I am starting this blog as my personal fitness journal, to chronicle my commitment to a being fit and eating clean.  Being fit and healthy is not something something you do for a number of weeks and then stop, it is a lifestyle.   I am officially making my Fit <3 Commit promise, on this day right now.

Ideally, I am embarking on this lifestyle journey because I am striving for a fit, toned, lean, and healthy physique.  Our bodies are a reflection on the outside of what is on the inside, so I have no doubt that living a clean lifestyle, with hard work and dedication  to training- I will naturally manifest the body I desire.  I am going to set myself goals and challenges as I progress through this journey to extreme fitness.  My first challenge is an 8 week  Eat-Clean Induction program. This challenge is essentially an induction process for me- I will not weight myself until the end of this first challenge. This allows my body time to make positive changes (and hence I need not be traumatised when I step onto the scales for the first time.  This first challenge will finish on New Years Day 2013, which is perfect, because I intend to bring in the new year exactly the way I intend to live it- fit, healthy, and ripped!  I refuse to bring in the new year an unhealthy frump, pledging get lose weight and get fit. These new years resolutions are doomed to failure. If you are serious about change, you don’t wait to ‘new years’- this is simply an excuse to by time… inevitably, a new excuse is sought at this time, and another year of miserable frump proceeds. Excuses are the nails ….. I intend to stop making excuses, and start making results.

It allows for a readjustment period, as it will include 6 days clean eating, and 1 entire ‘cheat’ day, in which I will allow ‘non-clean’ foods, including indulgent cheat meals (e.g. chocolate etc) if I so desire.  At this stage, I am including this day for psychological reasons.  My long term goal is to significantly cut back on the types of unhealthy ‘cheat’ foods I eat, and eventually cut them out completely.  I have a lot to learn about clean-eating; which foods  and ingredients are and are not clean, and which foods and ingredients should be included on a clean diet for optimal nutrition. I will make changes and refine my diet as I educate myself along this lifelong journey.

Essentially, these are the main goals of my 8 week Eat-Clean Induction Challenge.  I will use the calorie balancing method to allow for my cheat day. This ensures that I am still creating a calorie deficit whilst still allowing a high calorie, unhealthy, indulgent day. On 6/ 7 eat-clean days I will aim for 1200-1300 calories,as close to clean as I can, and making improvements day by day; and, on the cheat day I allow for around 2,500 calories. However, his must be balanced out so that I am only eating 10,500 calories a week, which is equivalent to 1500 calories a day.  I will aim to train 6 days a week, a combination of strength and cardio. However, I must burn 3, 500 calories per week, which is equivalent to 500 per day.

From this day forward, I will ask myself this everyday, and be able to answer yes!  Dream body, here I come!