Fitness and Healthy Living Misconception

I was on the phone with a friend today and we were talking about lunch.  I told her that I had been eating Hot Pockets for lunch lately and she was surprised.  When I asked her why she was surprised she said that she thought I always ate "healthy".  I've gotten this response in the past when I've gone out with friends to eat or have been in a social gathering.  The misconception is that every thing you eat and every time you eat, it has to be a healthy meal in order for a person to be fit, be into fitness or live a healthy lifestyle.

I believe that this misconception is a reason that a lot of people are turned off or unmotivated to start a fitness routine and or a healthy lifestyle. Most peoples diets are so bad, that just a small change, maybe one healthy meal a day to start with would make a big difference.  The same thing goes for exercise.  There are a lot of people that get no exercise at all, so one or two good workouts a week would also make a big difference.

The bottom line is that I hope that people are not turned off by the misconception that you have to exercise every day and or eat "healthy" 100 percent of the time.  If you are new to exercising, are just getting back into it, or don't have much equipment, try doing Fat X Workout video 10 a couple of times a week.  It's probably the most simple workout routine in the the Fat X Fitness program. You can simplify the workout routine even more by using one set of dumbbells instead of using a drop set. You can also try eating close to the Fat X diet guidelines as much as possible.

Once you get used to working out and eating healthier and you really want to boost your fat burning and fitness efforts you can try completing the Fat X Fitness program in 12 days.

Fitness Exercise Fat Burning and Diet Mistakes I've Made

I've been involved in fitness for a long time.  It started as a hobby.  I would exercise to stay in shape and this eventually led into making fitness a career choice.  Along the way I made many mistakes.  Through an eagerness to learn better and more efficient ways of exercising to get the results I wanted, I was able to correct these mistakes.  I can attribute the correction of these mistakes to the success I've had Fitness Coaching and to the success of the Fat X Fitness program.  I thought I would put a list together of some of the mistakes in fitness, exercise, fat burning and diet that I've made so that hopefully it will help you avoid these pit falls and make your efforts more successful. Here are the top three.

Too Much Cardio

I wrote an article pointing out how too much cardio can hurt your fat burning efforts.

Not Organizing Exercises in a Workout Properly

Not organizing exercises properly can make the workout inefficient and less effective in achieving your goals.

Not Keeping Track Of Workouts

This is a mistake that a lot of people make.  How are you supposed to know if you're improving if you don't keep track? You can actually be doing less work in successive workouts. I now keep track of every single one of my workouts as well as each of my clients.  If you need help with this I would recommend downloading the Fat X Workout Guide.

Concentrating Too Much on Quantity of Calories vs Quality

This is actually one of the biggest mistakes most people make. Foods don't just contain calories but they provide other nutrients that benefit your body and some foods have the lack of these nutrients.  Those nutrients can directly and indirectly help in burning off excess fat.

Fat Burning, Weight Loss, Diet and Fitness Question of the Week

Every week I answer a question or questions that are sent in to me regarding fat burning, weight loss, diet, fitness and or the Fat X program. Today's question was regarding the protein intake.

I've been doing your exercise and diet program for 4 days now and I was wondering if I should start taking a protein supplement.  I like the program and I feel I'm getting results but my body has been sore and I think I might not be eating enough protein.

Dean

Your body will be sore from the exercise program but taking in enough protein will help.  I've noticed that when I don't get enough protein for whatever reason I do tend to stay sore longer.  It only makes sense since protein is responsible for building, maintaining and repairing muscle tissue.

The other issue is knowing exactly how much protein you should be taking in.  A quick and easy rule I follow is that I try to get my body weight's worth of protein in grams in my diet each day.  This gives me a goal to reach for, and I can easily adjust up or down depending on how I feel my body is recovering from workouts.  If you have a high body fat percentage you can adjust by taking in your lean body weight's worth of protein in grams each day.

Late Night Snack List For Fat Loss

If you want to lose excess fat weight it's very important that you eat several times a day for at least two reasons. One, eating several times a day keeps your metabolism boosted and burning calories. Secondly, eating several times a day keeps you from getting overly hungry to the point where you just feel that you have to gorge on the first thing you see. The problem with this piece of advise is that some people think that eating several times a day means eating a three course gourmet meal several times a day. They feel they can't do it, it's too much food, or they can't fit in 4-6 meals a day because the last meal would be near bed time and they've heard this is a bad thing.

Meals don't have to be big. Eating as little as an apple and a few nuts can be considered a meal. So you can see how six meals a day wouldn't be too difficult if you think of it that way. Now, back to the point of this post. Here's a list of my favorite night time snacks that will help you get closer to the six meals a day goal without over eating,

keep your metabolism boosted and lose fat weight.

1. Celery and peanut butter.

2. Cucumber slices with a splash of lime/lemon juice with seasoning

3. A mix of fresh berries and a handful of mixed nuts

4. A protein smoothie

Secret of the Fat X Exercise Program

The Secret of the Fat X exercise program is less like a secret and more like little known and under utilized concept in fitness.  I've always been open minded when it came to trying exercise methods, concepts and routines.  This open mindedness and unbiased approach gave me the advantage of throwing away things that didn't work, and holding on to things that did, regardless of it's popularity.  Through trial and error I was able to learn a very important concept or secret in fitness and fat loss.

This concept or secret I've learned and implemented in the Fat X exercise program and in each of the workouts is the concept of synergy.  Synergy is what makes the exercises in each of the workouts interact and cooperate with each other in such a way that they produce a combined effect greater than the sum of it parts or their separate effects to produce a highly effective fat burning exercise program.

In putting together the Fat X exercise program not only did I choose high quality effective exercises, but I organized them in an order and intensity level (in respect to one rep max) to work synergistically.  I've constantly been asked about "the secret" to the success of the Fat X exercise program, and again it's not so much a secret as it is this very important and under utilized concept of synergy.  

If you haven't already tried the exercise program, check out the workout videos.  They're all free and if you need a little extra help you can instantly download the The Fat X Workout Guide.  It's only a few bucks and it helps support the blog.

Fat Burning, Weight Loss, Diet and Fitness Question of the Week

Every week I answer a question or questions that are sent in to me regarding fat burning, weight loss, diet, fitness and or the Fat X program. Today's question was regarding the Fat X diet.

I've been doing your Fat X exercise program and have lost a few pounds but my problem is the diet. I'm a very picky eater and I really don't like vegetables.  Do you have any tips to help me. 

Thanks so much,

Patty

Since you say that you are a picky eater, you are really going to have to experiment a lot.  A good friend of mine and grappling coach once gave me this piece of advice, "you need to be comfortable, being uncomfortable".  What that meant to me is that I needed to reach out and try different things and not just stay in a box.  This has helped me tremendously not only in fitness terms, but in life. As a matter of fact, without that piece of advice I wouldn't have ever done the Fat X Project and started this blog.

So anyway, this might help you in terms of being comfortable trying different foods that you would have never tried otherwise.  You might be uncomfortable at first, but you never know, you might end up liking some of them or finding a taste for them.  When I was a kid my mom used to put zucchini in stews and I came to hate zucchini.  As an adult, I have tried zucchini prepared differently than what I remember as a child and I actually really like it now. 

Here's your homework for a week.  Go to a farmers market and pick up vegetables, fruits, berries and nuts that you have never tried before.  Try them out in small dozes throughout the week and I'm sure you will find at least one or two new foods that you like at least a little.  If you've already lost a few pounds with just the Fat X exercise program, imagine the results once your diet gets a lot healthier, even if it doesn't exactly match the Fat X diet guidelines.

The Anatomy of a Fad Diet Part 2

Fad diets usually become popular because they actually will work to lose a few pounds short term.  Marketers are aware of this so they'll push and advertise a fad diet aggressively and then just move on to the next fad diet.  This is one of the causes of yo-yo dieting.  If you think back a few years you might remember the Atkins diet, then the cabbage soup diet, and then maybe the apple patch diet, this list can go on and on.  What all these diets have in common is three things.  They work short term, they're highly restrictive, and they fail long term.

The fact that they work short term is actually tied to their restrictive nature, which in turn is tied into why they end up failing long term.  For example, the Atkins diet  and other low carb diets highly restrict carbohydrates.  For most people, the carb restriction alone will cause short term weight loss due to the fact they will not eat certain high carb, high calorie, non-nutritious food they had been eating like muffins, bagels, cookies etc. The weight loss though is a bit misleading.  Because there is a switch from eating carbs to eating more fat, there is a change in the way your body holds on to fluid/water.  The short term weight loss is actually just water weight and not fat.  

Even worse than being mislead my short term water weight loss by the food and calorie restrictions in fad diets, is actually losing good weight coming from muscle.  When highly restricting foods and calories,  along with losing water weight, you might very probably lose muscle.  If you lose muscle, your metabolism will slow and this slowing will make it difficult to lose fat weight long term.

When looking into a diet you should ask yourself if the restrictions of the diet can be maintained for the rest of your life.  If these restrictions can not be held, then it's a fad diet and the short term weight loss is most probably coming from water weight, muscle and only some fat.  Unfortunately this weight loss will rebound as soon as you return to your normal eating habits.  Worst of all, the weight gain will probably be mostly fat because of the muscle lost during the fad diet.  And like I said before, this fat weight will be more difficult to lose because of your slower metabolism.  For those of you that have been on that yo-yo dieting roller coaster, does this sound familiar?

Obviously I'm not a big fan of restricting foods and or calories. As I began to develop the Fat X diet I wanted to make sure that it was open to all foods but in certain groupings.   In simple terms it's a less of this, more of that approach.  Making the Fat X diet versatile as far as food choices also dealt with the long term problem of the fad diets.  Since you can chose the foods that you like, it makes it easier to stick to long term than fad diets.

So in conclusion, if you want to succeed long term, stay away from highly restrictive fad diets and follow a healthy more versatile diet like the Fat X diet or any other diet that is healthy and you can maintain long term.