TOP 5 things that helped me OUT of my fitness rut!

OK a little back story about me! When I was a kid, I was in good shape. Used to play sports, skateboard and in general be pretty active. Somewhere along the way, during highschool, things started to change. I started drinking a lot of pop, playing video games and in general my lifestyle changed to a pretty unhealthy one. During that time I was pretty uneducated on fitness in general. Just out of highschool my friends and I decided to join a gym...gold's gym...big mistake. We spent about 1-2 months occasionally going and when we did go it was just cardio machines, we weren't comfortable with the weights and if we did any it was some sloppy bicep curls. After seeing no results we just stopped going. Frustrated, I started searching the internet for anything that would get me on the right track and THIS is the point at which I want to SAVE anyone else in the same situation tons of TIME and FRUSTRATION so here we go!

#5 STOP DRINKING CALORIES

This is a huge one! Stop drinking pop! This can be pretty life changing for people, and I have had multiple friends absolutely change their lives by cutting out sugary drinks. And unfortunately this includes BEER! That's a tough one. If you are really serious about it, but you HAVE to drink beer, drink Michelob Ultra, at 90 calories a beer and 3 grams of carbs it won't do so much damage.

#4 Try a low carb diet or intermittent fasting!

To be honest, after trying so many different styles of eating and reading sooooo many articles the big thing is this : Eating is the cause and solution to your weight problem. The only thing that really matters is if you expend more energy than you put in. 3500 calories is 1 pound of fat. If your daily expenditure is 2500 calories and you are eating 3500 calories a day you are putting on a pound of fat every 4 days and 8.5 pounds a MONTH!!! That's how quickly it can add up. Here are a few things to try, in the end you need to find out which change you can make to your diet that you can be the most consistent with.

Low Carb Diet

• This has by far worked the best for me. It's not even about the carb part of it! A low carb diet will basically force you to choose healthier options, and summer is a great time to start because if you have a barbecue you are basically set. Scientifically Low Carb Diets are about the same as a calorie restricted diet. You get an initial spike in weight loss but generally it's just water weight and then everything evens out. This is a lot easier than you think, take some time to think about the types of meals you can have, it takes a bit more planning but not much. An added bonus is you will tend to eat at home more often and save money BIG TIME!

Intermittent Fasting

• This one is not for everyone. The main reason I would suggest trying this one is the effect it has on your mental relationship with food. I did two 24 fasts a week for 6 weeks and lost 15 pounds, and I didn't change my eating habits. If you do the math you are taking 2/7ths of your weekly intake away. If you are burning 2500 calories a day just being alive that's a 5000 calorie deficit a week or approximately 700 calories a day! So even if you are eating slightly too much on your regular days your weekly intake is still going to be in a deficit! And to be honest when I told people at work why I wasn't eating lunch they just thought I was dumb. But give it a shot! Try this, eat dinner at say 5-6 the night before and then just wait until dinner the next night at 5-6. Drink water, chew gum, drink coffee (without sugar). You will be surprised how easy it is once you realize you don't HAVE to eat during the day, and many people, myself included, tend to feel even more energized during the day of a fast! For more info check this out www.eatstopeat.com

Counting Calories

• This just straight up works. Calculate your basal metabolic rate on any site on google and then track your calories with something like MyFitnessPal and try and stay somewhere around 300-500 calories under. This is worth a try because it will absolutely awaken you to which foods have been screwing up your diet.
  

#2 Compound Lifts

Compound lifts are multi joint movements like Squats, Deadlifts, Chin Ups, Bench Press. The BIG lifts! After going through pages and pages of work out information on sites about bodybuilding I finally made it to a site that actually made sense to me. I started doing compound lifts! My results SKYROCKETED! I finally found something that worked. This was a minimalist program that fit my schedule....well to be honest I just didn't want to waste hours in the gym. I would be at the gym for maybe 20 minutes and I was out of there. 10 minute drive to the gym 20 minute workout 10 minutes home, and I was making some real gains for once. My advice for anyone starting out is start with this type of routine (http://rippedbody.jp/reverse-pyramid-training/) its fast and effective and you feel amazing making progress every week!

#1 Be consistent at TRYING

To me this was the biggest thing that helped me. KEEP TRYING. If you don't see results, try something new. I mean, realistically the easiest path to success is having a solid plan and sticking to it. You read that all the time on blogs and everything, but these are words from the super inspired "making a living off fitness" types. That's not me and it probably isn't you. In the end a lifestyle change is where it's at, and to do that you might have to try some different things. Try the bro split, try the compound lifts hell try just playing basketball a couple times a week. Try and go for a walk every day. If regimented programs make you feel trapped just do what you can to stay active. I often refer to fitness as a journey, and like in real life there are many ways to get to your destination, some will take you there faster than others but as long as you are moving forward you will get there!

AND 1 Bonus tip!!

For those of you who DO start getting into compound lifts try this site out (http://www.strengthstandards.co/#/)
It works almost like a video game progress bar, you can type in your information and see where you stack up against Untrained, Novice, Intermediate, Advanced and Elite! It's surprisingly motivating!

I hope this was helpful and can get some people on track to feeling and looking better!!