Here at Empower Personalized Fitness, we help people and communities lead stronger, healthier, and happier lives through personalized fitness plans.
Fitness is a journey and therefore it must evolve. People, and most everything else in life, are always changing; your workouts should too. Let’s explore when, why, and how your fitness plan should change. See what Jess and Ronda have to say HERE.
When
You’re not getting the results you want.
So many people are trying really hard to change something about their bodies or their health, and they might get to a point where they plateau or things are just not really working. One of the first things that you need to ask yourself if that’s the case for you, is that are you working out frequently enough? We like to have our clients strive for five workouts every week.
You’ve been doing the same things over and over.
Our bodies really adjust to things that we do on a regular basis, so it might be time to switch things up because variety is the spice of life. The same is true with your exercise plan.
Why
You’ve had an injury or health condition come up.
If you’re an active person, it’s likely that you will experience some sort of injury or setback from time to time. Even if you’re not, it’s just part of life that we may pull a hamstring or you might be at a point where you need a joint replacement, like a knee replacement or a hip replacement, or maybe you just simply turned your ankle walking. Whatever the case may be, this is a time when you definitely need to think about altering your workout plan.
If you have pain, then that is definitely an indication to stop, but it doesn’t mean that you can’t be active at all. You might be able to find exercises that you can work around that particular body part and still be effective and still be moving. When you have some sort of injury, you need to know what sort of exercises are safe and those that are contraindicated, and that’s something that a personal trainer can definitely help you navigate.
You’re aging.
This is something that many of us are now experiencing personally. Many things change with age, right? Our hormones are changing, we become stiffer and less mobile, and it’s important to really take all of that into consideration when you’re thinking about how you work out.
As you age, do not stop strength training. Oftentimes as we get older, we may tend to lean more towards walking and swimming and biking. All of those activities are fine, especially if you enjoy them, but strength training is essential. Part of the aging process is losing muscle mass and bone density. Strength training is a key component in helping you keep your muscular strength and your bone health.
Start to build mobility exercises into your workout because we become stiffer. Oftentimes life has taken over, we have more stationary jobs, and it’s really important that we spend some time moving our bodies through full ranges of motion. Mobility is more than just simply flexibility. It’s the body’s ability to move through these full ranges of motion fluidly and under control. It actually means the combination of flexibility and strength and control.
How
You aren’t exercising at the right intensity.
Oftentimes we find that it’s hard to challenge ourselves, and so sometimes working out with a workout partner and/or hiring a personal trainer can help really push you a little bit, because the intensity is one of the factors that can really help you push through plateaus and also get things back on track for you.
You need some moderate or restorative practices.
Much of this ties into what’s happening with our hormones and just the stressors of life. Exercise is, in fact, perceived by the body as a stressor. If we have a really high-stress job, and stress at home and stress all around us when we go to exercise intensely all the time, our body gets overloaded. All this causes cortisol, which is a stress hormone, to spike. That can wreak havoc on our bodies, especially if you’re trying to lose weight or just feel good and feel healthy.
Once you understand that your training practices need to evolve, it’s important to have some workouts that aren’t always so high in intensity. Here is an example of a moderate-intensity workout for a changing body into your 40s and beyond.
