OCTOBER 8TH
OCTOBER 13TH
BTCF Board Member Dr. Gia Marson talks with Goop about helping loved ones with an eating disorder.
Breaking the Chains and NEDA
Breaking the Chains Foundation partnered with NEDA in support of National Eating Disorder Awareness Week on February 26 – March 4th by promoting awareness via a variety of our social media networks, celebrity support, sharing NEDA’s screening tool through our social media platforms, as well as having our own online event through out the week. Also joined NEDA in forming our own team for the Los Angeles NEDA Walk on April 7th, walking and raising funds in support of stopping eating disorders.
GREAT NEWS
The award winning short film “FINDING ALICE” was an Official Selection both as a short film and written word in The Hollywood Dreamz International Film Festival and Writer’s Awards in Las Vegas, August 2017!
UPCOMING NEWS
STAY TUNED! – BTCF YOUNG HOLLYWOOD CAMPAIGN
June’s Recipe: Banana & Strawberry Foster
Canvas of Culinary ArtsBananas and Strawberry Foster
by Chef Gason Nelson
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup dark-brown sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Few splashes of vanilla extract
1/4 cup good quality dark rum
8 ounces strawberries, hulled and sliced in half
8 oz sliced bananas
1 loaf of butter cake or pound cake
Instructions
Heat butter, sugar, cinnamon, vanilla extract, and rum in a medium skillet over medium-low heat. Cook for 4-6 minutes, stirring while you cook. If the mixture catches on fire, turn off the heat until the flame subsides and then continue cooking.
Add strawberries & bananas, stirring to make sure they are all coated until warmed through, 2-3 minutes.
When it Comes to Exercise, More Isn’t Always Better
Blog, Health & Wellness ConversationsTrain Smarter, Not Longer
The other day, I posted a screenshot of my Oura ring data on social media. I do this sometimes to be transparent and show that as a fitness coach, I follow my own advice.
I’d had a reasonably active day, skateboarding, playing basketball, and running sprints, not to mention taking my dog on several walks. All in all, I’d averaged around 16 miles walking equivalency, 25,000 steps, and 2,800 calories burned by 8 pm. Not a bad day, activity-wise. I was tired, but in a good way — looking forward to sleep that night, but not that feel-like-I’ve-been-hit-by-a-truck type of tired.
Soon after I posted, a follower responded, suggesting I get a Peloton. His reasoning: I could burn way more calories than that in a day with a sweaty spin session.
Now, I have nothing against Peleton or spin classes. I know many people who love using a Peleton to get in a quick at-home sweat session. I also fervently believe that any movement is good movement. If you enjoy what you’re doing — great. Keep doing it.
But indoor bike rides with twenty-somethings dancing and shouting motivational mantras are not my thing. And neither is making maximum calorie burn my main goal.
This wasn’t always the case. When I first started exercising after college, I struggled with body image issues and disordered eating. I was firmly in the “more is better” camp — often, I wouldn’t let myself stop exercising for the day until my fitness tracker informed me I’d burned 4,000 calories (a lot for a 130-pound girl). Sometimes, this meant doing jumping jacks five minutes before midnight until I finally hit that magic number.
This obsession with exercise took over my life. At the time, I thought about little else other than exercise and food. I was always exhausted and constantly had nagging injuries.
I now know this unhealthy cycle was a form of exercise addiction, an unhealthy obsession with exercise to lose as much weight as possible. My constant focus on more-is-better put me at risk for behavior that did more harm than good. Unfortunately, I still see this mindset perpetuated by much of the fitness industry. The message often portrayed by gyms and fitness classes is that you should always go longer, push harder, and do more. But here’s why the focus on more exercise is a trap:
It puts the focus solely on appearance or weight loss
When your goal is to simply burn as many calories as possible during a workout, you’re likely focused on weight loss or appearance-related goals. This can be fine as a short term goal, or if you need to lose a significant amount of weight for health reasons — but for long-term health it isn’t sustainable.
Why? For two important reasons:
1. With the more-is-better mindset, there’s rarely an endpoint. It’s almost impossible to know when enough is enough.
When I fell into this way of thinking, I’d always leave a workout session thinking I should have done more. 4,000 calories a day? Why not 4,500? One workout class? Why not two?
Not only does this put you in a never-enough cycle of guilt, it can also do more harm than good. For example:
Despite what the fitness industry says, more exercise is not always better.
2. Research shows that appearance is the least motivating reason to work out — which is why people with appearance-related goals consistently experience yo-yo workout motivation.
One reason this may be the case is that when you set an appearance-related goal, the pull between your future self (I want to fit in a smaller pair of jeans) and your current self (I want to eat this cookie right now) just isn’t strong enough to change your behavior in the moment. Without a deeper reason behind your decisions, it’s a lot easier to give in to what’s in front of you. Rather than focusing only on appearance-based goals, I encourage my clients to create goals based around performance, adventure, or learning new skills, sports, or activities. These types of goals add joy to your life while helping you stay more motivated long-term.
Cardio can be addictive
One of my biggest gripes with group fitness classes, whether in person or online, is that they make the focus all about cardio, with the goal usually being to burn as many calories as possible. Some cardio is obviously healthy. Regularly getting your heart rate up does wonders for your body and mind, helping to ensure long-term health, increase energy levels, decrease depression and anxiety, and so much more. Research shows we should all be getting at least 150 minutes of moderate aerobic activity or 75 minutes of intense aerobic activity every week.
Cardio can also give us a euphoric feeling, or what’s known as runner’s high. Despite the name, it can occur with nearly any form of aerobic exercise. You may feel a runner’s high when your activity has caused chemical changes in the body and brain, similar to the changes that happen when people take opioid drugs.
The result is that we can actually get addicted to cardio — just like we can get addicted to drugs.
Psychologist and addiction specialist Elizabeth Hartney warns that this frequent high exposure to drug-like opioids due to excessive exercise can lead people to overexercise at the detriment of their health. Too much exercise can lead to overtraining syndrome, resulting in fatigue, sickness, injury, lack of motivation, and loss of performance. It can also become an unhealthy obsession, taking over everything else as the sole pleasure of life.
Train smarter, not longer
Don’t just fall into the more-is-better trap. Making it your goal to burn as many calories as possible in every workout puts you at risk for an unhealthy mindset and even possible exercise addiction.
Instead, get to the root of why you’re exercising and aim to train smarter — not longer.
If you want to lose weight for health reasons or to feel better in your body, steady-state cardio isn’t everything. Other useful forms of exercise are high-intensity interval training (HIIT) and sprinting, which as a bonus, can help increase your metabolism so that your body burns more calories at rest.
If your goal is to be healthy and fit and increase your healthspan, the number of years you’re healthy and able to do the things you love, cardio is an essential piece of that. But so are resistance training, flexibility, mobility work, and nutrition. Don’t put too much focus on one versus the other.
If you want to make exercise a part of your lifestyle, find something you actually enjoy doing. Think about those performance, adventure, or skill-based goals I mentioned above. If you’re not sure what your goals are, think about the things you loved doing as a kid, and do those.
Also, make sure to enjoy life. If, as it did for me, exercise ever takes up too much of your life, you can be sure something is wrong. Peleton can be a part of that, but it doesn’t have to be. Aim for balance and never use exercise as a form of punishment.
Ultimately, exercise should be a source of joy, meaning, and connection in your life.
“Movement offers us pleasure, identity, belonging and hope. It puts us in places that are good for us, whether that’s outdoors in nature, in an environment that challenges us, or with a supportive community. It allows us to redefine ourselves and reimagine what is possible. It makes social connection easier and self-transcendence possible.” — Kelly McGonigal
An Interview with Mary Basmadjian
Artist Blogs“Laughter is the best medicine.”
photo credit Arthur Hamilton
AN INTERVIEW WITH MARY BASMADJIAN
BTCF: What motivated you to become a comedian?
MARY: I always loved storytelling and making people laugh, finally decided to join the two together. I also felt I was in a unique situation where I wasn’t constricted by social standards like most Armenian girls would be.
BTCF: What is your process of developing characters for your comedy performances?
MARY: The characters come from experiences and people I’ve met throughout the years. Some characters are a mixture of people I grew up with.
BTCF: BTCF uses all forms of art and its healing elements committed to the prevention of body-focused and mental well-being stigma. Does comedy have healing elements for you? If so, what are they and how do you connect to them?
MARY: Comedy for sure is healing for me. When I write a joke about something that is going on in my life, I know I’ve processed it (usually). I journal and write jokes at the same time and its very therapeutic. To add to it when I tell a joke that has a lot of personal meaning for me and I get laughs or applause of agreement it validates my feelings even more and I love that!
BTCF: How does comedy help your mental health?
MARY: As I said, when I tell a personal joke and it gets laughs or applause of agreement it validates me and I feel like I’ve processed it. Also, the community of great people I’ve met doing comedy helps my mental health as well. I frequent an all-female mic on Monday nights at the Tao Comedy Studio and that helps me so much to process and write out jokes
BTCF: Your character Vartoush Tota is so likeable, colorful, and very funny! How did Vartoush come to life? What does she mean to you?
MARY: At first Vartoush Tota character represented all the WRONG adults around me. Meaning the adults that would say stupid things like I need to lose weight to find a husband and things like that. But as time went on, I developed her to be more progressive and to serve as the perfect vessel of truth telling and lesson teaching with comedic timing.
BTCF: You perform in many cities and venues; do you have a favorite and why?
MARY: I love Flappers comedy club in Burbank that’s where I produce my shows. The staff / everyone there is so nice. Tao Comedy Studio in LA is also such a great and supportive place to perform. I’m just grateful to be performing live comedy again wherever that may be.
BTCF: Do you come from a show biz family background? What are your roots?
MARY: My paternal grandparents did some plays and sketches when I was a kid, my dad was part of it as well.
BTCF: Can you share a bit about your journey so far in your relationship with your body image?
MARY: For a very long time I’ve had a bad relationship with my body, but I’m starting to learn and unlearn certain things. I’m learning to appreciate this body and what it has done for me over the years.
BTCF: How did you originally hear about HAES, and what does it mean to you?
MARY: I heard it from Tammy from Keystone Treatment. Most of my life I was told I’m not healthy because I’m in a bigger body, but I’ve never displayed symptoms of any illnesses that would be connected to my size. I’ve learned that I am in fact healthy even at a bigger size.
BTCF: Has your culture shaped your relationship with your body and food? How?
MARY: YES. It’s very common in my culture to comment on bodies (weight gain / weight loss) without thinking about it twice. I’m Armenian and my ancestors survived genocide and famine, and I strongly believe that this has had a very big impact on our people as a whole. Growing up we are told to “eat it with bread so you can fill up” or “clean you plate so your future spouse is beautiful” I would assume my ancestors needed to eat like this to survive but that was passed down to us, forcing us to ignore body/ hunger cues and we are judged or pitied when we gain weight. Mixed signals to say the least
BTCF: Can you share a little bit about some of your other characters and how you came up with them?
MARY: I have a younger girl character and an older man character; I usually think about things I want to address in the community or talk about certain things and I ask myself who I want to see talk about this matter and I create that character.
BTCF: Do you like to cook? If so, what is your favorite dish to prepare?
MARY: Sometimes I love to cook and sometimes I don’t lol but my favorite things to cook are breakfast foods I LOVE eggs and cheese.
BTCF: Can you share 3 tips for those interested in creating comedy characters?
MARY: I’ve never taken character development classes, but I would suggest speaking from your own truth. It helps if the character is based on someone you know but it doesn’t have to be someone you know it can be anyone or anything that inspires you to share your truth the way it should be shared. Most importantly have fun doing it, if it not fun it’s not worth it. Don’t force anything.
BTCF: What would you share with youth today regarding using social media for positive and do you have any tips they can begin with?
MARY: Social media can be a double edged sword so it’s important to be mindful of what you’re posting and contributing to as a whole. I would suggest looking at some pages/ influencers that bring you joy and asking yourself what you can add to it that would make it your own. You can create something and NOT post, that’s ok too, that’s part of the social media journey. Start small and build on it, and don’t pay too much attention to numbers i.e.; followers, likes, reposts things like that, yes I understand analytics are important in the social media world but that can take a toll on a person and your mental health is more important than social media validation. 🙂
You can connect with Mary here!
Website: Marybasmadjiancomedy.com
Instagram / Facebook: Mary Basmadjian
YouTube: Mary Basmadjian Comedy
IG @marybasmadjian / FB @marybasmadjian / Twitter @marybasmadjian / TikTok @marybasmadjian