Are you burning fat and losing weight? If not, you need to make changes.
Change makes us all uncomfortable…….and making changes in habits can sometimes be the toughest thing to do. If your exercise program isn’t giving you the results you want then there’s a reason. Changes have to be made somewhere or you will continue to be disappointed in your fitness results.
From my experience as a life-long exerciser and personal trainer, there are 2 main roadblocks to people’s fitness success:
1. unwilling to change your workout routine and
2. unwilling to change eating habits.
There’s many other reasons between those 2 main reasons but let’s just look at the bottom line here…..Here’s a real life example: I have a friend who has repeatedly asked me how to burn fat and tone up her body. My answer to her has been the same:
a. Cut your weight training workout time down from 2 hours to 50 minutes or less of circuit weight training.
Regular strength training builds muscle mass, burns fat and helps you to: increase range of movement, strengthen bones/tendons/ligaments, improve your ability to do everyday activities, improve health, help prevent accidents, injuries, and sickness. “Weight loss only” programs won’t give you these benefits. And, you must continue to build muscle mass or you will lose muscle mass (atrophy because of inactivity).
With regular strength training, you will increase muscle mass and overall body tone. Your metabolic rate will also improve helping you burn more calories during the day and at rest.
b. Cut your 60-minute, slow-paced cardio session down to 20 minutes of interval cardio.
Sprint interval cardio sessions are proven fat burners and won’t waste away your muscle mass.
c. Follow the sample fat-burning meal plans or substitute similar food items that you like.
If you are going to strength train and have it be effective, you must eat enough to feed your muscles. Eat right and often. Eating small meals every 3-4 hours will keep your metabolism humming and your energy up.
If you have some bad eating habits, don’t try to change them all in 2-3 days. You may have had bad eating habits most of your life. Don’t set yourself up for failure by thinking all your bad eating habits will be gone in 2-3 days.
You will be more successful by taking steps such as severely limiting fast foods, processed foods and sugars. These three steps will slash tons of calories and make you healthier. Meanwhile, replace these foods with the whole, natural foods on your meal plan. The substitution method works.
Write down what you eat and compare it to your meal plan until you get good at knowing what, how much and when to eat.
Actually, her 2 hour workout includes about 45 minutes of socializing…..anyway, her body fat hasn’t changed because she is still doing the same things. Bottom line: she has been unwilling to change so she will continue to get the same bad results.
What about you? Are you unwilling to change your workout routine and eating habits? If so, you will be just like my friend—-disappointed with your fitness results!
-Cathering Ebeling and Mike Geary are co-authors of the popular ebook, Fat-Burning Kitchen, which shows you how to totally revamp your kitchen to make your body a fat-burning machine!
Mark Dilworth, BA, PES
