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New research: The emotions of 2020 transformed how we eat. If you want to release pain and pounds, a health coach has the tips you need to succeed.

It may be a new year, but we’re still feeling the effects of the 2020 shutdown. The “quarantine 15” added onto the typical holiday weight gain is having an impact on how we think about our food and how to take care of our bodies. Even a year later, our lives still feel disrupted. We are reaching for comfort food instead of healthy food. Our exercise goals have been crushed and tossed out with the trash. And why would we bother moving around if we’re just going to be in PJs all day!

Losing the weight we’ve gained can be a feat in itself, so this year, let’s change the way we think about diet and exercise with the Black Girl Joy Diet. In this article, we’re gonna take a look at what’s really feeding you. We may think of the foods we eat as the only thing that feeds us, but “primary foods,” as described by the Institute of Integrative Nutrition, are also important. Primary foods are the ingredients in your life that nourish your body, mind, and spirit.

In my latest article for the Sisters AARP newsletter, “Your 2021 Black Girl Joy Diet: Reclaim Happiness and a Healthy Weight”, I want to prioritize happiness within our healthy habits and take a closer look at what’s really feeding us. Click to read the full article here.

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Racism can feel like a daily occurrence in America, and there are so many ways we can experience it. There’s the random white woman touching your hair without your permission. The passive-aggressive colleagues who never really liked you and you think you know why. Or even the security guard that watches you way too closely while you’re out shopping. All of these experiences, and more, can add up to racial trauma, something that affects many of us every day. Especially after 2020.

It’s all exhausting and it can take a toll on our mental health. And it can be hard to prove or even diagnose, especially when speaking to a white doctor or therapist. However, recognizing the impact of these experiences in your life can be immensely helpful. That validation can help contribute to your recovery.

In my latest article for the Sisters AARP newsletter, “We’ve Experienced Racial Pain, Here Are Ways to Heal From It”, I share tips on how to identify the effects of racially traumatic experiences and start the healing process. Click to read the full article here.

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As the coronavirus continues its relentless march through humanity, there are rays of hope with the recent approval and distribution of the first vaccines. But it may still feel as if we are moving into a season of uncertainty, with cold settling in throughout many parts of the country and folks hunkering down for the season. This winter is sure to look—and feel—very different from winters past.

Seasonal sadness and feelings of loneliness are common for some with shorter days. These feelings are magnified with the country in the grip of a coronavirus resurgence, with hospitals in some regions overwhelmed with the sick and dying, millions still unemployed, miserly government support, and anxiety about when safe vaccines will be widely available. 

That brings us to “pandemic fatigue,” a sense of weariness from the steady case and death count and constant hyper-awareness—from washing your hands to wearing a mask to not being able to gather with others as freely as you normally would. Most of us have been dealing with this since early March of 2020, and the uncertainty of not knowing when it will end contributes to the sense of fatigue. Add to this fears of shutdowns—cutting us off from family, friends, and the places we love at a time when most people are drawn together by ritual and tradition—and it might seem as if we’re headed into the longest winter ever. 

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For communities of color in the United States, the impact is felt even deeper, as Black and Latino people, who are nearly twice as likely to die from the coronavirus as white people, have been disproportionately affected in urban, suburban and rural areas, and across all age groups throughout the country, according to The New York Times. These communities are also heavily affected by job loss, racial injustice, social inequities, and lack of (or loss of) insurance, and many have to manage the stress of working in frontline jobs where social distancing is difficult if not impossible. 

While many of these circumstances are simply not within your control, you do not have to let the worry of winter wash over you. You can aim to be your healthiest self by finding ways to stay connected, stay active, and stay positive while staying safe. Here are seven ways to help you to move through the season:

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1. Add walking to your day. A brisk walk, even just 10 minutes, gets your heart rate up and your blood flowing. Exercise that elevates your heart rate contributes to a D.O.S.E. of feel-good hormones. Brisk walking is also credited with helping you maintain a healthy weight, strengthen bones and muscles, help prevent heart disease and type 2 diabetes, and improve your mood. 

2. Stay connected. Even though you and your family or friends may not travel to see each other this year, you can still get together virtually via Zoom or FaceTime for game night, milestones, or other occasions that give you a reason to celebrate. Have the video rolling as you cook or have dinner together. Technology provides us many options to stay connected as we stay safely apart.

3. Expand your spiritual practice. Having a spiritual practice, whatever that looks like for you, will help you stay grounded during these tumultuous times. Whether it’s prayer, meditation, chanting, or some other practice, create space to focus inward and connect to a higher power, energy, or frequency. Need some help getting started? Try this guided meditation app, Liberate, which is a safe space for Black folk to develop a daily meditation habit.

4. Engage your creative side. Art is a cultural touchstone for many of us and often reflects what’s going on in our world—from music to writing and more. Try tuning into concerts online, dancing the night away to DNice, or safely visiting museums as a way to engage with the arts in your life. Want to learn to paint? Try a paint and sip class online. Cultivate a regular writing practice through journaling or use a site like Six-Word Memoirs to get you started.

5. Commit to learning something new. From cooking to jiu-jitsu to yoga, online classes are abundantly available for you to take your pick and are a great way to spend downtime at home. Joining a class gives you a reason to show up each week and creates opportunities for social connections with your fellow learners... 

Learn a new skill, participate in a favorite hobby with others via online groups, or take a fitness class. If yoga is your thing, or you’d like to try it out, here is a list of 20 Black yoga instructors with online classes to get you started.

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6. Be still. Know that winter is a time of rest and renewal. Many plants and animals that go dormant for the season emerge in the spring full of fresh life and energy.

You don’t have to hibernate, but your body may need to take a break. Give yourself the gift of a day or an hour or even 15 minutes with nothing to do. Slow down. Read. Listen to music or soothing sounds or your heartbeat, settle your body, and reset.

7. Be encouraged. Consider that you’re moving through the most difficult days of what may be the most difficult year in your lifetime. Journal about what you're grateful for at this inflection point in your life, what you’d like to leave behind in 2020, and what you need to move forward in 2021.

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Lift ev’ry voice and sing …

As I write this article, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are preparing to speak for the first time as President-Elect and Vice President-Elect of the United States of America after their historic, hard-fought win of the 2020 presidential election. 

‘Til earth and heaven ring …

Regardless of whether you are one of the 74 million-plus Americans who voted for the Biden-Harris ticket, it’s hard to ignore the jubilation that fills the streets of many cities around the country as supporters celebrate with strangers and loved ones alike. Many Americans are feeling something that perhaps they were running low on: hope. After four tumultuous, divisive years -- and a 2020 that no one could have imagined -- hope is a welcomed emotion.

Ring with the harmonies of Liberty …

Hope is a feeling of optimism rooted in the expectation that what you want will happen. Hope is about aspiring, believing and leaning on faith. With hope, the positive can prevail. Hope can anchor us when everything else seems uncertain or in decline. It helps us to hang on through anxiety, move through fear, recover from disappointment and reawaken dreams and desires. Hope is what animates our goals and drives us to reach them, which in turn gives us more hope. Yes, hope is regenerative. In working with a client who is experiencing deep sadness or depression, one of the first things that I try to determine is her capacity for hope, because hope is the scaffolding on which to build a way out of despair. 

Let our rejoicing rise … high as the list’ning skies … 

And hope, especially, is what we need in this moment. With systemic racism and disproportionate deaths from COVID-19 deeply afflicting our communities, hope may, at times, feel like all we have. This experience is not new for us. Historically, hope has fueled our resilience. Hope is what led enslaved Africans to dream of and steal away for freedom. Hope is what led the late Congressman John Lewis and hundreds of other brave souls to march across the Edmund Pettus bridge for voting rights. Hope is what fueled the effort of Shirley Chisholm, the barrier-breaking New York Congresswoman, to become the first Black person from one of the two major parties to pursue the presidential nomination. Hope is what led Black folks, and Black women in particular, to ensure that a Black woman became the first woman and first woman of color elected Vice President of the United States of America. 

We immerse ourselves in that which brings us hope. Hope is in our art, our literature and lyrics, on the screen and stage. It’s in the way we masked up, lined up, and broke out in the cha-cha slide while waiting at the polls. Every ballot mailed in was sealed with hope. 

Let it resound loud as the rolling sea …

Hope Wanted: New York City Under Quarantine" exhibit at the New-York Historical Society. Photography: Kay Hickman

Here are some reasons to remain hopeful in this historic moment and beyond:

Your voice matters. Witnessing the painstaking task of making sure every vote is counted should let you know that your vote matters and that you have the capacity to affect change.

Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us …

You can make a difference. Not only can you let your voice be heard in the national election, but you can also get involved in your local community. You can help with voter registration efforts, volunteer to be a poll worker, support a Political Action Committee, or you may even choose to run for office yourself. Even outside of politics, there are plenty of opportunities - in person and virtual. Find one that suits you and get involved with something bigger than yourself -- which in and of itself helps instill a sense of purpose and, yes, hope.

Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us …

You’re not powerless. This year especially, there may have been moments when you felt helpless. Perhaps you or someone you love fell ill with COVID-19, or perhaps you were financially affected by the pandemic. Yes, there may be some circumstances outside of your control, but if you try to focus on what you can control, and the ways you can find support, you may find that even in the toughest of times, you are more powerful than you think. 

Facing the rising sun of our new day begun ...

You can do hard things. Whether you waited in line for hours to cast your vote,  whether the candidates you supported down the ballot won or lost, you made it through the most polarizing election in a lifetime, and you are forging your way through what might seem like an impossible 2020. You are a survivor. And may that, too, bring you hope.

Let us march on 'til victory is won 

(“Lift Every Voice and Sing” lyrics by James Weldon Johnson & J. Rosamond Johnson.)

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The chronic racism in the United States is stressing out Black people all over the country. That stress may be causing us to hold our emotions in our bodies and causing us gain to weight. As upsetting as the actual act of racism is outwardly, we must remember to look inward and heal ourselves emotionally, mentally, and physically. Racism contributes to long-term chronic pain and life long diseases. Now that we know this, it's our job to be gentle with ourselves and take the time to nurture the only body we have now so we can continue to be great.

When your body is assaulted with racism, it can express itself mentally as anxiety, depression, irritability, exhaustion, and feeling overwhelmed. Physically, stress caused by racism can manifest itself as heart disease, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, and increased fat around your abdominal area. 

In my latest article for the Sisters AARP newsletter, “When Racism’s Heavy Toll Contributes to Weight Problems”, I share tips on how to heal your body in the moment and how to create a long term routine to combat the physical effects of racism. Click to read the full article here. 

The “angry Black woman” trope can be damaging to a Black woman’s psyche and your sense of self if you let it. But there are ways that your anger can inform and empower you. 

As the writer James Baldwin famously said in a 1961 radio interview when asked about being Black in America: “To be a Negro in this country and to be relatively conscious is to be in a state of rage almost all of the time — and in one's work. And part of the rage is this: It isn't only what is happening to you. But it's what's happening all around you and all of the time in the face of the most extraordinary and criminal indifference, indifference of most white people in this country, and their ignorance.”

Baldwin shared this observation nearly 60 years ago, but if you take inventory of the state of the world today -- in your life and in the broader society -- there’s still a lot to be angry about. It’s likely that you deal with persistent microaggressions in your professional and personal life, with  knowing that you are paid 38% less than white men and 21% less than white women even while you’re as qualified, and with experiencing repeated trauma from a newsfeed full of outrageous stories about the policing of Black bodies. Add to that the disproportionate impact of the COVID-19 virus on Black and Brown communities, and how could you not be angry?

Too many Black women feel they can’t acknowledge, much less express, their own anger for fear of being labeled an “angry Black woman.” But getting in touch with your anger could be just what you need to move through difficult experiences in your life.

As I recently wrote in an article for Sisters AARP, “anger is a part of a full range of emotions, and even though it’s a negative emotion (as are fear, anxiety and sadness), that doesn’t make it unhealthy. All emotions are useful because they convey information, and negative emotions help you recognize threats and respond to danger. So the question is, what is your anger telling you, and what can you do in response?”

Read on for the full article, You’re an Angry Black Woman? Own It. And learn how to put your anger to good use.

As Americans of all stripes march and rally and push to end racial injustice, not only are Black folks reinvigorated to to fight chronic, systemic racism — the other pandemic that we we’ve been facing all along — we’re also being asked to talk about it! In addition to exploring with family and friends in spaces where we feel comfortable, some of us are being invited by white colleagues to share our thoughts and experiences at the office.

But maybe you don’t want to talk about it at the office. And you know what? That’s OK!

In my latest article for the Sisters AARP newsletter, “Boundaries Matter: It’s OK to Not Want to Talk To White People about Racism,” I share some ways you can establish healthy boundaries in your workplace so that you can take care and protect yourself from racially traumatic experiences in white spaces. Read the article here.

The continuing rise of COVID-19 deaths and the disproportionate impact on Black folks, the killing of Breonna Taylor, the killing of Ahmaud Arbery, the killing of George Floyd—the first six months of 2020 have been a lot for us to handle. And understandably, so has the grief that we all feel. Not only are we grieving loss of life, but also the loss of our way of life in many cases where simple gestures such as a handshake or a trip to the grocery store require more contemplation than they ever had before. The important thing about grief, though, is not to avoid it, but rather to go through it so you can begin to heal.

In a recent article I wrote for Sisters from AARP, I share how you can use a framework called The Four Tasks of Mourning (by psychologist and death education expert J. William Worden), how to move through those tasks, and how to feel better over time. Click here to read the full article.

Although parts of the world are opening back up, the coronavirus pandemic is still ever-present, fraying nerves and patience as we all learn to adapt. Between balancing work (or looking for work), wondering if the kids will have camp this summer and way too many Zoom meetings and toilet paper scavenger hunts, it may seem as if the last thing you and your honey have time to think about is each other. If stress and busyness have created distance between you, it may be time to reconnect.

In a recent article I wrote for Sisters from AARP, I share how the stress we’re all under — whether we’re still quarantined or navigating life within this new world — can keep us from checking in with each other and making sure our “love tanks” are full. Click here to learn some simple ways to reconnect, refill and keep your love alive.

I recently appeared on the Support is Sexy podcast with author, speaker and coach Elayne Fluker, who interviews diverse and inspiring women and shares their entrepreneurial success stories of personal growth, courage and transformation.

We explored the uncertain, unnerving terrain of the world of the coronavirus. As news continues to fill our timelines and TV screens, and as we adapt to lives that are vastly different from the way they were at the start of the year, many of us are trying to figure out our "new normal."

Elayne led with thoughtful questions including how to manage stress and anxiety, how to harness the power of the breath, and how to practice self-care in meaningful ways. Viewers also had a chance to ask their own questions. 

This was one of Elayne's "Wine Down" sessions for Support is Sexy -- where viewers are invited to bring a glass of their favorite beverage and join her for real-deal talks with women experts in various fields.

In the end, we opened a powerful and healing dialogue about tools for Black women to cultivate resilience in the eye of the storm. You can hear the full conversation below':

I thank Elayne - a creative visionary, collaborator, friend and former ESSENCE colleague - for providing a necessary space for women to gather, speak their truths, face their challenges and lift one another up.

You can find Elayne's impressive collection of interviews with more than 500 women entrepreneurs from around the world at supportissexy.com.