If you've been on a hiatus from training, or been too busy to make it a priority, you've gotta start somewhere & sometime right? Instead of waiting for the perfect time & place, consider starting with a mental approach that disregards timing, location, or special circumstances...

Thinking about just doing what you can, with the space &/or gear that you have, where you are is simple because the emphasis is on action. This can mean squeezing a 15 min jog during a break at work, using the stairs at every opportunity, or a general circuit of pushups, sit-ups and squats in the morning or at night at home. Once you get over the hump of starting, you'll find that what you can do, what you have, and where you are will wind up being at the gym, with weights in hand, pushing yourself to your limits...because you started the process.

What do all of the following phrases have in common?...

"Six minute abs!"

"Turn fat into muscle!"

"Increase your metabolism by taking this!"

"This is a great 'toning' exercise!"

"Lose 30 pounds in 30 days!"

"Target the fat around your belly, hips, and thighs!"

I'll give you a hint...1st word starts with a "B", second with an "S". Bogus, shortsighted claims like these are everywhere in the fitness & performance industry. They can make training, setting goals, and staying motivated very frustrating, not only for athletes, but coaches and gym owners alike! The most bonified, substantive claim that can be made about reaching goals, training hard, staying motivated & getting results is that it is hard, sometimes painful, and always will require sacrifice & compromise. However, those claims are not very marketable...so chances are you won't see, hear, or read them in many places. You're more likely to hear them from a seasoned coach, see them in a quality gym, or feel them amongst a supportive class that has reached performance milestones while training together. The key to overcoming the pain, sacrifice, and compromises required to reach your true fitness & performance potential is knowledge, support, and being real & honest with yourself. So, in your fitness pursuits think about tuning your B.S. meter, and steer clear of products and services that claim that the road is easy, fast, and only costs 3 easy payments of $19.95!

People too often focus on the number they see on the scale. They weigh themselves every morning & become obsessed with decreasing that number. Our society is all about the quick fix nowadays; magic pills & fad diets, pretty much the quickest way to their “beach body”. So what they do is dangerously decrease their caloric intake to shed those pounds as fast as possible. What they don’t realize is what they are actually doing to their body will be counterproductive in the long run. Losing weight doesn’t just mean losing fat it can also mean losing muscle, glycogen, & water. Why does this happen when we just want to lose fat!?

• When you severely limit caloric intake your body goes into starvation mode & actually burns more lean body mass (muscle tissue) than fat. This happens because fat yields more energy than carbohydrates or protein; your body is smart & wants to save as much energy as possible when it is not properly fueled.
• When you begin you may lose weight quickly but the majority will be water that was stored with carbohydrates; you will quickly deplete carbohydrate stores (glycogen) since you are not replenishing them with proper nutrients. Once this happens you will begin to break down muscle.
• If you are not fueling properly you are not getting sufficient amounts of the vitamins & minerals you body needs to carry out metabolic processes which can lead to deficiencies.
• The first thing people think to do is skip breakfast & “hold out” until lunch. When you do this you tend to mindlessly snack, make poor food choices later in the day, & you will have a lack of energy throughout the day.
• People always think cardio is the best mode of exercise for losing weight but it can actually being another muscle burning activity. Your body becomes more efficient overtime, it adapts. You actually burn less calories the more you run (same goes for other modes of cardio)

The real way to sustainably lose fat is through proper nutrition through clean eating, strength training, & good overall lifestyle choices..

• Clean eating refers to making the majority of your diet whole foods (one ingredient foods) that are nutrient dense as opposed to processed foods that are energy dense (lots of calories not a lot of nutritional value)
• 40-40-20 rule (this will vary based on your goals & what your workout plan looks like) 40% of your diet protein, 40% carbohydrates, 20% fat.
• Strength training! Building muscle is important when trying to lose body fat. In the long run having more muscle will allow you to eat more & become leaner. Muscle burns more than fat! Its science, you can’t argue with that.
• Pre & Post nutrition is very important when optimizing performance in the gym & your body composition.
• Proper sleep patterns are another area people tend to overlook but this is huge so your body can recover properly & “reboot” itself

In the end losing fat comes down to burning more calories than you are taking in. You do need to have a caloric deficit but you need to realize there is a right way & a wrong way to do that. There is no magic pill that will do this for you, it will take hard work & dedication but I can guarantee that doing it the right way will get you where you want to be faster than trying all the fad diets out there. If you want a lean toned body you need to eat clean & bust your butt in the gym!

There's more to hitting the heavy bag than getting a good workout in, or becoming more fit. The benefits of learning how to REALLY strike, with any and everything you have, go far and beyond the bag, the class, or the gym. Like most things that are worth pursuing, the value and the rewards are hidden, and in order to realize them, you have to let go & emerge yourself in learning & being absorbed by the movements, the skills...the art. In order to make real progress in an artistic skill or sport, you need FOCUS. If you don't have it you can develop it with practice, but you will never truly excel without it. Acquiring the ability to FOCUS, and channel your efforts really improves skills you're trying to develop. As you develop skills, you develop confidence, as you develop confidence you become empowered, and when you're empowered you're ready to take on anything. The real hidden benefit I'm talking about here is when you take this process of developing focus, confidence, and empowerment, and apply it to your everyday life. This transfer of learning brings a famous quote from Chuck Palahniuk and the movie "Fight Club" to mind:

"No fear. No distractions. The ability to let that which does not matter truly slide."

Learning to focus teaches you how to turn the volume down on things that don't matter, or that don't have anything to do with the outcome you want to see...the goals you really have. We all want to do remarkable things, and lead remarkable lives. No one wants to spend their day engaged in mundane productivity in pursuit of a meaningless consumer existence. Certainly not you, right? Consider letting go of distractions, learning a valuable skill with a worthwhile process...a process that will transfer into your day to day life.

You always hear that processed/refined foods are bad and whole foods are the way to go. In a sense -  yes, this is true but don’t be confused, all foods are processed in some way or another unless you are the one hunting the chickens or spearing salmon in a running river fighting with bears. My point is what I mean by stay away from processed/refined foods is try and eat foods with the least amount of ingredients, ideally one. Whole foods refer to one ingredient foods; think of an apple or an ear of corn there is no ingredient list with names that look like a different language. Foods that are in their natural state still have all their nutrients, vitamins, and minerals. Their chemical makeup is still intact, they have not been stripped of nutrients and processed to the point where they provide no health benefits. Let’s look a little more at why and how we can incorporate more whole foods into our diet…

• Whole foods are referred to as nutrient dense; they are lower in calories but higher in nutrient content. They contain high amounts of fiber, antioxidants, phytochemicals, vitamins, and minerals. These nutrients can help reduce risk of preventable diseases (heart disease, diabetes, and certain cancers); they also aid our body in daily metabolic processes.
• Processed/refined foods are referred to as energy dense; they provide us with calories (usually high) but no abundance of nutrients. They are higher in saturated fat, trans fat, added sugar, sodium, and usually high in unnecessary chemicals (think added dyes and synthetic sweetener) that are body has to process and dispose of.
• Whole foods are found on the perimeter of the grocery store (produce section, deli, meat cooler, dairy cooler, bakery)
• The farmers market is a great place to find the freshest seasonal fruits and vegetables
• Processed foods are not evil, sometimes they are necessary but try to find those with the most natural and least amount of ingredients (the more ingredients you can pronounce the better)
• Whole foods have a shorter shelf life than their counterpart and that can be difficult for some people but here are a few tips
  • Buy frozen fruits and vegetables
  • Buy meat and freeze it until needed
  • Meal prep for the week and you can keep your meals frozen until needed
  • Nuts are a great snack and last much longer than other whole foods
  • Dried fruit is a good alternative (but usually have added preservatives and flavoring)

In a nutshell whole foods are better for our body and provide us with more of the nutrients we need. If we focus on making our diet mostly whole foods than we won’t need to worry about vitamin and mineral deficiencies, we won’t need to take vitamins because we are getting the natural form in the food we eat (natural is always better, our bodies were made to utilize the natural form). Diabetes and heart disease are linked to bad diets; high in saturated fat, high in trans fat, added sugar, high sodium intake, all of these are found in processed/refined foods that lack the nutrients are body needs to fight off these diseases and keep our body running properly. I will leave you with this...“Processed- to perform a series or mechanical or chemical operations on something in order to CHANGE or PRESERVE it”. Not something that I particularly want to happen to my food.