In today’s health and wellness environment it can feel normal and natural to go to extreme lengths for fitness. But the fact is, most people can see significant improvements simply by making small changes and sticking to them.
A Couple Hundred Calories Makes A Difference
Often, when we decide to lose weight, we want that weight gone fast. In our zeal, we’ll do a radical reset of our diets. Some turn to juice cleanses, others clean out their pantries, many give up entire food groups. While these methods work in the short term, they usually prove to be unsustainable in the long term. That’s not only a strategic mistake, it’s also unnecessary. For many, cutting daily calorie intake by a couple of hundred calories is enough to spur weight loss, as long as you give it time. (Healthy weight loss should be around one to two pounds a week, maximum.) For instance, a large glass of red wine is somewhere in the neighborhood of 120 calories. A large latte can be upwards of 250. So, cutting back from two glasses of wine a night to one and going from a large to a small latte might be all it takes to start dropping weight.
Ten Minutes A Day Can Beat A Whole Hour
Sometimes we think that if we can’t fit in a proper workout then it isn’t worth bothering. This often leads to putting off exercise again and again until, before we know it, another week has passed and we haven’t done anything. There are a lot of exercises that can be done in ten minutes a day that, thanks to the virtue of actually doing them regularly, will have a profound impact on your body. Three sets of ten to fifteen bridges every day, for example, can go a long way to improving low back pain. Ten minutes of stretching or mobilizing can be enough to loosen up joints and reduce nagging aches and pain. A daily walk around the neighborhood can work wonders.
Fixing One Weakness Can Transform Performance
If you’re already a fitness fanatic who eats healthy and works out regularly, it can sometimes feel like it is impossible to make progress. You might find yourself constantly trying to add more exercise, more intensity, or both. If that’s you, consider the opposite approach. Try finding your biggest weakness and then focusing on it. For example, do you do cardio all the time but you can barely do a body weight squat? Spend a month prioritizing your strength training—don’t add it on top of your cardio, replace some of your cardio with it. Make it your emphasis. After that month you’ll probably find that you got better at your cardio, even while doing less of it, because you improved your strength. Bottom line: Many people can make significant progress in their fitness by simplifying.