HOW TO REVIVE YOUR MOTIVATION

Everyone at one point or another has struggled for motivation to exercise or to eat the right things. Have you struggled to get out of bed on a cold morning to get to that cycle class? What about not pushing yourself to get those few extra reps out on the leg press? Have you ever stopped your treadmill session halfway through as you couldn’t be bothered? If any of this sounds familiar, you know how hard it is to keep going when you’re not motivated. Here’s a few ideas to help you refocus and stay on track.

• Have specific goals.

I have mentioned this in a previous article but I’m mentioning it again because its so damn important. It’s so much easier to push yourself when you have a goal in mind. It gives you some purpose and direction. You know there is something great that is waiting for you at the end of your journey. If you don’t have a goal, get one!

• Turn the main goal into a “goal journey”

It’s always great to have long term goals such as waiting to lose 20kg of body fat or to squat another 60kg but sometimes these goals are just too distant. The accomplishment of these goals can be months or even years away, so it’s easy to lose motivation .The best thing to do is to break the one big goal into multiple smaller goals which I call a “goal journey”. If your aim is to lose 20kg of body fat, instead make it into 4 goals of 5kg or any other increment. You could have 20 goals of 1kg if need be. Once you reach the first goal, you feel good about yourself as there is the feeling of accomplishment. Chances are you’ll be even more motivated for the next goal as you’ve proven to yourself that its possible when you break it down into baby steps!

• Personal training

If you are really finding it hard to push yourself or struggle for direction when training, a personal trainer can be the perfect injection of motivation. They’ll push you to the limits you didn’t think was possible, all the while making sure you are exercising safely. Having someone there to encourage you to go that little bit heavier, longer or faster can really make the difference between success and failure.

Personal trainers can also help you set realistic goals and help you track them through various methods such as measureing body fat percetage and performance in the gym. It will keep you accountable as you’ve made an appointment you HAVE to go to as no one likes wasting money.

• Have pictures

Did you know that being able to visibly see something can help you to understand and comprehend it 400% better than just writing it down (you do write down your goals?….. don’t you?).  If there is an ideal body type you are looking to achieve, try and find a picture of it and put it somewhere where you will see it constantly. This might be at your desk, on the back of the toilet door or even on fridge door so you see it when feel like snacking!

With picture up, you will constantly be reminded of your goals and it will help you to stay motivated. If you are trying to get back to a body shape you used to have, keep a picture of your old (soon to be new) body to remind you how could you can/will look if you keep at it. You can even take pictures of yourself every month and see the gradual changes. This in itself is like a goal journey.

• Training partner

Having a training partner can be great as you can help to push each other and keep each other accountable. If you agree to meet someone at the gym at a certain time, you will feel guilty if you don’t turn up. You’ll be letting both you and him/her down. Its good to have a training partner who is around the same fitness level as you, but it’s even better if they are slightly fitter and motivated. You always want to surround yourself with people who will pull you up, not drag you down.

• A new program

Training can get stale and stagnant if you keep the same program for too long. As you keep doing the same training program over and over, the progressions you make will start to slow and you may get to the point where you plateau!  This is dangerous for your motivation and attitude towards fitness as you may be disheartened at the lack of results and stop training all together !

• Have a rest week

As I write this I am currently having a rest week. I have one every 8-12 weeks. The last week or so I’ve had sore and aching joints and my energy levels in the gym have not been great. These are signs that its time for a break.  It allows my body to rest and get rid of any niggling injuries. Dont worry about losing all of your gains in your rest week. Sometimes I even come back stronger as my body is fully rested and fresh. By the end of a rest week, I’m itching to get back into it again.

If you would like some more information on how PerFit Health and Wellness can help you with your goals, visit www.perfit.com.au and book in for a free consultation to find out about our training packages.

Yours in good health and wellness,

Julian Gaylor

Owner of PerFit Health and Wellness

Coffee: Go Ahead and Have a Java Jolt!

Over the years, we have heard to stay away from caffeine, especially coffee because it was being classified as a drug. “Say no to drugs” has been our world-wide motto and this campaign was affecting the coffee bean industry; however, there has never been a study or test that has proven coffee or caffeine has a connection to a heart condition or any other medical problem. Drinking about 2 cups of coffee could possibly cause a rapid heart beat in a small percentage of people and could temporarily raise their body temperature.

Some weight loss clients have been advised to drink 2 cups of coffee in the morning before a workout to help reduce body fat. How this works is that the client will awake with an empty stomach, drink the 2 cups of coffee and proceed to workout. The caffeine in the coffee will boost their endurance by prolonging fatigue and help the client burn just body fat. What many people do wrong is they eat a meal right before a workout, usually high carbohydrates or no meal at all and wonder why they crash during a workout. Unfortunately, you will only maintain your current weight and body fat instead of tapping into your excess body fat storage.

Some other benefits to drinking coffee are:
• improvements to long term memory

• stimulates the bowels

• natural diuretic
Of course, plenty of clear liquids should be taken in to flush out toxins no matter how much coffee is consumed.
The only proven negative effect of coffee is that unfiltered coffee beans have compounds that could possibly
raise your blood cholesterol as much as 20 points. Basically, stay away from coffee made in a French press. Many people claim the flavor is better but obviously not healthy for the body. Therefore, drink only
filtered coffee!!

A couple of tidbits of information about caffeine:

• 1 shot of espresso has less caffeine than regular coffee

• 1 cup of tea has more caffeine than regular coffee

• 1 cup of coffee can enhance your alertness

So, go ahead and have a java jolt and enjoy! Take advantage of the benefits a hot cup of coffee can do for you. One short, skinny latte to go could add amazing results to your life!!

Coffee: Go Ahead and Have a Java Jolt!

8 REASONS YOU’RE NOT SEEING RESULTS AT THE GYM

If you are finding that you are not getting the results that you would like, maybe it’s due to one (or more) of the reasons below.

1. You don’t have a specific goal

We all go to the gym for a reason. Common reasons include “To lose weight”, “To get fitter/stronger” or “To build more muscle”. If you are serious about getting results, these goals are not specific enough. Give yourself a deadline.  For example, if your aim is to change your body weight, make it specific by saying “I want to gain/lose ×kgs in the next 6 weeks”

2. You don’t keep a training journal

A training journal is your roadmap to results. If you don’t keep one, you don’t know where you’re going or how fast you are getting there. A training journal can be a program sheet written up by a trainer or your own gym diary. You need to fill this out every session. Write down what exercises you did, how many sets, reps and the weight lifted. For cardio sessions, depending on the machine you use, write down the time, speed , distance , incline or resistance. Because you are documenting your sessions, you know exactly what you have done in each workout and therefore, can try and improve each session.

3. You undo all your good work by not eating well

So many people sweat it out in the gym and give it their all but then go and sabotage themselves by eating badly. The most common problem is with those trying lose weight. If you come to the gym and work hard, but then leave the gym only to continue on with your poor diet, sure the exercise might help a little but if you are still making poor nutritional choices and eating WAY too much, chances are your weight will stay the same or even continue to rise! The worst part is, not only do some people not change their diet, but because they are working so hard in the gym they feel the need to reward themselves with a little treat in the form of fast food, chocolate, cake, alcohol etc. Chances are this “little treat” is a calorie bomb which has more calories than they actually burn in the gym (possibly in the whole week!) which more than counteracts all the hard work they do in the gym.

4. You’re doing the same workout you were doing 2 months ago

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result- It’s an old adage that’s been beaten to death but is still relevant. You may not realise it but our bodies are smart and lazy machines. If you do the same exercises repeatedly, the body will find the most efficient way of completing them. This is bad news because it means when our bodies become more efficient it will be harder to lose weight or gain muscle, strength, and cardiovascular fitness.  Keep your body guessing by starting a new program or even doing your program in the opposite order.  If you do 30 mins on the treadmill, do 25 mins at a higher speed or use a different machine altogether!

5. You’re not consistent with your training

It’s not about what you do SOME of the time, it’s what you do MOST of the time. Missing a rare session here and there is OK but when you start to miss sessions every week, you are seriously hindering your ability to make progress. Let’s do some quick math here- There are twenty-four hours in a day. Yes? OK, so if there are seven days in a week that’s a total of one hundred and sixty-eight hours. Still following? Good.  Doing three- one hour session a week is a whopping 1.78% of your whole week. Is that too much to spare?

6. You’re exercising too much

Here’s the opposite of #5. They say too much of a good thing can be bad for you. Exercise is no different. Training too hard, too often can actually hinder your ability to make progress. When training in the gym, you put your body under a lot of stress (good stress). When weightlifting you actually damage your muscles and make micro-tears in them. When you are resting, the muscles repair and rebuild bigger and stronger so in actual fact, you don’t get bigger and stronger in the gym, you get bigger and stronger when you are resting. This means if you don’t rest enough, you don’t give your muscles enough time to repair and recover which leaves you prone to injury and can make you smaller and weaker! Even when you train different body parts each day, it still taxes your body as a whole so it still needs time to recover.

The same can be said for cardio training. When putting in a hard cardio session, it taxes your whole body. Among other things, your immune system becomes suppressed as all your body’s resources are trying to help you recover from the intense exercise. This really isn’t a big problem as your body returns to its normal state after time but if you continually put your body under intense stress and don’t allow for sufficient recovery time, you will gradually run yourself into the ground and exercise will become less productive and less enjoyable! I even take a whole week off from training every 8- 12 weeks. I find I come back more motivated and stronger as I’ve let my body fully rest and recover!

7. You’re not pushing yourself hard enough

As with everything in life, if you want to truly succeed you need to get out of your comfort zone. It’s no different in the gym. If you want to see results, you must challenge your body and give it a reason to change! Now with that said, I don’t want you to train so hard that you are at the point of literal exhaustion. That’s just dangerous and actually has adverse effects on your body. Chances are when you think you are working your hardest, you are actually nowhere near your maximum potential. The reason you think you couldn’t possibly put anymore effort in is because you’ve never tried to! Next time you are exercising, put the treadmill up an extra 0.5km/h or go for another 30 seconds. When weight training and you think you’re done try squeezing another one or two reps out. Dig deep! You might surprise yourself.

8. You’re weightlifting with your ego, not your brain.

Ever notice that the biggest guys in the gym or those with the best muscle tone don’t lift the heaviest weights? That’s because they lift smart and target the right muscles. In general, most people who lift weights do so with the intention of improving their lean muscle mass. Unfortunately, it is an all too frequent occurrence that people let their ego get in the way and get caught up in worrying more about the amount of weight they are lifting rather than the technique they use. When lifting with bad technique you usually bring other muscles into the movement which then takes all the stress off the desired muscles. For example, if someone is doing a bicep curl with too much weight, they will usually swing their upper body and bring the shoulders into the movement. This means that the muscles in the back and the deltoids (shoulder muscles) are doing a lot of the work rather than the biceps.

You’ll get better results lifting a lighter weight with good form that really targets the desired muscles than a heavier weight with bad form. Remember- it’s not how much you lift, it’s how much you look like you can lift!

If you have any questions about this article or would like some help in other areas, feel free to schedule a free consultation at the top of the page- Kind Regards, Julian

Five Ways to Boost Your Metabolism

“Metabolism” is the name of the bodily system that converts food calories to energy needed to perform various tasks, like pumping oxygen to muscles during a long walk. Many variables contribute to your metabolism, including heredity, gender and age. But you can quicken yours; here’s how.

Exercise more. When you walk, run, or lift weights, you increase the energy required of your body, which raises your metabolism then, and for hours afterward.

“It’s not a huge spike, but it makes a difference,” says Gary Miller, PhD, associate professor of health and exercise science at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Read more

10 Best Foods for Your Heart

Simple food choices go a long way when it comes to your heart’s health. Focusing on fresh foods full of heart-healthy fats and antioxidants can decrease your risk of developing heart disease and cut your chances of a heart attack. These 10 foods will help keep your ticker in top shape.

Oatmeal
Start your day with a steaming bowl of oats, which are full of omega-3 fatty acids, folate, and potassium. This fiber-rich superfood can lower levels of LDL (or bad) cholesterol and help keep arteries clear.

Opt for coarse or steel-cut oats over instant varieties — the coarse and steel-cut contain more fiber — and top your bowl off with a banana for another four grams of fiber.

Read more

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