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Thursday, 25th November

Are you keeping variety in your programme? You still need to keep to your core programme, but you need some extra activities to add to the spice of your life. If you just go to the gym, do you run outside too?

 Have you been cycling outside? Have you ever tried canoeing (its much harder than you think!)? Have you ever tried a trampoline? A lot of people i know find it fun! Have you ever wanted to learn how to swim? Whats wrong with signing up for a course for 10 weeks?

We talked about exercise being an every day habit for you, have you got to that stage yet or are you still fighting that concept? Good news is that if you stop fighting it, it WILL become an every day event that you actually enjoy as long as you have enough variation!

Have you had the goal of becoming a good runner? If this is true, start out walking every day and see how you feel after a couple of weeks.

Then you may be able to run ten yards in different intervals when you get your breath back. The worst thing you can do is start off running.

 I know people who bought the “run a marathon in 26 weeks” book and ended up with nasty blisters, bad feet, knees and back because they didnt listen to good advice. They followed the advice of running 5 times a week and it ended up in disaster! These books often don’t take into account everyday people and the problems they may run into.

You MUST try to find something you like, otherwise you are very unlikely to keep it up.

Another great tactic would be to team up with a friend in your fitness, as long as you have similar goals and are of similar fitness levels. The social aspect alone will motivate you along very well and take you to levels of training you may not have thought possible.

Bottom line is simply to DO instead of talking about it so lets give it your best shot!

Twitt
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Thursday, 24th November

All options are possible if you apply yourself to a goal that’s uppermost in your mind.

What stops us getting there is being sidetracked into minor things that have no bearing on what we are trying to achieve.

This week as I have said yesterday, has seen me focus on getting every single person I train up to their best levels for the year. This has led to exciting training sessions and previously unseen motivation levels.

There are so many things that can detract us from our goals, this is why its vital to have a structure in our lives we can do without even thinking about it.

I had to visit the dentist today with a minor complaint, but still enough pain to cause me some distress. We then get lectured (rightly I might add!) on how to clean our teeth properly, twice a day to enable us to have our teeth for a lifetime. Im sure most if not all of you have experienced this.

So why do we brush our teeth every day, twice a day, some people more, and we cant look after the rest of our bodies every day?

If we don’t look after our teeth, they eventually fall out!

If we don’t look after our body and continually abuse it, we are likely to have a heart attack or bring on a serious disease.

So by that comparison, most of the population doesn’t treat their body with the respect it deserves, until its too late usually when you are being lectured by a doctor in hospital!

So if you are doubting whether to continue your exercise programme, and somehow questioning the virtues of eating healthy food daily, then surely this must be the wake up call you need?

The primary need to exercise and eat right is to be healthy, to function properly in daily life, for your immune system to be strong to fight off disease, and to live a decent quality of life.

Surely these most basic reasons are enough to get you back on track and get you exercising today!!!

Twitt
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Thursday, 23rd November

Hopefully, you have reinvigorated yourself this week by re-booting your exercise programme and you have already hit a big couple of workouts already this week.

Its this type of enthusiasm that i have been bumping in to all week long. Any “feeling sorry for yourself” attitude has been crushed and replaced with fresh enthusiasm full of people rallying themselves for a big end of year performance.

All this sea change in attitude takes is a momentum shift in the way you approach everything. If you approach everything in a negative way, you are highly likely to get a negative reponse.

If you approach everything in a highly optimistic and positive way, then doors usually open for you and people can be very receptive to your ideas.

For example, if i suggest a workout to someone that involves one of their most difficult bike rides so far this year, with a few extremely difficult hills etc, then the initial response may not be so good! However, if i point out that this type of ride coincided with them being in their best physical performance all year, then they start to associate the two and then start nodding in a positive way and are then far more likely to approach and have heck of a go at this hugely difficult ride.

Then when the ride is completed, a huge sense of achievement and satisfaction starts to come over them and this one workout alone, can make the difference from either having a mediocre end to the year, or a far more exciting end to the year with perhaps new highs of performance attained, which usually transform to excellent body fat levels and that all important feeling of wellbeing!!!

Whatever your situation right now, positivity about your true ability and previous achievements this year need to be revisited right now to end the year on a massive high, and allow you to follow on into 2012 with a fresh batch of goals that will inspire you on to greater things again!!

Twitt
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Tuesday, 22nd November

A massive amount of colds, flu you name it, its around in a big way at the moment, and a huge amount of people have got some illness one way or another!

This is the first big wave of illness to hit us this winter, and undoubtedly, not the last. Some people have already had it for a couple of weeks, some people havent been out of the house at all.

We usually talk about how being fit makes us look better and lose body fat and weight, but its exactly at times like this that we need to talk about the importance of a health and fitness programme for our immune system.

Without a healthy immune system, our bodies would break down and make us vulnerable to the biggest and most threatening illnesses. This is why hospitals have become much more responible for cleanliness and not passing germs/viruses on, because when you are ill in hospital, your immune system is down and you are highly vulnerable to infection, which has even killed some patients in the past of course unfortunately.

So if you are one of those who are ill or have been ill lately, being healthy and feeling just “normal” again would be an achievement! Weight loss and fat loss may not be on your priority list right now, and getting your immune system back up to speed is the most important thing you can do right now!

I bang on about fresh, natural healthy foods where possible, and these happen to be the most important foods when it comes to boosting your immune system. These are often called “superfoods” and they are becoming more and more appreciated, and you can usually read about them at least once a week in the national newspapers.

These foods will form the foundation not only for your immune system and how healthy you feel, but for your entire future success, they are that important!!!

Twitt
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Monday, 21st November

Under five weeks to go now and i find there is huge momentum with everyone i train now coming up to the festive period.

Most people i know want to be in their best shape for the end of the year.

There has been a cultural shift the last few years too. Years ago, christmas used to be all about the parties begining at the start of december. Now because of the changing culture of people not going out so much, and there not being so many parties for whatever reason, people’s health has become much more important again, which is great news!!

People are also becoming much more aware of the health in general too, more check ups and more preventative measures are being taken. People are also more aware of the need to be in shape in december to avoid the folly of going on some kind of faddy drastic diet in januuary.

Most people realise now that if you’re in shape during december, then theres no need to diet in january, maybe lose a few pounds but no monumental effort needed!!

Once you manage to get over the “let’s get in shape for this or that season/holiday”, you will really understand that its the best overall strategy to be in shape ALL YEAR LONG!!!

Your body will thank you too!!! One of the most destructive things you can do to your body is diet hard and lose lots of weights, then don’t care for a while and pile lots of weight on. Then the more times you repeat this process, the more resistant your body becomes to losing weight in the future, which is a very negative situation!!

So under five weeks left, you don’t need major efforts, all you need to do is use common sense, eat sensible portion sizes and try to keep your food as natural and as fresh as possible. No salt, very little refined sugars and little saturated fat.

Start your week off well, stay positive and you’re off to a flyer!!!

Twitt