5 Dos and Don’ts for Improving Health and Fitness
To kick off the new year let us begin with 5 Do’s and Don’ts for Improving Health and Fitness. These are some of the common areas I find myself coaching others. I think the last year has inspired us all to think about our health in a deeper way. Cheers to a healthy 2021!
Scott
Don’ts
Don’t choose exercises that bore you. For one thing, it’s difficult to make it through a workout when selecting exercises that aren’t engaging. In addition, the more engaging the exercises the greater the production of BDNF, a brain protective protein. By choosing more interesting exercises you increase the likelihood of sticking with the plan, AND you improve brain health.
Don’t drink coffee as a means to suppress appetite. It can feel good to skip meals and coast on the coffee buzz for the first several hours of the day, but the problem is that your blood-sugar becomes imbalanced, and this sets the stage for imbalanced blood-sugar for the rest of the day. This can lead to strong food cravings later in the day, especially shortly after finishing work, and you’ll have to rely on willpower to abstain from unhealthy foods. So rather than rely on willpower to eat properly, take a look at your daily nutrition to make sure you’re nourishing yourself. This starts with breakfast. Coffee is best consumed when you don’t need it.
Don’t sleep less in order to squeeze in exercise. Sleep is so important for health, recovery, metabolism, and appetite control that it’s counterproductive to cut it short. It’s best if you can wake naturally without an alarm. The exception to this is if you’re sleeping too much as it is, for example because of depression.
Don’t come out of the gates like a race horse. This is especially true if you’re new to exercise or just getting back into it. Exercise is a stress, and if you overly stress your body physically, your immune system will temporarily decrease and your likelihood of contracting a viral or bacterial infection escalates. Your training program should develop and progress as you do.
Don’t ignore constipation. You should be having a bowel movement daily, every day, always! If feces stick around too long in the colon the body will start to reabsorb some of the toxins through the colon wall. This is called auto-intoxication. These toxins need to be detoxified along with other toxins in the body. In order to detoxify they need to be combined with valuable nutrients in the body.
Constipation is usually corrected by one or more of the following:
Drinking half your body weight in ounces of water per day.
Making sure you’re eating enough healthy oils in your diet.
Relaxing. If your day is full with no empty space your body will experience stress, which can lead to constipation. Some people notice their best bowel movements on Sunday morning when they don’t have to rush out the door for work.
Dos
Do believe that you are someone who can achieve fitness. When we’re trying to improve fitness it’s common to repeat self-defeating messages in our head. Become aware of these messages and stop doing it. If you wouldn’t say it to someone else, don’t say it to yourself.
Furthermore, your belief of what you think and feel you can achieve is paramount to your success. Remember, just because you’ve failed in the past doesn’t mean anything about what you can achieve from this point forward. What is your conception of yourself? This is a good question to ponder because what you think of yourself is what you’ll tend to reinforce through your behaviors.
Do drink ½ your bodyweight in ounces of water per day. Getting enough water will help your joints, digestion, metabolism, energy levels, and satiety. Drink mostly when your stomach is empty.
Do establish a daily rhythm. Your body works on a 24-hour circadian rhythm (among other rhythms). Your body responds best when you go to sleep, wake up, eat, and exercise at approximately the same time every day.
Do listen to your body for feedback. Are you becoming fatigued from your health and fitness routine? Do you feel tired and wired at the end of the day? Are you doing all the right things but yet you feel drained or ‘flat’? If this is a case, it’s possible you’re over-trained or under-nourished. You’ll need to pull back on your training volume and intensity and take a close look at your nutrition, hydration and amount of rest you’re getting. You’ll also need to account for the amount of stress you have in your life. This is because stress influences the amount of energy you have for exercise. More stress means less energy-reserves for exercise. Other things that can lead to over-training are: taking stimulants in order to perform a hard workout, exercising too long or too hard, and/or restricting calories.
Do pay attention to your breath. Take note if you’re holding your breath. This can happen when you’re hyper-focused on a task and you become less focused on body signals. Intermittent breath-holding leads to imbalanced body chemistry. Becoming aware of your breath is the first step. The next step is to take ‘peace-points’ which involves taking ~5 deeper breathes to help calm your nervous system. If you’re an intermittent breath holder, correct this by taking at least two peace-points every waking hour. This is also a good first step in emotional self-regulation.
Scott Bevins is an integrative health & fitness coach and trainer who teaches in all domains of health – physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. He is based in the Turks and Caicos Islands. Contact Scott.