“The whole is greater than the sum of its parts”
In the field of health and fitness, there are many effective techniques to help us achieve our optimal weight, appearance and fitness level. When used in isolation however, many of these techniques provide only short term results and often produce a yo-yo effect (think fad diets). We’d like to show you how your goals can be effectively achieved through a synergistic approach.
Synergy can be described as “the interaction of two or more agents or forces so that their combined effect is greater than the sum of their individual effects.”
At 3D Personal Training we firmly believe (and our experience proves) that success in achieving your health and fitness goals depends on a synergy of 3 dimension: the right mental approach, functional physical training, and supportive nutrition and lifestyle.
Here’s why…
Mental approach
Effective goal-setting is where the road to success begins. It’s essential to understand where you are now in terms of your personal goals, and where you want to be in order to obtain clarity and purpose, and to be able to visualize your ultimate goal. Your goals need to come alive, so we encourage you to take the time to complete the following exercise and write the answers down in order to realize them:
Be bold – What is your ULTIMATE health/fitness dream?
Be honest – WHY do you want to achieve this, what will this outcome mean for you and allow you to DO?
Be connected – What will you SEE, HEAR and FEEL when you have it?
Be courageous – WHEN will you achieve it?
Be realistic – What are you WILLING to give up in order to get what you desire?
Be creative – How can you ENJOY the process while doing what is necessary to achieve your goals?
The secret to achieving a positive mental approach lies in how often you can be connected and aligned to these thoughts and feelings.
Physical training
In our experience there are three aspects of physical training that when addressed will bring success in achieving goals:
The need for muscle:
Muscle is one of your very best friends if you want to lose body fat, because it’s an active tissue that directly increases your rate of metabolism. Unfortunately, around the age of 30, our muscles begin to shrink, so it is imperative to regularly maintain or build them. When it comes to training, avoid fixed resistance machines as they allow no freedom for the muscles, literally boring them senseless with the same movement pattern and decreasing neuromuscular awareness at the same time. That’s a bad deal for your body. Choose free-weights or cables instead and try incorporating Swiss Balls (aka Physio Balls) to increase the neuromuscular demands. Additionally, think training “movements” not “muscles”; pushing, pulling, squatting, lunging, bending and twisting are the basic movements of day-to-day life and we should try to mirror these during exercise.
Cardio in moderation:
It’s important not to overdo the cardiovascular exercise (e.g. cross-trainer or jogging), as this can lead to a decrease in muscle mass which reduces your ability to burn fat. We’re by no means suggesting that cardio exercise is bad. It’s essential for transporting nutrients to the cells via the bloodstream. When fat is released from storage centers (adipose cells) it travels through the bloodstream to be “burned”. However if there is a decrease in muscle mass, the body’s ability to burn fat is also decreased. As such, we recommend short-duration, high-intensity cardio to limit the possibility of losing muscle.
Flexibility:
Not only do our muscles shrink with age, but gravity, sedentary lifestyles and poor posture begins to take its toll as well! Bad posture can lead to injuries and regular bouts of associated pain. The details can be a little complex, but suffice to say there are muscles in your body that naturally become short and tight and others that get long and weak by nature. We need to stretch the shorter, tighter muscles and strengthen the longer, weaker muscles. For example when someone has a posture that resembles the Pink Panther – protruding head and rounded shoulders – the chest is one muscle that needs a good stretch. It’s important to only stretch what is tight though, as stretching the long and weak muscles will lead to further imbalances.
Supportive nutrition and lifestyle
What you eat and drink daily and the amount of rest you’re getting are absolutely vital if you want results, not only in terms of weight loss but also for optimal health. Here are three things you need to get right:
Eat to boost your metabolism
Largely, this means minimising your intake of simple sugars and refined carbohydrates, and eating frequent meals (no greater than four hours between each one) consisting of quality proteins (preferably from free range, chemical and hormone free animals), fibrous carbohydrates (above ground vegetables) starchy carbohydrates (sweet potatoes, brown rice), and good fats and oils (seeds, nuts, fish and olive oil). When it comes to the specific ratios of each macronutrient (especially the amount of starchy carbohydrates), it’s a case of listening to your body after each meal in order to account for bio-individuality and stress levels. We recommend using a food diary (like the one you get with our FREE 21 Day Elimination Diet) and recording after each meal (or at the end of the day) what you ate, including proportions and the respective reactions, e.g. satisfied, not satisfied, bloated, hungry, mentally-focused etc.
Drink plenty of water
The body is made up of around 75% water. Water is crucial when it comes to health because it plays a role in transporting nutrients, digestion, elimination of waste products, and detoxification – and those are the tip of the iceberg. Beware though, a “dry mouth” is not a safe indicator of thirst; it is actually a sign that the body is well into dehydration. How much water should we drink each day? That depends on several factors, including your weight and how active you are. To get an approximate amount in litres, try this formula: your weight in kg x 0.033 = the amount in litres per day you need to drink.
Get sufficient sleep
Sleep is another factor that has huge implications for your body. We consider sleep a major tipping point, and there have been many times when we’ve seen clients who are addressing the above points, but only achieve significant results by getting to bed earlier and sleeping a little longer.
Finally we’d would like to share the story of one our clients to illustrate the value of applying synergy in your life.
Fathima came to me because she wanted to change the way she looked before returning home after moving to London to study. She had previously tried all the usual diets and had also tried personal trainers who took her through workouts. But she achieved no lasting results with these individual approaches. So our first task was to realign Fathima’s mind-set with success through our goal setting exercise. The next step was giving her the framework to achieve success by teaching her about synergy. Here’s an extract of an email she sent us (used with kind permission).
“FIRST OF ALL, I MUST TELL U that I have been absolutely showered with compliments ever since I got off the plane here! I’ve had people come up to me and ask me what I’ve been ”taking”!!! It’s crazy, and quite a few people weren’t able to recognize me at all…I’ve also tried on my old clothes…and well…I’ve had to take in at least 5 inches on some of my shirts (which has been VERY satisfying indeed!!). The weirdest thing is that most people don’t believe me when I say it’s all down to a healthy diet, exercise and decent sleeping hours!!”
Is it time to get some synergy in your life?
Yours in health,
Craig, Matt and the 3D Personal Training team.