Our resident blogger and fitness fanatic, Alexis Fletcher, is back with her tips on nutrition, exercise and all things fitness. With a new year comes a new set of resolutions and fitness goals, so this week Alexis gives us her lowdown on how to ensure we stick with our health and fitness resolutions.
So what were your new health & fitness resolutions this time? Give up sugar? Go to the gym more? Stop smoking?
What are your resolutions?
Whatever the promise to yourself, chances are, like most of the population you haven’t done much about it. With the festive season well out of the way and January in full swing you should be able to fully focus on making these things happen!
If you’ve already fallen off the wagon or feel as though you’re destined to fail you need to refocus in order to be successful in hitting your fitness goals. First up, make sure you break down your overall goal into realistic, bite size chunks! For example if you’ve promised to run a half marathon this year, then set yourself a goal of hitting a 6 mile run by the end of the month first. This makes it achievable and realistic – you’re more likely to stick to these kinds of resolutions and if you break them don’t beat yourself up – just start again and try harder the next time!
Resolutions normally take form of giving up the bad things but why not try and moderate everything – yes, we all have our vices – but don’t ban yourself of things (have a cheat day) and only try to give up one bad thing a month to prove you can do it. Whatever the promise to yourself, chances are, like most of the population you haven’t done much about it. With the festive season well out of the way and January in full swing you should be able to fully focus on making these things happen!
Exercise The Right (Way)
Guaranteed, there will be promises to exercise more this year – as it makes you feel better about yourself, is great for your health and makes you happy – why wouldn’t you?!
Keep your fitness goals realistic – and have fun!
If you’re tight for time try and make a quick class like spinning or have a quick kettlebell blast!
Healthy Ways
If you’ve promised yourself that you will be healthier try some little changes instead of fad diets that will leave you worse off! You need to keep your blood sugar low so simply avoid refined sugar found in typical things like pastry and cakes. Avoid sugar and fat together – a good rule which will cut out a lot of things you can’t have.
Keep an eye on portion control and use apps such as myfitnesspal to keep an eye on your food and drink intake and input your exercise.
Yoga
Start your new year the right way and, if you haven’t already, give yoga a go! It really will help with clearing your mind, helping you to relax and it will make you more flexible.
Detox
A great way to kick start a healthy year is giving a juice, soup or smoothie detox a go – great to flush yourself out after all that over consuming! See this latest soup recipe – perfect after overindulging!