For years I’ve seen a number of gadgets, programs and so forth that has confused me as well as others. Every time I hear of a “new” program, it really makes me mad. I’m not saying that they are good or bad. It’s just that many will believe that the newness is the only way. We’re hypnotized by all of this. I know, I’ve done the same thing. The more complicated something, the better it must be, right? WRONG!!!!

It’s the same when business people use big words and sentences to explain an idea. Not only does it confuse the listener, it also never gets put into action. In fitness, when you’re confused, you usually don’t take action either. It is just the way our brain works. If we don’t understand something, we normally won’t do it. Sure, there are those that will try to understand it and may do it. They are the exceptions, not the norm.

Now, let’s get right to the point of simplifying your fitness. In every category there will be the foundations we all have to abide by. This includes strength training, cardiovascular training and even flexibility.

The very basic foundational training that I suggest for the beginner is simply to walk. I can tell you that even walking can be made challenging. This includes distance, speed and stride length. One of the signs of someone who is aging is how they walk. You may see people who are taking shorter strides and slowing their pace in walking, right? Heck, this could be someone at any age. You may have even thought of how old that person looks. By the way, when a younger person walks slower with shorter strides, they also appear older (at least in their physical body).

All foundational work has to include the core. This is important towards having a safer and more effective workout and functionality in daily life. Simply put, use your abs and glutes in your various activities. When doing a squat, for example, make sure you feel your butt being engaged. When you’re picking something off the ground, again, feel that backend working.

Whether you’re doing squats, push-ups or anything else where your feet touches the ground, your full core (including your glutes) should be engaged. If you’ve been sitting for a long time, you may have to do some pelvic lifts to start to feel them working. Just remember that the core helps to stabilize your whole body as a single unit.

When it comes to strength training, your core should be engaged when you’re progressively increasing the intensity. The basics of strength training is to make sure your whole spine is in proper alignment, core engaged and form is proper. Increase the reps, sets and/or weight to ensure you’re progressing. I even do this with body weight training.

Cardiovascular training is done by increasing volume, speed and decreasing rest time. This includes high intensity interval training (which I prefer). Keep your training under 45 minutes. It’s that simple.

Flexibility training is not just from stretching. Increasing your stride length when walking will help with flexibility. Doing full range of motion in strength training helps with flexibility. In fact, stretching does not necessarily increase flexibility. It’s more of adaptation to the pain and pushing beyond it that counts. Recent studies have shown that muscle does not stay stretched after stretching. It’s still pretty much the same when we were more flexible as kids. What has changed is our adaptation to sitting and therefore, less stress on our muscles and tendons.

Here’s the very basic and most simple aspect of fitness that I can tell you. MOVE! Move in all different ways. Move more. Move when you’re sitting, standing or anything else. Simply move and you’ll discover that is what fitness is all about anyway. Do physical activities that you enjoy and you’ll do more of it, more often.

Cheers,

Bob Choat, “Transformational Master Black Belt”
America’s #1 Mind-Body Transformation Expert and author of Mind Your Own Fitness