The Missing Piece to Reaching your Health and Fitness Goals: Maintenance
Have you ever lost weight during a cut/diet and then after it was over you gained all the weight back (maybe even a little extra)? 🙁
You’re not alone. Everyone has probably experienced this a time or two.
Enter the maintenance phase.
Maintenance is what comes after you've hit your health or fitness goals OR when you need a break from chronic dieting. It's about keeping up the good work you've done during your diet or fat loss phase. Here's what that looks like and why it's super important for everyone:
Staying Consistent: Maintenance means sticking to your healthy eating, exercise, and lifestyle routines. This consistency helps you hang onto the progress you've made.
Keeping Up the Good Habits: During maintenance, you're reinforcing all those positive changes you've made earlier on. That means sticking to balanced eating, keeping up with regular workouts, managing stress, and getting enough sleep and water.
Being Your Own Boss: Maintenance is about learning to deal with challenges like cravings and setbacks without slipping back into old habits. And if you need help staying motivated, we've got your back! One of the greatest benefits of 1:1 coaching!
Checking In and Tweaking: It's important to keep an eye on how you're doing and make adjustments as needed. That might mean setting new goals, tracking what you eat and how active you are, and reaching out for support when you need it. Your Habyt coach is here for you!
Shifting Your Mindset: Instead of just focusing on the numbers on the scale, maintenance is about prioritizing your overall health and well-being. That means having a healthy relationship with food, exercise, and your body.
Keeping Your Body in Top Shape: Maintenance helps you keep those important health markers like blood pressure and cholesterol in check. It also helps you hold onto muscle, stay strong and flexible, and keep your heart healthy.
Boosting Your Mood and Confidence: Taking care of yourself isn't just good for your body—it's good for your mind too! Keeping up with healthy habits can make you feel happier, less stressed, and more confident in yourself.
Preventing Long-Term Health Issues: By sticking with maintenance behaviors, you're reducing your risk of serious health problems down the road, like diabetes, heart disease, and even mental health issues.
So what does maintenance look like in real life?
Here’s the breakdown:
You eat the same amount of calories that you expend per day. Your intake = your expenditure. You’ll notice a small increase in your weight, but don’t worry it is NOT fat gain. It’s a little extra food in your stomach from the calorie increase and the water along with it.
You’ll notice you have more energy throughout the day. You won’t be nearly as hungry if at all. You won’t feel as restricted when it comes to eating out at a restaurant. You’ll be able to CRUSH your workouts instead of just getting through them. Life is amazing in maintenance! After you spend a decent amount of time in this phase you can always do another deficit to continue your fat loss goals. Big goals take several nutritional phases. By incorporating a maintenance phase, you won’t have to keep starting over in the same place whenever you decide to diet again.
In summary, the maintenance phase is all about keeping up the good work! It means sticking to those healthy habyts you've been building, keeping an eye on things, and making tweaks when needed. Think of it like cruising along, enjoying the ride after putting in the hard work. It's not just about looking good; it's about feeling great inside and out for the long haul. So, embrace maintenance—it's your ticket to a healthier, happier you, for life!
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