Trim the fat to get sexy abs!

How many of you out there exercise and can’t seem to get those sexy abs that you’ve always wanted?  Don’t use that as an excuse to stop what you’re doing, lets analyze and find a solution to the problem.  If you to want have sexy abs you have to lose the fat around your waist.  The only way to that is by eating healthy, exercising, doing cardio along with abdominal exercises.

If you are exercising and not getting the result, you obviously have to do something different either with your diet or exercise or maybe both.  What you’re doing may seem like a lot of effort but if you’re not getting the result, then it’s just simply not enough.  You can’t expect a different result if you continue to do the same thing.

First thing you have to look at is your food intake.  To gain great abs, you’ve got to be lean.  What do I mean by lean?  Having no “extra” fat in your body. Try cutting your food portions or eating a lighter meal, even if that means eating one spoonful less at each meal.  You may not think that it would make that big of a difference but every calorie counts.  Your liquid intake also has a big impact.  That means no alcohol, sodas or anything with a lot of calories.  Replace your liquid intake with 8 glasses of water a day and you’ll see the changes.

The second part is exercising.  You’re probably not doing enough exercises to see the result you want.  The best exercises to trim down and get sexy abs involve cardio.  Most likely you’re not doing enough cardio exercises to burn the fat.  Some people think that if they walk or jog 30 minutes a day that it will be enough.  What is enough?  Everyone is different and depending on your body and goals, I recommend doing an hour or more of cardio per day if you’re serious about trimming the fat to get those sexy abs.  Cardio is the fastest way to burn the fat.  Without it, no matter how many ab exercises you do, your abs will always be hidden under a layer of blubber.

According to the Health Check System, your body fat percentage categories for women and men are as follows:

Women           Men

Essential Fat    10-12%           2-4%

Athletes           14-20%           6-13%

Fitness             21-24%           14-17%

Acceptable      25-31%           18-25%

Obese              32%+              25%+

Although there are several formulas, using the U.S Navy body fat formula, my current body fat is 12.35%.  Does that make me unhealthy?  No.  Charts are only guidelines and this is only of them.  Don’t be afraid to trim down your fat!  I’m very healthy and my endurance is extremely high.

Three years ago, I was 88 lbs. and by most standards, I was in great shape!  For my height, I was already considered underweight.  My abs were toned but I wanted a more defining set of abs.  In order to do that, I had to do something different.  I was doing 200 ab exercises daily and decide to increase it to 500 ab exercises.  As healthy as I was, I still had to trim down my fat to reach my goal.

Now I weigh 85 lbs and my abs are still toned but just more defined and that was exactly my goal.  To have my abs, I do 45 minutes of ab training daily, a 4 mile jog every other day and 30 minutes of swimming along with a variety of other exercises.  Of course I continue to eat healthy. 

Keep it simple!  If you are at a plateau and are not getting the result, you may need to change your diet or your exercise routine.  Maybe even both.

Protect Your Skin & Look Younger Naturally

A common question I get asked is, “What is your secret to looking so young?”  The most important factor in keeping a youthful appearance is staying active both physically and mentally.  However, what you put in your body has a huge impact.  I don’t spend my time worrying about the aging process, although I do take precautions by making healthy choices in the foods that I eat. 

People are always amazed and surprised when I tell them my age.  They usually think I’m about 10 years younger than I am and when I go out, I still get carded 95% of the time. I’m 100% natural and I don’t believe in any plastic surgeries or injections like botox to look young.  As a woman, you can freak out a young man by telling him you’re pregnant.  As for me, I just tell him my age.  Genetics are only one factor but the rest is up to you.  I personally limit my alcohol consumption, I don’t smoke and I’m careful about how much sugar I eat.  All of the above directly affects the appearance of your skin.

I wear make-up when I’m out in public because it makes me look more mature as I like to being taken seriously.  Without make-up, sometimes I get mistaken for a teenager or they think my husband is my dad.  Although it’s humorous, it’s still a good problem to have.  Looking youthful truly begins with your skin.  If you don’t take care of your skin, you can age pre-maturely.  Besides exercising and being physically active, it’s important to choose healthy foods that are good for your body. 

One wrinkle-fighting super food that I enjoy eating is the pomegranate fruit.  This is one of several options that I personally use to have beautiful skin.  Pomegranates contain Vitamin C that helps fight wrinkle damage caused by excessive sun exposure.  Research indicates that the pomegranate contains ellagic acids and punicalagin.  Ellagic acid is a polyphenol compound that fights damage from free radicals and punicalagin is a super-nutrient that may increase the body’s capacity to preserve collagen that helps your skin look smooth.  It is recommended that you consume a cup of pomegranate per week.  Although it’s not as easy as pealing an orange and can be messy, I enjoy eating fresh pomegranates.  However, you can pick up the juice at any grocery store, drink it straight or mix it in your smoothies.  Pick up yourself some pomegranates and start looking naturally younger!

CHALLENGE YOURSELF

The one thing that helped me to stay in shape is that I’m constantly challenging myself.  We challenge our minds by going to school and educating ourselves.  To gain a healthy and fit body, you have to do the same, by educating yourself and being aware of your body.  You have to put efforts into working out to see results.

My most recent physical challenge is taking Wing Chun martial art class.  If you’re not familiar with Wing Chun, it’s the foundation of Bruce Lee’s martial art.  I’m aware of my age, size, look and sex and being that it’s a male dominant club I know it would be very challenging.

My challenges:

1) Age - In general, most people consider my age as “older” to learn something new.  I tried to persuade a female friend to take the class with me and she denied and said she’d feel silly being “so old” (she’s my age, 37).

2) Size - I’m 85lbs and 5ft tall, smallest person in the class.

3) Looks - My looks works against me in this environment because the men see the ladies come and go in 1-2 months.  For that reason, the men don’t take women seriously especially the attractive ones.  Therefore, some of the men give the least amount of effort to help and are less than welcoming.  As my teacher said, “The pretty ones don’t last.  They quit when they get a bruise”.  I’ll be damned if I will be stereotyped.

4) Sex - In general, men are physically stronger than women so I will always be sparring with someone stronger than me.

I accept my challenges and have a lot to overcome.  I’m 8 months into my martial art class and some people are starting to warm up to me.  I can only prove myself in time.  But the one thing that I won’t do is to say, “I can’t” and give up.  And I’m surely not afraid to fight with a man nor will I be intimidated. 

My goal is to master a new skill and become as good, better than the men or even the best!  I never limit myself to doing or trying something new.  Most females would rather take a dance or yoga class.  There’s nothing wrong with it and I have taken some and enjoyed it very much but it’s not challenging enough for me.  With my martial art class, I’m sparring with men who are physically a lot stronger and bigger than me in size and it forces me to work even harder and keeps me coming back.

This kind of physical challenge keeps me motivated, fresh and young.  Find your challenge and let it do the same for you!  Age, size, looks or sex has never been an issue for me so I dare you to challenge yourself.

Intellectual Beauty

What is intellectual beauty and do you have it?  You don’t need to be a scientist, doctor or even have a degree to be considered intelligent.  It’s as simple as your ability to hold a conversation without coming off or sounding like a moron.  Nothing turns me off more than an attractive person who is dumb.

There’s a certain charm and charisma that comes with intellectual beauty.  In my profession, I meet a lot of attractive people.  Unfortunately, their beauty begins to fade as soon as they open their mouth.  Lets face it, doors do open and opportunities present themselves much more rapidly to an attractive person.  This is why I set the watermark so high for them as well as for myself.  To rely on just your physical attributes is to short change yourself.

I’ve always been drawn to intelligent people and those who have a passion for learning.  People limit themselves when they think they already know everything.  They close themselves off to learning something new or better.  Life is a constant evolution and you can never know too much.  There’s always something new to learn, experience or improve upon.  You’ll never live long enough to know or do it all.  The greatest minds of all time are constantly open to new development, research and data to expand and improve upon their work and contribution to society.  These people are truly beautiful.

There’s nothing wrong with people who like to pamper themselves like going for a facial, manicure or a makeover.  It’s important to take care of yourself, just don’t skimp on the internal.  Be sure to pamper your mind as well as your body.  Fill it with knowledge and ideas.  Most successful people have biographies; you can spend an hour or an evening with some of the greatest intellectual and fascinating minds of all times. 

Physical beauty can only take you so far, and sadly for some, it just may be enough.  Your exterior beauty is temporary and will fade in time.  Intellectual beauty is eternal and gets better as we age and become wiser.  Keeping up with your workout is great but be sure to take time to exercise your mind!

Breaking Your Limitations

No matter what your fitness goals are, do you put in just enough effort to maintain or do you take it beyond your comfort zone to be extraordinary? If you want to be great, you have to push your mind and body beyond your limitations.

You wouldn’t know it by looking at me that I have asthma and I’m also allergic to my cats. My symptoms of asthma and cat allergies are: wheezing and shortness of breath. How does this affect my workout? I have two choices:

1) Avoid my cardio exercises all together in fear of an asthma attack.

Or

2) Push myself beyond my own limitations.

Having asthma and cat allergies, running would be the most challenging to me. Instead of replacing running with an easier exercise, I choose to master it.

As a society, we have hundreds of reasons not to workout but you only need one good reason to workout and that is to be healthy. I can pity myself for not having perfect lungs by not exercising but I choose not to. In fact, I use that weakness to motivate me to be stronger. Amongst other exercises, I jog 4 miles every other day and over time, I’ve trained my body and lungs to the point where I have so much control and endurance. Cardio is by far my top workout as it builds up my endurance and nothing is better to me than a runner’s high.

At home, I have my 2 cats that I’m allergic to plus my asthma, which makes it even harder for me to breath when I jog. I normally jog a 10 minutes mile, it takes me 40 minutes to complete my 4 miles jog. When I do my home workouts, it takes me longer but I don’t avoid it just because it’s harder and uncomfortable. My lungs work extra hard having the cats around. But no matter how long it takes to complete my 4 miles, I just do it! I’ll stop and walk if I need allowing me to catch my breath but I would never compromise my workout just because I have a less than perfect lungs. I give it my best effort and I improve upon it. I fight to become great.

The way I see it, you can train your mind and body to break your limitations. You have two choices, push yourself and become extraordinary or you can just be average. The choice is yours.

Self Motivation

Here’s an excerpt on motivation from my upcoming fitness book:

GET THE BODY YOU WANT!

Finding motivation is difficult for most people.  I found my self-motivation at a very young age.  I was an immigrant at 7 yrs. old living in the United States, and if being poor isn’t enough, I did not speak any English nor did I understand the western culture.  I remembered when I was in first grade, I was always the last kid to be picked for a team sport because I was the smallest in size and didn’t understand the game or sport.  Like most immigrant families to this country, we were extremely poor.  I remembered going to school dressing like a little tomboy and my clothing and shoes never quite fit me properly.  It was probably a good thing that I didn’t understand what the other kids were saying but no matter what language we speak, teasing is universal.  I could tell that I was being made fun of.  It wasn’t until I was in fourth grade and after taking a few years of ESL (English as a second language) classes, I began to get the hang of things.  I worked really hard to learn the language and practiced the games/sports and was learning to adapt to the western culture.

Fast forward to my high school years, I was still the smallest in size but I was the captain of ever team sport in my Physical Education classes.  I’m proud to say that I have never lost a game and we always won with at least double the opponent’s score with me scoring at least half of the winning points.  I never let my size stop me from participating in any sport or anything else for that matter.  If it wasn’t for the lack of support from my family, I might have pursued a profession in sports.  Sadly, because of the cultural difference, I was brought up that sports were only for boys.  I was not allowed to participate in any extra after school sports.  No matter what obstacles my life had taken me, my passion for fitness never died but was simply on hold.

Nevertheless, not wanting to be the last to be picked for a team sport gave me my motivation.  I knew how it felt to be an outcast.  It’s awful but in some sense I’m glad to have gone through my experiences early on as it made me into the strong person that I am today.  Life is not always easy when you’re dealt a bad hand but you have two choices, you can either be a victim of your surroundings or you can be a survivor.  Our greatest tragedy sometimes can be the motivating force to achieve greatness.

My experience is no different from you wanting to reach your weight or fitness goals.  You can do it if you work hard and put your mind into it. I truly believe that if you want something badly enough, you can achieve it.  Sometimes your pain or humiliation can be the motivating force to change your life and truly that’s what I did.  If you have ever been teased, stared at or laughed at because of your appearance, use it to fuel your motivating force. Your natural and first reaction is anger but try not to react, use that energy and choose to take action instead.  By reacting to anger you’re allowing people to dictate your emotions and your life.  Turn a negative into a positive.  Stop feeling self-pity and do something about it. Don’t let the humiliation keep you from action. Who cares what other people think?  This is your life!  Use it as a fuel that drives you to get up earlier or take time out for yourself to work out.

I have nothing but love and encouragement and want to help you through your journey.  Find what drives you and fuel your motivation, you’ll be amazed what your body is capable of doing if you only put your mind into it.

My Power Abs DVD Is Now Available!

The Power Abs workout is the ultimate ab workout designed for every fitness level. This dvd is based on my proven technique and routine which will trim, tone and sculpt those abs. My no nonsense, no gimmick approach will get you the sexy abs you’ve always wanted. This “No Excuse” program is designed to maximize your ab work out whether you’re on the road, at the gym or in the privacy of your own home.