Hello, my friends! I hope you are doing well and have had a great week so far! I am back for the third and final installment of my 3 Part Achieving your Health and Weight loss Goals! In this series, I am just reviewing some foundational ideas about health and weight loss…made especially for those of us imperfect people who sometimes forget the basics. 🙋♀️ If you haven’t read them yet, check out Part 1 and Part 2
- Go Natural
Sometimes when we are making health changes or want to lose weight, we have the urge to complicate things and get into the weeds of diet change right away. We make drastic changes, that we can maintain for a little while, but find it hard to maintain with consistency long-term. (Longterm consistency is the key to lasting weight loss and health transformation. What if instead of making huge drastic diet changes that start to feel overwhelming within the first week, you make small gradual changes and build on your successes over time? Like starting with the basics of cutting some or all of the processed low nutrient junk foods from your diet and adding nutrient dense vegetables, fruits, beans, and whole grains. The most transformative thing you can do for your body and metabolism makes sure you are giving it all the nutrients and fiber it needs to work optimally. Adding an abundance of vegetables and fruits, especially green leafy vegetables (spinach, kale) and cruciferous vegetables (broccoli, cauliflower, Brussel sprouts), brightly colored squashes, and berries (strawberries, blueberries, cherries) can be the key to unlocking your bodies health potential. Get back to the basics of natural eating and then build upon that into more advanced diet modification techniques (if you want), but always start with the basics. Let me know if you need help with this, diet modification is my forte’!
- Add Some Weight
I’m talkin’ iron baby! Adding some weight training throughout the week is hugely beneficial. Generally speaking, the more muscle mass you have the higher your metabolism is, meaning the more calories you burn, and if your goal is weight loss that’s a big plus. But more importantly, having more muscle tone makes you more functionally “healthy”. More tone helps you move efficiently and with more stability during exercise, which helps decrease injury. It also makes it so you can ‘work harder’ when exercise which helps you burn more calories and helps you feel like a badass (goal!). Really there are so many reasons to increase your muscle mass and tone, like maintaining strong, healthy bones, which has even been linked to improved brain health. I’ll be honest weight lifting, is not my favorite form of exercise, but I do it at least one weight training day a week. If you are new to weight training, start out with bodyweight, then build from there. My hubby has some great, easy to follow videos over on Driven if you are interested HERE.
- Drink Water
This one is pretty simple. Our bodies are about 60% water Try to drink at least 2 liters of water a day. Staying adequately hydrated is essential for so many reasons like ensuring proper detoxification, nutrient delivery, metabolic regulation, skin health and so much more. Also, if weight loss is a goal, drinking plenty of water often staves off the cravings that come when your stomach starts to feel empty (but don’t forget that water is not a substitute for food, optimal nutrition is a must!). If you aren’t used to drinking plain water, ease into enjoying it by trying some lemon water or fruit infused water.
- Focus on Sleep
And last by certainly not least, vitamin S…sleep. It’s so important to prioritize getting good quality sleep. Sleep is the time when your brain resets and “cleans” itself and without this daily deep clean problems start to arise (in the short and longterm). Sleep is also the time when the emotional regulatory areas of our brain can sort through all of the information from our day to help us maintain our emotional equilibrium. Without this very important time, we are less tolerant to stress and adverse events, which can lead to, mental health issues and possible unhelpful coping strategies such as stress eating and overeating. Sleep is also the time when our immune system regenerates and rejuvenates, making us more prone to getting sick and even long-term chronic illness. Prioritize getting 7-9hours of sleep by planning when you need to go to bed at night. If you have trouble sleeping, melatonin and/or magnesium supplementation is helpful.
Best of luck with your health and weight loss goals my friends! And remember, if you need support in achieving your goals set up a free 30min consultation and I can help!
Be Well,
Sally
