11 Health and fitness enemies

Health and fitness enemies can prevent us from maximizing our progression unless we develop strategies to deal with them. Here are a few examples:

Happy Miserables – Stress

These people always look at the negative aspects of life and can bring you down, adding stress to your life. Recognize their negativity doesn’t have to impact you.

Drinking buddies

These are friends who want you to join them in their lifestyle of drinking and eating unhealthy foods. Find ways to join in socially without indulging, such as eating a clean dinner before you go out.

Potluck Planners

Potlucks are usually full of unhealthy foods. Bring a healthy item to share as well as additional healthy sides for yourself.

School fundraisers

Candy in the break room is a big threat. Instead, keep healthy snacks in your desk so you won’t be tempted.

Competitors

Some people may want to compete at the gym. Stick to your plan and don’t fall into their trap.

Loiterers – Hogging equipment

These people will hog the gym equipment, texting, etc. Don't be shy, ask if you can step in between their sets.

Sick but pushing through

Germs can spread easily in the gym. If you’re sick, do your workout at home. Keep your distance from those who work out while sick.

Bad Personal Trainer

Ask around for a good personal trainer, one who will listen to you and help you reach your goals in a safe, effective way.

Well meaning friends and family

They may try to convince you that their way is best. Make health and fitness choices for yourself and don’t let them derail your progress.

Back stabbers

These people want you to fail, so stay away.

Nonparticipants in the home

You don’t have to prepare two meals if your family is not eating the same foods as you. Cook meals with meat, vegetables, and sides that allow everyone to pick and choose.

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11 Best mobility tips

Mobility

As we age, mobility becomes an even more important.  Before we go through my best tips, I think it is worth going back and defining what mobility is all about.

Mobility is the ability to move naturally through a full range of motion.  This can be impaired by either a tightness of a muscle or damage to a joint.

Every Day

To have an effective mobility training program, it should be something you do every day.  This not only includes doing mobility training, but also undoing the things we do to reduce mobility, such as sitting all day.

Warm up

Before you do any stretching or self-myofascial release, it is important to warm up the muscles.  This can be done simply by moving the muscle to get good blood flow.

Do SMR right

Most people do self-myofascial release wrong.  When you roll the muscle, you are stimulating it.  What you should do is to roll lightly on the muscle until you find a sore spot.  Then you should apply pressure until the muscle releases.  This is more about spot pressure than rolling.

Purpose of static stretch

A static stretch is for the muscles you aren't planning to train.  When you do static stretches, the muscle loses strength.

Purpose of dynamic stretch

On the contrary, dynamic stretches do not reduce strength.  You should use dynamic stretching to warm up and loosen up the muscles you plan on training.

Hydrate

It is very important that you're properly hydrated.  Muscles and joints need fluid to function properly.

Move

Staying in one position for long periods of time causes muscles to tighten up and joints to lose function.  This damages your mobility.

Time of stretch/age

When we are older, we need to hold stretches and self-myofascial release for longer.  I recommend you hold the positions for a minute or more.

Breathe

Don't forget to breathe when you're stretching or doing self-myofascial release.  This helps with release/stretch.

Partner

Finding a partner to stretch with can make the stretching more enjoyable and can help you get a better stretch.  Just be aware of your form to avoid injury as more pressure is applied than you'd be able to apply yourself.

Mindfulness

Stretching is a great time to practice mindfulness.  Don't zone out.  Stay in the moment to help build the mind-muscle connection.

 

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Mindset – vanity/self-confidence

When we start seeing results from our hard work, we are often put in a weird place.  If we don't have the right mindset, the reactions of the people around us can set us back.  Is it vanity to be happy you look and feel better?

Mindset – feeling bad about being different

People love to congregate with people who are similar to themselves.  When you break out by changing your body, you may find the people around you begin treating your different.  Taking the time to understand this mindset can keep you from being derailed.  In fact, this is a great opportunity for you to reach out and help bring them along with you.

Mindset – feeling great about your success

I'm someone who feeds on success.  As a result, I also have a tendency to let failure bring me down.  Over the Thanksgiving holiday, I didn't eat well.  I had a terrible cold, so I didn't exercise.  I felt I had lost some ground, but upon stepping on the scale, I had not gained an ounce.  I'm not realizing I need to start getting refocused to feed my success engine.

Would you do me a favor?

If you do any shopping on Amazon, you can support this podcast by using the link below (it won't cost you anything, but the podcast gets a small commission):

Thank you!

 

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Eliminate chronic pain with Sue Hitzmann

Sue Hitzmann developed the MELT Method to help her clients deal with chronic pain.

Acute Pain/Chronic Pain

Acute pain – comes from an impact or injury.  This pain is a protective measure.

Chronic pain – comes from disease, environmental factors, or neuromuscular issues.  This pain is not a protective measure.  Over time, the pain can increase.

With a negative loop using the neuroplasticity, your mind creates a relationship to a certain movement-pain connection.  Eventually, you can experience chronic pain just from thinking about the movement.

Self-Myofascial Release vs MELT Method

Self-myofascial release – By finding a pain point on the muscle and pressing down with a hard object we can release the muscle.  But this is not really improving the balance of the fascia.

MELT Method – Using “hands on” from a trained practitioner or self treating with the MELT method you are restoring the hydration and helping make the fascia healthier.

Fascia is not just related to the muscles and bones, but is a full connective tissue from skin to bone, top to bottom.  MELT focuses on restoring all of the fascia.

Stuck Stress

Stuck stress is a description of dehydration of the fascia.  Drinking enough water is not full answer to re-hydrating the fascia.  If you consider the fascia like a sponge, you can just put water on the sponge.  You have to massage the sponge to allow water to be drawn into it.

Inflammation

Inflammation is part of the natural healing process.  But with a lot of people, as we get pain from low-grade inflammation we get a stress response.  From there, the inflammation causes more pain and an endocrine response.  Often, we begin focusing on the symptoms rather than going to the cause, fascia dehydration.

MELT Method

When Sue developed the MELT Method in 2004, she coined the term with Myo-fascial, energetic, lengthening technique. It now focuses on restoring the fluid flow, mobility, and stability to get everything back into balance.

The Four Rs

– Reconnect
– Rebalance
– Rehydrate
– Release

Links

MeltMethod.com

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Big fat food fraud with Jeff Scot Philips

In this episode of the 40+ Fitness Podcast, we speak with Jeff Scott Philips.  In his book, Big Fat Food Fraud, he takes us through his past as a health food manufacturer.  It is a very interesting story that provides great insight into the way food labels are done in this country.  It is quite eye-opening.

Food Fraud

Government Control (or lack thereof)

Despite having an onsight monitor, Jeff learned that this individual wasn't so much a controlling factor, but was more of an enabler. Additionally, because the laws are so complex, many labeling issues fall through the cracks between organizations. While this comes off as frustrating to someone who wants to do the right thing, it provides a ton of opportunity for those who want to make health claims.

Tactics

Food companies can use many different tactics to misrepresent the food in the package.  The food label, while intended to show you what is in the food, is seen by the food companies as just another part of the package for marketing their product.  From rounding, to burying ingredients in other “ingredients”, to using other names for things you may be looking to avoid, these tactics allow them to skirt the rules.

Kale and Broccoli don't have labels

Real food doesn't pose the same labeling risks processed foods do.  When you're making your own meals from whole food ingredients, you can know much more about the contents of what you're eating.

Links

Big Fat Food Fraud

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11 Best time management tips

Don't have time to work out?  Cooking your own food just takes too much time?  These 11 time management tips will help you free up the time to both work out and eat right.

Best Time Management Tips

1. Go to bed 30 minutes earlier

   This may seem odd.  But going to bed earlier will help allow you to get more sleep.  Being well rested will help you be more productive.  Let's face it, you were just going to watch television that half hour that you can now apply to something much better for your help, sleep.

2. Time style of work

   Don't want to work out during your lunch hour because you'll be sweaty all afternoon? Then schedule your work for times where it makes more sense. I prefer a moderate pace walk during my lunch hour. I do my more sweat inducing work in the morning (I was going to shower anyway). This way, I maximize my workout time based on my existing schedule/activities.

3. Multitask

   Multitasking can allow you to get things done while you're doing something else.  For example, I'll often do my squats (Forever Fitness 30-Day Squat Challenge) while I'm brushing my teeth or cooking breakfast.  I'll go for a walk while I'm on a conference call.

4. Batch cooking

   I love batch cooking as a time saver.  Cooking large batch meals on the weekend and packaging them up in single servings frees up time during the week, when all that's left is to warm up the meal.

5. TV Exercises

   We all find ourselves in front of the television from time to time.  Consider doing some squats or better yet, burpees during commercial breaks.  Or set up a treadmill or stationary bike and walk/ride during your show.

6. Circuit training

   Circuit training is where you go through a series of exercise, one right after the other.  This can allow you to get a series of strength training exercises done in a short period of time.  And you get a metabolic boost.

7. Minimum effective dose

   Many people go much harder and longer than they need to get results.  To improve fitness you need challenge, feeding and recovery.  There is an upper limit to how fast you can improve.  More of a good thing isn't always a good thing.

8. Go faster

   Seems simple, just go faster and you get the work done in less time. This strategy works, but you have to be careful.  As you get more fit, you may be able to move faster, for example adding a jog to your daily walk.

9. Single focus/goal

   When I go into the gym, I have one thing on my mind, get the work done and get out.  Having a plan and focusing on the work will keep you working at pace and not wasting time.

10. Raw/quick prep food

    Choosing foods that require minimal preparation can save time. I'm not talking about microwave meals, but rather pre-washed salads, single serve nuts, etc.

11. Eliminate low value non-exercise activities

    If you sat and wrote down what you do in a day, I imagine you'd find many low value activities. Could you eliminate them?

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Fasting for weight loss with Dr. Jason Fung and Jimmy Moore

I will use ketosis to manage my body composition, which invariably leads to fasting for weight loss.  In the new book, The Complete Guide to Fasting, Dr. Jason Fung (77)and Jimmy Moore (18, 23, 28) explain how we can use fasting to improve our health and lose weight.  Fasting for weight loss can be done in a healthy and safe way.  Dr. Fung uses fasting in his clinic to address obesity and type II diabetes.  Jimmy Moore has been experimenting with fasting and shares his experiences in the first and only complete guide on fasting.

Fasting for weight loss

Virtually half of our medical conditions today are caused by obesity and type II diabetes.  Fasting for weight loss can be an effective protocol to manage obesity and type II diabetes.

Types of fasting

Intermittent Fast – By pushing your normal nighttime fast to 16 to 24 hours, you'll get many of the benefits of fasting in a very manageable way.

Alternate Day Fast – This style fasting is where you eat every other day, which leads to a 36 hour fast.

Extended Fast – An extended fast goes from 3 days, but most people find that the first three days are the hardest.  Jimmy is currently on day 11 of a 21 day fast.

Diets don't work

Most diets focus your attention on eating.  You're told to eat from the time you wake up until you go to bed.  If you're adding energy to your system as you need it, you won't lose weight.  Fasting is an approach that will allow you to lose weight.

Fasting is not a cause of eating disorders

Fasting is a normal part of the human condition.  Today it is mostly associated with religious rituals.  When it is brought up as a way to manage weight and health, some will complain that this will cause an eating disorder.  This logic would tell you that instructing your children to wash their hands before dinner will lead to OCD.  Eating disorders are associated with body image, not triggered by someone doing a fast.

Postscript on fasting

After I stopped recording the call, Dr. Fung, Jimmy and I kept talking and some wonderful gems came out that we wanted to make sure we captured it for you.

When you fast, you'll lose weight.  When you stop fasting, you'll gain some of that weight back.  This happens for two reasons:

1. Water – With the resumption of eating your body will store more water.
2. Homeostasis – Your body has a tendency to stick to a given state/body weight.  This is the cause of plateaus and the reason your body will work to get back to the previous set weight.

When you lose weight from intermittent fasting, it isn't due to calorie restriction but rather from hormone changes.  Insulin is reduced and eventually, you begin healing your insulin resistance.

Follow up on Jimmy's 21-Day Fast

We discussed that Jimmy was on a 21-day fast. Up through day 11, Jimmy had had only had one cup of bone broth. I asked Jimmy for an update on his fast and here is what he said:

I made it the full 21 days and had two meals (one at the end of Day 12 and one at the end of Day 18). I lost 27 pounds in the 21 days even with these meals, saw many of my skin tags shrivel up and fall off (a sign of insulin resistance healing), and became more abundantly aware that my need for eating as often is likely unnecessary. Will be continuing to implement lessons from this fast into my everyday lifestyle moving forward as I continue to pursue healing the insulin resistance. 🙂

Links

www.intensivedietarymanagement.com
dietdoctor.com
Fungsweigh Facebook Group
livinlavidalowcarb.com
Jimmy on Periscope

 

 

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