Trap 1: Fueling Your Body With Small Meals
So often clients come to me eating tiny meals, or even skipping them, and wondering why they aren’t looking toned.
It’s one of two things usually: 1) These tiny meals make them ravenous in the evening leading to way over eating later or 2) These tiny meals just don’t provide enough protein and carbohydrates to promote muscle mass and a strong metabolism.
A “toned” look requires muscle definition and a body fat percentage that allows you to see the muscle definition. We get that with consistent fueling & consistent workouts.
Getting into a routine of 3 solid, filling meals each day that feed your appetite and fuel you for more effective workouts is a huge step towards looking more toned.
Looking toned requires an adequate amount of fueling — not too little or too much. You need sufficient calories, protein, carbs and fats to get results and maintain them.
Try aiming for 450-600 calories per meal and see if you don’t feel satisfied for longer, have better workouts & energy and more control over evening snacking after a few weeks. For most people, shooting for 30 grams of protein per meal is a great target.
Trap 2: Supplements Are Key
You don’t need any supplements to look toned. Putting too much worth into supplements, minimized the worth of other things that have more importance, like:
- Sleep
- Stress management
- Good workouts w/ progressive overload
- Enough calories overall
- Adequate protein
- Adequate nutrients from food
- Time outside
Can supplements (like a protein supplement if you struggle to eat enough) help? Sure, but they are not as necessary as mastering the list above. Once you’ve got control of that list, then you can think about supplements if you want.
Trap 3: Variety Is Best
Variety in your diet – great! Variety in your workouts – not as great.
Avoid “switching it up” for at least 4 weeks. This gives the body time to adapt, increase it’s efficiency & strength, and progress.
Not switching it up allows you to apply progressive overload, which is crucial for seeing results.
Keep track of the workouts and movements you are doing for those 4 weeks so you can be excited about seeing progress week over week (this helps with boredom and motivation as a bonus). THEN, after 4-6 weeks you can “switch things up” (ideally to work on the weaknesses you identify and progressing to more challenging movements) to keep yourself happy and entertained.
TLDR: Consistently fuel your body with filling meals (that have enough protein), value the big hitters over supplements & don’t switch up your workouts more than ever 4 weeks.