Six Biggest Workout Mistakes

 

1 Corinthians 9:24                    
Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it.

Our family recently joined the gym.  I personally, had been doing my workout videos at home and walking outside and felt like I was doing just fine on my own.  Until.... I just recently (like in February to be exact) for no reason, with my healthy eating obsession still in tact and doing the videos I have always done and loved, started to gain weight.  What in the world????

This gym stuff all started when Joseph broke his ankle in October, so he was out of soccer for 6 weeks.  We signed him up in November for the gym so he could work on upper body and not lose all physical abilities that he has worked on during that time.  So, my brain said "Wait! You are paying for a membership for your child and not doing anything to help your situation!".  See, I am very bad to sacrifice whatever I need, to help my children, or other people.  I am one of those who needs to learn to do something for me.  I am a nurse, so I am wired to help others all the time.  But, something (maybe God) said you need to join with him.  So, if I am going down with him, so is everyone else in this house, lol!  We all joined.  The Great Body Company has been wonderful to help all of us.  They have made a workout even for Jacob who is 9.  We have been going for about 4 weeks now.  I have always been kind of anti-gym if that is a word.  I felt like I was fine to work out on my own at home without paying money.  While that is true, you can do that, I have found that it is much more effect for me to go workout on equipment and with people that I don't have the access to here at my house.


So the trainer there told me something eye opening.  Are you ready for this one.... if you are over 35 and you are not actively lifting weights and making muscle, you are actively loosing muscle!  It's all part of the aging process.  Muscle helps metabolism, as well as strength and bone mass.  So if I am losing muscle everything is slowing down.  So if I am not building muscle, my body says...slow it down guys she is getting old lol! So my anti-aging plan is to lift some weights and turn this car around!  I do not have all the things that I need to do this at my house and for the cost to buy it all, we can pay much less and go work out as a family and with friends..bonus!!

Here are some helpful tips and six big workout mistakes... and I, Mrs. Health Fanatic, am guilty of them all!!

Mistake #1: Too much cardio

You need to avoid steady state cardio and shock your body! Get off the treadmill and the elliptical and start mixing things up.  Increase your workout intensity, but lower your duration.  Try something fun and new (kickboxing, circuit training, sprints, or play a new sport) and continue to switch things up to keep your body guessing. By lowering the amount of traditional steady state cardio, and replacing it with higher intensity and shorter duration exercise, you will actually improve your hormonal state and your body’s ability to burn fat and build lean muscle.

Mistake #2: Intimidated by weight training and therefore not doing it

I understand that you are afraid to get “bulky” and lose your feminine look, however you need to throw this fear and misconception out the window.  Strength training is extremely beneficial for your bone health and overall long-term health.  Additionally, lean muscle will improve your body composition and help you burn fat faster than cardio. One key ingredient is finding the proper environment or facility to learn to strength train and losing your false insecurities that others in the gym are watching you or judging you. 

Mistake #3: Spending 15-20 minutes isolating your abdominals

Your abs are made in the kitchen with a great diet and not by performing an insane amount of isolated abdominal movements.  As you begin to strength train, you will want to do multi-joint functional movements (Ex: squats, dead lifts, pull-ups, kettle bell swings) where your abs are engaged throughout the entire workout.  Fortunately or unfortunately, all of the isolation crunches, bends, twists, etc. will never out do or overcome a poor diet.  Did you hear that?? YOU CAN'T OUT RUN YOUR FORK!

Mistake #4: More is not better

It is absolutely important to work hard in the gym and get after it.  However, you need to also listen to your body and work to develop a set training schedule.  If you are overtraining and pushing your body too far, more time in the gym will not equal better or faster results.  Lack of sleep and too much training is counter-productive to your results because you will be putting your body in a poor hormonal state and you will be taxing yourself mentally as well. As previously mentioned, shorter and more intense workouts are the best way to burn fat and build lean muscle.  I just started a few weeks ago, and if you know me, I am all in or nothing on everything.  So, I am guilty here and my elbow is sore because I pushed a little too much lol!

Mistake #5: Carbohydrate loading before workouts 

There are many misconceptions about carbohydrates, but most experts would agree that lower to moderate carb intake is effective to get lean.  We must also understand that athletic performance is different than weight loss and training for body composition.  If your primary purpose is to get a lean fit body, then stop eating carbs before your workout. If you need to have a snack or eat before try eating something with just protein and fat in your pre-workout meal. Many people will get leaner and feel better with ketogenic, low carb, or cyclic low carb diets.

Mistake #6: Unrealistic expectations 

You can’t be so hard on yourself and you must understand that your body will not change overnight and you need to be patient. Changing your body or anything in your life will take consistent effort over time and you must have a plan and stick to it. You must immediately stop your obsession with the scale and instead notice how you feel, how your body looks in the mirror, how your clothes fit, and how you perform in life on a daily basis. Set a realistic time frame for your goal.  I would recommend setting a date of at least six weeks and preferably eight to twelve weeks before you judge your results.  I am so guilty of this..SO GUILTY! 
You must also remember that diet, sleep, and stress are arguably even more important than what you do in the gym.  So make sure these aspects of your life are also in check so you do not sabotage your well deserved results!

Action Steps

In order to take this information and put it to good use in your life today, you will need to do several things:
Get a workout plan that involves variation and has a focus around strength training.
You must find an environment that you are comfortable in and hire a coach that can properly teach you new things.  If you have budgetary constraints, start by reaching out to an experienced and “fit friend” for some initial guidance.
Have realistic expectations and set goals for at least six weeks out and avoid the mental traps of the scale.
Have equal focus on your diet, sleep, and stress levels so you can get the results that you deserve from your workout program.  Moving towards a real food diet will be a great start.
Now you have specific action steps to move forward today and you can begin working smarter and not harder towards the body or your dreams.

Brownies ..gluten free and paleo friendly

I made these last week and they were so good! The kids loved them and I took them to a family get together and they all loved them and they are free of wheat!  You can also make them sugar free by substituting stevia in the place of honey.

Paleo, Gluten Free Brownies

ingredients:

1/2 cup almond flour
1/3 cup cocoa powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp sea salt
1 stick organic butter
2 organic free range eggs
3 tablespoons of raw honey
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 tablespoons almond butter
1/4 cup chocolate chips

instructions:

1. mix together the almond flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt
2. melt the butter
3. whisk the melted butter with eggs, honey, almond butter, and vanilla
4. add dry ingredients in to the wet and gently fold in the chocolate chips to the batter
5. spread the batter in an 8x8 inch greased pan or parchment paper lined pan
6. bake at 350 for 25 min or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean
7. let brownies cool before cutting

my ingredients

mix dry ingredients

whisk wet ingredients

mix together wet and dry and fold in chips

I like to use these chips

all done!

Budget Friendly Healthy Eating Tips

          

          

1 Corinthians 16:2  On the first day of every week, each of you is to put something aside and store it up, as he may prosper, so that there will be no collecting when I come.

The biggest complaint I hear from people trying to start a healthy diet is the following.. "it's too expensive to eat healthy".  Well, first of all, the price of being unhealthy is much more.  You will have more medical problems, medical bills, and medication costs, if not now, you will have them later.  You are what you eat and eventually it will all catch up to you.  If you don't put the proper food and nutrients in to your body your body is suffering.  Not to mention what the added chemicals in your foods will cause.  Like everyone else in this day's economy, we don't want to go out and spend $300 a week on a grocery bill and we don't.  So how do you eat healthy and stay on a budget?

 

Budget Friendly Tips for Healthy Eating

1. Buy Local: it is much cheaper to buy from your local farmer or farmer's market than the grocery store for produce and other items.  There are many local farmer's markets and if you plan meals and buy what is in season that alone will save you money.  I not only love the farmer's market, but I love my local farmers and call them when I need items, such as grass fed beef, eggs, and produce.  If you live in the Tri-cities area and don't know about Indian Brook farm near our church, send me a message and I will hook you up with my favorite farm girl, Wendi!

2. Plan meals: If you plan your meals for the week, make a grocery list, and stick to it, you won't be buying impulse items or throwing things away.

3. Go to more than one store on more than one day:  No store has everything that I use and no store has their items at the same price.  I shop about three different places about two different times a week and I shop a little at a time and do not do one huge grocery store trip. If I shop on Monday for eating grilled chicken on Friday, the chicken isn't as fresh and some of the veggies I would have used are starting to go bad.  I don't like to waste and throw things away, so I will make a mid-week grocery stop often.

4. Shop the perimeter of the store:  Most of your items that are healthy and fresh are around the perimeter of the store.  Most of the processed junk food impulse items line the shelves down the middle.  If you don't go down them, you don't buy any extra junk.

5. Use coupons:  What?? They have healthy coupons?!?  Yes, they do.  Here are some links for healthy coupons.  Note: earthfare has store coupons, but most of the coupons on their site are from the manufacturer, which means you can print and use it anywhere.

Earthfare Coupon Homepage :  remember you don't have to shop there to use these!
Mambo Sprouts
Stoneyfield : sign up for free coupons

The World's Fastest Workout Video!!!

The 4-Minute Fat-Burning Miracle Workout

 

 

         

1 Timothy 4:8                    

For while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come.

I have pinned a lot of the these workouts on pinterest.  I know some of you have heard of this and some of you think I am speaking a cool new language.  It rolls off the tongue smoothly and the word sounds cool.

Tabata training is a High Intensity Interval Training (H.I.I.T) workout that lasts four minutes.   I know what you're  thinking.....how can that be effective?  Oh, that's easy, four minutes.... HA HA HA, I say. Try one and you will see.  When I first watched one of these, it reminded me of middle school PE exercises and I thought "this will be fun and easy and four minutes, oh yeah". Let me tell you, I was sucking wind, dizzy, breathing as loud as a bull, and laying on the floor.  See, if you aren't about to fall over, you didn't do it right.  So why would any human inflict this upon themselves? You will feel amazing and have lots of energy all day long.  I miss that feeling when I don't do it.  I do it first thing in the morning.  It raises your heart rate for up to 36 hours after the workout and keeps that metabolism revving all day! 

The History of Tabata

Tabata training was discovered by Japanese scientist Dr. Izumi Tabata and a team of researchers from the National Institute of Fitness and Sports in Tokyo.  They used this on Olympic Speed Skaters to increase their aerobic capacity.

Tabata and his team conducted research on two groups of athletes: one group trained at a moderate intensity level while the other group trained at a high intensity level. The moderate intensity group worked out five days a week for a total of six weeks; each workout lasted one hour. The high intensity group worked out four days a week for six weeks; each workout lasted four minutes and 20 seconds (with 10 seconds of rest in between each set).
The results; group one had increased their aerobic system (cardiovascular), but showed little or no results for their anaerobic system (muscle). Group two showed much more increase in their aerobic system than group one, and increased their anaerobic system by 28 percent.
In conclusion, high intensity interval training has more impact on both the aerobic and anaerobic systems.

The Tabata Program

The Tabata workout lasts only four minutes, but is one of the longest four minutes you'll encounter. The structure of the program is:

• Workout hard for 20 seconds
• Rest for 10 seconds
• Complete eight rounds

You push yourself as hard as you can for 20 seconds and rest for 10 seconds until you complete eight sets. You can do pretty much any exercise you wish. You can do squats, pushups, rows, etc... Any exercise that works your large muscle groups is strongly recommended.

Tabata is great to get a quick workout in if you're short on time, need to switch up your routine, or need to improve endurance speed. Incorporate this type of workout into your fitness routine and produce results.

Some people just do it on their own with little tabata timers.  Personally, I like to do a video and have instructions out loud.  I need to follow along to keep myself going at a fast pace.  I will post my personal favorite video below.  Have fun!!!

The Truth About Soy and Bonus Recipe for Protein Bars

Genesis 1:29
And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food.

I know you all have heard all the bad things about soy and good things about soy, so which one is it? Let's go back to rule #1 in clean eating..if God made it, it's good for you. God made soy beans. They are meant to be eaten in their whole form and not to be processed in to something else or genetically modified. This (as with all foods) is where the problem begins.

Meet the edamame

Edamame is a green vegetable more commonly known as a soybean, harvested at the peak of ripening right before it reaches the "hardening" time. The word Edamame means "Beans on Branches," and it grows in clusters on bushy branches. To retain the freshness and its natural flavor, it is parboiled and quick-frozen. In East Asia, the soybean has been used for over two thousand years as a major source of protein. Edamame is consumed as a snack, a vegetable dish, used in soup. As a snack, the pods are lightly boiled in salted water, and then the seeds are squeezed directly from the pods into the mouth with the fingers. This is the healthy form of soy.

When soy beans are processed, every healthy part is stripped away leaving you with SOY PROTEIN ISOLATES...these are little molecules of estrogen. This will get your hormones out of whack, help to increase the risk of breast cancer, causes girls to start periods at an earlier age, causes our boys and husbands to have increased breast tissue. AVOID THIS INGREDIENT at all costs.

Watch this little video below....it is wonderful about telling how soy is broken down when processed and what it does. It also shows you bad forms and good forms of soy protein. Please watch it..it's so informative!

http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/1-food-women-should-avoid-processed-soy


Joseph runs track and plays soccer. He is our 13 year old. Sometimes he does that on the same day and is starving right after school before practice. I have been sending him with an apple and a Kind bar or some kind of organic protein bar daily. I checked the labels on them all...even organic and found this :

Do you see it?? The Soy Protein Isolate????

I have found that the "healthy snacks" aisle is responsible for more weight gain than the candy aisle. Most protein shakes and bars contain more sugar and fat than a bag of candy! They also all have soy protein isolate. The tricky part is that we think they are healthy because they came from the health food aisle. If you’re also trying to lose weight and stubborn body fat, you should run past this aisle.

There are a few bars out there without these ingredient in it...however Joseph doesn't like any of them. So I am making my own for him. What could be better?!?!

There are many healthy protein powders out there besides soy.. I choose to use cold-pressed whey that comes from milk and it has stevia instead of sugar. Other good ones are hemp and pea powders. It's the process that makes the difference on these. Anytime you heat up the products and process it, you strip it of the nutritional value and create issues. You will pay for high quality powders; just let me tell you, but I can't put a price on my family's health. It is actually more economical to make my own as these bars are expensive on this case.

Here is a recipe for you that I made for Joseph today:

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Protein Bar

1 1/2 cups dry oatmeal

2 Tablespoons flax seed, ground

2 Tablespoons Honey

2-4 scoops protein powder

1/2 cup peanut butter ( no other ingredients but peanuts)

1/4 cup shredded coconut

1/4 cup coconut oil or butter, melted

1 cup chocolate chips (divided) mine or pictured below

1/4 cup water

Mix all ingredients and half a cup of chocolate chips.... (mixture will be somewhat sticky). Line an 8×8-inch pan with parchment paper and spread the mixture evenly in the pan. Melt the other 1/2 cup of chocolate chips on the stove or in the microwave. Drizzle or spread over the mixture in the pan.
Place the pan in the freezer for at least 2 hours. Cut into 10 -12 bars and wrap in plastic wrap and/or foil and store in the freezer.
Thaw slightly before serving.

my protein powder found at kroger

this only has peanuts or you can make your own as pictured below

this is peanut butter made at ingles

I cut mine with this super pampered chef thing..oh my so easy

I am going to wrap these individually and store in fridge