Archive for February, 2010

GO TO

Friday, February 19th, 2010

HEY EVERYONE CHECK OUT MY NEW BLOG AT:

 

http://www.thefitnessprodigy.com

 

Ill be posting all my new blogs there

Your Million Dollar Notebook

Wednesday, February 17th, 2010

Journal writing isnt just for when youre in your teens anymore. It can actually save your figure. This “secret” has been used by many to double their results. Studies show people who keep a journal and actually write in it are 20% more likely to lose weight. You should have 2 journals.

Keeping a workout journal and a food journal is the easiest way to track progress and get better results. Im sure youve had one of those days where you had an awesome workout. You loved it and felt great after it. But a couple of weeks later your workouts are stalling and you cant remember what the “awesome” workout you did was.

Thats where your workout journal comes in. Just write down everyday what you did, how much, and for how long. It might feel like homework. I know when I started to it took be about a month to finally be consistent and wanna write in it. Honestly I dont like writing much, for one I have really bad handwriting and I wanna get writing over with so I write really fast and make tons of mistakes. So at least a journal is something small and easy to write.

So now I want you to get a small journal and write down everything you do for that day as far as exercise. Even if its waking up and jogging then doing your workout in the evening. Ive had times when I couldnt figure out why I was leaner 2 months ago than now when the workouts are better and nutrtion is still good. Then I realize 2 months ago I would walk my dog first thing in the morning then again in the afternoon. Everything counts so write it down.

(Side note: When I say everything counts I mean everything that passes as exercise. Dont write down walk to your car, walk to my neighbors, climbed up the stairs to my apt. ect.)

Your workout journal will become your referance when it comes to exercise and how your body reacts to it. Everybody’s different and what works for mr. olympia may not work for you. Dont get the magazines and see that Jay Cutler does this workout so you should too, or Ava cowan does this one so you should too. Their bodies have been trained for over 15 years and have worked up to the level they are at. Not to mention the “chemical enhancements” that help them recover almost as fast as wolverine while the rest of us are still trying to crawl out of bed.

At least with your workout journal you can cut out things that didnt work and put together new awesome workouts. If you don’t have any, let me know I have tons.

Now your most important journal is your food journal. You can say to yourself that you’ve been eating healthy all you want but the journal wont lie. It will be your bible. Write down everything you’ve eaten from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep. Also write down what times you ate these things. Dont skip that its really important. When somebody tells me they need help they cant lose weight I ask for the last 3 days of what they ate. Majority of the time they dont have it so I ask them to write down everything for the next 3 days but be honest, and eat what you normally eat. This is where I can figure out whats wrong or where are the weak points.

If you look at my food journal you see that my weakness is evening meals. Everything else can be great hell ill even eat tasteless bland food. I dont mind. But for some reason around 7pm im craving something tasty so I replace my normal borning food with a healthy good tasting one so I dont go and order a pizza.

Figuring out where your weak points are and finding healthy alternatives or a way around it can save your metabolism. For instance if you have cravings at night before bed and notice on your journal your eating 4 hersheys kisses before bed then replace the kisses with 2 cups of sprite zero. It doesnt have caffiene so you wont stay up and the carbonation will fill your tummy and keep your cravings at bay.

Anyway I want you to try this. Start keeping a food journal writing down everything. Now once you do, look over it and see if you follow these cool guidelines.

1. Are you eating breakfast?
2. Are you eating breakfast first thing when you wake up, not 3 hours later?
3. Are you eating every 3-4 hours?
4. Are you eating protein every 3-4 hours (a good amount, just cause your sandwich has 1 ham doesnt count)?
5. Are you eating veggies?
6. Are you eating the majority of your starchy carbs in the am and winding down to fibery ones in the pm? (starchy carbs= potatoes, oatmeal, sweet potatoes, brown rice ect. Fibery carbs= veggies)
7. Are you drinking a protein shake immidiately after your workouts?

Following these simple guidelines will have you shedding fat in no time.

*BONUS TIP* keeping an extra journal to write down cool things you learn of that standout helps keep boredom at bay. It can be a small memopad or even your Iphone. Just write down fun things that you learn or things you think you should remember.

Maybe these notebooks wont make you a millionaire but what you learn with them is worth a million dollars.

The Real Wonderbread

Tuesday, February 9th, 2010

Hey everyone! Hope your having a great week so far!

I got into a talk with a friend of mine who is like many of us a bread lover but can’t eat it because of a gluten allergy. So I told her the same thing im gonna tell you.

Wonder bread has been around for years. When you really look at it, its not that wonderful. I mean it tastes good, but is it good for you?

NOPE!

What are you saying Jonathan? Wonder bread isn’t wonderfull?

What im saying is there is another bread that is. It’s the REAL WONDERBREAD. It surprises me how few people know about this bread or the brand. I’m happy to say more and more people are learning about it.Very nice!

A bread that came straight outta the bible.

Ezekiel 4:9., “Take also unto thee Wheat, and Barley, and beans, and lentils, and millet, and Spelt, and put them in one vessel, and make bread of it…”

Pretty cool huh.

What if somebody actually did that? Put it all together. Would it work?

Yes it does! Ezekiel bread is a great tool to reach your fitness goals! Ezekiel bread is flourless, organic, contains complete protein, and is a sprouted whole grain. It’s gluten free and wheat free. So you don’t have to worry about any food allergies. I have clients that can’t have gluten in their diets and have had to cut out most breads.

When I say it’s a complete protein I mean it matches the protein quality found in eggs. Alot foods contain protein, but most of them are not complete. They are missing some amino acids. So they are not complete protein sources. Complete sources are usually meat, chicken, eggs, milk, etc. So for ezekiel bread to also be a complete protein coming from vegetable sources only is pretty awesome! Great for vegans.

One thing though. It doesn’t have any preservatives so it’s shelf life is shorter than normal bread and you have to keep it refrigerated. You can find it in the freezer section at your local Green Fields Market. It’s usually way cheaper there and they carry other products by this brand.

Like I said its refrigerated so its best to toast it when youre gonna eat it. I ate it without toasting the first time and it wasn’t that good.

But once you get creative with it you can have tons of great meals. I like to toast 2 slices and put some almond butter inside with some sliced up bananas for a snack. Especially when im craving sweets. It gets the job done.

Let me know some of your experiences with this bread? Or if you have any recipies with this write them down here. Leave a comment

Prune Your Garden

Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010

Hey Everyone hope your week is going awesome!

I love rain! For some reason rain is like coffee to me. Im more productive and get tons of stuff done. I dont like the cold so much though. But oh well.

I wanna tell you about something that will dramatically improve your performance and get faster results.

Cool thing about this is it works on all aspects of your life. Wether it be business or spirituality this helps. Im a big believer in taking care of every part of life. So what you need to do is prune your garden. Cut your weeds. Here let me tell you about my “A ha!” moment.

When I was in high school I was in football. Well our football team wasn’t clicking for some reason. We would do good for a little bit but we’d always fall apart and end up losing. It was really frustrating.

One year we got a new coach who was supposed to be a real successful guy. After a few games and practices he gave us this speech. At first I thought here’s this guy giving a cheesy speech but it made sense. He told us a story about crabs. Hold all your giggles these are real crabs from the ocean. He said he went up to the coast one summer and was walking on the pier when he saw and old man catching crabs and putting them in a big bucket.

Now there wasn’t a lid to that bucket. He thought it was kind of odd. A bunch of crabs in a bucket without a lid. This old man must be crazy. Then he noticed one of the crabs reaching up and about to get out. So he ran to old man and said hey your crabs are getting out, you should put a lid on it.

The old man told him you’re not from around here are you. Watch what happens next. So he watched, and just when the crab was about to get out, all the other crabs pulled him back down. It’s no wonder they didn’t a lid. They never helped each other get out.

When my coach told me this story my first thought was, “Man crabs are dumb!”. I didn’t put much thought into after that. He told us all if we stayed away from crabs we’d be a much better team.

It wasn’t till one day I was heading to practice I realized what he meant. I was walking to practice when 3 of my close friends who didnt play football stopped me and said we should go play video games. I said I had practice. They said why even go ya’ll never win. I wanna be honest with you a small part of me thought they were right and wanted to go play games. But that’s when I had my “A ha!” moment. Those were my crabs. Yea they were my friends, but they were holding me back.

What im trying to get you to do is think really hard. Who are the crabs in your life? Who keeps holding you back instead of pushing you to your goals. Wether your goal is to try to lose weight but you have friends who don’t care and invite you to eat and drink. Or you have a business goal and other friends are telling you to stay home and have a beer.

It’s time to prune your garden. Cut out all the weeds. It’s tough, but this simple strategy will help you reach your goals faster and better. Now dont go and tell your friends or family Jonathan said I cant talk to you anymore. I didnt say cut them out completely.

Im just saying put a small wall up and make them have less influence on you. Surround yourself with like minded people who are geared towards success and the same goal.

Be Sure To Leave Me A Comment And Let Me Know Your Thoughts