If you are now engaging in an effort to improve your life and you’re not where to start, I would say the first thing is to improve your fitness.

Create a plan and start exercising. This goes beyond “looking good” and goes into being healthy and creating a fulfilling lifestyle.

So in this article, we’re going to talk about fitness programs and what goes into one.

I hope I can answer all sorts of questions, but before we get into it, make sure you go and subscribe to the podcast.

Every Monday and Thursday we come out with new episodes designed to help you strategically improves your life by getting you to do worthy hard things.

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Fitness Program Necessary

Is a fitness program even necessary?

Yes. 100%.

Without physical exercise, we become weak and unhealthy. Exercise helps every aspect of your being and it reduces the risk of developing diseases such as obesity, diabetes, heart diseases, and others.

Exercise also helps the mind. When you exercise, your brain releases chemicals like dopamine and serotonin which improves your mood.

It also improves your discipline and resiliency. I believe that it also helps give you the momentum to accomplish the other goals in your life.

Overall, exercise is a necessity in order to improve your life, and there are so many benefits to it.

But what is necessary for a successful fitness plan?

That’s the nice thing about exercise. You don’t need to have your exercise plan to be exactly the same as mine. Instead, you need to incorporate the right elements based on your goals and preferences.

WIth that said, there are a few necessities for every fitness plan that everyone needs to implement.

These aren’t so many requirements as they are principles of good fitness. With these necessities, make sure you implement them in whatever way best suits your style of fitness.

No two people are the same, therefore tailor your exercise regimen to fit your needs.

Cardio

A lot of people shy away from this fact, but there may be times in your life where you have to run.

In those instances, you don’t want to worry about your lack of capability.

Cardio helps your body to optimize its ability to push blood to all the regions of your body that need it. It basically makes you a stronger, more efficient machine.

In your workouts, find a way to implement more movement to get your heart pumping, and you breathing hard.

The nice thing about cardio is that it isn’t just running. You can get some good cardio in by doing things like HIT workouts, swimming, row-machines, biking, and anything else you can think of.

To start doing more cardio, you don’t have to make it complicated. Just set aside some time in the week to do some cardio.

If you don’t know what to do. Start running. It’s the simplest form of cardio and you don’t need to plan much. Just go run for a mile.

If that’s easy, then run two. Most people hate cardio because it’s so hard.

That’s exactly why we should be doing more of it. It will enhance every aspect of your life.

Strength

While cardio is very important, you can’t forget about simple strength building.

Usually people will gravitate towards one form of exercise or the other, but both aspects should be incorporated for a good fitness plan.

If the Mayo Clinic is to be believed (and I think it is), then strength training helps improve bone density (prevents major injuries), helps regulate weight (prevents obesity), and enhances the quality of life (gives you more capability).

I believe that strength training has a very symbolic element to it as well.

For people who are trying to train themselves to successfully do worthy hard things, what could provide a better microcosm of facing a hard thing than subjecting yourself to the unnecessary weight of heavy objects simply for the purpose of seeing if you can withstand the downward pressure.

I believe it gives you a sense of accomplishment. I believe it helps you build momentum.

In order to start building up your strength, start doing some pushups, situps, squats, and pullups. If possible, attend a gym or start assembling equipment at home.

The purpose is to build strength and you can do that anywhere.

Mobility & Flexibility

In order to round out your fitness regimen, make sure you incorporate good principles of mobility and flexibility.

To do this, make sure you perform your workouts using proper form and make sure to stretch and warm up your muscles.

Stretching is very beneficial because, among other things, it helps to relieve post-workout pain, it helps to improve posture, and it prevents injuries.

Nobody wants to be that person who pulls a muscle playing pickup basketball and then can’t do anything for the next 3 weeks. instead, be that person who never seems to be injured because you are always in such great shape.

Mobility is important because we don’t just lift weights to look good in the gym. Instead, we perform lifts in order to improve our capability outside the weight room.

To give you perspective, have you ever had to lift a heavy box over your head while standing on a ladder? I have.

My mom has so many boxes full of Christmas decorations that, for some reason, she stores on shelves too high to reach from a normal standing person’s height.

This requires me and my brother to stand on a ladder in order to retrieve and place these heavy boxes.

This is just one example of a situation where you need a full range of motion, and strength throughout the motion. You can’t afford to be limited at any part of the movement.

So focus on mobility and flexibility.

Personal Focus

The first thing you should do when creating a fitness plan is to start.

It doesn’t matter at all if you can’t turn your potential energy (in the form of a well creafted fitness program) into kinetic energy.

So get up and go do something. Focus on consistency, and little by little, as you go along, add new elements to your workouts. Add more cardio, strength training, mobility, and flexibility.

As you do this, you’ll feel a greater capability to face the difficult things in your life, even outside the gym.

As you grow and improve, make sure you document your journey. Share it with us. We’d love to see what you do and the hard things you overcome.

If you want to support the podcast, and get in shape, head on over to 1Mission Nutrition and get some great supplements. You get 10% off any order and (because we are an affiliate of theirs) it goes towards helping support The Hard Thing Podcast!