The start of my own personal health and fitness journey happened late one night while lying in bed, back in January 2015. I was struggling to sleep and had reached an all-time low. I knew I needed to make a change to turn things around.

Out of desperation, I began searching on Instagram for an answer. After stumbling across the fitness community hashtags, I found a string of comparison posts, showing side-by-side images of weight loss journeys. These women had gone from looking as though they were fed up, to radiating energy. I wanted a piece of this for myself. I HAD to have a piece of this. But where to start? The thought of eating lettuce leaves and running for hours on the treadmill didn’t exactly excite me. There had to be a more exciting and sustainable way.

All or Nothing

First of all, I made a commitment to myself that I would stick to a routine. My plan was to exercise 3 times a week for about 30 minutes for each session, for a total of 12 weeks. I also knew I’d need to overhaul my diet in order to get healthier and support my weight loss goal. I knew it would be tough and incredibly challenging both physically and mentally, but it was important for me to make a complete lifestyle change if I was really going to lose two stone in weight.

The Inner Cheerleader

I think it’s worth pointing out here, that I’m fortunate enough to have always had a supportive inner voice. I’m aware that not everyone has this, and sometimes that inner self can be another critic we have to fight. My advice for those who may have a daily battle with their conscious thought is to perhaps find ways to focus on working towards a more peaceful harmony in your mind, to help support your health and fitness journey. Start with listening to that critic rather than trying to silence it straight away. What is it actually saying to you? What is at the root of it? Once you can try to better understand the inner critic, where it has stemmed from and how you can weed the problem out to deal with, the more you can support yourself.

Nutrition Is Everything

They say you ‘can’t out-train a bad diet’, and from my own experience, this is very true. While the basics of weight loss recommendations are to burn off more calories than we’re taking in, it’s vital to ensure we work with our bodies to support our goals.

If you’ve ever used a food tracking app like MyFitnessPal, you’ll know that quite quickly your ‘daily calories’ will be eaten up in highly processed junk foods. While technically you can still be in a calorie deficit, you won’t feel full and could end up malnourished.

Instead focus on getting a variety of carbohydrates, proteins and healthy fats, as well as those all important vitamins and minerals. It’s easy to get lost in marketing and convenience foods, but bring it back to basics and you’ll start to notice a huge difference in your fat loss and how you feel.

Take Progress Photos

When we weigh ourselves, we’re literally weighing our skin, bones, fat and organs – basically every single element that makes up our bodies. And this isn’t even considering whether you’re wearing clothes, eaten food recently or are on your period.

When we take progress photos every few weeks or once a month during a weight loss journey, we can visually capture the results of fat loss. This is also particularly useful to do if you’re looking to tone your muscles while losing fat too, as you’ll start to see more definition through photos you wouldn’t be able to see through the scales.

Discovering Strength Training

I honestly thought that weight training was limited for men in the gym, and hadn’t even considered working on my muscular strength as part of my fitness journey. Surely weights create a physique that’s bulky right? Well, actually they don’t have to. Not immediately anyway! Using weight training can be a fantastic way to support our bodies from bone strength to our running goals. If you’re not into cardio, why not consider doing some weighted squats or lunges for example? When I started out at home, I didn’t want to commit to buying a full set of dumbbells, so I used full water bottles and tins of food from the kitchen! Starting your own fitness journey doesn’t need to be overwhelming. It just needs to start.

Enrich Don’t Restrict

Whatever you do – don’t look to the left of this screen. Did you look? Most of the time when we’re told not to touch the wet paint, all we suddenly want to do is touch the wet paint! When we tell ourselves we’re not touching any sugary foods for months, our focus shifts on all the cravings and sugary foods we ‘can’t’ have now.

My tip is to flip the perspective. Focus on what you can add into your daily routine. If you’re struggling to hydrate, challenge yourself to add in a glass of water. Once you’ve built this habit, focus on drinking two glasses of water a day. Keep building on these healthier habits and challenges, and see how much your confidence and mindset flourishes.

Focusing On The Little Wins

In my own personal health and fitness journey, I’ve found it can be more motivating to focus on the little wins. It’s great to have a bigger goal you want to achieve, but don’t deprive yourself of acknowledging your achievements in the everyday.