#imagreatist Ambassador!

A few weeks ago in one of my Frankenstorm 2012 posts, I quickly announced that I have been chosen to be a Greatist Ambassador. I am beyond excited and honored to be chosen out of the many health enthusiasts out there! I'm sure choosing the ambassadors was not an easy task for them. So today I want to share with you a little more about my Ambassadorship with Greatist and the letter that got me there!

If you haven't visited Greatist yet, you should zip over there right now and check them out! Greatist is all about making health and fitness easy by providing quality content to help you make healthier choices in your everyday life! They offer healthy tips, GWOD (Greatist Workouts of the Day), news, podcasts and A-Z guides on health, happiness and fitness! They've got it all!

When I saw the post Announcing Greatist Ambassadors - Apply Today and Do Good!, I knew right away that I wanted to become an Ambassador! I too share the desire to inspire and show others that living a healthy lifestyle can be easy and fun! Plus I always enjoy reading Greatist articles on my Pulse news reader while riding the subway around town, and I follow them on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram AND Pinterest :)

So if you haven't already seen me use the hashtag #imagreatist in my posts, start keeping an eye out for it now. There are already tons of great posts around the web by other ambassadors sharing their healthier choices via #imagreatist, so do a search now!

 This is what I wrote:

My name is Amber, I live in beautiful Brooklyn, NY and I blog at ExSoyCise.com. I would love to be a Greatist Ambassador because I have a serious passion for living a healthy lifestyle and sharing it with others. 

 My mission is to show people that living a healthy life doesn't have to be boring, it can be fun and flavorful! I hope that sharing my story will help to motivate and inspire others who may also be struggling with weight loss or who are dealing with food allergies. 

 I started the blog ExSoyCise so I would have a place to share my soy-free and dairy-free fitness journey.  I have been on a weight loss roller coaster my entire life. After many years of being on the wrong path of failed diets and trying to find that “magic” pill, I got back on the right path by eating a healthy clean diet, weight training and learned to LOVE the benefits of living a healthy lifestyle!

 Once I started planning and cooking most of my meals at home, eating 5-6 mini-meals per day, and exercising regularly, the weight started to come off naturally. Over the last two years I’ve lost about 17lbs and have gained lean muscle. Along the way, my clean diet helped bring to my attention that I was allergic to soy and lactose intolerant. I got what I call the "soy belly" any time I consumed any amount of soy. It was very hard to adapt to a soy and dairy free diet at first because they are in almost everything on the shelves these days. I found it difficult when I was out in the city and couldn't grab an “easy” on the go meal such as protein bars or a quick sandwich. These challenges helped me to realize that if I want to be successful and feel my best, I would have to cook ALL of my own food and there would rarely be times when I can just grab a “quick” bite to eat out.

 

I’ve made the most out of living soy and dairy free by creating fun new recipes such as my cinnamon pumpkin protein loaf and my banana and chocolate chip protein pancakes. I love creating these recipes because they are soy, dairy and gluten free, loaded with healthy ingredients, easy to make and last but not least they make me feel like I am enjoying a naughty treat!

 

On my blog I also share reviews of all of some of my favorite things, soy allergy information, my progress, and motivational tips and tricks that help me to stay on track.

 Besides my blog, I am very active on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Tumblr and Pinterest. On these platforms I share photos of the foods I eat daily, motivational tips and tricks, videos and other fun articles that I think are interesting. I am also a FitFluential Ambassador and have participated in several events such as the Fitness Magazine FitblogNYC event, Bob Harper's book release event, Yoga in the Park, Whole Foods health events and connect with other health bloggers on a regular basis in my spare time!

 I hope you will consider me to be a Greatist Ambassador! Thank you for listening to my story!

 How will you make a healthier choice today or throughout this week?

xoxo - Amber