The majority of people start working out for two reasons to feel better and lose weight.
By working out, you build strength, increase mobility and stability, increase bone density, and improve cardiovascular health. All while moving more and increasing caloric output which will help you lose weight and feel better.
When we start working out, we will feel stronger, but there is a chance you have not seen a change on the scale. Or there is a chance you feel burnt out and are thinking of stopping your workout journey.
How is this possible? There are three common reasons you are not seeing the results you expected after starting to exercise.
Start Moving Less
A funny thing can happen when we start exercising; we start moving less, not during the workout but in our day-to-day life. For example, we end up sitting more because we feel we can watch a few more episodes of a TV show, or we feel too tired after our workouts.
Decreased movement can lead to you maintaining the same weight.
Solution:
Monitor your steps and make sure to hit your 10k still or if you are feeling too run down after working out on your off days. Go a little easier during your workouts, so you have the energy to stay active away from the gym.
Start Eating More
As we incorporate more vigours activity into our weekly routine, we might want an extra little bit of food. Whether we are rewarding ourselves for working out or because our body is giving us hunger cues, our bodies are not used to us working out and want us to maintain where we are.
Solution:
Be mindful of what you eat and know that there is a chance that your body will give you more hunger cues, but that doesn’t mean you need to listen to them, especially if your goal is weight loss.
Crash and Burn ( Too Much with Too Little Recovery)
One of the more common things to happen when starting is we do too much in a short period. Another way to look at it is we go zero to 60 right into a brick wall, where the brick wall is burned out from soreness or achy joints or injury.
For example:
You start working out seven days a week after not working out for two years. The better idea would be to do two workouts the first week while increasing your overall daily activity outside of the gym for the first few weeks and over a month build up to something like four workouts a week.
Or
While increasing your activity, you decide to go on an aggressive calorie-restrictive diet. That leaves you feeling tired and irritable, resulting in you one day eating everything that is salty and sweet in your house.
A better solution would be to slowly increase activity like in example one while taking your body weight and multiply it by 9 to get your calories needed to get you in a caloric deficit.
Closing
Start your journey off slow, keep aiming for 10k every day, and be mindful of your eating.
If you follow these steps and avoid these three common mistakes, you will be off to a solid start to your fitness journey.
Your Fitness Sherpa,
