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One of my readers asked for a list of 10 steps to good health. I provided it, but now I want to break each of these items down and give you more useful details. So here’s step 3, cutting out the sodas.

We’ve already talked about sodas a number of times on 60 in 3, but now I’d like to share with you my personal experience with them.  At the height of my health crisis, I was consuming about 5 to 7 cans of soda a day.  It sounds high when I think of it in cans, but the reality was different.  At a restaurant, I would get a soda and then couple of free refills.  With the average size of a restaurant soda glass, that meant about 3 or 4 cans right there.  At work I would drink 2 to 3 cans, typically of ice tea, along with my lunch and just as drinks through the day.

Let’s do some quick math there.  A can of Lipton Brisk ice tea has 120 calories in it.  A can of coke has 140 calories in it.  So I was easily consuming around 800 calories a day from sodas.  These calories had no nutritional value and they didn’t contribute at all towards satisfying hunger.  That’s not even counting the times in the evening when I would go to 7-11 and buy one of those gigantic cups full of coke.  Those cups might hold upwards of 1000 calories, all of it from processed sugars.

Saying goodbye to coke

While I recognized that I was consuming way too many calories through sodas, doing something about it proved to be harder.  Simply put, sodas, especially caffeinated ones, are addictive.  Your body gets used to the sugar and caffeine rushes and it craves them.  Once you’re addicted, it’s hard to put them down.  Try it yourself if you think all this talk about addiction doesn’t apply to you.  Try not drinking any caffeine at all for three days and see how you feel.

So I decided to split the problem and deal with it gradually, as I did with other bad habits.  I switched my consumption of soda to 50% diet soda and 50% fruit juices.  I figured this way, instead of getting both sugar and caffeine with every drink, I would only get sugar or caffeine.   The amount of calories I was consuming dropped because half my soda consumption went to diet coke, and the amount of caffeine I consumed dropped because half my soda consumption went to fruit juices.  Then, I slowly started reducing each half by replacing it with plain old water.

Hard lesson learned

In the end, I learned that addiction to caffeine is a fact and that I was not immune to it.  I managed to completely remove the fruit juices and drink water instead, but I was still drinking 3 to 4 cans of diet coke a day.  Still, I considered this a victory since at least my calorie consumption from liquids went to zero.  Eventually, I managed to quit the caffeine habit too, but that’s a post for another day.

It took me slightly over a year to go from 6 to 7 cans of regular soda to 3 to 4 cans of diet coke a day.  These days, almost four years later, I drink 1 to 2 diet, caffeine free cokes a day and I’m trying to get rid of that too.  So yes, the soda habit can be a difficult one to break.  Just try to eliminate it gradually and steadily from your day to day routine.  Find healthier substitutes if you must and then slowly eliminate those as well until you’re left with the best drink of all, water.

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Just came back from Culture Fest, a small festival in downtown Mountain View. If you’re looking for something free and fun, I would highly recommend checking out volunteer opportunities in your area. They can put you in touch with place like Culture Fest that need your help for good causes. In this particular case, the money generated by the festival went towards the Mountain View public library. Bonus benefit, the right volunteer opportunity can be very physically active.

And without further ado, here are some articles I thought you mind find useful:

This week I talked about cutting out junk snacks and replacing them with healthier snacks. So I thought this article from eDiets is very timely. It lists out a number of great snack options under 100 calories.
@eDiets

And another one from eDiets. This one talks about general snacks fact. Another good article to read if you’re a snacker like me but want to maintain healthy eating habits.
@eDiets

From Blogging Away Fat we have this great personal piece about the scale and how it doesn’t always tell the whole truth. I’m a firm believer that weight loss does not necessarily equal health. Health is measured in a number of ways, one of which is related to weight. So focus on health, not weight.
@BloggingAwayFat

And finally, from VitaBeat, we have this report about a law in New York City. The law requires restaurants to report on the nutritional value of their food, just like you see at supermarkets. I’m a firm supporter of laws like this. I believe government cannot legislate behavior, but they can and should make sure we have the information we need to make informed decisions on our own. I’d love to hear your opinions so if you agree or disagree, feel free to leave a message in the comments and let me know how you feel.
@VitaBeat

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One of my readers asked for a list of 10 steps to good health. I provided it, but now I want to break each of these items down and give you more useful details. So here’s step 2, cutting out the junk snacks.

My first month after my realization that I needed to get back in shape went something like this:

1. Walk 30 minutes
2. Get on scale
3. Be disappointed that my weight didn’t change
4. Get frustrated
5. Consider quitting the whole thing

Sound familiar? A lot of people go through it when they first start getting back in shape. We do one little thing and expect it to have an immediate and noticeable affect. I shared this feeling with a friend who was a physical trainer. She gently explained to me that walking is great, but I may also want to look at what I was eating as well. I had no clue what she was talking about. I mean, my diet was healthy. I knew it was healthy because there was no way it could be otherwise. I didn’t go to fast food places that often so how could my diet be bad? This is another problem for beginners, a sense of denial about our bad habits.

The sad truth

She very politely suggested that I keep a food journal for a week and see what I learn from it, which I did. The end of the week was an incredible eye opener for me. My meals were in fact ok. I did eat a bit too much at lunch but I made up for it by eating almost nothing at breakfast and dinner. Not exactly the healthiest pattern but if you added up the calories from meals alone, I was eating around 2500 calories a day. Not too bad although a little high for someone who didn’t exercise at all. The problem was snacks. More specifically, the problem was junk snacks. From candy bars and ice cream to microwaved pizza pockets and convenience store burritos, I was snacking on junk all through the day. When we added up the calorie totals from these snacks, they were an additional 2000 calories a day. All together, I was eating 4500 calories a day, and that’s not even include the sodas I was drinking.

Sounds unrealistic? Well, a single small container of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream can have 800 to 900 calories in it. Add a couple of candy bars, a small 7-11 burrito and a bag of chips and you’re easily at 2000 calories. That’s 2000 calories of crap. It has almost zero nutritional value and it wasn’t coming instead of my meals, it was coming in addition to my meals.

Cutting out the junk

So I knew I had to get rid of this bad habit, but I didn’t quite know how. I loved snacking and I loved the snacks, so how was I going to get rid of them? Well, my plan involved several parts, each of which was implemented gradually and slowly. By the way, this is where I adopted the philosophy of slow and gradual is better than fast and sudden. I figured that cutting out the snacks all at once would never work, I just didn’t have the willpower. If you do, then that’s great for you, but those of us who have struggled for years with overeating know how difficult it is to walk by a fridge and ignore its calling. So yes, slow and steady was the plan.

Basically, I started either cutting out the unhealthy snacks completely, or replacing them with a healthy snack in the form of a piece of fruit. By the way, fruit is not the only options here, there are a variety of healthy snacks you can eat that are under 100 calories, but I chose fruit because I enjoyed it the most. I needed something I really liked in order to not feel the craving for the unhealthy snacks. If you can do the same thing with vegetables, a small handful of nuts or some other small and healthy snack then by all means, enjoy.

You’ll note that I kept one unhealthy snack as a part of my diet. That usually means a candy bar of some kind. Yes, I realize they’re bad for me but I like them too much to give them up completely. So I adjust my diet accordingly and make sure I don’t overindulge. That’s another lesson I learned from all this, it’s ok to have some bad habits, as long as you are aware of them and adjust your behavior accordingly. Don’t ignore your bad habits, that won’t make them go away. Instead, you need to recognize them and find a way to work around them or compensate for them if you can’t eliminate them completely. By recognizing the fact that I enjoy an occasional piece of candy, I can use it as a reward to myself. I’ve taken a bad habit and turned it into something acceptable, if still not good.

Plan Details

• Starting Point - 5 unhealthy snacks a day. About 2000 calories a day.
• 1 to 3 months - 4 unhealthy snacks a day and 1 piece of fruit. About 1700 calories a day.
• 4 to 6 months - 3 unhealthy snacks a day and 1 piece of fruit. About 1300 calories a day.
• 7 to 9 months - 2 unhealthy snacks a day and 2 piece of fruit. About 1000 calories a day.
• 10 to 12 months - 1 unhealthy snack a day and 2 pieces of fruit. About 600 calories a day.

Summary

So a year after I started, I had cut out 1400 calories a day from my daily intake. Not too bad. The best part about this was my realization that slow and gradual changes meant I barely even noticed them. I stopped getting on the scale every morning and expecting to see some kind of magical weightloss has taken place overnight. Instead, I simply settled in for the long haul. I realized that this was something I was committing to for the rest of my life and if so, then I could live with smaller results as long as they kept on coming.

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One of my readers asked for a list of 10 steps to good health. I provided it, but now I want to break each of these items down and give you more useful details. So here’s step 1, walking.

Yep, walking was the first and best thing I did to get back in shape. At the time, I knew very little about fitness or health. So when I first started out, I tried jogging. That proved to be a huge mistake but that’s a topic for a different day. Rather than beat myself up over the jogging, I simply started to walk. I set myself a goal of 30 minutes of walking every single day and I’ve kept that goal for the past 3+ years.

Why Walk?

Walking is the best exercise because it’s so easy. It requires no equipment other than good shoes which you probably already have and it can be done by almost anyone, even those who are overweight. There’s no learning curve with walking as there is with gym workouts. There’s also very little risk of injury which means no unexpected setbacks. Walking can be done at any time or place. Even at work you can take a quick break to walk. Basically, walking is the exercise everyone can and should do.

Benefits

Walking doesn’t burn as many calories as true cardio and it doesn’t build muscles like weight training. So in pure physical terms, walking isn’t as beneficial as cardio or weight training. However, walking does have some benefits. First, it’s a good way to raise your overall energy level. Try this after lunch when you feel like slipping into a food coma. Simply get out and walk for 15 to 20 minutes. You’ll feel less tired and ready to get back to work. Walking also burns some calories and strengthens the leg muscles.

However, the best benefit of walking is simply to get somebody into the mindset of doing something physical. When I started walking I thought of exercise as boring. Being physically active was something I did because I had to do it, not because I wanted to. Walking changed all that. When I walked, I would explore the neighborhood around my house. I would discover new shops and restaurants that I didn’t know existed. I would listen to podcasts on my iPod and learn things I didn’t know before. Best of all, I found out that physical activity can be a fun social activity.

I started inviting friends on my walks. It was usually two or three of us walking for about 30 to 45 minutes. I quickly realized that walking was just as good as hanging out at home. In fact, it was better. Rather than sitting at home watching a movie, drinking sodas and eating chips, we were outside walking. We were talking, learning from and about each other all while being physically active. I think this is the most important lesson I learned from walking and why I would rank it as the number 1 step for getting back in shape, because it taught me that being fit can also be fun.

How To Start?

Walk out the door. Yep, it’s that easy. Just go and walk. Now if you’re the kind who has trouble with mild weather like snowstorms, then find an alternate place to walk. Many malls in snowy areas will open early to accommodate walkers. You can join a gym and walk on a treadmill. You can even pace around your backyard I suppose. Whatever it is, keep three simple guidelines in mind.

1. Always go - Don’t make any excuses for why you can’t go. I don’t care if you’re tired and I don’t care if your feet hurt. You’re tired and your feet hurt because you weigh too much my friend and walking will help that. 30 minutes of walking each day, if you can’t even commit to that then you may as well stop now.
2. Bring a friend - Make it a social activity. You’ll be more committed and less able to make excuses if you’ve invited a friend along.
3. Make it fun - If you can’t bring a friend then bring an iPod. Stop at interesting places like shops you’ve never seen before. Chat with the people you meet along the way. Heck, if you find a good restaurant you never knew existed, stop and grab lunch. Walking isn’t about pure exercise, it’s about getting you off your ass and into the fit mindset.

That’s it, that’s all you need to do. Is your health worth 30 minutes a day? Is being able to watch your kids grow up worth 30 minutes a day? How about being able to play with your grandkids instead of just sitting on a bench and watching them play around you? Is all that worth 30 minutes a day? It better be or else why are you here reading this site?

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I got an email yesterday from a reader of 60 in 3. They were reading the four day workout series of articles but they felt a bit lost. Here’s a quote from their email:

It sounds like a great workout, but I don’t even know where to begin. I’m 100lbs overweight and I don’t even feel like I can get on a treadmill and forget about the weight training. I don’t even know where to start. Is there a list of things I can do to start out with?

Well, I’m not a big fan of lists, they usually don’t provide enough information to be really useful, but I thought I would try something. I’m going to list out the ten biggest steps I did to turn my life around. I’ll start with the first step I took and end with the last. In today’s post, I’ll just list them and give a brief description, but over the next ten days I’ll go over each one in details. I’ll include details on why you should do it and also on how you should make the change. I hope that way I can give you the list but also make it useful.

So here are the biggest steps I think I made in my life to get fit, become healthy and lose weight. Number 1 is the first step I took and number 10 is the last. As I write the more detailed post, I’m linking them back to this list, so click on the specific items to see more information on each.

1. Walk - One walk every day. Doesn’t matter if it’s raining or blistering hot, I’m out there for at least 30 minutes.
2. Cut out the junk snacks - That means those corn dogs you ate before dinner, the chips you ate while watching TV and those pizza pockets you chomped down during the football game. They all have to go.
3. Cut out sodas - No need to drink your calories. If you really need the caffeine boost then switch to diet sodas. Otherwise, stick to water.
4. Weight training - That doesn’t necessarily mean going to the gym, it just means working out with some weights, and yes, this applies to women too.
5. Cardio - Yep, everyone needs to sweat a bit. Whether it’s on the treadmill or out on the dance floor.
6. Active life - Stop watching TV and start doing something active. That could mean walking instead of driving, taking the stairs instead of the elevator or going hiking instead of watching a movie. Choose to be active, not passive.
7. Healthy breakfast - It’s always a good idea to start out your day with a good breakfast. It will keep your energy levels high and your binging urges low.
8. Sleep - Regular sleep is a must. Get between 7 to 9 hours every day. Go to sleep at a regular hour and wake up at the same time every day if you can.
9. Smaller and more frequent meals - Don’t eat all your calories in one meal, split them up into smaller portions that you eat throughout the day. Like a healthy breakfast, this will keep your energy high and your binging low.
10. Cut down on the meat - No, you don’t need to become a vegetarian or a vegan, but you should eat less meat and especially less processed beef and pork.

There they are, the first ten steps to getting fit and losing weight. Tomorrow we start with the first one, walking.

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We’ve covered a standard four day workout over the past few days. We looked at how each day’s worth of exercises is constructed and we looked at cardio options as well. So what’s left? Well, nothing except a few tips and tricks to keep you motivated and interested.

Tracking - Tracking progress is vital if you’re going to keep at this. It doesn’t have to mean a journal or anything complex like that, it can mean a simple spreadsheet where you list the exercises you do each day, the weight you use and the number of reps you plan on performing. If you want to track all this online, there are a number of sites that can help you do so, like FitDay. Personally, I think FitDay is a bit of overkill, but to each his own.

Improvement - When something becomes easy, raise the difficulty. Yes, you should constantly be challenging yourself and your body. Now that doesn’t mean you should push yourself at all times, but it does mean that you should look for gradual and steady improvement. My philosophy is to look at my workout plan each week and improve one thing. Perhaps I will raise the number of reps of pushups I do per set or maybe I’m going to increase the weight on a specific set of exercises. Whatever it is, I just choose one thing and improve it while keeping everything else constant. Next week I choose something different and so on. Slowly but surely, my entire workout gets harder, but the change is so gradual that I never notice it.

Change - When it comes to workouts, change is good. You’ll find yourself hitting plateaus or finding specific exercises that just don’t agree with you. Also, it’s nice to change things once in a while to keep yourself interested. For me, I try to change out one exercise every month and replace it with something else. Of course, you’re going to need to replace it with something that works out the same muscle group, but that’s easy to do. There are various online resources that can help you find exercises for specific areas of the body. I use EXRX and Cooper’s Guns (Cooper’s was brought to my attention by a reader here at 60 in 3 and I can’t recommend it enough, it’s a great site).  You can also ask other people at the gym for advice, you’ll find them very willing to share.

Schedule - I really recommend that you find a schedule and stick to it.  Too many people think that a four day workout means that can keep putting it off.  “I’ll just start my workout on Tuesday…” is the common line I hear.  Except they never start on Tuesday, they keep pushing it off and it never gets done.  Decide which days you will work out on and stick to that schedule.  Yes, if you happen to miss one it’s ok, you have three more days in the week to catch up, but that should be the exception, not the rule.

That’s it, all the tips I have about this specific workout.  If anyone else has anything to share about what keeps them motivated and interested, I’d love to hear about it.

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We talked about a good four day workout last week. We covered the various exercises you should do as well as some tips and tricks for each. Now we’re going to finish it up with cardio. Yes, cardio is important for anyone serious about their health. You can eat healthy and lift all the weights you want, but you’re not done until you add some form of cardio.

I’ve covered some cardio options in the past in this article and I’d recommend you go back and read it. It will give you some overall information about the various cardio possibilities. However, for today’s article, let’s go with a bit of everything. Remember, you don’t have to do this at the same session as your weights workout. In fact, you don’t have to do these on the same day. Your weight sessions could be Monday to Thursday while your cardio is Thursday to Sunday. You could also do cardio before or after your weights. It’s all up to you and what you feel comfortable with.

The Exercises

Day 1 - Running. This means jogging on the street, running on a trail or spending time on the treadmill. 5 minute warm up at a slow pace, 30 minute run at a moderate pace and 10 minute cool down at a slow pace or walk.

Day 2 - Biking. Again, can do this on a stationary bike or you can actually go out there and bike. 5 minute warm up at a slow pace, 30 minute ride at a moderate pace and 10 minutes cool down at a slow pace.

Day 3 - Walk. This is slightly different from standard walking. It’s faster and harder. That means you need to find a tough hiking trail or an elliptical machine. Alternatively, you could find a set of stairs and then go up them for a while. Same setup, 5 minute warm up, 30 minutes of exercise and 10 minutes of cool down.

Day 4 - Run or bike but interval style. Interval style means exercise as hard as you can for a short period of time followed by a few minutes of slower exercise and so on. So for example, I usually run at 6.5 mph. On Day 1, I would simply run for the entire 30 minutes at 6.5 mph. On day 4, when I’m doing intervals, I will run for 1 minute at 7mph and then 4 minutes at 6mph. Do that 6 times and you’ve gone the entire 30 minutes. Intervals can be a bit tough at first, so if you’re just starting out, you may want to be careful here. Take it easy and don’t push too hard.

Summary

That’s four days of cardio right there, plenty for a whole week. Now doing this doesn’t mean you can sit on the couch for the rest of the week. You should still be out there, as active as possible. Go hiking for fun, dancing with a special someone, walk up the stairs at work and take a short hike after lunch. These are all things that should be part of your everyday life and have nothing to do with the amount of exercise you perform every week. Still, a structured exercise plan is a good thing to have, so take this four day workout that we’ve laid out in this series of articles, modify it to suit your needs, and then follow it every week.

We’ll finish up this series tomorrow with some tips on how to customize and modify the workout to better match your specific requirements.

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