Wake up 1 hour earlier - waking up earlier than everyone else to get your workout done, and get it out of your way guarantees a better day. This way you remove any potential interruptions and distractions to your workout. Additionally, you are not eliminating or replacing your workout with something just as important but ensuring it gets done before.
If you are just starting you don’t have to do it on a daily basis, 2-3 times a week is a great start.
Sleep by 11 p.m. - I know this advice is difficult, but it's significance is immense! Going to sleep early will help you with stress, weight loss, energy, and external appearance. Research shows that the connection between heart diseases, weight gain, and stress is almost directly correlated to lack of sleep, or sleeping during the “wrong” hours such as 2-12, etc. In addition, it is highly recommended to turn off devices 2 hours prior to your bedtime, turn off the lights in your room, and have a bedtime routine. This will help your body release melatonin which helps you fall asleep.
One Salad a day - The ideal is to make one fresh salad a day, but it's not always possible. The most important thing is to include some vegetables in every one of your meals. Add as many vegetables as you can of all different colors: cilantro and parsley, avocado, garbanzo beans, or even nuts, chicken and fish. It is important to try and include a variety of options, and to change up your salad to make it as interesting as possible. However, one thing I feel I should mention is that when it comes to salads the dressing is oftentimes the issue. Salad dressing can easily add 400-500 calories to your meal, which most of the time defeats the purpose of eating a salad.
In order to ensure you don’t fall into this trap, you should try using only lemon, salt, and pepper, and stay away from other dressings and oil.
With love & health,
Yael Rodriguez