This has been weighing on my heart for a while so I’ve decided to put together a bit of a guide for everyone to use. Now take this all with a grain of salt because I am no expert but all the following information is based off acquired knowledge and experience.
There are so many “quick fixes” people turn to when it comes to losing weight and I want to address and explore some of these.
I want to start by making sure you absolutely know that you do not need to go to the gym to lose weight or become healthy. I will happily let you know that it all matters on what you put into your body. You’re all probably stressing at this point. Calm down, please. Pizza and burgers are not out of the picture. Now you can put that smile back on your face. If you eat properly enough you hardly have to exercise and can still lose weight.
The biggest part of becoming healthier or fitter is determining a goal. Whether it’s fat loss, gaining muscle, overall health, or all the above. One common goal we can all strive for is a healthy, yet happy, lifestyle.
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Goal
So, the first thing you need to determine is what your overall goal is. For me it was hard to choose so I started with fat loss then moved to muscle building. Small steps first. Everything else gets determined by what your goal is, so be as specific as possible. Saying you want to lose weight is as vague as it gets. If this is your goal I advise you to re-evaluate and choose something small yet specific like, ‘I want to lose three inches off my waist.’ If you do not choose something specific I recommend that you choose between fat loss or muscle building.
Water
Understanding water weight is a huge part of maintaining a positive self-esteem. I often see people mistake their loss of water weight as success and once it goes back up they are devastated. The tricky thing about weight is that it fluctuates daily so basing your goal off a scale will only leave you in disappointment- unless you plan to lose a massive amount of weight. Your body is very intelligent and if you do not intake an optimal amount of water your body will hold onto it. If you maintain the habit of drinking your daily amount of water, your body will naturally recycle and release the water that it has been holding onto. You can actually lose weight by just drinking water.
Take caution while trying to cut water weight. This is commonly done by fighters and wrestlers who drink small amounts of water and sweat out as much as they can to meet a specific weight class. The problem with this is that, not only will it affect your performance but can ultimately put your life and health at risk. You can lose 5-20lbs of water weight in a week this way but this type of weight loss it only temporary. Once you intake water and food your body will absorb everything and you’ll be back to where you started. If you’re looking for a quick way to look leaner for just a few days cutting water weight is your best bet but if you’re looking for something more long term you’re going to have to do it the “hard” way.
It’s important to understand and maintain a healthy balance of water in our daily life. If you wish to know how much water to intake daily just multiply your weight by ⅔ or 67% and that will give you your number in ounces. For physical activity, drink an additional 12oz for every 30 minutes of activity. (Yes, I know it’s a lot of water but it is essential for success so suck it up.) If you’re someone who does not like water, use Mio or fresh fruit to flavor your water and never use sports drinks, like Gatorade, as a substitute.
Diet
Once you choose a goal it’s time to figure out an eating plan. Please, please, please, do not starve yourself. Choose between a normal high carb or high fat (keto). Intermittent fasting is an option as well but that is basically a high carb diet on a timed schedule. I can say I have personally done both high carb and high fat diets. The cons of both are that, while on a high carb, I crash multiple times throughout the day due to the amount of food and sugars processed within your body but when I combined it with intermittent fasting I encountered great results. Fasting is tough but can be very beneficial for your body. As for the high fat, I felt very energetic throughout each day but was left feeling somewhat hungry.
Your diet is determined by you as an individual. It can be calculated by your age, height, weight, and activity. For fat loss you will need to put your body in a caloric deficit. This means that your body burns more calories than you consume. This is how you lose weight and burn fat. This does not mean starving yourself! You will still need to eat and for best result consume your daily goal of carbs, fats, and protein. To calculate your caloric deficit, you will need to eat 500-1000 (10-25%) calories less than your daily goal.
I recommend going to iifym.com. There you can enter your stats and it will give you everything you need. It shows you your daily calorie goal, carbs, protein, and fats needed. To calculate your keto goals, go to ketokarma.com. It can be tough to keep track of and a bit of a hassle but if you really want it, you’ll do it. Download Myfitnesspal. Here, you can scan and log everything you eat throughout the day and it also tells you how many steps you took and you can log your workouts- all for free. If you are a runner, I also recommend downloading mapmyrun.
Eating right is extremely challenging. I love food as much as anybody. Trust me, I understand the struggle. There are so many good foods to be eaten! But for those of us who were not blessed with an unnatural metabolism, we must monitor what we eat and every now and then have a little treat. It sucks but if your health and appearance are that important to you, you’ll make the necessary changes.
Exercise
Now you have established a goal and set a diet; now it’s time to work out. For some of you, it may have been a while since you done a committed workout session and that’s okay. You must start slow. A lot of times when we get a burst of motivation we try to accomplish it all as fast as we can. One thing you must understand, is that it may take up to at least one month before you notice any results. It’s different for everyone but your will not notice serious changes until month three. In six months of dedicated work you should be at your overall goal. It takes time. Do not measure in days and do not measure by the scale until you reach your goal.
A lot of times when we decide to work out again we go straight back to the basics: push-ups, sit-ups, and running. Which, there is nothing wrong with it but I would not recommend it for losing weight. Especially for those of you who haven’t worked out in a while. Then, there are the Insta-workouts. Some are effective. But most are pretty wacky. Do not use these if you’re just getting back into it. Start simple. You must walk before you can run.
People enjoy working out in different ways. This is something you must learn for yourself. Do some self-exploration. You’ll never know unless you try it. Walking, dancing, running, lifting, boxing, hiking, etc. Find what you like and use it for your benefit. If you don’t like running then you don’t have to run. There are so many alternatives. Get your body working, moving, and sweating. The only exception is that if you wish to build muscle you must do resistance/strength training.
If you choose to do only strength training make sure you have the workouts you are going to do before you start. Don’t walk in and do random workouts. I recommend doing one core workout (bench press, squat, deadlift, overhead press) with at least four complementary workouts (dumbbell, cable, and/or machine workouts). Then determine a rep scheme. The basic scheme is three sets of ten. Which is good for starting but a more advanced scheme is five sets of five increasing weight for each set. This paired with high amounts of protein will help build muscle mass.
Weight training can be extremely beneficial. Half an hour of moderate weight lifting burns 112 calories if you weigh 155 pounds and 133 calories if you’re 185 pounds, according to the Harvard Medical School. After a heavy lifting session your body continues to burn calories up to 72 hours after according to research published in the European Journal of Applied Physiology. If you have never received any sort of training with free weights, please research the proper form before doing it or have a certified trainer teach you because nine times out or ten you’re not going to do it right the first time. Don’t risk getting injured.
If you are more into doing cardio activities you will need to set goals and time constraints. For walking set a high tempo pace and add incline. Running is definitely not for everyone but if enjoy it- go for it! Set a good pace and a distance goal. For sprinting I recommend 30/60s or 60/120s. This is sprinting for 30 or 60 seconds and walking/jogging for 60 or 120 seconds. Your intensity will determine how long you will need to perform your chosen workout. Less intense=more time, more intense= less time. Less intense workouts will take at least an hour for a good workout and more intense workouts take at max 30 minutes.
- Slower (run 11:00/mile): 4 calories per pound per hour
- Average (9:30/mile): 5 calories per pound per hour
- Faster (7:00/mile): 6 calories per pound per hour
Finding the time to work out is a huge factor as well but is more often just another excuse. If it is that important to you, you will find time. It’s hard but if you work eight hours, sleep eight hours, you still have around eight hours of free time. Then you’ll say that’s family time but in reality, you’re just watching tv and messing with your phone. One to two hours is all you need and will leave you feeling more accomplished and will improve your overall mood. It’s worth it.
Sleep/Rest
A huge factor when exercising is sleep and rest. Sleep can affect everything you do but after performing workouts- it is crucial that you allow your body to recover. It is recommended to sleep at least eight hours for muscle recovery. If you can establish a healthy sleep cycle (which is near impossible) you will begin to see improvements in your workouts. Just do the best you can to sleep because if you don’t, you’re going to feel it when you try to exercise. Not only will you not want to do it at all but you will also feel weak and unfocused.
Rest is very important as well. If you push your body too hard and never take a rest day it can eventually be life threatening. I personally know someone who has been hospitalized for not resting their body. A close friend of mine would work out every day of the week sometimes two to three times a day. Don’t ask me how he had the energy to do it but he did and eventually caused serious harm to his body. It is recommended to rest at least one full day per week and don’t intensely train the same muscle group twice within a three-day period. Work hard but don’t forget to rest when it is well deserved. Oh, and a rest day is not the same thing as a cheat day so even though you’re resting, that does not mean you can eat whatever you want.
Maintain
Now that you have your goal, your diet, a workout plan, and a rest period- you must maintain it all. This is the hard part. With so many different factors that come into play like events and family, it is a challenge to stay on track. If you slip up for a few days after a long period of diet and exercise, that is okay. Enjoy yourself. Just do not completely fall off by stopping for over three days because at that point it can be tough to get back to where you were before.
A huge mistake people commonly make when committing to this lifestyle is avoiding all of the good things in life. They become so dedicated to achieving a goal that they completely stop taking part in the memorable stuff. I’ve been there. It’s okay to go out and eat and drink- just take it easy. Everything is good in moderation.
Eat well, workout hard, rest, and reward yourself every now and then. This is all a part of maintaining. If you never reward yourself, it’s possible you might stop working towards anything. So, treat yo-self! After you commit to it for so long, it just becomes who you are and what you do. Old habits die and new one’s take its place. Hopefully, all good ones.
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It’s crazy to see how greatly we have failed each other by not stressing the importance of health, nutrition, and exercise. I see so many people who do not understand how to take care of their bodies- or simply just don’t care. Live your life however you want but it is important. If we can teach each other and our younger generations a healthy lifestyle it can drastically impact everyone’s mental state and well-being.
As human beings, I believe that we don’t teach or share with each other the more important things in life. Too many of us are busy trying to get ahead of one another and are worried about being less successful than someone else. This is a problem we should fix. We need to share our knowledge and experiences so we can all have the chance to be successful. And no, I’m not talking about communism. I believe we all deserve what we work for but all of us are subjected to different lessons, experiences, and knowledge throughout our life and I believe that sharing with one another can help and encourage us all to be successful in one way or another. Many of us are raised in a culture of selfishness. We think me, me, me- when it needs to be us, us, us. But this concept makes those living in riches afraid by threatening their very existence and what they believe makes them special. If you have a story- share it. If there is something you wish others to know- share it. One thing I will say to keep to yourself is an idea or an invention but once you are able to create it- share it. Just think of how much we all could benefit if we shared more with each other.
Thank you for taking the time to read and I hope you learned something. I plan to release additional posts to complement this one covering workout routines, supplements, warming-up, stretching, and more. Stay tuned and if you plan to change your lifestyle- Good luck!