It’s that time of year again! People are searching for the next best thing to change their lives and help them get fit!
The problem is- they are often looking for a quick solution- such as a 6-week program, a 30 day cleanse, or a 12-week transformation to get them to their goals once and for all.
Unfortunately, it just doesn’t work that way.
It’s actually not the workout programs that are the issue, but it’s the TIMELINE that is the problem – the mindset of short-term thinking that becomes the real handicap to long-term results.
Let’s think about it…if you want to achieve weight loss and fitness, you know this is a lifelong endeavor, not a 6-week challenge or a 30-day diet. And in that case, if you are looking for a short-term commitment, you are ultimately going to fail long term. To truly become the person you want to be and have the body you want to have, you need to COMMIT to a LIFETIME of changes to your eating habits, your daily routine, and consistent workouts.
Does this mean you have to go out and buy a lifetime membership at a gym? No, but let’s start with a year. Yes, 1 whole year.
Because if you’re honest with yourself about what it’s going to take, you know that 6 or 12 weeks isn’t going to do it. In fact, if you only want to commit to 6 or 12 weeks, then my advice is don’t waste your time because you’re not ready to do the real work that it will take to transform your body. Sound harsh? Perhaps, but some truth and honesty are what you need when you really really want to lose weight, get fit and change your life! You don’t need another quick fix, a no carb diet or some hardcore boot camp to whip you into shape. Ultimately, all that is just going to get you is- rebound sugar cravings and probably a back injury.
So this year 2019, please consider doing something different than what you’ve done in the past. Work on the mentality of a new life, one with daily workouts and lots of vegetables and salads. Make huge weight loss and fitness goals, and then make a reasonable plan to reach them. Keep in mind that this is a marathon, not a sprint, and slow and steady will absolutely win the race! This is about changing your eating habits and scheduling workouts all the time, and it’s not easy to change a lifestyle- it takes hard work over an extended period to really get there.
But here’s the good part:
You CAN do it.
It can be FUN!
There are people who will hold you accountable and make sure you are doing things right.
And finally, it is WORTH IT.
Start today, and make a plan for the whole month of what you can do to move forward. and then do it next month and the next.
Make this your best year yet!
Come see us at Essential Fitness for your health and nutritional needs! Here are a couple of our upcoming events!
Our next workshop is Saturday, Jan. 12th– from 9:00-10:30 at Essential Fitness. We will do a group workout, then discuss goal setting, building resolve, commitment, and distribute new BINDER material, followed by a member coffee social hour from 10-10:30 am. Free to members, non-members $35.00. Please call the front desk to register- 949.264.6767
“Wellness Weekend” Friday, February 22-24, 2019 in Palm Desert. Join us for an amazing transformation weekend designed to challenge and inspire you to reach new heights in 2019! This will be a weekend of signature E.F. Personal Training workouts, workshops on mindset, goal setting, and nutrition, plus the building of lifelong friendships and community that will support you all year long!
How to believe in your own anchorMay 10, 2021 - 8:30 am
This place is my anchorMay 4, 2021 - 4:27 pm
Control What you CanMay 4, 2021 - 4:23 pm
What Is Your Bedtime?January 1, 2020 - 9:01 am
Hesitation
Hesitation is one of our greatest obstacles as fitness coaches. Many people who have health and fitness goals let hesitation get the better of them for years and decades before doing anything about it. I find that this is one of the greatest roadblocks we face when trying to help a potential client change his or her life. The fact is, many potential clients have often been putting off making a change for a very long time, and as Mel Robbins (author of “The 5 Second Rule”) is so adept at explaining, any hesitation is long enough for our brains to kick in and actually MAGNIFY the potential risks of making a change.
This is because our brains are wired to prevent us from doing uncomfortable and challenging things. And when you hesitate, your brain will actually start working against you – helping you to imagine greater potential loss, magnifying the difficulty of changing your life, and remembering the fear of failing again. Very often, in the end, these habits of hesitation essentially kill the excitement to change, to grow, and to reach your goals.
Just think about it, your day is made up of thousands of decisions, and so often, you make those decisions based on how you feel at that moment. You might have had big plans to work out at lunch and then eat a salad, but the morning was tough, so instead, you skipped the workout and went out for a burger with friends.
It’s true that if you delay long enough, you can always put off doing difficult things. Difficult things like working out and sweating, running 3 miles, and saying no to dessert…. these can feel like hard things, but it seems like the longer you think about it, the harder they seem to become.
You rationalize to yourself saying… I’ll do it later, I’ll start tomorrow, it doesn’t matter. But we are here to remind you that it does matter! If you do truly want to change your life, lose weight, and take control of your health, STOP HESITATING. Stop overthinking the potential difficulty and start moving!
I highly recommend Mel’s book if you are struggling with this, and as a result, you are watching the months and years go by without taking charge of your fitness. If you want something more for yourself, find a place to help you reach your goals and jump in! Fully commit to yourself and your health and don’t hesitate – you will never regret starting TODAY.
Essential Fitness Trainer’s Training
Hello –
Maureen from Essential Fitness here! I wanted to share the details about our newest and most exciting program- “Trainer’s Training.”
Do you love fitness?
Do you love helping others?
Then this program may be for you!
This internship is designed to teach you all of the information you need to help inspire and motivate others to live a healthier lifestyle!
This program has been a passion of mine for over two decades and I cannot wait to share the opportunity to help like-minded women empower other like-minded women to be their best!
In fact, Essential Fitness was born from the idea of helping women achieve anything they want to achieve!
So, please read the details below, and don’t hesitate to get back to me with any questions you may have.
In the words of Jen Sincero “Stop doubting your greatness and start living an awesome life.”
1% Better Every Day
1% Better every day by Trainer Cynthia Carlson
Habits are the compound interest of self-development.
The same way money multiplies through compound interest, so too do your habits multiply as you repeat them. It doesn’t appear to make a difference on any given day, yet the impact they deliver over the course of months and years can be enormous. It’s only when looking back two, five or ten years later that the value of good habits and the cost of bad ones becomes extremely obvious.
That is hard to appreciate as we make our way through our daily life. We overlook the small changes because they don’t seem to matter very much at the moment. Save some money today, you are not a millionaire tomorrow. You go to the gym 3 days this week, you are still overweight, feeling out of shape.
The same with bad habits, the slow pace of the consequences of these choices make it easy to let this behavior slide. I just ate one cookie, I can put off that project until tomorrow when I have more time to finish it, I can skip my workout it’s only one. A single bad decision is easy to dismiss.
When you make small beneficial changes and engage in positive habits to become 1% better every day, in one year you will be 37% better overall. On the flip side, repeated errors every day through poor decisions, tiny mistakes and rationalizing little excuses, combine to lead to a 1% decline day after day.
These 2 paths will lead to very different destinations. With good habits repeated over time, your destination will be toward success. Poor habits will lead to one of failure and hardship over time.
We should be far more concerned with the direction of our lives than with your current results. Results are important. But day to day, it’s the habits we employ that will predict our future.
Good habits make time your friend. Bad habits make time your enemy.
You get what you repeat.
Make it a great day!
Registration is still open for our amazing Wellness weekend in Palm Springs but there are only a few spots left! Call Maureen today to find out more! 949-264-6767
Don’t Look For A Quick Solution To A Lifelong Problem
It’s that time of year again! People are searching for the next best thing to change their lives and help them get fit!
The problem is- they are often looking for a quick solution- such as a 6-week program, a 30 day cleanse, or a 12-week transformation to get them to their goals once and for all.
Unfortunately, it just doesn’t work that way.
It’s actually not the workout programs that are the issue, but it’s the TIMELINE that is the problem – the mindset of short-term thinking that becomes the real handicap to long-term results.
Let’s think about it…if you want to achieve weight loss and fitness, you know this is a lifelong endeavor, not a 6-week challenge or a 30-day diet. And in that case, if you are looking for a short-term commitment, you are ultimately going to fail long term. To truly become the person you want to be and have the body you want to have, you need to COMMIT to a LIFETIME of changes to your eating habits, your daily routine, and consistent workouts.
Does this mean you have to go out and buy a lifetime membership at a gym? No, but let’s start with a year. Yes, 1 whole year.
Because if you’re honest with yourself about what it’s going to take, you know that 6 or 12 weeks isn’t going to do it. In fact, if you only want to commit to 6 or 12 weeks, then my advice is don’t waste your time because you’re not ready to do the real work that it will take to transform your body. Sound harsh? Perhaps, but some truth and honesty are what you need when you really really want to lose weight, get fit and change your life! You don’t need another quick fix, a no carb diet or some hardcore boot camp to whip you into shape. Ultimately, all that is just going to get you is- rebound sugar cravings and probably a back injury.
So this year 2019, please consider doing something different than what you’ve done in the past. Work on the mentality of a new life, one with daily workouts and lots of vegetables and salads. Make huge weight loss and fitness goals, and then make a reasonable plan to reach them. Keep in mind that this is a marathon, not a sprint, and slow and steady will absolutely win the race! This is about changing your eating habits and scheduling workouts all the time, and it’s not easy to change a lifestyle- it takes hard work over an extended period to really get there.
But here’s the good part:
You CAN do it.
It can be FUN!
There are people who will hold you accountable and make sure you are doing things right.
And finally, it is WORTH IT.
Start today, and make a plan for the whole month of what you can do to move forward. and then do it next month and the next.
Make this your best year yet!
Come see us at Essential Fitness for your health and nutritional needs! Here are a couple of our upcoming events!
Our next workshop is Saturday, Jan. 12th– from 9:00-10:30 at Essential Fitness. We will do a group workout, then discuss goal setting, building resolve, commitment, and distribute new BINDER material, followed by a member coffee social hour from 10-10:30 am. Free to members, non-members $35.00. Please call the front desk to register- 949.264.6767
“Wellness Weekend” Friday, February 22-24, 2019 in Palm Desert. Join us for an amazing transformation weekend designed to challenge and inspire you to reach new heights in 2019! This will be a weekend of signature E.F. Personal Training workouts, workshops on mindset, goal setting, and nutrition, plus the building of lifelong friendships and community that will support you all year long!
Essential Fitness is Hosting a Wellness Weekend in Palm Springs
You are personally invited to spend a weekend with the women of Essential Fitness at our inaugural *Essential Wellness Weekend* in Palm Desert!
This amazing weekend is designed to inspire, educate, and motivate you to be your absolute best!
Do you need to:
Disconnect from your hectic life and RECONNECT with what you truly want?
Master your workouts with next level training utilizing all new equipment, methods, and advanced training techniques?
Be Inspired by amazing women and their stories that will humble and challenge you?
Change your mindset, change your results! Learn multiple techniques to help you TRANSFORM your life forever and finally feel in control?
Then this weekend is for YOU!
Where:
Our hotel is the amazing 4 Star Renaissance Indian Wells Resort and Spa, Palm Springs, CA.
When:
The program begins at 12:00 pm Friday, February 22nd, and ends at 12:00 pm Sunday, February 24th.
What’s included:
The entire wellness experience– including all meals, Personal Training, Your Room (based on double occupancy), workshops, lectures, and entertainment is provided! Travel is on your own.
How much:
Early bird pricing and Essential Fitness ”Family and Friends” discounted price is $1200. Act today and secure your spot by placing your $500 deposit before 12/25/18. Deposit is fully refundable if you must cancel before 1/25/2019. Prices will increase 10% on Dec.25th, so act today!
Reserve Your Spot Today!
Don’t miss this fantastic weekend with Essential Fitness!
You actually do have time to work out!
“I don’t have time to workout!” is another excuse we hear all the time. Let’s face it, we are all over-scheduled and feel we need more hours in the day to get everything done. But the truth oF the matter is YOU HAVE TO MAKE THE TIME TO TAKE CARE OF YOU. No one is magically going to wave a wand and grant you an extra hour in a day– it is solely up to you how you prioritize your schedule.
Women will literally lose years and decades of health and fitness hiding behind this excuse of not having time. But we each get the same amount of hours every day, and how you use your time reflects your priorities. So, it actually becomes a priority issue, not a time issue.
When you wake up in the morning (or before you go to bed at night) if you chose 3 priorities that absolutely needed to be completed that day, what would they be?
Your workout needs to be one of those priorities.
YOU.
A PRIORITY.
Your health, wellness, fitness, strength, flexibility, endurance, stress relief, weight loss, and everything else that comes with it. This needs to be in your top three every day or it simply won’t get done. Plus, as you know, the priorities need to be completed at the beginning of the day, not at the end of the day.
For instance, if you had a special project due at work, would you wait until 4:30 pm to start working on it? No, of course not. The same goes for fitness. Your energy wanes during the day, so why would you put off something that requires energy until 6:00 or 7:00 at night?
Is your health and fitness a priority? You know it should be, but if it’s not, let me leave you with another thought. If you look ahead ten years, will it really matter if you worked at your job yet another hour every day or cleaned your house more??? No, of course not.
On the other hand, ten years from now, how would you look and how would you feel if you devoted that one hour a day to sweating, stretching, running, lifting and developing you and your body? Your health is not an infinite thing. If you don’t take care of it, it will not always be there for you, and I guarantee that it will decline.
So, do your current and future self a favor today and start making YOU a top 3 priority.
Write it down, every day, in your “Top 3 things”, and stop using time as an excuse.
Stop The Hesitation!
Hesitation is one of our greatest obstacles. Many people who have health and fitness goals let hesitation get the better of them for years before doing anything about it. I find that this is one of the greatest roadblocks we face when trying to help a potential client change her life.
The fact is, many potential clients have often been putting off making a change for a very long time, and as Mel Robbins (author of “The 5 Second Rule”) is so adept at explaining, any hesitation is long enough for our brains to kick in and actually MAGNIFY the potential risks of making a change.
This is because our brains are wired to prevent us from doing uncomfortable and challenging things. And when you hesitate, your brain will actually start working against you – helping you to imagine greater potential loss, magnifying the difficulty of changing your life, and remembering the fear of failing again. Very often, in the end, these habits of hesitation essentially kill the excitement to change, to grow, and to reach your goals.
Just think about it, your day is made up of thousands of decisions, and so often, you make those decisions based on how you feel at that moment. You might have had big plans to work out at lunch and then eat a salad, but the morning was tough, so instead, you skipped the workout and went out for a burger with friends. It’s true that if you delay long enough, you can always put off doing difficult things. Difficult things like working out and sweating, running 3 miles, and saying no to dessert…. these can feel like hard things, but it seems like the longer you think about it, the harder they seem to become. You rationalize to yourself saying… I’ll do it later, I’ll start tomorrow, it doesn’t matter.
But we are here to remind you that it does matter! If you do truly want to change your life, lose weight, and take control of your health, STOP HESITATING. Stop overthinking the potential difficulty and start moving!
I highly recommend Mel’s book if you are struggling with this, and as a result, you are watching the months and years go by without taking charge of your fitness. If you want something more for yourself, find a place to help you reach your goals and jump in! Fully commit to yourself and your health and don’t hesitate – you will never regret starting TODAY.
Try this protein packed recipe that checks all the boxes!
1. Simple to make.
2. Makes a lot and gives you and your family a healthy option ALL week!
3. Low in carbohydrate, low in fat, HIGH in protein.
For busy moms, it can be a struggle to make a healthy breakfast every day, not to mention, wash the dishes and clean the kitchen afterward. I made this recipe on Sunday and am still enjoyed reheated leftovers on Wednesday! Talk about making your life easier while keeping you on track with your weight loss and fitness goals.
I found something similar online and made a few adjustments, based on what I had in the refrigerator…
Enjoy!
Why The Food Journal Is So Useful For Weight Loss
In order to make lasting, sustainable changes to your health and diet, you have to follow your natural patterns. To go against how you naturally approach things is like swimming against the current, you can do it for a while but when you get tired…you stop. You revert back to what you have always done and then nothing changes, especially the scale.
Keeping a food journal is a “snapshot” of your habits. What you eat, what time you eat and how much. Think of this log as information, a map of where you are. In order to get to your destination (your goal), you must know where you are starting from.
For the next week, keep a log of what you eat, EVERYTHING! By being completely honest with this food log you are taking the first real step on your weight loss journey. Without honesty and true tracking, there can be no change to your current habits.
Then, armed with this information, we can choose small changes that will move you forward, one step at a time. We will start with metabolism boosting habits such as: eating breakfast, not skipping meals, and finishing eating at a reasonable hour. When you master these small goals, we move on to things like protein balance, fat intake, and water. Each client’s meal plan is customized based on their starting point and goals. But remember, your food log is our jumping off point, and we will revisit it regularly to gauge your progress and keep you accountable.
So, get started today- writing down everything that passes your lips. Be honest and keep this in mind- “YOUR BODY KEEPS AN ACCURATE JOURNAL REGARDLESS OF WHAT YOU WRITE DOWN.” and let’s face it, your body doesn’t lie. You are already a walking testament of your diet, and if it’s not great, no worries! There is no perfect diet…..absolutely nobody eats perfectly. There is no judgment here, just information and tools that we must have to design the easiest approach for you!
10 Minute Protein Packed Breakfast
How about trying something different today?
Try this super simple protein pancake, and make breakfast for the whole family in less than 10 minutes!
Our favorite pancake mix is Maple flavored Parrillo Pancake and Muffin mix. Just add water and cook in a skillet with a little avocado oil. 2 cups of mix (add water) will make enough pancakes for the whole family AND provide leftovers for the work week.
Be sure to add some egg whites for an additional protein boost to help you recover from your workouts and build that muscle and tone that EVERYONE wants!
How much protein should you get per day? General recommendations are 50 grams per day for the average sedentary woman. However, if you are weight training and trying to build muscle, you need more than that! Aim for at least 20 grams per meal – this is a good starting point, and a “protein” breakfast will start you off on the right foot!