Connelly Ben - 12 Weeks to Lifetime Fitness Habits: Get in Shape. Stay in Shape. Improve Your Health.

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12 Weeks to Lifetime Fitness Habits

I titled this program 12 Weeks to Lifetime Fitness Habits not because you can achieve results in 12 weeks that will last you a lifetime, but because in 12 weeks you can learn the habits and principles to live a healthy life. To truly transform your body and lifestyle, you will need more than 12 weeks. But in 12 weeks you can begin your transformation.

That said, you may see some results in 12 weeks. The main purpose of my program is to get you to practice healthy eating and exercise, but 12 weeks is enough time to shed 10-15lbs of fat, or build some visible muscle.

I have created this program based on coaching I have done and based on ways I have approached fitness in my own life. My goal for you is not to help you achieve incredible shape, but rather to teach you to exercise right and eat right.

Most people learn best by doing. If you follow this program, it will force you to practice proper nutrition and it will help you develop healthy habits around exercise and eating. I want you know understand how it feels, and what it looks like, to eat healthy, exercise regularly, and move throughout the day. Over the course of the 12 weeks, you will begin to develop actual habits that will carry you farther than any intensive 12-week diet or exercise program can.

This program will not transform your physique. Rather, it will teach you the building blocks of exercise and nutrition that will enable you to live a healthy lifestyle and improve your physical health and body composition over time. I do not promise any results. But you may see visible improvement in your physique by the end.

Who Needs This Program:

I developed this program for beginners, people who are new to fitness and nutrition. If you are either completely new to exercise and healthy eating, or if you have had serious trouble following diets or exercise programs in the past, this program is for you. If you typically gain back any weight you lose on a diet, this program is for you.

Finally, this program is for adults, not children. It is intended for people without any serious health conditions. It is not intended for anyone at an advanced age. Consult with a doctor if you are unsure of whether or not you should begin any exercise program.

Outside Research:

Following this program will require a little bit of outside research on your part. I will point you in the direction of some resources, but you may need to do a little searching on your own. I cannot teach you on paper how to move efficiently and with proper form, how to cook all types of nutritious meals, or every detail of exercise and nutrition. You will have to do some outside learning in order to make the best use of this program.

What to Expect:

The program will ramp up in intensity over time. On both the nutrition side, and the exercise side. Your diet will grow increasingly rigorous and you will incorporate more movement throughout each day. You will also experiment with new forms of exercise.

By the end of the program, you should have learned some tools and habits to carry you through a healthy life. While you may use those tools and habits to improve your appearance, you can also use them to increase your healthspan (the portion of your life during which you remain active and healthy).

Fitness is a long-term journey, not a one-and-done fix. My goal in this short program is to make it easier for you to continue that long-term journey on your own. After 12 weeks, you will have practiced elements of a healthy lifestyle and you should be able to continue making progress on your own.

Shame and Virtue:

Before we begin, I need to briefly address the subject of shame and virtue - as it relates to exercise, nutrition, and health.

Exercise, nutrition, and health do not make you a better or more virtuous person. When I say that a certain food is bad or good, or when I use phrases such as you should or you need, I am not trying to shame you in any way. All I am doing is attempting to teach you how to eat and exercise in order to improve your own health. If you are reading this, I assume that improving your health is an important goal of yours. If you want to improve your health, I offer my advice on how you can best do that. Feel free to take that advice or leave it. Improving your health will not necessarily improve your character, but it may help you live a better life. But you are the ultimate judge of that.

All of that is to say: I am not preaching to you. When I use direct language about certain bad habits or misconceptions, I am not making a moral value judgement. Instead, I am trying to be clear and honest so that you can easily understand my meaning. Eating a bad food does not have anything to do with whether or not you are a bad person. It is only bad in the context of your health.

Disclaimer:

By no means am I an expert on health and fitness, but I have learned a thing or two over the years. I hope to impart to you some of the principles that I have learned. This program that I have designed should help you to improve your health if you are a beginner to exercise and nutrition.

But I cannot guarantee any results. Use your own judgement about following any particular dietary or exercise advice. If you have any concerns about your readiness for physical exercise, please consult with a doctor before beginning this program.

Exercise Overview

One key to a healthy life: stop thinking of exercise as a burdensome activity you do at the gym.

This program will teach you to increase your activity outside of the gym and outside of any daily workout you perform. 30-60 minutes a day in the gym 4 days a week, will not determine your health and appearance. What you do with the rest of your time will impact both your health and appearance at least as much perhaps more. You can quite easily sabotage all your efforts in the gym with a poor lifestyle outside of the gym. This program will teach you how you can begin increasing your daily activity to maximize your gym gains. Even with difficult work and childcare responsibilities, you can find ways to move more every day.

The goal of exercise is not just to improve your appearance, but to actually improve your physical health. Physical health does not simply mean staying out of the obese range. In order to avoid chronic pain, injuries, and many biomechanical maladies, you will want to improve your posture, learn proper movement (lifting, carrying, etc.), strengthen your muscles and bones, and incorporate a variety of movements and positions into your daily life. In order to reduce your risk of illness (including COVID-19) and chronic disease, you will want to eat and exercise properly.

I approach this subject from an evolutionary angle. Human beings did not evolve to sit inside a cubicle, staring at a screen for 12 hours a day. The human body evolved to move, exercise, and engage in physical activity. Why would we think that we could place our bodies into unnatural environments and activities without consequence? When you realize that the human body evolved for activity, you will understand that in order to avoid poor health consequences, you will need to avoid long periods of inactivity and sedentary positions (even if you run for an hour every single day).