Fit Villains: Selfish, Shameless, Sassy, Fitness.

Hello Bad Ass Beautiful,

Hope your week’s off to a kick ass start! Will be posting some Q & A later today, going through your questions is fun but time consuming! I don’t always answer them in order, so if you haven’t already, send in your ‘I wanna knows’ (be sure to leave your email address if Anon, so I can send you a link with the reply).

Inspired by your questions, I felt there were a few things that we should re-visit. These are all topics I’ve written about, but from the questions I’m getting, some really important things haven’t sunk in for many of you.

Your shape is your shape, for better or worse better.

Here are a few things you should know by now…

1. Curvy girls who don’t want to workout for fear they’ll lose their curves, stop worrying! It’s not true! Curvy is curvy, big or small. Some women experience a loss in boob-age, but not all do. I was kinda sad about losing my boobies… til I realized they were still there. And now they had a new butt & tummy to play with, and they were rather nice and perky. See Why Losing Weight Won’t Change Your Shape (and other FAT facts)
2. Girls who are constantly looking for exercises to induce a ‘thigh gap’ should stop. I’d never heard about ‘thigh gap’ desire until I joined Tumblr. It’s the most ridiculous trend. I cringe when I hear it mentioned. I understand it though, and to be honest, with all the manipulated photos going round the interwebs, I can see why some of you think it’s normal to have them. Thigh gaps are genetically impossible for most of us, and not a symbol of fitness, good health or even thinness. Some of the thinnest people in the world will always have thighs that touch. And people who are overweight can have thigh gaps. Why? Because it depends on how far apart your hip bones are set, and whether or not you’re genetically programmed to accumulate fat there. Some people have more in their bellies, legs, butt.. some have it in their thighs. It’s normal & common be thin and have thighs that touch. (P.S - in case no one told you, 99% of those ‘thigh’ gap images have been altered to show the gap. It’s not something to aspire to). Let your thighs makeout, it’s okay.
3. Ladies looking to spot reduce are in for disappointment. ‘I like my butt, but I hate my stomach. How can I target my stomach without losing too much of my butt?’. You can’t. You can’t spot reduce. You can add muscle in your tummy with ab & core exercises, but it won’t do much if you still have a layer of fat over the top. Fat gets lost at the same rate everywhere on your body, and your genes & hormones will dictate which spots have more fat to lose than others.
4. The fear of bulking from lifting weights is bull. Not going to happen. 30lbs heavier I was a muscle-y girl. That’s in my genes. 30lbs lighter, I’m still a muscle-y girl, but not big. I squat 150lbs regularly (25-30lbs more than my body weight), and exercise keeps me toned, but it doesn’t make me bigger. At the beginning of a strength program, some women mistake muscle swelling with growth. Not true. Sometimes it swells & pushes the fat up & out, but a healthier diet will help. Fat loss is key to unveiling those muscles, but believe me you’d need to be working INSANO hard, taking supplements & training 5-6 hours a day for body-builder results. And it takes YEARS of that to build a body like theirs. Won’t happen with a 10, 15, 20, or even 50lbs of weight. I promise, I’ve seen it myself, I’m not just saying it. Lift heavier for better results everywhere.
5. Ladies who think 20 -30lbs is a reasonable amount to lose in a month. Really? That’s a pound a DAY. Unless it’s poop & water, not gonna happen. You don’t know how this story goes? Let me remind you: you spend a month working crazy hard & starving yourself down. You’re bitchy, unpleasant & constantly feeling deprived. You get down to a size that’s good, and you feel comfortable enough to have a cookie, or something high in carbs & fats. Which tastes goooooood. So you have another, and another. Since you’ve been starving your body, it’s having a field day storing those extra calories cause it doesn’t know when you’re gonna starve it next. You gain all the weight back. Now, you’ve just spend a month and a half starving, feeling like shit, and destroying your body… to end up right back where you started. MAKE YOUR GOALS REALISTIC: 1-2lbs a week if you’re average sized, with 15+lbs to lose. If you do more, great. Less? Okay too! But do it too fast and unhealthily? You’ll end up back where you started. And you KNOW this, cause you’ve probably DONE this a million times. Let it sink in: it doesn’t work. Unless you’re VERY overweight or obese, losing 20lbs in a month is unrealistic. You aren’t a failure for not being able to do it: it’s not realistic to think you can. 
6. You can’t make changes unless you start, and you don’t need a 30 day plan to do it. Today you could: take a 30 minute walk, have a salad instead of fries, do 10 pushups ANYTIME, or sign up for a class. You can do all these things. Not having the motivation is another story, but don’t think you have to have a full plan ready for you before you start. I hear a lot of “I’m gonna do this” or “I can’t wait to try this” or “When I’m thin I’ll start ____ “. Bullshizz. Stop thinking, and make just ONE change each day. If you catch yourself making “promises” to start another time, ask yourself ‘Why not now?’. The answer is usually because you don’t feel ‘ready’ or ‘don’t really want to’. Stop thinking, get moving. Walks are perfectly fine exercise.