Healthy Living

Lately, I've been motivated more then ever to take better care of my body, eat healthy and exercise. The things is, it's really hard for me to get rid of my current eating habits. I eat a lot. More than many guys do, so it's safe to say that I eat too much for a girl. I've been doing that all my life and never really had any consequences, no weight change, but lately I feel like my age is getting to me, so I've put on a few kilos these past couple of years. That's why I need a good plan.

First of all, I need a drastic change in my eating habits. No more chips, pizza, burgers, hot-dogs and anything unhealthy. Instead I will try to change all of that for fruits, vegetables, salads, oats, nuts, seeds, whole wheat/whole grain products and clean protein, lots of it. Since they say that it takes 21 days to break a habit and create a new one, my goal is to keep this up for 21 days, I want to see if that really works. But the thing is, I can't just completely give up my favorite foods in one day, so that's why I'm gonna create a "cheat day" every week, after these 21 days. On this day I will allow myself to indulge in one of my favorite foods for one meal a day, and that will probably be lunch. I'm still not sure which day should I pick. I'm thinking Saturday or Sunday. We'll see about that, I'll figure that out later. But I am thankful for finding this healthy food blog on tumblr, where there are tons of recipes and ideas for healthy meals, so that should make things easier too. Keeping a food journal always helps. A few years ago I found this website called Calorie Count, I was using it on regular basis and it did help me lose some kilos, but then I just forgot about it. So I'm starting to keep track of what I eat again.

Next comes exercise. I have been exercising more than usual lately. But I have a feeling that my self-made workout program kind of sucks. I do 30-60 minutes on a elliptical trainer, light to moderate effort, a fair amount of core, arms, shoulders and butt workouts. But I have no order, my workouts are all over the place, I do not stick to my schedule. It's still hard for me to stay motivated since I don't have a very strong willpower, but I found a few great blogs on Tumblr that got me motivated more than ever. I actually have been feeling a lot happier since I started working out, so the endorphins don't suck at all. I just need a better plan on how to do this right.

And next comes defining the goals. What do I want to achieve with this? What should my goal weight be? How do I think this change will change my life? I DO NOT expect to magically turn into a Victoria's Secret model. Personally, I want to have more energy to sit and walk up straight instead of always slouching and gain some confidence, I want to radiate health and positive energy and maybe to look awesome in a bathing suit. Until recently I was doubting that that is even possible, but then I came a across these admirable ladies that proved the opposite: #1, #2 and #3. If they were able to do it, so can I, so can anyone else, we just need the commitment that they have. And that shouldn't be too much to ask for...

Oh, and recently I found myself a new fitness role model, the amazing Caroline from fotballfrue.no. She has some great tips on how to stay motivated and why you should be active even if you're not trying to lose weight, on her page.

My dumbells and my elliptical trainer.