Don’t let Halloween pass you by without having at least a little bit of fun. Halloween is one of the only holidays left that is still mostly just about fun. No gift giving expectations, crowded stores, or extreme busyness. That doesn’t mean Halloween can’t be ruined by Adultitis, as this latest case study video from the Cure Adultitis Institute attests.

If there was ever a holiday in which you shouldn’t take yourself too seriously, this is the one. Have some fun. At the very least, keep the broccoli in the freezer.

Technorati Tags: Cure Adultitis Institute, Halloween, stress, fun, Adultitis, broccoli

| Comments (3)

All this week (Monday, Oct. 29 through Friday, Nov. 2), we’re running a special promotion at the Lemonade Stand. If you place an order, we’ll throw in a handful of candy and other Halloween surprises. Like what, you may ask?

Well that’s why it’s called a surprise, silly.

There’s no order minimum and you don’t need to enter a special code. All you have to do is place an order. Dressing up in costume is optional. It’s sort of like a grown-up version of trick-or-treating. (After all, why should kids get to have all the fun?)

What are you waiting for? Go shopping now!

Technorati Tags: Halloween promotion, free candy, trick-or-treat for adults

| Add a Comment!

In our speaking programs, Jason and I share with our audiences about The Escape Plan. One of the challenges we highlight is #24: Outside the Lines: Figure out a way to add some color to your day in a new, unusual, or wacky way.

It’s funny to think that something as simple as color can help cure your Adultitis, but it really can.

Here’s a simple and wacky idea you can try today. Next time you are cooking, grab the food coloring and get a little silly (We’re all aching for a little silliness!). This is how Jason accomplished this challenge the first time around. For breakfast he ate green eggs, drank red orange juice and had his Captain Crunch in blue milk. (seems chalky to me) You can see the picture here.

Dr. Seuss, an inspiration for Jason’s breakfast choices that morning, had something to say about this playfulness.

I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, It’s a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope. Which is what I do, And that enables you to laugh at life’s realities.

Something tells me Dr. Seuss may have been one of these rare individuals who lived an Adultitis-free life.

This past Wednesday evening we worked with a room full of stressed-out families and individuals at our speaking program and I shared the story about Jason’s encounter with the food coloring. I mentioned that with Halloween coming up, it’s the perfect time of year to do this. I challenged them to leave the food coloring on the counter for the next week and see what happens. How about serving up a meal of green meatloaf, purple mashed potatoes, orange creamed corn and black milk? YUM?!

On Thursday morning I received this email from a woman who attended the program with her daughter. She shared,

Just wanted to say thank you thank you. This morning I went to work dressed in my Halloween clown outfit! We had a great time last night. My daughter really enjoyed it also. So this morning when she went to school I made her lunch which included blue cottage cheese, orange milk and green cream cheese on her bagel. I can’t wait till she opens up her lunch. I really needed last night. So, thank you again.

Later in the day I received yet another email from her.

To make the story even more funny… for my lunch I had taken the rest of the container of cottage cheese which did not contain the blue food coloring. To my surprise my daughter had also added blue food coloring to that container of cottage cheese without my knowledge. So I can’t wait to pick her up from school today and ask her who put the food coloring in my cottage cheese! We sure are having fun with this.

How fun to make the colors a surprise!

I guarantee that you will instantly morph into your five-year-old self as you watch the color overtake the unsuspecting yummies.

We’d love to see what you come up with, so feel free to email me pictures of your colorful edibles.

Technorati Tags: food coloring, Dr. Seuss, Green Eggs and Ham, The Escape Plan, playfulness, silliness

| Comments (3)

(This is an excerpt of an article written for Kim & Jason magazine by Jill Fleming, MS, RD, a registered dietitian and amazing wellness speaker.)

Do you love your body? I do now, but I didn’t always. Nineteen years ago, I went to college and gained 40 pounds in just 2 years. I had a very low self-image and made terrible lifestyle choices. I now refer to these lifestyle choices, such as eating junk food, inactivity, excess consumption of food or alcohol, sleep deprivation and chronic (uncontrolled) stress as “Crap Choices.” I made crap choices daily and I felt like crap!

After earning two degrees in nutrition, I began to make better lifestyle choices. I call these healthier choices “Love Your Body Choices™.” I lost my excess weight and began to feel good again. The more Love Your Body Choices I made, the better I felt. The better I felt, the more my body craved these same choices.

Food—particularly fast food—is so readily available that we are rarely planning our meals in advance anymore. Our grandparents used to plan for meals a full day in advance. They would thaw the meat, prep the vegetables, and even bake the dessert. They planned meals that were fairly well balanced. Today, we go through the drive through after a busy day. Not only does our meal rarely include healthy options, like fruit and vegetables, but we are not even getting out of our car to get the food.

We are also much less active than we used to be. Advances in technology have allowed us to accomplish more, as we do less. One day I realized that our family was… (read the full article on page 18 in the FREE digital version of Kim & Jason magazine.)

| Add a Comment!

Chuck Westbrook has a blog called I Hate Your Job. While poking fun at cube life, it offers funny, irreverent, yet practical advice on how you can enjoy your job more (or find another one).

He’s 23-years-old.

Does that make him too young to offer valuable advice to someone in the middle of their career? That’s the question Rennie Sloan of Motto Magazine proposed. Here’s an excerpt:

He seemed a bit young to me to truly grasp this concept – don’t you have to be out there for a while before you understand the ways in which the last comment tossed out by an insufferable colleague during a meeting can fuel Google searches of how to earn a living selling sunscreen in a Tahitian hut?… can you really appreciate the rewards of escaping the traditional 9-5 career if you never had to pay your dues and suffer through it?

Rennie goes on to say that she does hope that more young people become inspired to successfully pursue nontraditional and rewarding career paths. But the urge to undermine the wisdom of another person, simply because he or she has not reached a certain age or does not have a certain level of experience, is a strong one.

Kim and I get this a lot. I can see it on the faces of some people in our audiences as they sit their with crossed arms and sour faces. “What do these two young kids know about life? What can they teach me about anything?”

These people used to bother me. Now they just sadden me.

Wisdom is the application of truth. Sometimes, but not always, does it have anything at all to do with age or experience.

Children, although quite low on the age and experience meter, often seem to have an otherworldly wisdom about them. They get the idea that having your dad read you a bedtime story is more about the time spent together than the quality of the story or how expensive the book was. Kids understand that a simple ladybug is just as elegantly designed — maybe more so — as a modern day cell phone. And somehow they know that a hug can do more to heal a broken heart than a long-winded lecture.

When we see this wisdom borne out in a little one, should we disregard it because it comes from someone who is not able to tie his own shoes? Of course not.

You see, people who discount other people in such ways are really just creating an excuse to not accept the truth. It could be that they are embarrassed that it took so long for them to see the light. Perhaps they are regretful of choices made and the opportunities missed. Or maybe they are afraid of the changes that would have to be made if they accepted this new truth into their lives. You see, if we discredit the source of the truth, we give ourselves an out. We can ignore our responsibility to do something about it.

As the cult classic television show The X-Files proposed, “The truth is out there.” Your first challenge is to understand that truth and wisdom can be revealed by anyone: a Harvard educated expert, a twenty-something blogger, or a four-year-old next to you on the bus.

Your second — and most important — challenge is to have the courage to act on it.

There’s a good chance that sometime this week, someone will share a bit wisdom that can make your life better. Will you be able to see it if the messenger isn’t someone you’d expect? And if you do see it, will you do anything about it?

Technorati Tags: wisdom, ageism, career advice, truth, ChuckWestbrook

| Comments (4)

But don’t take our word for it. Coolsiteoftheday.com has just named Adultitis.org as it’s Cool Site of the Day for October 26, 2007.

Pretty cool.

If you have not had a chance to hop on over to Adultitis.org, now’s as good a time as any. Maybe the coolness will rub off on you. At the very least, you’ll want to get tested to see what stage of Adultitis you have.

Oh, and we’d really appreciate it if you took a few seconds to vote for us over at Cool Site. (You’ll see the voting drop down at the top of the page.) If we land enough votes, we may even be considered for Cool Site of the Year. Now that would be cool.

Technorati Tags: Adultitis, Cool Site of the Day, cool

| Add a Comment!

Recently during an Escape Plan TV episode I excitedly purchased a pair of red Chuck Taylor low tops. Love ‘em! (Yeah, I know I have BIG feet.) It’s just plain fun to wear them. But an unexpected free prize has proven to happen every time I sport these playful sneakers. Inevitably someone comments on them… every time. Perfect strangers are giving me the thumbs up, big cheesy grins, and sharing stories of their favorite pair of Chucks. It’s almost like they are partaking in the fun as well. I honestly wasn’t expecting this to happen, but it’s turned into an insightful social experiment.

I love this quote…

Be eccentric now. Don’t wait for old age to wear purple.

Why do we wait until we are retired to finally muster of the courage to be a little bold?

You’ve seen them… the smiling ladies in the big red hats (aka the Red Hat Society). They rock! It always brings a smile to my face to see a group of ladies all decked out in their purple and red. They are obviously enjoying life and surrounding themselves with other playful people… a great strategy for staying young.

What about you? Does your closet reflect your personality?

Even if you have a “dress code” in your 9 to 5, what about amping up the accessories… socks, shoelaces, jewelry, neckties, purses, cufflinks, etc.

Challenge #36 from The Escape Plan is “Accessorize your wardrobe today with a touch of childhood.”

What can you do to add a little touch of playfulness to your attire?

If you “kick it up a notch,” you will soon see just how contagious playfulness really is.

Technorati Tags: Chuck Taylor, fun, Escape Plan, accessories, playful clothing, Red Hat Society

| Comments (4)

Every Thursday, we pick out one of the cool things from the Kim & Jason Lemonade Stand and give it away. Yep, for free.

This week’s prize is a set of Atomic Food Containers. They scream, “Keep Out — this tasty lunch is mine!” There will be no more mix ups — or stolen lunches — because these food containers are instantly recognizable. One set includes three different sized bowls, each having a different attention-getting message. Bowls are dishwasher and microwave safe and come in three hot translucent colors. Bowls fit together for easy storage and include built-in air vent and date timer.

Here’s how to enter:

1. Just leave a comment on this post, answering this week’s question: “What food grossed you out the most when you were a kid?”
2. Deadline for entries is 11:59 pm CST on the day of the post. We’ll pick a winner from the list of comments sometime on the following Friday.
3. We’ll contact the winner by e-mail to find out where to send the free prize.

Good luck! And don’t miss any of the other cool stuff for the young at heart at The Kim & Jason Lemonade Stand!

UPDATE: This week’s winner was Lori Martori.

It did not matter how my mother tried to disguise this food substance.  It wreaked when she cooked it, it made the entire house stink to high heavens. Before and after this was prepared it looked like something straight out of a horror movie.  It is slimy in texture, a brownish-red color and it blobs around in the pan.  When soaked in milk prior to cooking it looks like mother did surgery on someone and was saving their body parts for an experiment.

Then once fully prepared, it would lay on a plate smothered with another clear slimy substance, just another disguise, and the ketsup bottle sat on the table next to it like you really needed to dump the whole bottle on it so you did not have to see it.  Oh yeah sure Mom, that is a steak.  Why would anyone want to put ketsup on their steak.  My mouth would start watering and my stomach would start wrenching and the sweat started beading up on my upper lip just knowing I had to sit down to this awful meal and my mom really expected me to eat it.

Then years later, when I decided to become a mother, my obstectrician told me to eat this as it was so good for me and my unborn child.   “Yes doctor, but do you eat this disgusting, awful, nasty, gross organ meat?”

LIVER AND ONIONS ARE BY FAR THE MOST DISGUSTING FOOD THAT ANYONE COULD EVER EAT!!!  IT IS AN ANIMALS ORGAN THAT FILTERS OUT ALL THE BAD JUNK IN THEIR BODIES AND WE ARE SUPPOSE TO EAT THIS AND LIKE IT?  I DON’T THINK SO!!!!!!

Stay tuned next week for the next chance to win!

| Comments (20)

Everyone is busy.

Enough already.

Do you find yourself unknowingly getting thrown into the “busyness” contest? Whether it’s at work, with family or acquaintances, people start talking about how busy they are. Before you know it you, too, are spouting how little time you have. For some reason, it seems like the busiest person wins. What a twisted and damaging conversation.

I am unofficially making “busy” a bad word, in order to avoid the trap of, not only the aforementioned conversation, but mostly the mentality. It’s poisonous. The funny thing is that everyone has the same amount of time, so if you are “busy” it’s your own fault.

The flaw is in you.

The other day we got a comment from someone unsubscribing from our Insider, our daily/weekly ezine. Since we are always looking for ways to improve it, after someone unsubscribes there is a comment box, which is not a required field. It says, “We care what you think. Please give us your feedback on the Kim & Jason Insider so we can make it better for everyone. Thanks!” This particular unsubscriber chose to take the time to comment, sharing, “I didn’t really want to spend time explaining why I am asking you to take me off the list. Time is what I don’t have. It’s a great site, just not interested anymore.”

Ironically she spent even more time telling me that she doesn’t have any time. How funny! The line that struck me is, “Time is what I don’t have.” People love to be martyrs about their time.

Admit that you do have enough time. So much so, that you don’t have to be so busy. It’s all about the little choices you make everyday…. your time management… your priorities. It all come back to you.

Has the modern culture’s obsession with the “I’m so busy” mantra turned into a crutch that enables you to avoid taking 100% responsibility for your life? (One hundred percent responsibility happens to be one of Jack Canfield’s “Success Principles.” If you haven’t made your journey through that book, start now!)

It’s time to stop talking about how “busy” you are and start doing something about it.

Technorati Tags: busyness, busy, Jack Canfield, Success Principles, time, time management, priorities

| Comments (11)

In this episode, brought to you from studio 315 in Madison, Wisconsin, we interview “Mr. Halloween” Chris Riddle, the official Halloween trend spotter for American Greetings, about his favorite holiday. We also talk about candy and childhood obesity, the original jack-o-lanterns, and some exciting new Adultitis-fighting things. Just click “Play” to listen to the show, or you can subscribe to the show in iTunes…

Show Notes…

• Learn more about American Greetings’ Chris Riddle.

• News: Sammamish mom urges holiday from sugar on Halloween (Seattle Times)

• News: On Halloween, let children indulge (The Free Lance-Star)

• Should Halloween be “green?” Visit www.greenhalloween.org to learn more. Tell us what you think. Send us an e-mail or give us a call at 608-554-0803

• Watch the new speaking demo video for a taste of what Kim & Jason’s speaking programs look like.

• Pick up a copy of the brand new Escape Plan journal, available now at the Kim & Jason Lemonade Stand. (Or place an order of at least $50 and get a copy for free!)

• Read the newest issue of Escape Adulthood magazine, and join Club K&J to get all the future issues mailed to your door!

• Check out our cool thing this month, Pumpkin Art.

Win Stuff: You can win a $20 gift certificate to the Lemonade Stand by letting us know, “What was your favorite Halloween costume as a kid?” E-mail us or leave us a message at 608-554-0803.

Show Music: Toccata and Fugue in D Minor written by J. S. Bach. Produced by Kevin MacLeod.

Show Length: 42 minutes, 9 seconds

Shout Outs: Thanks to Chris Riddle and Bryan Murdaugh!

Feedback: We’d love to hear your thoughts! Add a comment below, e-mail us, or give us a jingle at 608-554-0803.

Technorati Tags: podcast, stress, escape adulthood, Adultitis, Chris Riddle, American Greetings, Halloween, Halloween traditions, jack-o-lanterns, trick-or-treat

| Add a Comment!

The S.W.E.L.L. (Supremely Wonderful & Exciting Loot Lottery) prize winner for October is Club K&J member Anne Cashman! Anne, who was randomly selected from the list of Club K&J members, wins a GIANT Halloween fortune cookie — a terrific treat for this frightful season. Confectionery artisans will expertly hand-dip the giant vanilla fortune cookie in Anne’s choice of decadent Dark, Milk or White Belgian Chocolate, rich golden Caramel, or Peanut Butter or Strawberry Confections. Then, they sprinkle the cookie generously with Halloween candy confetti and handmade Royal icing decorations such as witches and ghosts. Can you say “Yum?”

Do YOU wanna have a chance to win next month’s S.W.E.L.L. prize? Become an official Club K&J subscriber today!

| Comments (1)

Kim and I have been enjoying a respite from all of the traveling for speaking engagements we’ve done over the last month. We’ll be in Brillion, Wisconsin this Wednesday and in California for Halloween. For now, it’s nice to be home, enjoying the autumn weather, and getting some things checked off the to-do list. One of those checked-off things was finally getting a chance to put the finishing touches on our new speaking demo video. For those of you interested, it offers a taste of what sorts of things we do.

We do a lot of health and wellness programs as well as presentations for faith-based communities, so if you or someone you know is looking for a speaker for an upcoming event, we’d love to see if we can help. Click here for details.

Technorati Tags: health and wellness programs, health and wellness events, stress speakers, professional speakers

| Add a Comment!