My Fat Loss and Fitness Tips

These are my practical and practiced fat-loss tips!

It didn't happen overnight

1. Chew Mint: Overeating is a habit; if you feel the need, chew gum to get your mouth moving and the mint will ruin the flavor of anything you would eat and help avoid cravings.
2. If you are going somewhere with unhealthy food like a party, never go hungry.  Eat a healthy meal before so that you are less likely to give in and eat what you shouldn't
3. Start each day with a tall glass of Ice Water, water helps curve hunger pangs and also gets your metabolism going.
4. Add pure and natural fiber powder to water throughout the day to keep away hunger.
5. Studies show that getting enough sleep is essential for your fitness. Getting 7-8 hours of solid sleep at night will help your recovery and aid your body in its ability to burn fat for energy.
6. 3500 calories of a surplus or a deficit equals one pound of body-fat gained or lost.
7. 1800 calories of surplus or deficit is equal to one pound of water gained or lost.
8. Log your calories! If you don't log then you don't know.
9. Workout tip, training to failure is when you push your body to a point it can not do anymore, and that tells your brain it needs to adapt and become stronger
10. Workout tip, lactic acid is the burn you feel in your muscles as you fatigue them, while it is generally not liked, it is essential.  The lactic acid is a key to producing growth hormone release and recovery.
11. Buy a pedometer and get moving; walking and moving every hour of everyday will give your metabolism an extra boost to help you burn body fat for energy. Set a goal for 10,000 steps everyday.
12. Take it one day at a time, and continually educate yourself on your body, and what works best for you.
13. Do NOT punish yourself for slipping up, guilt is horrible for fat-loss. It's so much better to forgive yourself and just get back on the diet horse. One day will not make or break your goals!
14. Be patient, Rome wasn't built in a day and your new body won't be either. This is a new lifestyle change that must be started now and followed the rest of your life. Otherwise you will fall into the yo-yo trap of most dieters. 

It takes time to build something you will be proud of.

We live very sedentary lives, 100 years ago the average person ate 1,000 more calories, didn't exercise, and being overweight was extremely rare. So we just need to be more active, get up and move every hour of every day. Every little bit helps! 

Having Defined Roles is a Key to Success.

Anyone who has ever worked on a team whether for a job, athletics, or a family knows how valuable it is to have clearly defined roles.  When everyone does the job they are supposed to, there will be success.  For me it is easy to see this in sports, it's not always the most talented team that wins, but the team that works the best together. Much like my favorite baseball team the Minnesota Twins that won two World Championships while being heavy underdogs. If everyone has a role then everyone is important and everyone has a purpose.

I believe dieting is the same way, having great talent is like having great genetics, and only a few of us are born with this awesome gift. 

The rest of us if we want to lose weight and keep it off we need to give each day a role, and each workout, and every meal has a purpose. This is a big reason why the Spike Diet is so successful. The Spike Diet has a role for every day:

1.  "High Days" , the purpose is to have a more calories available for an effective workout. 
2. "Low Days" , The purpose is to create a larger deficit on days we don't workout to burn more body fat for energy.
3. "Spike Day" The purpose is to reset or "trick" our mind and body, and at the same time enjoy the food we love guilt free.

On a day to day basis, when I am going to eat something, I ask myself "why am I eating this"
Is it for pleasure or is it to provide nutrients needed for exercise or recovery. On my Spike Day it's simply because I want it or I have been craving it.

Exercise is the same way, there's a reason we do certain exercises, it's not just for fun, the purpose is to break down muscle tissue to rebuild it stronger. So every set, every move has purpose. When you realize how important each set is, your intensity rises. Then you have much more effective workouts.  Don't just go through the motions when you exercise, but make each rep count.

A big tip to making "roles" work for you is to understand that losing and gaining weight all comes down to energy balance. Our body exerts energy all day long and food is our main energy source and when it's used up our body fat makes up the difference as our back-up energy source.

Next time you go to grab something you know you shouldn't ask yourself why? What's the purpose?
If it's simple pleasure, I choose to wait and have that and more on my Spike Day.