8 baby steps to building a Fitness Lifestyle for 9–5 workers
It’s common to feel like everyone has to do just one thing on a weekday. Wake up, shower, eat breakfast, and head out (or in) to work. Spend 90% of your energy working your job and return home feeling exhausted like you climbed a mountain.
I get it and I lived that life for a long time (2+ years) until I saw it take a tremendous toll on my body. The tire of fat around my mid-section kept growing and eating into my daily enthusiasm as a 25 year-old. Life seemed slow, and I could not relate to healthy fit young people getting excited for summer to spend days at various National Parks hiking and mountaineering.
Waking up to your work and sleeping with your work is the path of least resistance. No matter what level you are at — CEO, Manager, budding software engineer — if your work takes 12 hours ; (a) you are doing something very wrong (b) you don’t feel the need to carve out time for yourself. I am not going to get into corner cases where you are working on a big project or a short stint that requires all your waking hours. I am talking about average 9–5 office-goers like myself.
The fitness lifestyle is a gift that keeps on giving. But you must nurture it first. Plant the seeds, water them consistently, give it your unconditional best effort & then sit back and enjoy the life-long gifts.
I have been living the Fitness Lifestyle for 3.5 years. I started at 165 lbs(75 kgs) with a dimming spirit and no-enthusiasm to make every day a positive one. My outlook was bleak, relationships dwindling and overall I felt like I could not live like this forever. I could feel the negativity bubble up within me whenever I saw someone else succeed, darkness penetrate my inner being as I fought friendly advice toward self-improvement.
Life is 180 degrees different right now. I live free and full of positive emotions. I want to live for many many years. And I am basking under the sunshine of my Fitness Lifestyle.
1# Deconstruct your current weekday
What takes up your time before and after work?
Don’t think aloud or come up with excuses just yet. I know you know where this is heading. Let's find time together.
Map out your time.
Just like this image. Be specific about every minute.
When I attempted this for the first time ever, I found 3 hours every day where I did nothing substantial yet kept busy. I was never sitting around but yet did not have time for a workout or meal prep. Multiply that by 5 days and you get 15 hours of unaccounted waking time.
2# Pour your commitment
Imagine your determination was all in a cup and you had to pour from it every day. Somedays more, somedays less — but every morning the cup had to be filled to its brim.
This is what it takes to sustain physical fitness. You can never let your cup get empty.
How do I keep my cup filled? I learn. About fitness as a science, observe my body limits and the aftermath of pushing them, keeping tabs on my progress while thinking about sustaining it for life. I work. I train 5–6 or 7 times a week depending on how my body feels. I practice, experiment, and let go of preconceived notions that social media spins around fitness.
Spin thoughts around your dream — physique, race, or any fitness goal and dump it into your cup of commitment every night.
3# Work Stress
With your mind engaged at work — juggling between ensuring that your career is on track as well as your current project deadline is met — is exhausting.
We spend 10+ hours of our day thinking about work — solving problems, focusing on being better, carving out an improvement plan, aiming for a hike — because it puts the food on the table and roof on our heads. But the physical toll on the body? Who is thinking about your body?
You have to. The amount of mental stress you feel directly reflects on your physical being. You choose unhealthy, sedentary TV time, mindless activities to relieve your mind from working on anything else — which further impacts your physical health.
Re-direct the impulse of lying on the couch flipping Tv shows into wearing comfy clothes and going for a walk. Do this just once. Break the script.
Even after 3.5 years, I encounter this battle of who’s more tired? Mind or body ? … the mind always wins. Which means the body can help relieve some of the stress.
4# 30 mins
All the time you need in a day to build this lifestyle.
30 mins of physical deliberate movement.
30 mins of doing nothing but focusing on moving your body.
It can be yoga, running, climbing stairs, walking, floor exercises. Anything.
I post follow-along workout videos on my youtube channel as well as update my collection of 200+ workout videos on Instagram (use hashtag #iwillgetleanworkouts for all the videos)
5# The First Week
Do you know how the initial days of vacation are not as fun as the middle? Because the change from the current routine is always hard to adapt.
Your goal is to stay consistent for just one week. This first week. Stick it out.
Prepare for mental & physical discomfort for this first week.
You will find that you have ten other things to take care of after your 9–5 workday in those 30 mins. Don’t give in. Don’t let your excuses win this time.
Keep a small checklist like such :
- day 1
- day 2
- day 3
- day 4
- day 5
- day 6
- day 7
and scratch each day out as you finish your 30 mins of deliberate physical movement.
6# Everything can be cooked healthily
I love junk as much as you but I have also learned that it definitely won't help me keep my fitness lifestyle.
But everything you like to eat can be re-created at home to be healthy. You just have to take that extra step.
Find 3 dinner and lunch recipes you enjoy and learn to cook them restaurant-style with least processed foods (aka ready-made store substitutes). I’d recommend controlling the oils as well because they make everything extra tasty(encouraging you to overeat) and add a ton more calories.
But, what about a meal plan?
7# You don't need a meal plan
You need to choose right foods.
Over my 3.5 year journey (..and counting), I found myself building and re-building meal plans but never really sticking to them.
Food is such an integral part of our existence. Hunger is a cue for filling our bellies with morsels that satisfy the tongue and energize the body. Apart from the obvious — “everyone’s body is different, what works for her won't work for me” .. — your own body differs from its old self as you progress in your journey.
I find myself craving different types of food from month to month. I went from eating grilled chicken breast to only tofu and back to chicken curry and onto different pulses cooked indian style. And in this process I learnt how to cook to satiate my needs.
Make sure your plate has identifiable-
- Veggies: Potatoes, broccoli, bell peppers … et al.
- Protein sources: pulses, meats, seeds
- Carbohydrate sources: brown rice, quinoa, amaranth … grains.
- Healthy fats: nuts and seeds.
The portions on your plate should be in the decreasing order of the above list.
Eat until you are full. Then stop, leave the plate on the kitchen counter or refrigerate leftovers, and get on with your day.
8# An Information flood coming your way
.. but focus on the following in priority
- workout for 30–60 mins a day.
- Choose foods wisely 90% of the time in your meals.
- sleep for 7–8 hours.
I’ve read a lot of articles on generic and specific topics written by someone who has never stepped in the gym to an Olympic Athlete. But the right answer to any question you may have in your mind is — “the one that works for you and that you can sustain long term”.
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Follow my Journey to Abs on my Instagram page @iwillgetlean where I micro-blog my daily grind of cooking, working out, caring for my pup & punching the right keys at Microsoft.
