change you (check out “Your Soulmate Might Be The One Who Broke You”).
That’s why I also think it’s a good idea for you and your man to discuss what your greatest heartbreak was like — past (how it affected you) and present (how you feel about the experience now). It can shed great light into how you see relationships and love and why you make some of the decisions that you now do. It can also help you both to express if there are still some unresolved issues that are dormant there because I can’t tell you how many clients I’ve had who, when things got rocky in their marriage, the very first place they went to was Facebook or Instagram to see what their “long lost love” has been up to.
A writer by the name of Jodi Picoult once said, “Once you had put the pieces back together, even though you may look intact, you were never quite the same as you'd been before the fall.” Both of you discussing how this saying relates to this particular topic can, as I put it, “cover up mouseholes.” What I mean by that is, by getting it all out in the open, your partner will be able to know your wounds and weaknesses in that area and offer up some support and even protection — in ways you, he, or both may not have known was needed…until the topic was actually brought up.
3. Financial Habits
GiphyYou know, I find it very interesting how the Good Book says that the LOVE of money is the root of all evil (I Timothy 6:10), and yet, pretty much any time I tiptoe out to see what social media is yapping — sorry, I mean talking — about, “broke” comes up incessantly. Listen, should you want to be with someone who is financially savvy and stable? 1000 percent. Should you also be the kind of person who you want to be with? 10,000 percent.
That said, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been in a premarital session and asked both people what their credit score was, only for them to look at me like I asked them to strip naked or something. LOL. Well, I guess, in a way, it’s the same thing because nothing reveals someone’s financial stuff like their credit score and what they’ve got in their savings account. Yet if you’re thinking that your soon-to-be spouse isn’t going to find all of that out anyway, you’re caught up in some sort of delusion that I’m not sure any therapist can get you out of.
Personally, I think that engaged couples should hire a financial advisor and get a financial mentor (preferably a married couple) to comb through both of their finances so that they can see each other’s current state, areas of strengths and weaknesses, and so they can come up with a financial plan for their first, third and fifth year of marriage.
You know, although actually the top reason for divorce these days has a lot to do witha lack of support (emotionally and otherwise),financial stuff is still up there. A part of the reason for that is that there’s no way around the fact that marriage is a business contract (among other things). If you’re signing up to do business with someone, you need to know what their finances look like. That’s common sense 101.
4. Character Weaknesses
GiphyAnyone who knows me knows that if someone tells me that they believe that they’ve met “the one,” while they are acting like that person is an angel on earth, the marriage life coach (and “Shellie”) in me is like, “Uh-huh. What are their character flaws, though?” It’s not to break their spirit or be a Debbie Downer or anything; it’s just that I have watched too many marriages crash and burn because they didn’t ask themselves questions like that before saying, “I do.”
For instance, one of my friends (who, yes, happens to be divorced now) told me that he had met who he believed was his soulmate; when I asked him about her potential character weaknesses, one of the things that he casually said was, “I mean, she has a bit of a jealousy streak but…” Umm, sir — you are handsome and an entertainer and you’re going to marry a jealous woman? Hacked emails and tons of drama later, he admits that he wished that he hadn’t underestimated that side of her personality.
Listen, no one is perfect — not by far. In fact, if you’re mature in your thinking, a part of what marriage is designed to do is give you the kind of accountability partner that will offer a safe space for you to address, refine, and improve some things about yourself.
However, in order for you and your partner to be able to do that, you need to know what those things are — and that needs to be discussed well before your wedding day, preferably in the presence of a reputable marriage therapist, counselor, or life coach who can help you to figure out what to do with the intel that the both of you are sharing.
5. Poor Boundaries
GiphyWhen you sign up to become someone’s spouse, your wedding day, in part, is about declaring to everyone that you want to make them the top priority in your life under God himself. And in order to keep anything from affecting that, you need to have some solid boundaries. Boundaries, at the end of the day, are nothing more than limits — and yes, you need to have limits as far as how much your family can know about your relationship, what your friends can and cannot speak on, and what kind of decisions y’all will make that, quite frankly, is no one else’s business…including the internet’s (because A LOT of people out here like to be passive aggressive about their relationship online).
Does it take a village to “raise a marriage?” In some ways, yes. However, when it comes to the vow-taking process, that is between a husband and his wife, and if they are religious, God. No one else made those promises and that means no one else should be as involved or invested as those two (or three) parties are.
Poor boundaries are the cause of so much drama in marriages and honestly, relationships, in general. You do not want to take the approach of, “We’ll figure out what limits we should have as problems present themselves.” Uh-uh. Talk about what your limits should look like ASAP, and make sure that you mutually agree on them too. This point alone can save your marriage more than just about anything else on here.
(P.S. A great book for you to check out isBoundaries in Marriage: Understanding the Choices That Make or Break Loving Relationships. It’s by Dr. Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend.)
6. Perspectives on Daily Lifestyle
GiphySomething else that I’ve observed while working with married folks (and talking to older couples in Cracker Barrel; believe it or not, the marriage advice in there is top-notch!) is marriages tend to end, not so much because of one “big” thing that happened — it’s more like it’s due to the culmination of a lot of little ones.
Take how a person lives, for instance. I’ve dealt with couples where the wife was appalled by her husband not wiping the toilet seat, and the same husband was disgusted by her dishes being left in the sink overnight. A couple of weeks of this, and it’s whatever. Oh, but let it be some years? You’d be surprised.
It can actually be quite sobering to take a moment to ponder and process that, at least when you sign up for a traditional marriage, you’re signing up to share a home, bed, and life — for the rest of your life. If there are certain things that are super “icks” for you, if there are certain chores that you absolutely hate, if there are little pet peeves like sleeping with the television on or your partner being a morning person when you aren’t — you had better bring all of this stuff up now.
Many people have assumed that love will supersede peace when it comes to daily living. Chile, the reality is that you can love a lot of people who you just can’t live with. Please don’t find that out after taking vows and filling out paperwork. Discuss as much as possible about the day-to-day of how you both move, just as soon as you possibly can.
7. Patterns in Past Relationships
GiphyIn interviews, some folks will ask me what I think about the whole “Does knowing someone’s body count really matter?” debate (check out “6 Things About The Whole 'Body Count' Debate That Should Be Discussed”). As it relates to this particular article, two things: one, check out TIME’s article, “How Previous Sexual Partners Affect Offspring,” when you get a chance. Secondly, let’s do it like this: if you were to find out that your boyfriend used to beat up on his girlfriends, but he hasn’t done it in a couple of years, would “That’s in the past” suffice as his rationale? BE HONEST.
No matter how nonchalant our culture chooses to be about sex, how we decide to move in that space is about more than recreation and experiencing orgasms. So yes, knowing about your past in this realm can shed light on your mindset, your perspective, and even some of your patterns — not just your sexual past, but your past, in general.
Anyone who wants to give pushback on that, I’ll just say this: it is human nature to brag about things that we’re proud of. When it comes to your sexual past, if you’re hiding or deflecting concerning it, why is that? And what would make you think that, eventually, the things that you are suppressing won’t somehow come out anyway? Real talk, a great sign that you’re over something or someone is when you can bring it or them up — not when you’re doing everything in your power to avoid it/them.
And when it comes to past relational patterns overall — have you always been the one to do most of the work? Do you tend to flee when things get too challenging? Do you ever stop to think about what you did wrong? Do you tend to handle things with ultimatums? Do you treat relationships as projects? Do you avoid things with sex? Do you not communicate your innermost feelings well?
A pattern is something that you do over and over, oftentimes very naturally. When it comes to the men of your past, what qualifies as a pattern for you? Getting married doesn’t miraculously make those patterns go away. Discussing them can help you to get to the root of those issues and if you need to break some of them on the front end.
8. Media Programming
GiphyA quote that I find myself saying often is by The Doors singer, Jim Morrison: “Whoever controls the media, controls the mind.” There is no way around the fact that media influences and impacts society on some pretty monumental levels (you can read more about thathere,here, andhere) — and so to think that what you take in when it comes to television programs that you view, movies that you watch, books that you read and social media accounts that you follow aren’t affecting you? That is some serious denial that you are in.
Case in point. I have a friend who also works in mental health. Whenever his wife is watching some trash reality television (and boy, is there A TON of it), he says that she is way more touchy to the point of almost being combative than when she isn’t. One time, he instituted a two-week fast from reality television. He said that the first week was rough for her, which caused her to realize that she was way more attached to the shows than she thought. The second week, she was calmer and far more peaceful (her words, not his). Did she totally give reality television up? I mean, we’re all a work in progress, right? LOL. She does watch it less, though, and their marriage is running smoother because of it.
As we close all of this out, definitely an underestimated influence in marriage is the media. Find out what your partner likes and why. See where the two of you are in sync, where you’re not, and what you think the compromises should be. Otherwise, you could end up with someone who is making judgment calls about your relationship based on what some random on TikTok said — you’d be amazed how many people do that. And it’s a damn shame that they do.
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There’s a reason why this article has the title that it does. Getting real — and I mean, really real — about relationships isn’t always the most comfortable thing to do; however, it is beneficial.
And what, after (genuinely) addressing things like this, you find out that you’re not as compatible as you thought? Eh. That doesn’t have to be the end of the world. Either — again, with the help of a marriage expert — figure out how to compromise or, if you ultimately can’t find enough common ground…as I oftentimes say, It’s always better to break up before marriage than divorce after it.
Words to live by. Promise you that.
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