What will increase your chances of actually achieving a body transformation or weight loss goal once you get in the right mind-set and start to enjoy exercising?
CREATING AN ACTION PLAN
THOSE WHO FAIL TO PLAN, PLAN TO FAIL
Your Exercise Program Must:
1. Reflect Your Goals
If you want to lose fat and tone up, eating less and doing a ton of cardio is not going to be as effective as eating the right types of food in the right proportions and engaging in the right amount and type of cardio and strength training. Building up muscle will increase your metabolism so you burn more calories at rest. Plus, you will get that toned, lean look you want instead of flabby skin where the fat used to be. Muscle fills in the flab so you actually achieve that toned look.
2. Correct Your Muscle Imbalances
Muscle imbalances are caused by injuries, surgeries, improper posture, postural stress, emotional duress, repetitive movement, cumulative trauma, poor training technique, lack of core strength, or lack of neuromuscular control. These imbalances can be corrected with specific balance and stabilization exercises tailored to your needs.
3. Be Designed for Your Level of Workout Experience
If you are a beginner or have a health problem, do not do some crazy and intense workout program, find an online workout program, or copy what you see a trainer do at your gym – you will most likely end up getting hurt or becoming frustrated because you cannot perform the exercises correctly.
4. Take into Consideration Your Current Lifestyle Stressors
The level of stress you have in your life impacts the way your body recovers from exercise. The muscles of people with more stress need more time to recover than the muscles of people with less stress. If you do not recuperate enough between workouts, you are wasting your time.
5. Be Time Efficient
For most people, working out at the gym for 2 hours every day isn’t possible. Most people have between 30 – 60 minutes each day to work out. What you do during those 30 – 60 minutes each day can have a dramatic effect on the timeliness of your desired outcome. With time efficient training, you will stop wasting your time doing inefficient workouts. You will get maximum results in minimum time. Time efficient training consists of total body, balance, and stabilization exercises.
6. Integrate a Nutrition Program
For maximal results, the program MUST integrate a nutrition program that is designed for your specific goals.
We have discovered that most people do not understand how to design a workout and nutrition program to reach their goals. Why would they? Most gym members did not go to school for exercise science or nutrition. That’s why we have a personal training department. Please ask our trainers for help if you have become unmotivated, you no longer enjoy your workouts, or you are getting bored or reaching a plateau.
We have written the following articles to give you the tools to create a successful exercise and nutrition program:
Focus on Everyday Tasks
Once you understand exactly what you need to do to reach your goal, focus on the steps you need to take every day to get there – not on the goal itself.
1. Mentally Focus on Being Successful
Remember how to get in the right mind-set how powerful positive thinking can be. Wake up in the morning and tell yourself that you are going to the gym. Tell yourself that you will eat healthy today. Tell yourself that you will work out today. Remind yourself why you want to do these things: because they make me feel energized and good about myself. The more you tell yourself these things, the greater your chance of accomplishing them will be.
2. List Your Motivations
Write down a list of reasons you feel motivated to make a lifestyle change.
Example: I want to be able to wear a swim suit this summer without feeling embarrassed. I’m not comfortable with the way my arms look in a tank top or the way my legs look in shorts. I haven’t worn a tank top or shorts for years. I’ve decided to make a lifestyle change and live healthier. The only way I can accomplish this goal is to make a commitment to live a healthy lifestyle.
Example: It is extremely important for me to eat right and exercise because now I have a child who looks up to me. I want to be a good role model for my child. I don’t want my child to be embarrassed when I come pick him up at school for looking unhealthy and overweight like I am now.
3. List Your Barriers to Success and Develop a Strategy to Overcome Them
Barrier: I don’t have time.
Strategy: I’m going to ask a trainer about time efficient training and carve out 30 minutes each day to commitment to working out. I’m going to make healthy meals for the entire week on Sunday and freeze them so they are ready to go and portable when I need them.
Barrier: I need support to motivate me.
Strategy: I’m going to ask my significant other, co-workers, or friends to work out with me. I’m going to explain the importance of eating healthier to my significant other and kids. I will research how to shop healthy and have them help me read the nutrition labels and pick out healthy food. That way, they feel as part of the process.
Barrier: I feel guilty taking time for myself to exercise.
Strategy: Get in the right mind-set and start telling myself every day that if I get healthier, I will have more energy to spend with my family and friends and I’ll be in a much better mood.
4. Establish Clearly Defined Goals
It’s important to establish goals that are your own. These goals must take into consideration your capabilities, limitations, current fitness level, health concerns, available time, level of motivation, and expectations.
Setting unrealistic goals will cause frustration and failure. We will help you set challenging, yet achievable mini-goals that you can accomplish. Once one mini-goal is achieved, you will be more motivated to tackle the next. If we take small steps and shift your focus from the overall outcome (or goal) to the steps you must take to reach each mini-goal, you will be much more motivated to continue.
Example I: I want to have enough energy to keep up with my grandkids. If this is your goal, your exercise program will be completely different than for someone who wants to lose weight. If you are a grandparent, getting any type of cardio exercise that you enjoy will get you to your goal. In addition to cardio exercise, resistance training, balance and stabilization training, and flexibility training will be important to help you become stronger, provide joint stability, and decreasing symptoms associated with osteoporosis and arthritis.
Example II: If it is the first week of March and you want to lose 30 pounds by the end of May, ask us to examine your goal to see if it is realistic. If you design your exercise program correctly, you will gain muscle mass, which will affect the amount of actual pounds you lose. If you lose 20 pounds of fat and gain 10 pounds of muscle, you will burn more calories throughout the day than you did before. You will have more energy and start looking more toned. Just because you may not have lost 30 pounds doesn’t mean that you failed! Whether the goal is to lose weight, tone up, or have more energy, gaining muscle is your friend, not your enemy!
Our best piece of advice for you: stop looking at the scale and focus instead on how much more energy you have, how good you feel, how your clothes fit better, and how your body changes in appearance.
5. Create Mini-Goals
Chop the overall goal into smaller, more manageable mini-goals that are challenging, but not impossible, to achieve.
For example: I want to get down 2 pant sizes. This goal has nothing to do with the scale. Once you accomplish that, set another goal to go down 2 more pant sizes, and so on.
6. List the Steps to Achieve Each Mini-Goal
Make this list a checklist of the things you will need to do every day to reach your mini-goals. Update the checklist so that you continue to challenge yourself.
For example: get at least 8 hours of sleep, drink 96 ounces of water, eat protein with every meal, eat 2 servings of fruits and vegetables, take a multi-vitamin, do 30 minutes of cardio, etc. Then you can check off each task on the list as you complete it. If you follow your checklist, you will accomplish the goal of living healthier.
Our trainers gradually incorporate more and more healthy eating habits into your checklist until you won’t have room to eat bad foods. A gradual process is much more effective for adherence to the program and your body will not resist the change as much if it happens slowly.
If you decide to work with a trainer, you will also learn how to vary up and progress your workouts so that you have fun and do not get bored or plateau. You will also get help tracking your progress, developing a back-up plan, and creating a reward system. The best thing about having a personal trainer is receiving feedback on everything you’re doing so that you know if you’re on the right track or not!
7. Make Your Workouts FUN
· Enroll in a group fitness class
· Work with a personal trainer
· Get comfortable using all of the equipment
· Sign up for a workout partner meet-up group
· Have a friend or significant other join your gym so you can work out together
· Listen to your favorite upbeat tunes on your iPod or other device
· Watch your favorite TV show while you work out
8. Track Your Progress
· Work with a personal trainer
9. Make a Commitment
Make a commitment to exercise 3 times per week, eat at least 3 healthy low-fat meals per day, only allow yourself to have 10% of your total daily calories come from sugar, etc. Tell everyone that you know about your commitment and have them hold you accountable.
10. Develop a Back-Up Plan for Set-Backs
Something will happen that will set you back. Your child gets sick or you get sick. This is life. Create a back-up plan to deal with the kinks in your plans to work out.
11. Reward Yourself
Develop rewards for reaching your commitment goal each week.
