So, a few weeks ago, the
beautiful miss Akilah posed a very good question: what do we need to do to get
our bodies right for the summer?
While I’m a firm believer that
there is no healthy or permanent ‘quick fix’ for any physical aesthetic issues
we may have and also that one should maintain a healthy body year round, I know
that this is a question that comes to the majority of women this time of year.
First and foremost, I’d like to
reiterate what I’ve already said about nutrition – it is single-handedly the
most important part! You can go to the gym and sweat your ass off for two hours
a day but if you come home and eat like crap, your body will still look like
crap. Here are a few easy changes to make:
Sodium: Watch out for it! Sodium
(salt) will make you retain water and look/feel bloated. You’ll find a load of
this stuff in any pre-packaged or processed foods. This includes soups, instant
pasta dishes, frozen meals, pre-mixed spices (aside from those made without
salt), sodas etc. I don’t have to mention chips and stuff, right? Just don’t do
it. Dining out can also be a big issue. There are tons of hidden calories and
sodium in restaurant food… just think of where the food is coming from when the
restaurant prepares it – are they using fresh ingredients or are they taking
things from a can/bag/box and mixing them together? My rule of thumb for dining
out? Don’t. While I love enjoying a nice meal at a restaurant just as much as
the next foodie, it’s much easier to control what goes into your body when you
are preparing the food.
Carbs: Oh, the dreaded carbs.
While carbohydrates are absolutely essential for a healthy life – be mindful of
how much you’re eating and where they’re coming from! Simple carbs like white
rice, white flour, white potatoes (are you seeing a trend here? [hint – white])
basically turn to sugar when they process in the body and, when not burned,
sugar turns to fat. Yuck, right? SO when you’re eating your carbs make sure
that they are complex carbs and as whole as possible! I love to use quinoa (a
complete protein as well as complex carb), brown or black rice on the occasion
(black rice is a super food and is delicious!), and beans (I prefer black,
again a great protein as well). Aside from the issue of simple carbs eventually
turning to fat in the body, they will also make you bloat and retain water if
eating too much. I like to keep my carbs at about ¼ of my total food intake.
This is lower than the official suggestion of 60%, but with my goals, 25% or
less works for me.
Fats: Okay, let’s get something
straight – fat is not all bad. There are good fats and there are bad fats, we
obviously want to stick with the good ones. Good fats can be found in extra
virgin olive oil (make sure it’s extra virgin and of good quality!!), nuts
(almonds, walnuts etc – be cautious of cashews, they’re like the French fries
of nuts), good quality fish (if you eat it) like salmon, avocado etc. Stay away
from anything that is ‘Fat-Free’ when shopping for foods. When they take out
the fats, they supplement with extra sugar (in most cases) and you certainly
don’t want that. Go for ‘Low-Fat’ instead although, honestly, I haven’t bought
anything that needed to be ‘low-fat’ in QUITE a while. I’ll speak more on this
in a minute.
Sugar: Stay the hell away. White
sugar is the devil. It turns to fat and has been proven to cause cancer. Need I
say more? While some foods (most fruits, for example) have natural sugars, you
want to avoid added sugars. If an ingredient list reads any of the following:
sugar, sucrose, corn syrup, glucose etc – don’t buy it. Especially if it’s one
of the first things listed. Something that a lot of people don’t realize is
that food packaging lists ingredients in order of proportion. So if sugar is
the first thing listed, that means that that food item is mostly sugar. And you
don’t want it. Also try to avoid artificial sweeteners as much as possible!
That’s just like throwing a bunch of chemicals down your throat. If I
absolutely need a sweetener for something, I go for raw agave nectar or brown
rice syrup or something along those lines. Again, I avoid it like the plague
but if I’m going to use it, it’s going to be from a whole, natural source.
Water: Drink the hell out of it!
Seriously. Just don’t stop drinking it.
In general: I always always
always recommend that you keep with a natural, whole diet. Eat as many fresh
(organic, if possible) veggies and fruits as possible! Fill up on these
naturally low-fat and low-sugar foods, then get your energy from whole and healthy
carbs and proteins like quinoa, black rice, beans, or fish, lean poultry and
egg whites if you eat it. When I said before that I haven’t had to buy anything
‘low-fat’ in a long time it’s this simple: the majority of the food that I
purchase doesn’t have a nutrition label. If you were to see my grocery cart,
you would see that it is 85% fresh produce. Aside from that, you’ll find beans,
quinoa, sprouted grain tortillas, nuts, etc. Fresh, whole, healthy. J
OKAY – I’ll get off of my
nutritional soapbox now and move on to fitness! There’s a common misconception
that if you just go run for an hour, you’ll lose weight. Studies have proven
that shorter bursts of higher-intensity cardio sessions will burn fat much
faster than longer, lower-intensity sessions of cardio. This is called High
Intensity Interval Training, or HIIT. I absolutely LOVE this kind of training. Is
it hard? Yes. But it works. Not to mention the fact that your cardio sessions
are much shorter, and who doesn’t love that? I’m certainly not saying to NOT go
take a long walk or a jog or bike ride
or whatever your pleasure may be – I’m saying to add-in some HIIT to ramp-up
the fat-burning. A good addition to a routine is a Tabata. Tabatas are only 4
minutes in length – 20 seconds at max intensity, 10 seconds rest for a total of
4 minutes. Who doesn’t have an extra 4 minutes? Take caution though, it may
sound easy enough but it is difficult and I recommend that you do some research
before trying. J
In addition to cardio, you’re
going to want to do some sculpting. There’s no reason that you have to go to
the gym for this, you have your own weights between your face and your feet!
Bodyweight resistance can be just as effective when your goal is to tone what
you have. Here’s a sample circuit:
10 pushups
20 crunches
30 second plank
30 second wall sit
10 tricep dips
20 squats
10 lunges each leg
Repeat 3x
This shouldn’t take you more than 15 minutes
or so and can easily be done anywhere!
If you know that you have trouble areas that
you want to focus on for the summer, then go for it. Worried about your arms?
Start doing pushups, tricep dips and planks. Legs? Squat and lunge it out,
girl. Abs? Planks, crunches, high-knees, leg raises etc. (all of this in
addition to cardio – cardio burns the fat off so the toned muscles can be seen J)
I know this is a lot of information but what
it all boils down to:
Eat healthy
Drink Water
Move your body
Really, it’s that simple. Any questions? Just
ask. J
