Remember, if you remain diligent about eating healthy as the days lead up to Easter, you’ll be able to indulge a little bit on the big day.
Nobody wants to turn down a Ham dinner and a chocolate egg, or bunny rabbit, so if you make healthy choices until Easter arrives, you should be able to eat a little more indulgently without ruining all of your goals.
Everything In Moderation
I am not going to say you should not eat a single piece of chocolate at Easter because this rule is unrealistic. Get real with yourself and set limits. Several pieces of chocolate will not break the scales, but a whole box of chocolates can break your healthy eating plan. So, focus on life, and live within moderation.
Get your health and fitness goals back on track with these 5 easy tips.
1. Stop the sweets
You might feel that your overdose of all things sweet has given you a taste for more – avoid temptation by getting rid of the chocolate around your home. If you can’t bring yourself to bin it, gift it to a friend or family member.
2. Don’t skip meals
If you’ve overindulged, it may be tempting to skip a meal in an effort to minimize your guilt. Skipping meals will often lead to more cravings and overeating, so instead of avoiding a meal, make sure you consume well-balanced meals with lots of vegetables and protein.
3. Reassess your goals
Write down your health and fitness goals and assess why you are doing this. Are you looking to lose weight, build muscle or increase your fitness level? Taking time to reassess your goals with a Personal Trainer will help you to refocus or perhaps even change direction completely.
4. Try something new
Enjoy an endorphin rush by incorporating a new exercise into your workout routine – aerial yoga, a new running route or a workout at the indoor trampoline park could be just what you need to get your heart pumping and elevate your motivation levels.
5. Start meal prepping
Being prepared with the right foods will enable you to take better control of your health and fitness routine. Avoid late night binges or skipping meals by preparing your food ahead of time. To help you out, a qualified Nutrition Advisor will be able to advise you on healthy choices.
These recommendations will help you get through the Easter Meal/Snacks holiday season. But you also need to make sure your activity levels are back up to where they need to be when you began your fitness journey. Keeping active and eating right and in moderation will help you maintain the weight that your targeting. So below are a few suggestions to help you
Warming up is the most important part of beginning a workout. Warm up consists of light cardiovascular exercises as well as stretching that increases blood circulation and body temperature, but also protects against injury. At the beginning of your workout, start by walking or lightly jogging in place for five to ten minutes with your arms swinging freely to help remain balanced.
"In general, you burn more calories by doing high-intensity weight training than you do running," says Harold Gibbons, a trainer at Mark Fisher Fitness in New York City, and the New York state director of the National Strength and Conditioning Association.
Most people don't realize this, though. That's often because the number of calories you're told you just burned is typically estimated from The Compendium of Physical Activities, which calculates the energy expended through aerobic metabolism. That works well for low- to medium-intensity exercise, but not so well for higher-intensity activities that rely on anaerobic metabolism.
In fact, when researchers at the University of Southern Maine used a more advanced method to estimate energy expenditure during exercise, they found that weight training burns up to 71% more calories than originally thought. Which suggests that a fast-paced circuit workout burns as many calories as running at a 6-minute per mile pace.
But resistance training isn't your only option. There are also cardio exercises that can boost your burn, too.
One that most people never think about trying is Boxing. And no, you don’t have to have the theme of Rocky playing in the background, that is unless you want to but “Air-Boxing” can get your heart pumping and since your using your upper arms, shoulders, lats, and legs with moving in and out of your imaginary opponent's way. You don't have to get into a ring against an opponent to knock out calories with using boxing style workouts. If you’re hitting a heavy bag in tandem, or just performing punch combos on air to smash those calories, (up to 800 per hour) you can really affect a knockout punch on those calories you’re working to get rid of.
Another exercise that taxes your body and puts it into overdrive is Kettle-Ball Swings:
We found a few exercises that will help you burn off some of those holiday calories—without ever having to hit the pavement.
Kettlebell Swing
This explosive exercise works the big, powerful muscles around your glutes and quads, and sends your heart into overdrive, according to research from the University of Wisconsin. In the study, participants burned 20.2 calories a minute and their average heart was 93% of its max for the course of a 20-minute workout. It’s not a movement that your body is used to which makes your body work harder, thus burning more calories.
Now the above are just a few ideas and recommendations on how to get yourself back into the fitness routine after maybe a more than generous amount of time to eat what you wanted, without any motivation to work it off.
Which is ok, we forgive you especially since your back on the track of getting physical while watching the number of carbs that are going to be eaten by you daily, weekly and monthly.
Welcome Back to being Active and Healthy, we’ve missed you! The fitness team here at PedometersUSA.com!