10 Bad Habits to Eliminate Now

1) Weighing yourself too often

Your body fluctuates too much during the day for it to mean anything.

You're becoming paranoid or seeking immediate gratification.

Neither is good and is only making you think every action you do is effecting your health.

Not to mention most scales don't account for body fat and water weight loss.



Pick one day and time during the week and weigh yourself then.

The best time is early in the morning before your first meal.

The mirror and your clothes will be the best indicator though.

2) Too much saturated fat

Do you get all your fat from your protein, ex. meat.

That is all saturated fat. Fat which stays solid at room temperature. Like the fat on your steak.

You need more healthy essential fatty acids (EFA's).



Omega 3's from  flaxseed oil (actual flaxseeds if you grind them), fatty fish such as salmon, edamame, walnuts, leafy greens, and if you eat red meat then eat game meat like bison.

EFA's help burn fat, are essential for joint health (I can attest), improve skin texture, burn fat, great for your hair, improve insulin sensitivity and metabolism, and many more things.



What about Omega 6's and 9's...well, you're probably already getting too many of them and we need to make sure you get more 3's.

You can also buy Udo's Oil for the perfect blend.

3) Fat Free Food

Fat free does not mean SUGAR FREE.



These foods often contain a lot of bad things in them.

Don't get me started on trans fat.

Okay, too late. I'm getting started.

Fried foods (yeah pizza is fried cheese), pastries, doughnuts, frosting, taco shells, corn chips, hydrogenated vegetable oils, baked goods like cookies and crackers and cakes, margarine

Stay away from anything with the word hydrogenated.

Dr. Erasmus once said, “If you see the “H” word on the label, get the
“H” out of there!”

Trans fat does the opposite of Essential fat.

It decreases insulin sensitivity, lowers your good cholesterol, can cause cancer, hampers the immune system, interferes with the liver detoxing, and many more bad things.


4) Eating Appetizers

As my favorite comedian Norm MacDonald pointed out.



When you eat at home and make yourself some stew do you first eat an entire loaf of bread first?

Or a basked or two of chips?

Then why do this when you go out?

Once basket of chips can have more calories than an entire serving of frozen pizza!



CHIPS MAKE HIPS



5) Too much pushing, not enough pulling

I train so many people than come from other programs and have bad posture and even kyphosis (hunchback)


Too many people are doing pushups, benchpress, etc. no one is doing rows, deadlifts, pullups, etc.



You need to create an even balance for your posterior muscles.

Especially you that sit all day for work, sit all day when commuting, then sit the rest of the day in front of the tv and computer.



6) Blaming your weight gain on a bad meal or bad day



One bad meal does not crate a calorie surplus, unless it was an all nighter at CiCi's pizza.



one bad day could put a hamper on things, but it's most likely something you consistently do.

So find out what it is and hold yourself accountable. No more lying.

7) Hanging out with a bad influence

Reformed alcoholics don't having out with their drinking buddies. Whey would you hang out with people that want to drag you down. Only one influence will win. Either they change, or you will.



It's a lot easier to regress than for them to change.

Don't stay around negative people that want you to fail and make themselves feel better.

8) Not being accountable

If you're fat, don't have your desired body, not where you want to be yet?

Only one person to blame. YOU!



You control what you eat, when you workout, how you train, when you sleep.

No excuses. Accept it and make the change.

9) Buying clear cooking oils



Unless your buying Extra Virgin Olive Oil which is not clear, you're most likely buying hydrogenated cooking oil full of trans fat so that it has a longer shelf life. Too bad it shortens yours.

10) You're not tracking anything



How much weight did you lose this week? How about body fat? How many calories did you eat today? How many do you eat consistently? Do you get enough protein? How many reps of squats did you get at a certain weight?

If you're not tracking anything how do you know if you're getting better?

You're either getting better or worse. So which is it?

6 Reasons your New Years Resolution will Fail Hard

1. You're Fasting

I don't recall Ghandi on the cover of Muscle and Fitness

When you fast, it's not a long term thing. It's an amazing amount of effort that can only last so long, that doesn't teach you any long term skills. On top of that, the only weight you're losing is water weight and muscle weight. Even worse is you'll probably want to gorge afterwards as you're starving and want to reward yourself for your misplaced discipline.


Note: Fasting is dumb. Your body does not need a detox. There has never, ever, ever, been any scientific data to prove that it works. Your body naturally detoxes all the time, or you'd be dead. It's called having a liver.

2. You're doing some trendy Fad Diet

Pretty similar to what we just talked about. A lot of effort used to eat very trace amounts of foods, never allow yourself to eat foods you like, etc.

You know you've been dieting too long when this reminds you of pizza.

Are you really going to go the rest of your life on raw food, or never eat a carb again?


I'm sure you've heard it's not a race, it's a marathon.


Do you want to lose (water)weight for a few weeks, or be lean for life?


Exhibit A of Water Weight loss

3. You're relying off of a Supplement

Thrive, Herbalife, Isagenix,, Body wrap companies such as It Works...I'm sure you can name more.


I once fell victim to SELLING some of this stuff just because I wanted supplements I could sell from my gym and purchase at wholesale. But they were so pushy with their selling I felt sick and apologize for selling a product that I din't believe was the best out there. I won't say which product or anymore about them to not offend anyone.




I now have a supplement that I USE ON MYSELF and have it at the gym. But I'm going off tangent now.

QUEST IS THE BEST!!!!!!!

They tell you how to lose weight, but you need to use their product to attain it. And they want you to sell the product as well. Which is how they really make the money. Notice that they want you to sell it much more than they want you to buy it?

4. You don't have measurable goals

How much weight, or how inches do you plan to lose? When is the deadline? Are you measuring weekly and hitting your short term goals? If not, how do you know if you're diet and work out are working so that you can adjust it to fix the goals.

5. You have no support system

Don't hang around the wrong ELEMENT...get it??? Bad guys from the 5th Element...forget it.

Let's be honest. No one wants you to succeed. When you lose fat, you make your friends and family feel guilty about themselves.


When you don't, and give up. It makes them feel better about themselves.

Ever hear about the crab mentality. When crabs are caught in a bucket, they could easily escape. But when one starts to get away the others pull it back down.


A recovering alcoholic doesn't keep hanging out with his drinking buddies.

The best way to get somewhere, is to talk to someone that's already been there.

What about accountability?


What happens this week if you don't meet your goals. Do you have anyone pushing you. Keeping you on track, helping you when everything seems to be going wrong.

When you miss a workout do you make it up. When personal and business problems happen do you let it effect your workout?



6. Your workout sucks


What are you doing? Running? Do you run properly? Ever noticed how many ads in running magazines are for injuries? Do you really want a runners body, which is usually skinny fat.




Do you know how to periodize your programming? Do you know how to lift correctly? Are you putting enough compound exercises together which will help you burn the most calories, and build the most muscle and strength?


Are you doing a fad workout that makes you feel tired but is only getting you limited results?






You want to get the most out of the least. Doesn't mean you won't work hard for it. But it does mean you'll get what you put into it. And that will give you more motivation than anything else when you actually see the fruits of your labor.

3 Don'ts, 3 Do's of the Holidays

3 Don'ts

1. "If I'm gonna eat bad, I may as well go all the way" Excuse

I see this all the time. Somebody messed up with their diet so they decided to just go all out and eat completely horrible for the rest of the day, weekend, or even week!

I don't stub my toe and then go, well might as well break my ankle and slam it into a wall. I don't overspend by $50 on presents then decide to drain my entire savings since I'm already off budget. Hopefully those were good analogies.


Not to mention you're going to set yourself up for more weight gain, feel depressed, lose your momentum, and a downward spiral continues ever ...downward.

Seriously, you're just making excuses to overeat. Know that so that the next time your brain tries to talk you into cheating you know what's happening and don't let yourself be fooled. Because the easiest person for you to fool is yourself.

How about, I've been dieting, working out hard, might as well not ruin it over a few seconds of taste.

 2. Don't be that GUY/GIRL

You know who. The one that brings a protein shake and some celery while everyone else is eating as a family.

Just don't. I don't care if you got all your food in Tupperware that you can eat with the rest of the family. Just be normal and eat like a human for one meal. One meal won't ruin everything unless you just go crazy.

3. Don't weigh yourself immediately after

Of course you gained weight. You'll gain weight from a glass of water. You'll lose weight when you pee. Why weight yourself right after a huge meal and ruin your holiday moment with instant guilt.

Know that you'll gain weight and most of it will be from water. Lost of carb sources combined with lots of sodium will make you look and feel pudgier, but it's fake.

You'll lose it easy. No harm done.

3 Do's

1. Save your calories for the Big Meal

Intermittent fasting has proven that you don't have to eat every 2-3 hours, so if you can go most of the day without eating, then you can get most of you calories done while eating that big Christmas dinner.

I'm not saying you have to starve yourself all day. You can have very lean protein sources with fibrous carbs. That way you'll be full but still have lots of room for calories that night.

Which brings me to...

2. High Protein

Attack the turkey first, or whatever protein source you have. If you're vegetarian go after that tofurkey. Get all those pees as well. If you're filling up on protein and carbs first, then you'll be getting full of low calorie tasty food. Then with the little room you have left you can attack those pies and pudding without having to worry about self control. You simply won't have room for bad food. But you will be full, and have a good time doing it.

3. Be Prepared

I like to do the reverse of Fat Tuesday. A day where everyone knows they're going to be bad for Ash Wednesday that beings Lent.

So they get all the bad out of them.

You know you're going to be bad so get all the good out of you. Workout with lot's of intensity and volume. Get a good diet going before Christmas. And bring lower calorie desserts(that still taste great) to the event for everyone. 

I'd like to give Lyle McDonald credit for putting out a lot of good info on this as I took a lot of his ideas for this as well.

http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/

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