What Motivates You?
What Motivates You?
By Niki
I’ve been asking myself that question a lot lately. It is a really important one when you think about it, and one which I have only recently come to appreciate again. You see, for the past several weeks I have been trying to get my workout and diet “game” back on and struggling tremendously. I had always been an emotional eater; that is before I started embracing a healthier lifestyle and taking eating clean more seriously, but I thought I had overcome this weakness. Ha! Well a little havoc let loose it my life and no strict competition goals until June and cookies began to look more appealing…all the time!!
I could not figure out what was wrong with me. Normally I am a very strong willed person, and if I set my mind to accomplish something I will work as hard as I can to see it come to fruition. If I fail, I will regroup and try even harder. In trying to figure out the mystery of where my “game” had gone I realized that I needed to think about my motivation. I needed to critically think about why I was doing this and why I wanted this. I became cognizant that answering this question is crucial to maintaining my discipline and as a natural consequence, whether my body will undergo sufficient transformation to get up on stage…in a skimpy bikini no less.
Knowing that you have to be on stage in a bikini can really motivate!
You see, initially, when I began training for a figure competition I did not have to analyze or think about my motivation because my incentive was just that – to prove to myself that I could transform my body and get up on stage. Once I accomplished this I wanted to make specific improvements to my physique and push myself harder…and I did. But this time around my goals were not as concrete…June is a long way away…
What I have realized in agonizing over my recent falter in self-discipline is that it is essential that you revisit the essence of your motivation somewhat frequently because over time, particularly as you accomplish specific goals, it changes. So, remember to think critically about what is driving you and where you want to go. Set specific and short-term goals for yourself in anticipation of long-term ones. If you need a break, take one. But revisiting you motivation keeps it renewed, fresh and powerful. This is my experience at least. Knowing your motive and end goal helps keep you on the path you want to me on. I am happy I went on this little soul searching expedition and hope it helps someone else who may be struggling to get back on track 100 per cent.
Fool-proof dieting?
Happy New Years! Ok so I know I’m like 3 weeks late, but as always the most popular resolution is weight loss and better health, which means I’ve been very busy!
So how did you do over the break? According to the New England Journal of Medicine (http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/342/12/861) the average weight gain over the holiday season (from Thanksgiving to New Years Day) is 3.3lbs? (10% of you really enjoy your holidays and put on over 5lbs, that’s a lot of eggnog!) And that was a study done in 2000, I’m sure 10 years later that number has climbed. And I highly doubt that it’s muscle!
How bad were you over the holidays?
While this is a lot less than what most people would guess it can add up. If left unchecked in 5 years it would equal over 16 pounds of fat.
Now not to brag but I actually lost weight. And don’t think I avoided the nog, I actually went looking for the real high fat stuff.
- Mmm farm fresh
(It’s only available around Christmas I had to take advantage!)
So my trick for not gaining weight while still eating what I want?
Calorie shifting, or zig zag diet, it was developed by power lifting world record holder Dr Fred Hatfield (aka Dr. Squat).
Dr Squat then and now
It’s all about tricking you metabolism, to either lose fat or gain muscle. A technique used by many bodybuilders and fitness athletes to obtain low levels of body fat.
Zig zagging allows one to eat low calories without slowing down the metabolism, because every few days you’ll increase your calories.
The benefit of this style of eating is twofold first by having a ‘high’ calorie day won’t cause your body to go into starvation mode.
When you eat low calories for too long your body thinks slows down the rate at which it burns calories, which makes it extremely hard to lose fat. In fact when this happens it will take fewer calories to put on fat! This, of course is absolutely the worst thing that can happen.
So by adding in a higher calorie, you speed up your metabolism. Then while your metabolism is sped up, you once again lower your calories.
The second benefit of zig zagging continuously is that you’re less likely to hit plateaus. The body likes homeostasis, but if you keep adjusting calories it won’t have the opportunity to remain static.
How does the science hold up on this? Well even in the extreme case it worked!
Researchers had (non obese) subjects fast every other day for 21 days. (http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/abstract/81/1/69)
Their conclusion, fat oxidation (burning) increased thus they deemed it as a feasible fat lose protocol.
The only down side, on the fasting day you want to eat your arm off! (Ok so maybe not their exact words but you get the picture.)
Oil and water, two things to never eat together!
It’s the holiday season, you’re going to go to parties, have family gatherings and eat some bad stuff! Some really bad stuff! Admit it…I can!
Now with that being said, there is a certain food combination you want to avoid as much as possible if you want to give yourself a fighting chance over the holiday season.
The worse combinations of foods you can eat are refined fats with simple carbohydrates in the absence of protein. This will cause your insulin levels to rise, and literally drive fat and carbs into your fat cells at faster than you can say ‘Merry Christmas’ instant weight gain!
Beyond that, if you do this on a consistent basis you’re asking for various other health complications, take your pick- heart disease, diabetes…etc.
A side note alcohol is like a super sugar. Mixing alcohol and refined fats or alcohol and simple sugars are also extremely negative on the body.
So knowing you’re going to do it anyways, how do we minimize the effects?
The first solution would be to eat before you go to a party. The pre-party meal should be a high protein meal. The best thing would be a protein shake in the car before going in, that would make a HUGE difference.
Also while in the party, when ever you pick a refined fatty food or sugary food, have an equal amount of something with protein (cold cuts, sausages, etc).
It doesn't have to end like this!
Now I understand this may fall on deaf ears, but here goes- drink as much water as you can before, during and especially after, you’ll thank me in the morning!
Follow these rules and it will make the difference between staying the same or adding 5-10 pounds of fat over the next few weeks!
Have fun…but not too much fun!
Eating fat can get you skinny?!
You can quote me on this, as long as you’re not eating to many overall calories, eating fat WILL NOT make you fat. In fact at times I’ve adopted an Inuit style way of eating, where 70% of my calories came from fat. And guess what, I got leaner!
Fish for dinner again!
Contrary to popular belief fat doesn’t actually make you fat. Now mind you certain fats will clog your arteries. However healthy fats can actually help you become leaner!
Remember that there are certain vitamins that are fat soluble, A, D, E, K. There are also essential fats, that must be obtained from your diet. Think of it this way if you were to only drink one glass of water each day, your body would actually retain water! I know it sounds counterintuitive, but your body would be in a state of dehydration and therefore hold on to whatever water it can get since it doesn’t know when it will get more. Now if you were to drink 4 liters of water each day your body would flush it self on a regular basis knowing that it will get more water very shortly.
The same thing can happen with your fats. If you limit the amount of healthy fats your body won’t use fats for energy. Increase your healthy fats and keep your carbohydrate levels at a reasonable level and you’ll use fat for energy at times of low energy out put, like sitting around watching TV, imagine that!
- By having more healthy fats your body will use up more fat for energy.
- Best sources include; olive oil, fish oil, hemp oil, flax oil, borage oil, sunflower seed oil, palm oil, avocados, almonds, pecans, cashews, walnuts, coconut oil, pumpkin seed oil, fat in grass fed animals, butter (raw is best or organic).
- LIMIT/AVOID: trans fats (pastries, French fries, deep fried foods) margarine, hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated fats and oils, fats from conventionally raised cattle, roasted nuts, farm raised fish.
just so we're clear...this is the bad stuff!
As if getting leaner wasn’t enough, but you should also notice your skin and hair should look and feel better! So don’t be afraid to ‘chew’ the fat!
Is Your Morning Coffee Making You FAT!?
Are you the type of person that start the day off with a coffee to go along side your breakfast? If so you may be working against yourself when it comes to fat loss!
Coffee and cereal for breakfast is pretty much the same as eating a
chocolate bar for breakfast at least when it comes to your blood sugar
levels.
According to the study by University of Guelph researchers, blood sugar
levels in people who ate low-sugar cereal were 250 per cent higher if they
drank caffeinated coffee before or with breakfast, compared to decaf.
Research has shown that, “whether you’re a healthy individual, obese or a
Type 2 diabetic, when you ingest caffeine and then follow that with some
food that’s carbohydrate-based, for a prolonged period of time — certainly
six hours at least — your body becomes insulin resistant,” says Terry
Graham, professor of human health and nutritional sciences at the
University of Guelph.
“It’s the caffeine in the coffee that is altering your body’s sugar response,” Graham says. “It makes us resistant to insulin which in turn
makes our blood-sugar levels go higher.”
There are a few take home messages from this study.
1. Unless you are diabetic, this poses no real health problem. However if
you are trying to lose fat it IS a problem, because when insulin and blood
sugar levels are high, it means fat burning is at zero!
2. Eat protein with your breakfast. Having protein with a meal lowers
insulin spike caused by carbohydrates.
3. A bad breakfast can stay with you for up to 6+ hours! Which shows that
breakfast really is the most important meal of the day.
Here’s the link if you’d like to read the full article.
http://www.canada.com/windsorstar/news/story.html?id=dc861332-2795-47a1-baeb-bf036a3a4dc8