Part of making change in your world is finding new and different things to experience.
Today I wanted to talk about a few of the tools that we have used and that we still use and that we love. Finding tools is really key to watching and tracking your own improvement. Unless you are using a magnifying lens, change will be small and slow and hard to see.
1. Accountability Partner
When Doug and I started out on our new health journey, we were doing it together. That is probably the best thing that you can do. Find an accountability partner that you can celebrate with, gripe with, complain to, laugh with and most importantly have your own personal cheering squad. But doing this journey with your partner is unique, I get that. But, nobody does this stuff truly alone unless you choose to. Not sure why you would want to go it alone, but some do. You don’t need to find somebody that will do all the things that you do, although that would be awesome, just somebody that is there for you. Somebody that truly is in this partner thing for YOU. And, if this person turns out to be less than helpful, move on. Just as you would need to fire an employee who is not performing, you don’t need to fire them as a friend, just as an accountability partner. You can join us at Q4fit.com on Facebook, we will be there for you.
2. Food journal
There are a lot of ways to journal your eating habits. Journaling is super important especially in the beginning. You can’t begin to change and fix what you don’t see is broken. It comes down to measure, and nutrition in what you are eating. Writing it down with pen and paper works, but then you need to have somebody interpret what you have done. Not a bad plan, unless you don’t have
somebody. Most programs have this component in some capacity. Even the programs that have you eating prepackaged foods do so in order to monitor the food intake. I have had a great experience with https://www.myfitnesspal.com/.
a. First of all, it is FREE. You enter in all your personal stats, your weight goals, and you are off to the races. I like this site for a few reasons. Free is always good with me.
b. You can record either on your phone or desktop.
c. If you eat out, generally most chain restaurants are already in the program. You can enter your own complete meals if you tend to eat the same things each day.
d. There is a bar code scanner to enter foods that you can’t find by the search. If the manufacturer has put this info into their barcode, all the nutrients get entered at the same time.
e. There is also a community aspect if you want to get some encouragement from people on the same journey as you are.
3. Fitness tracking
Recording your workouts is really valuable for your own knowledge. Yes, some people like to post on social media every time they workout, so what. That is not what I am talking about. The more you do, the better you will become. Progress will happen. You will improve. You will do more. You will forget what it felt like when you started. This is your journey, so keeping track of your personal progress is really important. Again, lots of apps out there, too many to list. Even most smartphones come with their own fitness tracking system. The app we use and love is http://www.mapmyfitness.com/.
a. This app is again FREE. It records a huge amount of activities.
b. It can be recorded on your phone, with GPS, for tracking trails and routes. It
can be accessed through your desktop too.
c. Also it talks nicely to other programs.
d. Again, there is a community component here too. There are also friendly little
challenges that you can participate in for cool prizes. Why not??
4. Heart rate monitor
This has become a really important tool for me. When I began my health transition, I had no idea where my heart health was. A heart rate monitor was a suggestion from our trainer. When we began our journey, he has told us since, that he did not think we were capable of the kind of fitness things that he wanted us to do. So, we started tracking our heart rates so that we could see if we were working too hard, or not hard enough. Again, there are lots on the market. Everything from watches, your phone, and then the route we went. We chose to use the Tickr monitor. http://www.wahoofitness.com/
a. It is worn under your shirt and this type gets the best reading of your heart rate. This keeps you in the best heart rate zone for working out.
b. It helps keep track of the calories burned during your workout.
c. It talks to your other workout apps.
Keep in mind that these are all just toys to accumulate if you are not going to use them. If they are not simple to use and they don’t talk nicely to each other then they are not going to help you. Do what works for you. Keep yourself accountable to YOU. After all, this is YOUR journey, YOUR health, YOUR body, nobody else will want you to succeed more than you.
Well, except for us. 🙂
Your success is all that really matters.
To uncover your true potential you must first find your own limits and then you have to have the courage to blow past them.– Picabo Street
