What do you find the most difficult? Eating healthy or exercising daily?
The internet is comprised of various marketing campaigns promising results for the body you want in an unrealistic timeframe. I think there is plenty of expert advice available that is helpful. Unfortunately, not helpful for EVERYONE because EVERYONE has their own unique challenges, goals, and expectations from a service.
It is always important to ask yourself questions before starting any fitness or health regime: What would make you the most satisfied? Is your goal to cut out refined sugars? Is your goal to learn effective meal prepping techniques? Do you find it difficult dining out? Do you want to gain strength or improve cardio? Once you have addressed your main health/fitness goal, then from there its easier to make small steps towards this goal ✅
Making small but meaningful changes daily can add up and make a huge difference in the long run! When we are talking about getting the body of your dreams, lean and toned, we have to think about some habits we are currently doing that may be hindering this progress first. When working with clients on a goal such as getting more muscle tone to their body's, the first thing I do is address other areas such as stress in their lives, what their eating habits are like, and how are their sleep cycles (to name a few). These are just three possibilities that could be holding you back from seeing results.
Once you have addressed some of these factors (if any in your life) it becomes much easier to work on the fun stuff! Below are a few pieces of advice for anyone looking to start their fitness journey and tone their physique for the summer☀️
1. Having the ability to exercise and take care of yourself is a privilege, not a chore. Remind yourself of this often. Your fitness journey will not last long if your viewing exercise as punishment. Find something you enjoy!
2. Know which exercises are most beneficial for YOU! To get toned, you do need to have muscle mass. This doesn't mean you have to "get big". There are way too many benefits that outweigh even the slightest chance of you getting "too big" from lifting weights. Some people notice results from free weight training while others see changes from doing body weight/resistance exercise including Power Yoga, Pilates or Crossfit. There is no one size fits all, and sometimes less is best. So experiment, have fun with it, and find out which type of strength training you enjoy most 😁
3. Significant physique changes take time. You will drive yourself insane if looks are all you fixate on. Set up non-physique related goals too such as reducing stress in your day to day life or learning proper breathing techniques. This helps significantly with physique, but thats another topic for discussion. Maybe you want to do one pull up or simply drink more water in your day, but make sure you have some outer-body goals that will aid in your motivation to keep you on track.
4. Strength train, strength train, strength Train! Whether you do home workouts, go to a gym, use body weight or free weights, resistance training is a simple and effective way to see the results you want. Strength training is one of the best ways to transform your body and with time and effort, you can quickly see noticeable differences. You do not need to do this every day, but a good amount to start with would be 2-3 days per week of strength training for 30-45 minutes if you can 👍
5. Fitness & nutrition are not all or nothing (Although eating right is an important factor in your muscle toning goals). There is no need to make things black and white. Focus on making small improvements to your current habits rather than taking extreme measures. Choose one thing from a nutrition aspect and one thing from fitness aspect. Focus on those small points. Nutrition is important to how you end up training/working out. If you do not fuel yourself with the right foods, your workouts may suffer. Start small, then work your way to habits you know you can maintain but are still healthy!
Seeing the progress you want only comes when you can change your mindset and create concrete habits in both your nutrition and exercise routine. When you can start prioritizing your relationship with yourself, food and exercise as a healthy one, you stress less and this leads to increased results. Its also important to stop denying yourself things you love. As I mentioned above, I do not think muscle toning and strength training has to be all or nothing. It simply has to be something you love, something you can maintain and something that works around your life, not engulf it.
If you are looking to tone up, put on lean muscle and get summer ready for life (yes its possible to maintain all the hard work you put in for the rest of your life!) then send me an email for a complimentary consultation to set up a 3 week customized strength training plan! Id love to hear from you and help you succeed on your health and fitness journey ❤️
https://livingwellwithchanelle.com/pages/conntact