Remember, the way you think about something makes it stressful. Stress doesn’t really exist except to the degree to which you allow it. Your thoughts create emotions, which in turn mold your thinking. Your thoughts, via neurochemicals, electrical charges, and trillions of special receptors, influence every cell in your body. This is how conditions on the outside, negatively interpreted, produce harmful physiological changes on the inside.
Unless you deliberately develop an effective, perpetual system for stress management, you will undercut your performance and face greater risk of disease.
Here are some tips to get you started:
• Follow all the other keys to a maximum-energy lifestyle outlined in this lesson.
• Practice mental discipline. Choose what you think about. (Review lesson 5.)
• Make a personal stress inventory. Write down all the current stressors in your life and one step you could take to alleviate each one. Accepting that a difficult situation is real and clearly identifying the root problem is an important step. Proper diagnosis is half the cure.
• Simplify your life. Eliminate and concentrate. Focus on the vital few things that contribute the most to your overall life satisfaction. Taking on too much or spreading yourself too thin inevitably leads to a sense of overload.
4. Combine aerobic, strength, and flexibility exercises.
If you want maximum levels of energy, take responsibility for becoming a mini-expert on exercise and fitness. Subscribe to the most credible health and exercise magazines, add informative fitness sites to your Web favorites, and build your own library with the latest books, DVDs, and other resources related to energy and wellness.
Aerobic exercise
The most important component of effective exercise is aerobic exercise. Aerobics, or cardiovascular endurance, refers to the sustained ability of the heart, lungs, and blood to perform optimally. Through consistent aerobic conditioning, your body improves the way it takes in, transports, and uses oxygen. This means your heart and lungs will be stronger and more efficient at performing their functions. Proper aerobic exercise causes your body to burn fat, while anaerobic exercise causes the body to burn glycogen and store fat. Many people unknowingly exercise anaerobically when they intend to exercise aerobically. This results in, among other things, a frustrating retention of fat. The intensity of your exercise is what makes it anaerobic or aerobic.
Consistent and proper aerobic exercise has the following benefits:
• improves quality of sleep
• relieves stress and anxiety
• burns excess fat
• suppresses appetite
• enhances attitude and mood
• stabilizes chemical balance
• heightens self-esteem
Each of the above benefits either directly or indirectly leads to high levels of both mental and physical energy.
Here are some tips for maximizing the quality of your aerobic workouts:
Work out aerobically four to six times a week for at least forty-five minutes.
Use the talk test to stay within your target heart rate and gain the maximum fat-burning benefits. Your exercise intensity should allow you to work out steadily while still being able to talk without gasping for breath. For even better results, invest in a heart-rate monitor to track your cardiovascular progress more precisely.
Use a calm, steady, enjoyable pace. Correct aerobic intensity is strenuous but still pleasurable.
Instead of stretching your cold muscles before exercising, spend three to five minutes warming up by doing light, easy motions that mimic your sport or aerobic activity. Then do some stretching.
Also, take about five minutes to cool down gradually after your workout. Never stop exercising suddenly. Following your workout, keep moving at a progressively slower and slower pace. This cooldown period allows your heart rate and body systems to return safely to their pre-exercise state.
Vary your aerobic routine throughout the week, or at least from week to week. Alternating between several different aerobic activities develops a more balanced state of fitness and prevents boredom, which ultimately leads to the sofa and the remote control.
Drink lots of water before, during, and after aerobic exercise. Purified water is best, and research indicates that ice-cold water activates the metabolism better, even though room-temperature water enters the digestive track faster. Plan ahead so that ample water is convenient and accessible.
Whenever possible, blend your aerobic workout with a mental workout by listening to inspirational music or self-development CDs, or visualizing your goal achievement. Try to think healthy, energetic, and empowering thoughts because this will energize you and complement your physical workout. As tempting as they may be, avoid news channels and newspapers as you exercise. I encourage you to make your workouts completely positive experiences.
Benefits of Consistent Aerobic Exercise
1. Improves sleep
2. Relieves stress
3. Burns fat
4. Supresses appetite
5. Enhances attitude
6. Stabilizes chemical balance
7. Fortifies immune system
8. Heightens self-esteem
Strength Training
The next component of effective exercise is strength training. Proper strength training improves muscle tone, balance, coordination, and of course overall vibrancy. Including strength training, or progressive resistance training, in your workout regimen will help you burn extra fat, resist fatigue, and avoid nagging injuries. You will also look and feel better.
Muscle is the primary energy burner in your body, so the more toned you are, the more excess body fat you will burn in a twenty-four-hour period. With less fat, you will be more energetic. And with more strength, you will develop more endurance for work and everyday tasks, leaving you with additional energy for other enjoyable relationships, projects, and activities.
Flexibility
Flexibility is the loneliest component of intelligent exercise because it is left out most often. Proper stretching energizes the body and the mind. As my Choi Kwang Do instructor repeatedly told me, a flexible body equals a flexible mind. Done properly, stretching reduces tension, promotes circulation, improves posture and balance, increases range of motion, and helps prevent injuries. In addition, it is invigorating. In light of all the obvious benefits, it just might be worth adding yoga, Pilates, or some type of martial arts to your overall fitness plan. These disciplines involve significant flexibility and core stability.
After stretching, you’ll be more active and productive. Here are some guidelines for effective stretching:
Remember that before stretching you should do very light movement that mimics your sport or exercise activity. This increases blood flow to your muscles and makes them supple, limber, and prepared for stretching.
Stay relaxed throughout all stretching exercises. This requires a deliberate effort at first. Repeatedly tell yourself that you are relaxed, flexible, and resilient.
Slowly move in and out of each stretch. Avoid bouncing. A few stretches held for a minute or two each is far more useful than ten stretches held for ten seconds each.
Breathe slowly, deeply, and continuously. Holding your breath promotes tenseness.
Go at your own pace. Enjoy and don’t rush.
5. Eat for maximum energy.
The foods you choose to eat throughout the day exert a powerful impact on your level of physical, mental, and emotional energy. Fortunately, your nutrition is within your control! What you allow to pass between your lips will impact your health and well-being, either positively or negatively. It is your responsibility, as we teach in The 1% Club, to stay on top of the latest scientific research concerning the foods you eat and their connection to your energy, immunity, and longevity. You cannot rely on this book alone, government recommendations, one new study, or any other single source of information.
Upgrading your nutritional philosophy and daily habi
ts based on the practical, test-driven suggestions in this lesson will cause you to experience a quantum leap in your hour-to-hour energy levels. This will quickly translate into more quality time with those you love and for the projects and goals that you find most meaningful.
It is worth mentioning here that after age thirty, it is virtually impossible to compensate for mediocre nutrition with aggressive exercise. In other words, the older you get, the easier it is to out-eat your exercise program. The really good news, though, is that just a few small changes in your diet can cause you to wake up your metabolism and experience a surge of mental and physical vitality.
Here are some steps to high-energy nutrition:
a. Take the time to plan your meals. Planned meals are much more likely to include smart nutritional choices that promote energy, health, and well-being. Most Americans find themselves in such a constant rush that what they eat is based on convenience rather than nutrition. Planning meals puts you back in control. It is also likely to save you time and money at the grocery store and help you avoid impulse buys. Learn to read and understand food labels so that you know what you’re really paying for.
b. Focus on balanced nutrition. The food you eat—specifically the quality and the balance of proteins, fats, and carbohydrates known as macronutrients—dictates your body’s biochemistry. Your biochemistry then regulates metabolism, energy, immunity against disease, performance, and ultimately longevity. The primary factor in achieving optimal health and fat-burning is stable blood sugar. And balanced nutrition is the key to stabilizing your blood sugar. Balanced nutrition requires simply that you incorporate each of the macronutrients into each meal or snack.
For example, a balanced dinner could include salmon or chicken as the lean protein, a spinach salad mixed with a variety of fresh vegetables as the carbohydrate, with an olive-oil-based dressing as the essential fat. Add a tall glass of sparkling water with a slice of lemon, and you’re set! It is really that simple, and you will feel the difference immediately. A balanced lunch could include a turkey burger as the lean protein, a small bowl of homemade vegetable soup along with half of a whole-wheat bun as the carbohydrate, and an optional slice of avocado as the essential fat. A balanced breakfast could include an Egg Beaters omelet with Canadian bacon and 2 percent cheddar cheese as the protein, a slice of whole-wheat toast as the carbohydrate, and a small handful of raw almonds as the essential fat. A balanced snack could be an apple with a few raw cashews or your favorite raw nuts. Another snack could be several celery sticks dipped in raw almond butter or nonhydrogenated peanut butter.
Of course, the options are virtually endless, and you will be much more successful with a definite plan.
In The 1% Club, we teach our members to make a peak-performance shake with these ingredients:
• lean, complete whey protein isolate
• low-glycemic fresh or frozen fruit
• an omega- or flax-oil blend
This shake tastes fantastic and is a powerful way to start your day or energize yourself in the middle of the afternoon. For our latest 1% Club recommendations and a free copy of our shake recipes, please visit www.successisnotanaccident.com.
At optimal levels, blood sugar is your body’s primary source of energy. It is the gas that fuels your cells. Your cells and tissues need glucose, just as your lungs need air. Without it, you couldn’t survive. For your body to function at its peak, it must keep blood sugar levels in balance—neither too high nor too low. This is critical. Either too much or too little sugar profoundly affects your health, energy levels, and mood. Once you discover the perfect balance of lean complete proteins, essential fats, and low-glycemic carbohydrates for your body, you can achieve maximum energy, fat loss, and vibrant health—for the rest of your life!
c. Eat frequent small meals and very light snacks. Large meals overburden your digestive system and interfere with absorption of nutrients. Big meals, especially those high in saturated fat, trans fat, or refined foods, lead to postmeal lethargy and low performance. If you are serious about generating more energy, make your breakfast the biggest and most nutritionally sound meal of the day. When you enjoy breakfast within thirty or forty-five minutes of rising, your body and brain will function better and your energy level will stay more consistent into the evening. Eating a healthy breakfast also jump-starts your metabolism and decreases the likelihood of binge eating later in the day. Balancing high-fiber carbohydrates with lean complete proteins and healthy fats for breakfast sets the right nutritional tone for a world-class day. Lunch should be slightly smaller but still a balance of the right macronutrients. Dinner should be the lightest of your three main meals, while still following the balance of carbs, proteins, and fats. Most Americans do the reverse—a small breakfast and a large dinner—which makes little sense from a physiological or performance standpoint. Experiment with a light midmorning and midafternoon snack. This will boost mental performance and physical endurance and will curb overeating at dinner-time. If you eat an early supper, a balanced late-night snack will help keep your blood sugar stable and tend to improve the quality of your sleep.
d. Work in at least seven servings of fresh fruits and vegetables throughout your small meals, shakes, and snacks during the day. Fruits and vegetables are naturally high in vitamins, minerals, fiber, antioxidants, and the recently discovered phytochemicals that protect the body from cell damage. Go for the most colorful combinations of fruits and vegetables, as this indicates richer nutrient content. A lunch or dinner salad packed with lots of your favorite vegetables is an easy way to accomplish this. Also, make sure you have plenty of washed fresh fruit and veggies on hand in your kitchen.
e. Drastically reduce or eliminate sugar, salt, and refined white flour. Collectively—and deservedly—these are referred to as the three white poisons because they offer little if any nutritional value and are known to contribute to a host of health problems. The body has no need for added sugar, yet the average American consumes nearly two hundred pounds of simple sugar every year in the form of desserts, breakfast pastries, soft drinks, candy, jams, syrups, and alcohol, just to name a few. In addition to hampering the fat-burning process, simple sugars—often disguised as corn syrup, maltose, dextrose, dextrin, honey, or molasses—reduce your appetite for high-nutrition foods and leave you feeling even more tired and sluggish after the initial pick-me-up wears off. This is primarily the result of blood-sugar imbalances.
The human body also needs little or no additional salt, yet many products on supermarket shelves have salt as a primary ingredient because of its preservative value. Many people also pour excessive amounts of salt on their food even before tasting it. By relying only on the natural salts found in your food, you’ll start to enjoy a wider range of flavors that were previously neutralized with excessive salt. In addition, you’ll maintain a healthy balance of sodium to potassium, which helps prevent cancer, heart disease, high blood pressure, and strokes.
Bleached or refined white flour, the third white poison, has been stripped of virtually all vitamin content and just about all fiber. It is, in effect, nutritionally dead. All white-flour products, white rice, pasta, and crackers should be replaced with their whole-grain equivalent and enjoyed only in moderation. Though many white-flour products claim to be enriched with vitamins, just remind yourself what made them white.
f. Drink lots of water. Two-thirds of the composition of the human body is water, and water is involved in every function of the body. It helps transport nutrients and waste products in and out of cells. It’s required for all digestive, absorptive, circulatory, and excretory functions, as well as for the utilization of the water-soluble vitamins. Water also helps us maintain proper body temperature. Additionally, water suppresses the appetite and helps the body eliminate stored fat. We often mistake thirst for hunger, and an unnecessary intake of calories is the result. When you feel hungry but don’t think you should be, try rapidly drinking several cold glasses of water. If you wait ten minutes or so, often
the food craving will pass. Quickly drinking several large glasses of ice-cold water is also a terrific energy booster. Try it and see.
To determine how much pure water you need each day, simply divide your body weight in pounds by two. The quotient is the minimum number of ounces of water you need to consume each day. For example, if you weigh 150 pounds, your body needs at least seventy-five ounces of water over the course of the day. If you exercise vigorously or drink alcohol or caffeine, you may need even more water to ensure that your body has what it needs to maintain peak health and vibrant energy.
g. Supplement your diet with an all-natural, high-quality multiple vitamin and mineral formula. Even if you eat a well-balanced diet, manage stress well, and exercise regularly, it is still a good idea to protect yourself with the nutritional insurance provided by a broad-spectrum vitamin, mineral, and antioxidant supplement. Be sure to check the expiration date on the bottle to ensure maximum freshness. I’m a strong believer in natural food supplements and have been using a synergistic combination for many years. I encourage you to learn all you can about vitamins and supplements, and begin working them into your overall high-energy fitness strategy.
Steps to High-Energy Nutrition
1. Plan your meals.
2. Eat low-fat or nonfat foods
3. Eat balanced meals and snacks
4. Eat seven or more servings of fiber-rich fresh fruits and vegetables daily.
5. Limit the white poisons: sugar, salt, bleached flour.
6. Drink lots of water.
7. Supplement your diet with an all-natural, high-quality vitamin and mineral formula.
Success Is Not an Accident Page 19