STAY fit! Here are the best ways

Deadly Sushi

Formerly The Giant Mojito
I need to loose 50 pounds so I can get down to 175. Anyhow, these traits seem to be common sense, but easy to forget. Dont quit the fight! :bounce:



FROM: http://www.justaguything.com/the-7-essential-habits-of-a-successful-fitness-routine/
I’d always felt distinctly average in everything I have done until recently. I’ve found what I consider to be my winning formula to get myself fitter, stronger, and healthier than I have ever been before. In just two short months I’ve lost 20lbs of fat while increasing my muscle mass, bench pressing 180lbs and squatting 270lbs. Now I know these aren’t ground breaking figures, but for me they are. The best thing is that I’m improving every day. It’s not just my fitness that has seen the benefit. I’ve got improved clarity and am able to think more clearly about my goals and how I want to achieve them, and I feel happy all the time. A major improvement on the back end of last year.
So how did I do it? Well, here are the seven habits that I have adopted religiously in my pursuit of physical success.
Habit #7 - Motivation

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Image by ciberia
For me, the hardest part in my pursuit of fitness was giving myself a reason to go to the gym. I’d quite often find myself making excuses for not going. It got so bad that I actually stopped making excuses and just didn’t go at all. After seeing myself in the mirror one evening after a shower, something inside me clicked and I made the decision there and then that I was going to get my fitness back.
The best way to motivate yourself in order to get out of the kind of slump I was in is to make a goal and focus on it 100%. My first goal was to lose fat, improve my cardiovascular fitness and look good in the mirror. Whenever I think about quitting (which is very rarely) I think back to how I looked in the mirror that evening and it keeps me going. You need to find whatever trigger you need to motivate you. It could be how you look, how someone you admire looks or how your girlfriend feels about your body.
Another great way to keep yourself motivated is setting short term goals. When you achieve them, it feels great and keeps you pushing on to achieve more. It could be that you want to increase your squatting by 20% or something as simple as doing 5×100m sprints on the rowing machines with 100m slow rowing between them in 5 minutes. Create achievable short term goals and make them more difficult each week.
Habit #6 - Desire

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Image by Steve Collins
This habit directly relates to your motivation and can be a motivating trigger itself. For me, I used my desire and passion for self-help to continually strive for improvement. Part of being that man we want to be is having the desire to do something out of the ordinary and this craving is what keeps us going.
I like to think that my desire is strongest when I’m in the gym lifting weights. When I’m struggling to finish that 5th rep of 270lbs on the squat rack, there is nothing I want more in the entire world at that very moment than to complete my set. I purposely block out everything in my life for those few moments and focus all of my desire and energy on squeezing out one last rep.
Your desire comes back to what motivates you to workout in the first place. Whether you want to lose weight or build strength, it’s quite simply a case of how badly you want it. I’m quite lucky in that I’m very much an all-or-nothing kind of guy and so I give 110% and never give up until I complete the goals I set myself at the beginning of the workout. You need to man up and be strong. Not just physically, but when your body is tired and you feel like finishing 1 rep shy of the set you need the mental strength to force another one out.
Habit #5 - Reflection

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Image by ciberia
This is a very powerful habit that is often overlooked and sometimes even laughed at but when used correctly, it can fuel both your desire and your motivation to succeed. It involves reflection throughout the day on the workout you’ve done. If you dominated on the deadlift and set a new record for yourself, you should hold on to that for the rest of the day. How could you improve on it? Was your technique flawless? Not only will it help you to better yourself next time you perform the lift, but thinking about a good working makes you feel great. The endorphins are still flowing and you’re naturally on a high. There’s no bigger incentive to head back to the gym than when it makes you feel good. Arnold Schwarzenegger famously once compared working out to ‘coming’ and let’s face it, if we all felt like that after a workout maybe we’d get a physique like he had!
Another source of reflection is the mirror. The mirror doesn’t lie and is a terrific way of judging your progress. Being able to see a slight hint of six-pack after years of a beer belly can be extremely motivating to force you to burn off that stubborn bit of remaining fat. I like to use the mirror as a way of determining my goals too. Once I’d cut my body fat and could see my abs, I noticed my shoulders were underdeveloped and immediately began to focus on body dips and standing shoulder press exercises. The mirror is a weapon in your arsenal, so use it.
Habit #4 - Resting

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Image by littledan77
Rest is essential to allow our muscles to repair and grow, and it gives you time to focus on your state of mind too. One of the biggest mistakes I made in earlier years was not giving my muscles time to recover before working out again. The result was that I was unable to lift to the maximum of my ability in the gym because my muscles were still sore and weak. This obviously resulted in a strength plateau which, at the time, I assumed was down to my routine and simply switched the exercises. Needless to say that didn’t work and I have now come to embrace rest as a very valuable part of a successful fitness routine.
Resting doesn’t mean just sitting around doing nothing though. I like to use rest time to challenge my mind through creative writing or memory exercises. In addition to that, I use visualisation to focus on my muscles development. Actually meditating on the muscles and tissues themselves and visualise them healing and growing. It works really well, especially when done during a deep tissue massage. You may need to smooth-talk your girlfriend into that though!
Habit #3 - Eating

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Image by CarbonNYC
When I was a teenager, I was extremely active and I could eat whatever I wanted without putting on a single pound. These days, however, it’s a whole different ball game and I do watch what I eat. I’ve never been a big advocate of calorie counting because preparing food is a big enough chore without having to get all mathematically as well! Instead, I try to focus on eating natural, healthy foods such as fish, chicken, eggs, wholemeal bread/rice/pasta. In fact, I’d say that 90% of my meals consist of at least one of those foods.
Now, I’m fairly lucky because I don’t really need much variety in my food to keep me satisfied. I only eat to provide my body with the necessary fuel to repair and build my muscles. This suits me fine because I hate planning ahead anyway. However, if you do need variety then I suggest setting up a weekly meal plan. It’s a bit of a pain to plan out your food consumption in this way but in the long term you’ll benefit exponentially from it.
One thing I always know about with each meal however is the amount of protein I’m consuming. I try to get in about 30-40g per meal x 5-6 meals each day. It’s the only thing I obsess over when preparing food and I can be a bloody nightmare about it! As a general rule of thumb, you should be aiming to consume 1g of protein per lb of body weight. Therefore, if you weigh 200lbs, you would try to get 200g of protein each day. Personally, I try to get it through all natural sources such as egg, chicken, tuna, beef because protein powders cost a fortune when you think how many tins of tuna you could get for the same price (there is approx. 30g of protein per 130g drained tuna).
Habit #2 - Progression

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Image by Usodesita
I got into a nasty habit early in my fitness routines in which I’d bench and squat the exact same amount of weight for weeks and sometimes even months. Initially, my muscles got sore and I had to recover before working out again but over time, my body adapted and the weight just wasn’t challenging my muscles anymore which meant they never got bigger or stronger.
I never made the correlation between the lack of growth and lifting the same weight week-in and week-out. It’s actually blindingly obvious that if you want to get bigger and stronger, your workouts need to progress. This is one of the most useful habits I have ever adopted because my body is now in a constant state of change. I add weight to my workouts session to session and have seen a massive improvement in strength and size as a direct result. It also makes it more difficult for my muscles to plateau because I am constantly stressing them with an increased load.
Just like anything in life, you need to progress to achieve more and this is no exception. If you wanted to earn more money at work, you’d progress to a higher position with more responsibility. If you want to lose weight or build muscle you need to progress to more challenging cardio workouts or heavier weights. If you’re looking to lose fat and build muscle then you need to head on over to Strong Lifts for more information on how strength training can improve your fitness.
Habit #1 - Consistency

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Image by todd*
This is the single most important habit of any workout routine and one that many people struggle to form. At this time of year, hundreds of thousands of people have probably quit, or just about to quit, their fitness routine. It starts as a new years resolution but never really becomes a habit, and so they quit.
The best way to remain consistent is to just go to the gym. Don’t waste time thinking about reasons to go or not to go, just go! And when you get there, focus all of your energy on your goals. I am so engrossed in my gym habit now that if I am unable to make it, it consumes me with guilt and stress. Yesterday I lost my gym card to get in and, because I was in the habit of going at 10.30 every day, I became agitated, frustrated and annoyed that I couldn’t go. In the end I went anyway and talked my way in by blaming my girlfriend for losing it! The point is, if you go to the gym (or workout at home) consistently at the same time every day for a long enough period of time it will become a habit. You won’t even need to think about it anymore and that’s the point.
 

PieSusan

Tortes Are Us
Super Site Supporter
fwiw, and imho:
It's not what you're eating it's what is eating you. Most people tend to stuff their emotions down with food. Each and every person that I have seen on the Biggest Loser used food as a comfort and a friend. The insanity of it was they knew they were slowly killing themself and they didn't feel good about themselves. One even gained after winning on the show because he became depressed when the attention went away.

If you solve the problem of how to cope with your feelings without having to use food as your drug of choice, you will lose weight.

Exercise is important for mind and body. Eating should be enjoyable, too but when hungry and in moderation. I eat anything I want except for my food allergies. I don't demonize food so I don't feel guilty when I eat dessert.

There, now you have my two cents worth. (getting off my soapbox now)
 

High Cheese

Saucier
Great post.

I've been doing mainly cardio and body weight training for a couple months now. I quit smoking a little over a year ago after 15+ years and got back into motocross. The few races I competed in last year, I was fighting with my stamina terribly. Towards the end of the season I noticed an improvement, but I still couldn't do 4-5 laps and ride to my full potential.

I got pissed off at myself and wanted to acomplish something before I got too old so I started my exercese routine. The DW picked up Jillian Michaels 20 minute DVD. I thought I was doing pretty good on my own with my own workout, until I tried the DVD. Holy Smokes! She really knows her stuff. I'm barely making it through the 20 minutes, on workout 1 mind you, but I'm going to keep at it. If I can get through that 20 minutes fairly easy I should be able to get around the track pretty good.
 

joec

New member
Gold Site Supporter
Well being 62 years old I had 20 years of teaching karate which will keep one in pretty good shape. I gave it up though at 45 and now my heaviest excise is walking but then my heath is still good. I'm 6' 2" tall and weigh right at 200 lbs but do smoke about a half a pack a day. I eat pretty much what I want just don't eat as much per siting as I used to when younger.

In all honesty though I think obesity today is due more to the lack of exercise and food additives. I'm personally very carefully about where the meats we eat come from and buy all mine from a local grower. I also haven't eaten birds of any kind in over 30 years. It really comes down to moderation including exercise. Just my opinion on it.
 

Deelady

New member
I've been speedwalking, running and sprinting on my treadmill throughout the week for 20-30 mins then switching back and forth between upper body and lower body exercises (lunges ect.) I havent noticed alot of weight loss yet but I have noticed a big difference in my endurance and energy. My eating habits are completely changed now as well...I dont think I could get any healthier if I tried!
Its been two weeks now...I better start seeing results soon!!
 

High Cheese

Saucier
Care to share your menus? I get bored of trying to count. In fact, I've been slipping a bit. I just noticed last night my belly felt a tad bigger.
banghead.gif


Any ideas on lower abs?
 

Deelady

New member
I don't know if you were asking me but the best thing I know of for lower abs is to lay flat on the floor and lift up both your legs as high as you can ....its a b@*ch but it really targets them!


As far as menu my is as boring as you can get....just been eating alot of multi grain wraps, roasted veggies, brown rice, lots of meat and as little carbs as I can.....basically the only real starches I am eating is the grain tortillas and brown rice.......very sad and boring....but I'm just doing it till my fiance comes home, then I will switch to just eating sensibly

I would love some meal ideas as well if any one has good one for shedding pounds easier!!
 
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