Getting the focus off the Scale

Today I want to share a very crucial secret that everyone in this health and fitness lifestyle should already know or ought to know. The scale is one of the most misleading progress monitors. That's right, misleading! It took me a while to wrap my mind around this because for years I had been using the number on the scale as the only measure. I often got frustrated thinking I wasn't making progress when in actual fact I was.The reason why it's misleading is because the scale measures everything as opposed to measuring body composition. This can lead to overstating or understating results. For instance in one day your overall body weight can fluctuate due to what you eat or drink from 0.5- 1.5 kg. In terms of body composition, the scale doesn't tell you how much of that weight is fat and how much is muscle. Two people with the same weight of  70 kg can have a totally different composition and physical appearance. The one with more fat than muscle will be wider and more flabby while the one with more muscle than fat will be leaner and more toned thus having a better physical appearance. Your goal ought to be body composition. Aim for more muscle than fat in your body. For the ladies, forget the myth that muscle is manly and ugly on a woman. Muscle on women is perfectly normal, healthy and beautiful. If you don't believe it, look at all the lean women around that don't have their fat jiggling . I'm not saying aim to look like a body builder but tone out your body and get leaner.Fat is a silent killer and will have you suffering from all sorts of disorders that are avoidable, get rid of it starting now! If you ask me, death is not beautiful so I say yes to changing body composition for better.

Now for the tip part. What I use to measure progress that I have found to be more effective is measuring inches. This will directly tell you whether you are losing inches. In addition, take progress pictures. This shows clearly how your body is leaning out. Lastly the very obvious one is using the fit of your clothes as your clothes get looser or tighter you will see clearly where you are heading. I prefer to give tips that are less expensive because I want everyone to be able to benefit but for those who can afford it, measuring exact fat and muscle composition can be done at a nutritionist's clinic.

Side bar: Today I did Insanity Asylum Speed and Agility and followed it with Yoga with Sworkit mobile App.I loved treating my body to Yoga! Felt so good!

I hope that has sunk in now and can encourage you to keep pushing! Have a lovely weekend folks!

What it's about

 Quite a few people have been asking me what I do to keep motivated with my health and fitness and I decided that it would be great idea to share my experiences and journey thus far. It's actually an awesome way to keep focused because my readers will probably serve as accountability partners and share their experiences as well. It's a win win for us both and I'm very excited! I'll be sharing triumphs great and small, challenges, experiences, tips and lots more. For me fitness is a necessity as much as eating, prayer and all the things that a core to my existence. I'm not in this for a particular size but for a lifestyle change. I know the direct relationship between living healthy and avoidable diseases( both mental and physical) and I also want to be an all round testimony.  In fact today I was thinking about how we church folks love to EMPHASISE that the body is a temple of the Holy Spirit in relation to lust but conveniently forget that this includes, looking after your body and overall physical health. I'm not about that half truth life and neither will I ever cosign it! I also think about how many times I have heard people promote self confidence at the expense of health. I call that flattering to death! Love yourself and skin you are in but don't be comfortable in an unhealthy state. I feel like I'm about to digress into a zone for another day so I'll stop here and share my find of the day!
 Let's get started shall we?
 Today I discovered two awesome personal training mobile apps that are free(whoop whoop!) and I'll be using those to compliment my daily work outs. The apps are "Sworkit" and "Nike training". What these apps are for in my case is to help me work on my problem areas (lower abs and these oh so African thighs, Jesus be a toner! lol) I've made great progress so far but I want more definition and toning in these areas. The truth is there is always room for improvement so even though many people are inspired by my dedication, I'm inspired by the dedication and progress of others which pushes me to perfect these areas.  Both apps have video to help demonstrate how to do the exercises, a built in and customized timer as well as area specific work outs. They also nicely group the types of exercises which is great for me because I don't have to go through a list of exercises and create  a type of work out. If I want toning or strength exercises, I can quickly hit that tab and set it up! I can already visualize the definition! The more I learn, the less excuses I have which is a great thing. I hope that as I share with you, you too can be motivated to work not formulate excuses because that is the enemy of changing your life!

Side bar: Creating fitness apps awesome idea, I'm having a creative itch right about now, we'll see.
Side bar 2: I wrote emphasise in caps because blogger is trying to correct my spelling with the American "ize".