Fitness is a journey and we all have a different path to walk. It's not a one size fits all. We all have different personalities, different mind sets, different disciplines, different triggers. We each have lived different lives, suffered our own different heart breaks and dealt with those situations in our own way.
With this being the case, you cannot tell me that with every person being as unique and individual as they are that there is only one nutrition plan and only one way of training that will work for everyone. I certainly do not believe that to be true!
The "perfect" meal plan is not so perfect if an individual cannot mentally apply themselves to it. So what do you do? Do you give up? Quit? Get fat?? Tell your client that they lack mental toughness? Encourage them to eat in this mentally exhausting, physically draining and entirely unrealistic way. Tell them that if they don't, if they cannot comply to this perfect plan, then they will never achieve their dream body?? HELL NO !!!! If one way doesn't work for you, if it doesn't suit you, if it doesn't fit your lifestyle, your commitments, if it makes both you and those around you unhappy then we need to develop a plan that does work for you.
I received such a huge response from my post yesterday. I had so many girls contact me explaining that they have been experiencing the same difficulties with their weight loss as what I have experienced this past two years. I felt I just had to write a blog about it.
Photo 1 & 3 are from winter (mid July) 2012. I was scared to eat carbs, doing no / very minimal cardio, and training heavy weights only.
Restricting carbs from my diet worked for me the first time that I tried to get lean, but not again since. It makes me feel like shit and it is not maintainable for the lifestyle I live. I have a boyfriend, a family and a social life. I do not want to weigh and measure every single meal that I eat !! Every day since then I have always felt like I am on a diet but never getting anywhere. Putting on weight, putting on body fat, buying every supplement under the sun thinking that one supplement is the answer. Its been a roller coaster ride of restriction, limitation, binging, guilt and then starting all over again. Each time feeling more so of a failure than the last time.
Photo 2 & 4 are from Monday just gone 17/09/12. I am eating less fats, I have added in carbs, I eat weekend cheat meals and I do cardio (oh and of course I train heavy weights, because I . . . LOVE my weights!!).
At the beginning of this year I saught out advice from a beautiful friend who also happens to be an IFBB Pro. She is someone who I respect, admire, and someone who I trust. She encouraged me to eat carbs, she told me that my body needs them. Explaining to me that she too had limited them in the past and felt that it did her body an injustice. At the time I just was not ready to believe it. I was sure that if by not eating carbs I was still battling weight gain and putting on body fat, then adding in carbs would make me even bigger! I would tell myself that I can't eat carbs yet, I am not lean enough to deserve carbs. I certainly don't deserve a cheat meal on the weekend, how in the hell will that help me get leaner??! Fortunately though, by contacting her for advice the seed of thought had been planted in my head.
Six months later I was sure that eliminating my carbs and not doing enough cardio was the reason for me not getting anywhere with my weight. I accepted the fact that my body NEEDED a balanced nutrition plan which included carbs, as well as an exercise plan that also involved cardio. Before my trip away to New Zealand I emailed my best friend and now nutrition coach Alice Round. I asked her for a nutrition plan and promised her complete compliance. I then went away on holiday with my boyfriend.
The two weeks that I spent in New Zealand with Daine was the first time in two years I have felt like I was not on a diet. On the flight from Perth to NZ Daine spoke to me and said that what I had been doing with my food cannot continue any longer. To promise him that whatever plan Alice wrote for me that I would stick to it from the day we got back 100% until Summer. The agreement was that we would enjoy our holiday together, that I would not stress about the food we were eating while we were away. We ate healthily, but we enjoyed our holiday also. We ate chocolate and Ferg Burgers, and for the first time in my life it was guilt free! I promised Daine from the day we got back no more pie in the sky fitness goals, no more negative emotion experienced towards food and that on the weekend we could eat guilt free cheat meals together.
My now nutrition coach is also my best and most amazing friend Alice Round. Alice is the most supportive and amazing friend and coach I could ever have asked for. She has helped me figure out what wasn’t working for me and encourages me every day to keep taking forward steps towards achieving my goals. I feel fitter, leaner and mentally healthier than ever before.
My advice to you is to find a coach who you trust and who you can be honest with. Someone who preaches longevity in the advice and guidance that they give to you. A coach who pushes minimal supplements onto you and promotes health and the absorption of nutrients from a balanced diet - eating good, high quality, clean foods.
Whatever plan you are on you need to connect with it. Be sure that it makes you feel good both physically and mentally, inside and out.
I want to be fit, I want to be strong, I want to feel healthy and look beautiful. I want to motivate and inspire those around me. I want my clients to know that I truly believe in them and that I want what is best for them.
Above all else though, I want to be happy and share my happiness with those around me. This is my life !! We each get one life, one time, one chance to get it right. This life is my one opportunity to be the best person I can be, to love and be loved by the people closest to me, this is my life and my intention forever is to live it healthily and happily.
I'm not saying that it won't be hard work, you will have to prepare, you will have to push yourself, you will have to exercise when you're tired and eat fish and vegetables when your mind is saying just eat junk. There will be struggle, there will be set backs and some days you will feel like you just cannot be bothered! Well thats just human nature! Accept now that you are going to feel that way, and don't beat yourself up about it because it's a waste of your precious time!!
What I am saying, and let me put a huge stress on this, is that if it's a battle, if it's a fight and if your body is resisting, if it's costing you your happiness and the happiness of those around you, if you're looking in the mirror and saying that you hate your body, this body that you feel like you are trying to work so hard for but never achieving, and that hate for your body is turning into a self hatred, then you are on the wrong path for YOU. The path that you need to walk might take longer (geeeez mine has taken me two years to figure out and I feel like I've just only got my toes touching my path !!) but in the long run it will pay off! I promise you this! Find your path, get the right people to support and help you walk it, be sure of yourself, and never let anyone lead you in the wrong direction.
"Believe in yourself; feed your faith and your fears will starve to death."
If this post has helped motivate and inspire even just one person, then it has done its job. Good luck on your fitness journey. You can do it.
Your Coach,
Bek Antonucci
"Work, Earn and Deserve.".
