Have you tried to get your health back on track for the 100th time?
I get it, it’s horrible to search the internet for ways to reduce pain, lose weight and just feel better.
You end up feeling like you’ve wasted time and are back at square one again.
But that doesn’t need to happen.
Return to your roots and start optimising your body the way it was supposed to function with these 3 simple steps and principles so you can lose weight for good!
There is just one rule, focus on it, live it, and breathe it.
I promise the results will show very quickly.
Step #1 Optimise your hormones to lose weight
Let’s talk hormone rebalancing and imbalances.
So the idea of this is that you understand why we have imbalances and how we can rebalance them.
Nowadays, most people we work with, whether it be professionals, business people, busy parents, etc. their hormones are all out of whack, out of sync and all out of alignment.
Now, this is mostly because of the modern-day lifestyles they lead.
So let’s take your typical professional business person.
They…
- Are looking at multiple screens all day
- Have little movement throughout the day
- Hardly go outside
- Get less than 8 hours sleep
- Have lots of devices in the bedroom
- Do not get enough sunlight
- Are stressed! … Physically & Mentally
When you add all those things together, that creates a concoction of imbalances in your hormones. This is a key factor that will block you from losing weight.
Cortisol – The Stress Hormone
To give you a very specific example, when you wake up in the morning, you want the right level of cortisol.
Cortisol is the stress hormone, which will help you to get up out of bed without feeling like it’s a struggle.
Serotonin & Melatonin – The Sleep Hormone
When you go to bed at night, you want to make sure you feel like your stress/cortisol is going down, and the correct serotonin and melatonin levels kick in.
These are the sleep and wake regulating hormones and you want them to be balanced. So you feel like as soon as you hit the pillow, you want to go to sleep.
As I mentioned, the problem with the typical modern-day lifestyle is just that this doesn’t happen for most people.
Now, there are many other hormone imbalances and things that we need to rebalance. But these are just the typical main ones that we come across.
Training Hard Without Results? You WON’T Lose Weight!
I’ve seen people who train five, six times a week, they’re even eating the right foods as well as having healthy habits like drinking lots of water and so on. But they still struggle to get into shape and lose weight.
That’s because their hormones are all out of whack.
And no matter what they do, if they don’t focus on rebalancing things, internally, the external side will remain the same.
I’ve seen this far too many times.
Don’t let this be you!
How to rebalance your hormones
So what we actually want to focus on now is how can we rebalance those things, with these easy beginners steps:
- Spend some time in nature and regulate your body’s internal clock.
- Reduce your blue light consumption, that means no screen time 1 hour before bed
- Have a regular wake and sleep time
- Open the blinds/curtains when you wake up, let the sun shine through
We want to be able to switch off, and understand when to switch on our body’s internal mechanisms to be working at the right times.
If your hormones are completely out of whack, I promise you that you won’t get results or lose weight.
Step #2 – Myofascial Release (MFR)
In this section, we’ll be covering what myofascial release is, how to do it, and why it’s really important for you.
So let’s begin by breaking down the word itself.
Myofascial release can be basically broken down into two parts, Myo, and then fascia, or facial. So Myo basically means muscle, and this sits underneath the fascia, then on top of the muscle, is the fascia itself.
What is fascia?
Fascia is a very simple, interconnected network of fibres, which go all the way from your head down to your toes.
If you think of it like a spider’s web, it has a similar appearance, but also acts in a similar way. When you pull on one part of the web or the fascia, it interacts with the rest. And for fascia that’s all the way up from your head to your toes.
So, what that means is, if I massage my neck, there is a direct effect throughout the rest of the body.
This is why it’s really important that we focus on how our body works together as one unit.
So, when it comes to releasing stress, pain, aches and tension from the body, it’s not the case, that we just strengthen parts in isolation.
Just like we shouldn’t train our muscles in isolation.
Start treating your body as one unit with myofascial release in the right way.
Now you know what myofascial release is, let’s figure out a few principles that you can apply as you do it, to make sure it works for you.
Here’s an example of what happens if you stretch instead of doing MFR.
Think of an elastic band stretching. First, the elastic band is able to snap back into shape, but over time, if you keep stretching eventually some tension will be lost. That’s the same thing that happens when you stretch.
How to remove knots and increase weight loss
Now, let’s add the idea of adhesions, tension or knots as most people are familiar with. When you have a buildup of fascia you will feel a tension or a gritty, knotted sensation when you rub your muscles. These are areas of dehydration which need to be released. If you pull your muscles while you have adhesions, you will tighten the adhesion. You may get temporary relief, but the problem still remains and actually tightens.
These adhesions in the body can inhibit weight loss directly or indirectly. They can stop you from wanting to exercise or they can stop the flow of water throughout the body and therefore cause build up of toxins which inhibits your body’s optimal function. Which in turn will make it harder to lose weight.
Is muscle tension all bad?
All tension is not bad. Healthy muscle tension will allow you to expand and also contract your muscles.
This is where the muscle needs to be able to shorten, lengthen and work appropriately. And that could be for modern day life. Imagine, you’re just walking around, or it could be whilst you’re running or sprinting or even doing your training.
So when you think of myofascial release in this way, and it’s done properly, you’ll understand that actually we’re getting rid of the adhesions or tightness in our body, which causes postural dysfunctions, pain and other problems.
When we look at it in a holistic sense, we know that this is what’s going to help us to reduce your pain.
Hydration and Fascia
Once you release your fascia with myofascial release it’s super important to hydrate.
The reason is that when you release tension in your body, your body releases toxins, and you want to flush those out.
So, remember, when you do myofascial release, drink half a litre of water after. You’ll flush those toxins out and rehydrate those areas that need it most.
MFR Principles:
- Do it regularly, because otherwise you won’t see the effects
- Do it properly, chase the pain, don’t run from it. Go to where the pain is and understand that the pain is what you need to get out of your body.
- Do drink water and hydrate after you release
- Don’t try to release bones, only focus on the muscles. You can’t actually release bones, ligaments, tendons, In the same way you can muscle so don’t try to release those areas only focus on muscular release.
Try this quick, and beneficial foot release here to see how MFR can really help.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nn7TmF6vwB0&t=4s
Step #3 HYDRATE!
Now that you have got a taster of why hydration is important for flushing out your toxins after MFR, let’s delve a little deeper.
It’s really important to understand how you should be drinking your water, and also why you need the right kind of water.
Losing water weight
This is key when wanting to lose weight, or more accurately lose fat. The truth is, if you want to lose weight, just like when fighters start weight cutting, you actually aim to DEhydrate the body. This way you lose all the water weight.
But this is not sustainable, not normal, and not healthy.
For most people who want to lose weight, the goal is to lose weight long term, not for a few hours.
Drinking water & Weight Loss
One of the simplest things that gets most of my students to lose weight FAST is to drink more water.
It’s shocking how fast someone can lose weight just by drinking the recommended amount of water for their body type and activity level. A lot of the time people don’t realise how much more they eat as a result of being thirsty.
Staying hydrated often keeps poeple away from coffee, snacks and other treats. This is mainly down to the body being satisfied, it is not craving something, and therefore in a stressed state.
Why is water so important?
So, let’s get started with the body itself.
First of all, the human body is roughly made of about two thirds water. We need to acknowledge that, especially as we train more, we need to replenish the system in a healthier way. And hydration is the first point of contact when it comes to in taking nutrition, not food, but actually water.
Water is the most important because it’s the most abundant, and it helps the body to transfer nutrients to the right parts of the body, in the right parts of the cells.
If there’s no water, we’re dehydrated. We won’t be able to transport things in the way we need to.
Why filtered water is better
Next up, we need to understand the right kind of water is much, much more important than the quantity.
For example, tap water is not going to be as good as remineralize water through a gravity water filter.
So if you don’t have the filter yet, I’d highly recommend that you get that because that’s going to help you replenish your system in a much, much healthier way. You will feel the benefits over having something like tap water.
Let’s figure out some of the signs of dehydration:
- Really tight, dry skin
- Constipation
- Feeling agitated or stressed
- Muscle tension.
There are many more, but if your body is starting to feel like it’s dehydrated, the simple sign is “Oh, I need a drink, I’m thirsty”.
So, if you feel like that often, and you feel like even when you’re drinking, you’re not getting enough water or enough nutrients to the body to make you feel satiated from hydration point of view, then it could be the case there’s something else wrong.
This could be down to a lack of electrolytes in the body. This can easily be fixed with increasing your salt intake.
How to stay hydrated
Now that you know that the kind of water you drink is important and signs of dehydration, we’ll go through a few tips you can use to make sure you get the right hydration.
Over the years, I found that people struggle to fit the amount of water they need into their routine. They either get to the end of the day and realise they’ve only had one glass, or they’re worried they’ll need to go to the bathroom too often. This is because they’re so used to little amounts of water and their body is just not used to it and doesn’t know how to consume the amount it needs to function most effectively.
How much water do you need?
Here’s a simple formula to work out how much water you need based on a low activity day:
(Your weight in kg) x 0.03333 = litres you need to drink
So for example, if you’re 90 kilos, and you multiply that by 0.033, that will give you the amount you need. So that means if I was 90 kilos, I would need 2.97 litre have water to make sure I’ve got everything I need.
3 tips for drinking enough water
Now you know how much water you need to drink, here’s how you can make sure you get through it:
- Carry a bottle of water wherever you go, at all times. This could be when you’re at work, when you’re home, when you go to the gym, the office or wherever it may be. Make sure it’s BPA free, ideally, glass.
- Take a half litre glass of water to bed, then in the morning, drink it first thing. That’s your half litre for the morning already. And when you set your body up right from the start with water, as the first thing you intake in the morning, it will rehydrate the system, especially after sleeping.
- Set reminders on your phone, or email calendar to remind you every two to three hours that you need to drink that half litre of water. So good indications if you’re drinking two to three hours half litre, then by the end of the day, you’ll have what you need, obviously depends on your weight and your circumstances how much water you actually need, but that’s just a rough indication.
Over time, these tips may still help you but some of them especially like setting reminders, you don’t need for long term, you need to reinforce it into your habits so it becomes second nature. The main thing is you build a self-awareness to know that when you’re dehydrated, and you know what to do and how to fix it.
So there it is. Your first 3 steps to optimising your health.
There is not one that is more impactful than the other, if you focus on all 3 consistently for the next 2 weeks you’ll notice a difference.
If that’s not enough and you would like some 1-1 guidance on optimising your health join Modern Warrior Programme now!
Click here to book a FREE call to find out how you can optimise your health in 12 weeks.
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Comment below with your thoughts on the steps and which ones you have come across before.
