There I am in the check-out line at the grocery store with one high-spirited two-year-old trying to grab the nearest candy bar and a precocious five-year-old whining about why she can’t buy her very own tube of lipstick. And the worst part? I have to use the bathroom and quick! I’m thinking to myself, “This is my third trip to the toilet in one hour! What have I gotten myself into?” I had just started the first week of an innovative health plan, and what I didn’t know then was that the new and improved me was waiting just a short four weeks around the corner.
As a voice teacher, professional vocalist, wife, and mother of four, I most often have plenty to do. And yet sometimes I catch myself wandering aimlessly in an effort to know where to begin, especially when it comes to my own personal health and well-being. About a year ago a friend of mine introduced me to a book called The Game On! Diet by Krista Vernoff and Az Ferguson (www.thegameondiet.com). I read it and right away knew that this was for me. Here’s why.
I’m competitive. Like type A, red, obsessive/compulsive, perfectionist competitive. I like to win. It’s fun and fulfilling. I like to play games, especially ones that draw on my strengths and give me a better chance of winning. The Game On! Diet ingeniously combines personal effort with team accountability in an attempt to achieve a healthy life balance. It seemed to me like a win-win all the way around—begin anew, play a game, reclaim my life and, oh yeah, win.
The program outlines seven facets of a healthy lifestyle: balanced eating, exercise, water intake, enough sleep, adopting a good habit, eliminating a bad habit, and communication. For each of these aspects you receive points for your personal efforts on a daily basis. But the cleverest part is that you play on a team and you are accountable for a portion of that team’s weekly score. That means that if you screw up on your own, you also screw up for your whole team. I hate disappointing people even more than I like winning. So playing on a team provided a whole different motivation for me than dieting on my own. And I liked that.
Each day you are required to eat five balanced meals. Balanced as in one palm-sized protein, one fist-sized good carbohydrate, and one thumb-sized healthy fat. The game encourages you to eat real food. Artificial sweeteners are not allowed, but real maple syrup and honey in small amounts are. All grains must be whole grains, and soda is off limits. You are also to eat four fistfuls of veggies sometime during the day with any of your five meals.
To make it easy, the authors have included in the book a list of all “legal” proteins, carbs, and fats. They title it the F.Y.T. (Flatten Your Tummy) list. If you mess up on your portion, leave something out, or don’t eat in the time allotted for each meal (two to four hours between each meal), you lose points. If you don’t mess up, you keep your points and you are one step closer to winning. Have a lunch or dinner date coming up? No worries. The game also offers you one free meal and one entire free day each week, when you can eat whatever you want.
Twenty minutes of daily exercise (anything that gets and keeps your heart rate up) is all you need to earn 20 easy exercise points per day and hopefully shed some excess pounds. If you don’t want or need to lose weight, you can design a fitness goal that will increase your endurance/strength or ability and use the daily exercise to accomplish it. Fitness goals must be measurable. Either way, a fitness goal or a weight goal met at the end of each week means you get a large bonus in accrued points. “Only 20 minutes of sweat a day?” you say. Simple, I know. Of course, you can be an overachiever and go beyond 20 minutes, but you don’t get extra points for it. However, more exercise = more calories burned = more weight loss or improved fitness = more points = win the game. Did I mention I like to win?
If you get at least seven hours of sleep per night, you get points. Thankfully, children waking you up in the middle of the night (or, heaven forbid, all hours of the night) won’t count against you.
You also get points for drinking three liters (100 ounces) of water each day. This should be a piece of cake for singers, right? OK, I admit, I was a little out of practice at keeping my voice well hydrated. In fact, for years I’ve spent far more time filling sippy cups than drinking from them. My bladder’s learning curve was sharp on this point, and it called for some wise planning and shrewd bathroom location tactics whenever I was out. But I got used to it, and eventually the number of restroom visits per hour dwindled to a more manageable rate.
Every day you communicate with at least one person on your team and also with at least one person on an opposing team in order to get points. Both inspiring and aggravating, as well as almost always humorous, the communication becomes a very fun part of playing. I mean, really, when was the last time you got sanctioned smack talk?
Since you get to choose the team you are on, you can select people that you like (which means you could put the ones you don’t like on the opposing team and fuel some really fun trash talk). Each time I’ve played, I have found great teammates who inspire me, push me and, yes, even forgive me. When you’re tackling something as important and demanding as your health, it is wonderful to have a network of supportive friends cheering you on and working toward similar goals. This teamwork is yet another brilliant feature of the Game On! Diet.
Throughout the four-week challenge you also choose a good habit to adopt and quantify daily. It is something doable that helps you feel better about yourself. In one round, I decided to spend time organizing my home each day. I couldn’t believe what I could accomplish in just 20 short minutes! It was so refreshing at the end of the round to have closets and windows clean enough that even my own mother would be impressed. A fellow singer decided to add 30 minutes more to her daily vocalizing. In four weeks she saw big improvement in her range and agility. I have seen some other great examples of healthy habit adoption: decluttering, flossing, emptying your e-mail inbox, bed-making, practicing an instrument (ugh . . . hmm—voice, right?), journal writing, yoga, and service. The list is endless. The book refers to this as your “transformation” and, truly, nourishing a new knack can bring such empowerment.
Just like your wholesome habit puts your body into a place of optimal health, so does the purging of a bad habit—yes, still another part of the “transformation.” Find something negative to eliminate from your life. I hate to admit that I have used more than one round to help me get rid of my tendency to procrastinate. I am the worst, especially when it comes to open-ended obligations. I do much better when I have a deadline, and even then I wait until the last minute. For me, I have noticed that procrastination also breeds excuse making. Game On! has given me several opportunities to look closely at how I prioritize, work, and communicate in an effort to avoid weak explanations of why I haven’t followed through on my commitment.
A beneficial endeavor year-round, avoiding procrastination is especially helpful during audition season. Procrastination and professionalism don’t go well together. I know I am much happier and more confident in an audition where I have thoughtfully (and efficiently) prepared. When I’m organized and on time, I generally sing well and feel no inner need to explain if I do make a mistake. Here are a few other gems (from the book) that are great to give up:
• Negative self-talk (great for audition season)
• Cursing
• Being late (also great for audition season)
• Texting while driving
• Pornography
• Gossip
• Complacency
• Addiction
Like many, I have spent a considerable portion of my post-child-bearing life auditioning diets like I would a part in an opera. I look, try, find a small measure of success, but nothing that really lasts or encourages whole and permanent well-being. Each attempt leaves me hungering (in every sense) for that ideal role. You know, the one that holds the most expressive and technical variation, the one with the most developed character and enthralling plot, the one with passion and fury and, most certainly, the one with the best costumes. After I finished my first round of Game On!, I knew that I had finally found that deep fulfillment unlike any diet I had tried previously, and the exciting results spurred my persistence.
Any dream role (whether in real life or on the stage) must contain an overall balance. The most dramatic highs and lows aren’t fully realized if there is no return to a steady and well supported foundation. I just finished my sixth round of Game On! and have lost over 35 pounds and feel more fit than ever. It has been a great and challenging journey for me. With each round of Game On!, I more fully appreciate the complete and total package this health plan promotes in discovering that sense of balance. It is fabulous to feel that I am making and maintaining strides toward a healthier, happier me. And the best part? When I did it right, I did indeed get that costume change—a whole new wardrobe!
So, armed with a brief description of the components that make up Game On!, you are now ready to play. And just in case fitting into your favorite jeans, a clutter-free house, or calm control of your life doesn’t hold enough incentive, you get to pick a prize for the winning team. It can be money. It can be tickets to your favorite opera. It can be an elegant dinner paid for by the opposing teams. Be daring and creative. Next time I play (and win, of course), the losers will be cleaning my bathrooms for a month.
What have you got to lose, besides a bad habit and, if needed, a few pounds? Read the book, but with fair warning—it contains an excessive portion of profanity (the one glaring flaw of The Game On! Diet). Create a team, pick a prize, earn your points, and definitely play to win.
Now if I could only figure out a way to manage my two little ones in the grocery store line . . . not sure the game can help me there.
