While working out regularly can help to reduce your stress, improve your health and help you to lose weight, this is usually one of the hardest things for people to keep up with. No matter how well-intentioned you are, when stress or travel or a busy schedule strikes, working out is the first thing we toss aside. And while we’re busy kicking ourselves for not going to the gym enough, we let our eating choices degrade to options that we know are less than healthy.

It doesn’t have to be this way. It is possible to eat healthy even when going through a less-than-ideal day or week. I firmly believe (and have experience) that eating soundly is the most important part of becoming healthier.

Is eating healthier consistently something that you have been struggling with? If so, let’s start with an easy first step.

Start a food journal.

Grab a notepad and for the next week jot down everything you eat and drink as well what time you eat/drink it at. Grab a handful of crackers? Write it down. Having a beer at the end of the workday? Write it down. Write everything down for the next week. Don’t cheat yourself by not including that piece of chocolate you had after dinner.

If you want to go one step further, take a picture of the food before you consume it. You may decide that after seeing a picture of your choice (assuming it isn’t healthy) you might change it to something healthier. And if you decide to not change what you’re going to consume, you can easily send that photo to Evernote or any one of a dozen food/diet/health apps which will help you to keep a digital food journal.

The only way that you can improve your eating habits is by being aware of what you are consuming and when.

If you want to gain even more personal insight, write down your mood with each entry. Even a simple smiley face or one word emotion such as “stressed” will help.

After keeping your journal for the next week, overlay your food journal with your calendar. What do you notice? Maybe on stressful days you snack more than you would prefer. Maybe on Tuesdays you have a few extra cups of coffee due to a long staff meeting. Or it could you notice that during the day you don’t eat much thus leading you to snack more in the late afternoon to help bring your energy back up.

By understanding these habits you’ll be able to make changes thus helping you to achieve your healthy eating goals.

Question: Have you kept a food journal before? If so, did you find that it helped you make healthier choices?

Photo Credit: angelamaphone

The post Become Healthier By Keeping a Food Journal appeared first on Justin Levy.

I have logged more miles in airplanes than I care to count and spend many nights per year in hotel rooms. Over this time I have had to figure out the tools that I need to be productive while traveling. Some of these are obvious and fairly standard such as a laptop, smartphone or notebook. However others have found their way into my gear bag after needing an item that I realized I wasn’t carrying with me such as a small first-aid kit.

As I’m gearing up for a week on the road, I thought I’d share what’s currently in my gear bag. My hope is that you’ll gain a few new ideas that will help you the next time that you travel.

If you can’t see the video above, you can view it on my YouTube channel. Also, yes, I realized that I said that I “never leave home with” instead of “never leave home without” a couple of times. You know what I meant.

Since I am always tweaking my gear bag, I’ll be interested to learn what tools you carry to stay productive on the road.

Question: What items are you currently carrying in your gear bag?

Photo Credit: C.C. Chapman

The post What’s In My Gear Bag: 2013 Edition appeared first on Justin Levy.

After a few months of brainstorming, planning and prepping, Jason Keath, Michael Brito and I are thrilled to announce the launch of The Socialized Business podcast.

The first episode of the show is already live. During this first episode we discuss why we decided to launch a social business podcast, what social business means to us and discuss the future role of social media managers.

In case you’re not able to listen to the podcast right now or are wondering a bit more information, I wanted to provide a brief overview of the podcast for you.

What is The Socialized Business Podcast?

This is the description that you can find on our website:

The Socialized Business Podcast was created to educate and inform the community on the growing trend of social business and how it’s affecting both large and small organizations. Industry experts, Justin Levy and Michael Brito, lead the charge along with special guest, Jason Keath, by giving practical advice on how companies can create their own social business strategy that will push them well beyond their competition. Topics will include technology reviews and discussions of community, Social CRM, online monitoring and brand advocate platform applications. Other discussions will include advice on how to gain social business “buy in” from executives and employees, governance and process design, industry acquisitions and interviews from well known social business practitioners.

What is the format for the podcast?

The show will be recorded weekly on Friday afternoon and will be published on Tuesdays. Each podcast will be approximately 25-30 minutes long and will follow this format:

• Social Business topic of the week
• An occasional interview with a corporate social media strategist
• Social Business Tool of the Week — what’s on our radars right now
• Stat of the week and what that means for businesses and corporate strategists

How can I get involved?

In addition to the website and podcast, we have launched Facebook and LinkedIn Groups where we will be hanging out during the week.

You may be wondering why we chose a Facebook Group instead of a Page?

We want to build a community of listeners, social business practitioners and corporate social media strategists instead of just a place on Facebook to share out new episodes of the podcast. We can do that through our personal profiles. We want to use your feedback, questions and problems with becoming a social business to help guide the show content week-to-week.

If you’re more the type that likes to hang out on Twitter, you can use the #SocializedBusiness hashtag or ping us directly at @justinlevy, @britopian and/or @jasonkeath.

If you are a social business practitioner, corporate social strategist or provide a technology that helps companies transform into social businesses, you can reach out to us and we may have you on as a show guest.

While we’re still waiting for the podcast to be added to the iTunes store and Stitcher Radio, make sure you subscribe via RSS so you won’t miss any new episodes.

We’re really excited and hope you are too. We launched this podcast to be helpful to you so please let us know what pain points you’re dealing with, what questions you have and what topics you’d like to see us cover.

Question: What does the term “social business” mean to you? Let me know in the comments.

The post Announcing The Socialized Business Podcast appeared first on Justin Levy.

Over the years I have experimented with a number of different email folder strategies in an effort to increase my email productivity. I have created folder structures by team, project and person. I have created sub-folders that sorted email down to a single email in each folder. Every email that came in I would take 10-15 seconds to decide which folder it should go in. Usually it would come down to an internal debate about which was the best-fit folder since the email could be filed into one of several folders.

Does this sound familiar? I know several colleagues who have to scroll on a large monitor with their inbox window maximized to access all of their email folders.

If you need to pause at all to consider how to file an email, then you are negatively impacting your productivity. If you need to scroll to access your email folders, then you have too many.

The following folder structure is one that I have used for several years and through 3 companies. When I have tried changing my folder structure, I always end up coming back to these 5 folders. Every work email can be filed into one of these folders without thought and I never have a problem quickly finding an older email.

• *Review/Follow-Up: This folder starts with an asterisk so that it stays at the top of the folders list. Any email that can’t be processed immediately, needs follow-up or has been delegated is temporarily filed here. I review this folder a couple of times per week to ensure that I’m properly following up on outstanding requests.
• External: All emails that are received from non-employees are filed here.
• Internal: All emails that are received from employees are filed here.
• Misc: This folder is used to file emails that I want to keep on my radar but might not need immediate follow-up. An example of this would be a procurement order receipt, an email about upcoming tax changes or an API key. Usually this information has also been filed in Evernote but to keep the email easily accessible, I keep it filed in this folder.
• Travel: I use TripIt to manage all of my travel but I save all travel confirmations to this folder so that I can easily access them if there is an issue with TripIt, need a receipt for expense reports or any other travel related emails.

That’s it. 5 folders. Simple and easy. It allows me to process my inbox and get back to project work.

Search, filter and rule setting capabilities within email clients have improved drastically thus making the need for dozens of email folders not necessary. It’s an old habit and one that you need to break if you ever want to consistently achieve and maintain inbox zero.

Question: How many email folders and subfolders do you currently use? Let me know in the comments.

Photo Credit: Melissa Venable

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So, how much water should you be drinking per day?

It’s actually a fairly easy calculation: Take your body weight and multiple it by 0.5 to estimate your daily intake needs in ounces. If you divide that total by 8, you’ll get the total number of cups you need to drink per day. As a formula it looks like this:

I know you’re saying to yourself right now “I can’t possibly drink that much water every day. I hate the taste of water.” I understand. It’s hard. If I can do it, you can too.

To help you consume more water, here are a few tips that have helped me over the years:

• Add lemon, lime or cucumber slices. This will add flavor to water and make it tastier to consume. If you’re looking for additional reasons why you should consider using lemons, here are 10 more reasons. While I prefer lemons, I will switch it up from lemons once in a while to introduce a new flavor which almost always leads to me consuming more water.
• With or without ice. Going from ice cubes to crushed ice to no ice can help you to consume more water. It introduces different textures and therefore can helps you to not feel as though you’re drinking the same thing over and over. Sounds silly but it works.
• Use a reward system. Reward yourself for hitting milestones on your way to consume your daily water intake. It could be that you won’t allow yourself to visit your favorite website until you consume 2 glasses of water to start the day. Or maybe once you reach 50% of your daily water intake you’ll take a break from work to play with your dog for a few minutes. Whatever it is, put a reward system into place.
• Always have a glass of water near you. Your water consumption will significantly increase per day simply by having water around you at all times. Wherever I am I typically have water within arm’s reach. There is always a glass on my desk and a Nalgene bottle in my car. If you see me at an event, I usually will have water with me.
• Try using a straw. Do you typically suck down drinks when you’re at a restaurant or ordering fast food? Start using straws at home or buy a reusable water bottle with a nozzle.
• Different size glasses or water bottles. Similar to trying water with or without ice, try using different size glasses. If you’re going to use this tip, make sure you know how many ounces the glass is so that you can properly track your daily intake. If you’re unsure how much liquid the glass can hold, a simple way to find out is to fill the glass with water then pour the water into a measuring cup. I prefer larger glasses that hold between 14-16 oz because I’ve found that I consume more water that way.
• Use water as a replacement for other drinks. If you’re headed to the fridge to grab a soda or fruit juice, turn toward the sink and fill up with water. You are most likely simply thirsty and not actually craving the soda or juice you were headed for. Substitute it with water.

If you eat a lot of fruit and vegetables, you are taking in water from those sources and you are also taking in water from the other fluids that you drink.  While this helps, I personally don’t like to rely on the percentage of water coming from these soures.  I prefer to count that as bonus water points for the day.

I drink more than a gallon of water per day. After years of drinking upwards of 2 liters of soda per day, I now only drink a glass of diet soda every few days or so. Other than my protein shakes, the only other liquid that I consume in addition to water are wine during the week and another type of alcoholic beverage on my cheat day, either beer, a mixed drink or margaritas.

For this coming week try consuming the amount of water the above formula tells you and to help yourself out, try a few of the tips above.

Question: What helps your to consume more water each day? Leave a comment below to let me know.

Photo Credit: pinksherbet

The post 7 Tips for Consuming More Water appeared first on Justin Levy.

When 

This isn’t a marketing book. This isn’t a self-help book, though that is how it’ll get bucketed. This is a guidebook. A field manual to a better life. A guidebook to achieving everything you’ve been jotting down on your life list.

Readers get more than just a book of lessons written by a well-known guy. Readers get a mentor that provides them with advice and a series of tools from his experiences.

To share more of my thoughts on the book, I shot a short video book review. It’s been a couple of years since I last recorded a video book review but I set a goal for myself to record more video this coming year and this book felt like the perfect opportunity to jump back into it.

If you can’t view this video, you can head over to my YouTube channel.

I’ve already read the book twice and keep it on the corner of my desk along with a few other books that I reference often to stay focused on my goals. I know that you will find as much value out of this book as I have. If you need even further convincing, here is an overview of Amazing Things Will Happen that C.C. created.

Question: Have you already read Amazing Things Will Happen? I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

The post Amazing Things Will Happen – Video Book Review appeared first on Justin Levy.

Though I believed in myself, I never thought I would have the amazing opportunities and experiences that now, years later, I’ve had. I’ve traveled to the Philippines, sailed the Caribbean islands, published a book, enjoyed dinner on a beach while the sun set, sipped champagne overlooking a vineyard in Napa and many more memories. But, as someone that craves new experiences, there is so much more that I want to do.

Over the past few months I started creating a list of experiences and places that I want to travel to before I die. I couldn’t stand the term “bucket list” or “things to do before I die” but had never found a phrase that fit what this list meant to me until hearing it called a “life list”, thanks to C.C. Chapman.  Using that list as inspiration (and stealing a few from his list that I had forgotten about), I published my own life list.

As I was creating the list I began to question the “why” behind it and the “how” to accomplish the experiences I began to add.

Similar to the three words exercise, the value of creating a life list is to serve as guiding pillars for your travels through life. If you fully intend on accomplishing your life list, the decisions you make will put you on a path to having these experiences. For example, if you have a love for travel and new travel experiences dominate your life list, you should seek out a job that will allow you to travel either on behalf of the company or because they support workshifting.

But, just creating the list isn’t enough. You now need to work backwards from the experiences you have listed to understand what actions you need to take to achieve your goal. Some of these experiences you likely will not know how you’ll achieve them so don’t stress about those ones yet. I have no idea how I’ll build my own community center but it is something I’ve always dreamed of because when I was growing up, I didn’t have a community center.

There are other experiences though that you can work towards checking off in the nearer future. I’ve always wanted to watch the sun rise from a hot air balloon. There are a few companies that offer hot air balloon rides in Napa Valley so this coming year I will be making it a goal to have this experience. If there is anywhere that would be great to take a hot air balloon ride, it certainly is over Napa Valley!

Once you’ve created your life list, review it and see what themes jump out at you. You may be surprised. I’ve always had a love for travel but I didn’t realize how much until I saw the long list of places I want to visit.

If you’re interested in what I’ve added to my life list, you can find the entire list here. I plan on keeping that page updated with new experiences and to update current ones, hence why I didn’t just add the list to this post.

Question: Have you created a life list yet? If so, how are you working towards ensuring that you have these experiences? 

The post Creating a Life List appeared first on Justin Levy.

Using supplements and vitamins as part of your fitness program provides many benefits including:

• Help to provide energy during your workouts
• Helping muscles to heal post-workout and while sleeping
• Speed up fat-burning
• Boost your immune system
• Assist with joint support especially if you have problems with bad joints, arthritis or other similar conditions

Current Supplement Stack & Timing of Supplements

My current supplement stack focuses on providing energy pre- and during workouts, quick recovery post-workout and promote fat-loss. For each of the below supplements, I have provided a link that will provide you with more information, mostly thanks to great database on Bodybuilding.com.

• Nitric Oxide (N.O.) Booster
• Creatine
• Branched-Chain Amino Acids (BCAAs)
• Thermogenic
• Whey Protein
• Zinc Magnesium Aspartate (ZMA)

In addition to these workout supplements, I also use a variety of vitamins that help maintain a healthy immune system, promote joint support and a variety of other benefits.

• Multi-Vitamin
• Vitamin C
• Glucosamine & Chondroitin with MSM
• Flax Seed Oil
• Omega-3 Fish Body Oils

Unless you have previous experience taking supplements, I do not recommend simply copying my current supplement stack. Each of these supplements and the levels that are consumed have been carefully put together after years of taking supplements. Also, different brands will contain different serving sizes, dosages and timing. If you have never taken supplements or vitamins, do your research and consult with your  doctor ahead of time.

There are thousands of different supplements and vitamins that you can take. These are the ones that work for me. Approximately once every 4-6 months I will completely cycle off of my supplements for a week to allow my body to cleanse itself of any toxins and not to plateau using from supplement use. I also regularly change up the brands that I use to provide a shock to my system.

Wake up/Pre-Workout

• 2 scoops NO-Xplode
• 2 scoops Amino Energy
• 3 pills Nitrix

Post-Workout

• 1 scoop CellMass
• 2 scoops Amino Energy
• 2 pills Lipo-6X

30 minutes Post-Workout

• 2 scoops Syntha-6 protein
• 1 Opti-Men multi-vitamin
• 1 Glucosamine & Chondroitin with MSM
• 1 Flax Seed Oil
• 1 Omega-3
• 1 Vitamin C-1000

30-45 minutes Pre-Lunch

• 1 scoop NO-Xplode
• 3 pills Nitrix
• 1 pill Lipo-6X

Post-Lunch

• 1 Opti-Men multi-vitamin
• 1 Flax Seed Oil

30-45 minutes Pre-Dinner

• 1 scoop CellMass

Post-Dinner

• 1 Opti-Men multi-vitamin
• 1 Glucosamine & Chrondrontin with MSM
• 1 Flax Seed Oil
• 1 Omega-3

1 hour Pre-Bed

• 3 ZMA

Immediately Pre-Bed

• 1 scoop Syntha-6

There you have it. We have covered the three points of the fitness triangle. While we have briefly covered each topic, there are an endless number of websites, magazines, books and other resources that you can continue learning about fitness, healthy eating, supplements, vitamins and everything else related to leading a healthier lifestyle.

Was this fitness series helpful to YOU? What other topics would you like to see covered? Let me know in the comments.

Photo Credit: mikelietz

The post Post-Holiday Fitness Series: Supplements & Vitamins appeared first on Justin Levy.

Recording Your Current Food Intake

To understand where you’re able to make changes, you need to record your current food intake. The reality of what we eat and when is usually different than what we tell ourselves. For the next 3-5 days record everything you eat or drink and what time you’ve consumed it at. This includes your morning coffee, your mid-day square of milk chocolate, the after-work glass of wine and anything else you consume.

By just completing this food diary exercise, you will likely immediately identify basic areas where you can begin making changes. Before changing to a completely different meal, start by immediately making smarter choices.

Here are a few simple changes you can begin making today:

• Order mustard on your sandwich instead of mayonnaise.
• Ask for salad dressing on the side.
• Switch from milk chocolate to dark chocolate – the higher the percentage, the better.
• Use brown rice and sweet potatoes instead of white rice or Idaho potatoes.

These small changes will have a significant impact of your daily caloric, fat, carbohydrate and sugar intake.

Choosing A Meal Plan

Now that you’re ready to take the next step from making simple changes in your diet, it’s time to determine what type of meal plan you will follow. There are an endless number of different meal plans that you can choose to follow, depending on what your overall goals are. If your goal is to lose fat while increasing lean muscle, the easiest meal plan to understand and follow is the slow-carb diet that Tim Ferriss provides in his book The 4-Hour Body. I highly recommend that you buy this book to understand much more beyond just structuring your meal plan.

To get started quickly, Tim recommends 5 basic rules to the slow-carb diet:

Rule #1: Avoid “white” starchy carbohydrates (or those that can be white). This means all bread, pasta, rice, potatoes, and grains. If you have to ask, don’t eat it.

Rule #2: Eat the same few meals over and over again, especially for breakfast and lunch. You already do this; you’re just picking new default meals.

Rule #3: Don’t drink calories. Exception: 1-2 glasses of dry red wine per night is allowed.

Rule #4: Don’t eat fruit. (Fructose –> glycerol phosphate –> more bodyfat, more or less.) Avocado and tomatoes are excepted.

Rule #5: Take one day off per week and go nuts. I choose and recommend Saturday.

Sample Meal Plan

Over time I have shifted my meal plan from being a strict low carbohydrate diet to now including complex carbohydrates, such as oatmeal, sweet potatoes or brown rice, with a portion with 2-3 of my meals per day.

For those that have read The 4 Hour Body, you will notice that this is a departure. Remember: each of our goals are different. I have monitored my body’s response to making changes in my diet and this current meal plan provides me the energy that I need while increasing lean muscle and reducing body fat percentage.

• 7:30a - 2 scoops Syntha6 protein (highly recommended: chocolate peanut butter)
• 10:30a - 4 eggs (3 egg whites, 1 whole egg), spinach, 2 slices turkey, grape tomatoes, olive oil and 1 packet of oatmeal
• 1:30p - Chicken breast, sweet potato, roasted brussel sprouts
• 4:30p - Handful of raw almonds / protein bar
• 7:30p - Quick chili w/ground turkey, black beans, spinach and garlic
• 10:30p - 1 scoop Syntha6 protein

I follow this strict meal plan including adhering to strict timing 6 days a week, while leaving a single day for a cheat day to consume anything I want.

Others choose to only have a single cheat meal per week and I have done the same in the past. However, currently I find that having between 2 cheat meals to a full cheat meal per week allows me to stay strict on my meal plan while enjoying some downtime each week whether it is a favorite home-cooked meal, going to dinner and a movie or meeting friends for drinks after work.

The Timing of Protein Consumption

My goal every day is to consume approximately 195-200 grams of protein each day, which translates to 1g of protein per pound that I weigh. This is broken down over 6 smaller meals per day including a protein shake within 60 minutes post-workout and a slow-released protein shake immediately before bed. The reason for taking protein before bed is so that the body does not begin to fast over an average night’s rest of 6-8 hours. Since the majority of muscle repair occurs while you sleep, slow-release protein helps my muscles to heal faster thus allowing me maintain a grueling workout plan.

Again, it’s important for you to remember that your goals may be different so ensure that you do additional research and consult with your physician especially if you’re taking any medications or have pre-existing medical conditions.

Up Next

In the next article we’ll discuss the ever-interesting world of fitness supplements and vitamins. If there are any questions you have or other topics you would like to see covered in this series, please let me know in the comments below. Also, don’t forget to subscribe to my free weekly newsletter where I cover tips, tricks and hacks that will help keep you motivated.

Photo Credit: micagoto

The post Post-Holiday Fitness Series: Meal Plan appeared first on Justin Levy.

Announcing the Post-Holiday Fitness Series

As I was working on tweaking my post-holiday routine, several people expressed interest in me publishing it. That has formed into the “Post Holiday Fitness Series” which will be a series of posts breaking down different elements of leading a healthier lifestyle. During this series we will cover my workout plan, a sample meal plan, what supplements & vitamins I use and how I design my workout playlist.

My hope is that you’ll be able to take these concepts and apply them to your life. If you’re already actively working out, maybe there will be a tweak to your fitness plan that you make. If you’ve wanted to eat a stricter diet or are curious about supplements, hopefully there are elements of my plan that will prove helpful to you. If you need a few basic tips to get motivated again, here are 9 tips for getting back in shape and 7 simple fitness tips that can help you.

About The Post-Holiday Fitness Series

The reason why I’m choosing to focus on my plan instead of designing a generalized plan is that each of us are at a different point with our fitness. Some will be just starting while others will be more advanced. These are the exercises, foods, supplements, vitamins and music that work best for me to achieve my current goals. I have been working out my entire life, growing up going to gyms with my dad and have been working out consistently 4-6 days per week for the past 2 years.

This phase of my fitness plan is focused on increasing cardio while still building muscle with a goal of reducing body fat.

A few notes about the below program:

• Most lifting programs are structured with chest/triceps and back/bicep splits but I find that by using a chest/biceps and back/triceps split, I am able to better target all muscle groups instead of the chest and back taking the primary role and the triceps and biceps taking a secondary role. If you’re going to use the below plan, test with both splits to see what works best for you.
• There is cardio every day. As body fat percentage gets lower, it becomes harder to reduce it even more therefore I have ratcheted up cardio from 3 days per week to 6 days per week. Over the years I have tested with 2 workouts per day and find those effective – lifting in the morning and doing cardio in the evening however with upcoming travel and a demanding work schedule, I structured the cardio into my morning routine. If I can sneak in an extra session a couple days per week at night, that will be a bonus. This also doesn’t take into account the 3-4 times per day that I take Sasha for a walk.
• Due to an existing knee issue, my legs workout is far reduced from what most people prefer to do. I’m not able to do exercises such as squats, leg extensions or other movements that put extreme stress on my knee. In fact for several years I didn’t do leg exercises at all because of the pain it would cause me. You may choose to break out legs into a single day and add several more exercises to your plan.
• For every movement there is a link to a how to video, most of them thanks to the amazing Muscle & Strength video database. If any or all of these movements are new to you, please take the time to learn how to perform these exercises correctly. Learning how to perform the movements correctly will prevent injury and help you to achieve your goals.

My Current Workout Plan

Total Duration: 45 minutes – 1 hour each day
Rest Time: 30-45 seconds in between sets / 2-3 minutes in between exercises

Monday – Chest & Biceps

• Flat Barbell Bench Press – Wide Grip: 3 sets: 10,8,6
• Incline Barbell Press: 3 sets: 12,10,8
• Decline Dumbbell Bech Press: 3 sets: 12,10,8
• Dumbbell Flys: 3 sets: 10,10,8
• Standing Barbell Curl – Wide Grip: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Alternating Incline Dumbbell Curl: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Seated Preacher Curl: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Box Jumps (24″ box): 5 sets – 30 secs on x 30 secs off

Tuesday – Cardio & Abs

• Cable Crunch: 3 x 25
• Hanging Knee Raise: 3 x 15
• Medicine Ball Decline Sit Ups: 3 x 15
• Decline Bench Leg Raise: 3 x 15
• Planks: failure
• Side Planks: failure
• Elliptical: 25 mins (intervals)

Wednesday – Back, Triceps & Forearms

• Barbell Deadlifts: 3 sets: 10,8,6
• Wide Grip Pull-Ups: 3 sets to failure
• Bent Over Barbell Row: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• One Arm Machine Row: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Lat Pull Down: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• High Pulley Overhead Tricep Extension: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Lying Triceps Extension: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• One Arm Cable Tricep Extension: 3 sets of 12 to 15
• Seated Barbell Wrist Curl: 3 sets: 12,12,12
• Burpees: 5 sets – 30 secs on x 30 secs off

Thursday – Cardio & Abs

• Exercise Ball Leg Tuck: 3 x 25
• Laying Leg Raises: 3 x 25
• Exercise Ball Crunches: 3 x 25
• Exercise Ball Plank: failure
• Dumbbell Side Bends: 3 x 15
• Elliptical: 25 mins (intervals)

Friday – Shoulders, Traps & Legs

• Standing Military Press: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Seated Dumbbell Press: 3 sets: 10,10,10
• Lateral Dumbbell Raise: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Barbell Front Raise: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Dumbbell Shrugs: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Barbell Upright Row: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• 45 Degree Leg Press: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Dumbbell Lunges: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Kettlebell Swings: 3 sets: 12,12,12
• Hack Calf Raises: 3 sets: 12,10,10
• Jump Rope: 10 sets – 1 min on x 30 sec off

Saturdays – Cardio & Abs

• Abdominal Air Bike: 30 reps
• Medicine Ball Jack Knife: 30 reps
• Weighted Exercise Ball Sit Ups: 30 reps
• Decline Bench Leg Raise: 15 reps
• Decline Abdominal Reach: 15 reps
• Planks with Feet On Bench: To failure
• Side Planks: To failure
• Elliptical: 25 minutes (intervals)

Sundays – Rest / Stretching

Sundays are a day of rest for me. I use this time stretch my muscles and recover before starting another week. If I can, I will try spending 15-20 minutes in a hot tub to relax my muscles.

If you would like a spreadsheet template of this workout plan, subscribe to my free weekly newsletter where I will publish a template that you can use, thanks to Clay Hebert.

What’s Next in the Post-Holiday Fitness Series

In the next article we’ll discuss structuring a meal plan to achieve the proper amount of protein intake and fuel your body on consistently throughout the day. If there are any questions you have or other topics you would like to see covered in this series, please let me know in the comments below.

Photo Credit: elcamino73

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