Think Healthy Every Day

Hello! A nice 3 day weekend is upon us and I could not be happier. It will be a test for me to stay on path over a long weekend, as I will want to go out and be social. Today on Training Thursdays, I will talk about how you can keep your mind thinking healthy every day, even when you don't go to the gym. I will talk about activities to do on your days off and ways to avoid taking steps back.

Earlier in the year, when I started my health kick, I would tend to let days off be free days where I could do whatever I want because I know I was going to the gym the next day. This ended up making me lazy on days off and taking small steps back, forcing me to work harder on gym days and not advance as much as I would of liked. So what did I change? I would either take an early jog before work or go to the bike trail with the family after work for a nice 3 mile walk. Sometimes schedules get hectic and I can't do either of those. In this case, I would focus heavy on my diet.

When you aren't as active throughout the day, you don't need all the calories that you would intake on a normal exercise day. I usually shoot for around 3000 calories on active days, because I am a tall dude and need those calories, but on days off, I would shoot for around 2100 calories. I would also avoid bread as much as possible and absolutely no fast food of any kind. My typical off day diet would consist of:

• Breakfast: Apple, Orange, and big glass of water (very important in the morning)
• Lunch: Chicken breast, green veggie, and potatoes (leftovers from night before)
• Snack: Small candy bar (trick or treat size)
• Dinner: Pork Chops, green veggie, and corn

This is just a quick example, I usually make it a little more fun than that if I can. The key is to also drink a lot of water that day so you don't feel as hungry and snack a lot. On days you workout, snacking and getting hungry is perfectly fine because you need to replenish your body.

So on this long weekend, keep a conscious effort to stay in healthy mode. If you find yourself spending all of Saturday on the couch watching college basketball, drink water whenever you feel the need to eat a snack and get up during commercials or halftime and walk around a little bit. I'm not saying you can't have lazy days, you just have to make sure not to ruin your success by eating a whole pizza to yourself because you have been dormant all day, yes I have been guilty of this in the past. Stay healthy, stay fit, stay strong, and most importantly, stay happy.

* Although tomorrow is my day off, I will still post a recipe for Foodie Fridays. I know this is one of my more popular posts.