OPERATION:
MENTAL TOUGHNESS

Health and Fitness

Let me start off with the meat of the issue up front – your level of physical fitness has a direct impact on your mental ability.  Note that I didn’t say Mental Toughness, poor health will hold you back from being your best.

Imagine having more energy, lasting endurance (in everything!), the ability to handle stress all the while looking and feeling younger.  Feeling this good is the result of being healthy from the inside out. The three basic principle of health are:

• Exercise
• Diet
• Rest

Exercise

No matter what your current commitments or complaints that there is not enough time in the day,everyone needs to follow a basic exercise program.  You should schedule your workouts in your diary, get a training buddy and stick to a pre-planned program. It’s as simple as that.  There is a stack of information out there on how to train, what exercises you should be doing, number of reps etc.

Here is my recommendation on exercise for most people. You should plan to train 3 – 5 times a week. Your week may look like this:

Monday – Cardio: 30 min run, abs
Tuesday – Weights: Full body workout
Wednesday – Off
Thursday – Cardio: 60 min bike ride, abs
Friday – Off
Saturday – Weights or mountain hike with partner, abs
Sunday – Off

Now that’s not too hard is it? Remember all the usual advice such as getting a doctors check up prior to starting any exercise program, warming up and cooling down and work on your flexibility. Push yourself once you get into your routine and change your program every 6 – 8 weeks.

For a suggested weights program, I highly recommend The Optimum Anabolics Program  from the Muscle Nerd.  Here’s a tip, you can sign up to get the first two chapters free!
Click here for the program

“If you’re not growing, you’re dying”

Healthy Diet

You are what you eat.  Ok, so it’s been said a million times, but that’s because it’s true. The quality and quantity of your diet will have a direct impact on the way you feel, look and act. 

As we all know only too well, much has been written by all sorts of people claiming to be experts in nutrition. Be skeptical of the latest fad or diet. You can pick up 20 different books written by experts that will say something completely in conflict with the other.  What you need to remember is to stick with the basic principles that we all really know, but sometime it’s easy (and convenient) to forget. You need to stick to the basic principles that we all really know but sometime it’s easy and convenient to forget. Here are some of my favourite principles:

• The more you exercise, the more you can eat
• Five serves of fresh fruit and vegetables per day
• Whole grain breads, cereals, rice and pasta (avoid the white stuff)
• Lean meats, poultry, fish and eggs
• Snack on nuts, seeds and fruit
• Make an effort to include fiber and antioxidants
• Limit your intake of dairy products
• Avoid packaged, processed and frozen foods
• No soda / soft drinks or deep fried (ie; anything you order from a person wearing a uniform, asking “would you like fries with that?)
• Use monounsaturated or extra virgin olive oils where required
• Learn low fat (high vegetable) cooking techniques
• Check packet ingredients: If you can’t pronounce it… don’t eat it!

And most importantly of all…

Enjoy Everything in Moderation!
The healthiest meal in the world won’t be good for you if you eat it in mass quantities.  Conversely, if you want to indulge in some ice cream, or a couple of beers, don’t beat yourself up about it.  Allow yourself to have it, and enjoy it thoroughly, just don’t overdo it.

Rest

Rest is vital for our bodies to repair itself and to relax the mind. It’s during sleep that your body recovers and grows from the punishing you gave it during your workouts. However, do not use rest as an excuse not to exercise. Work out how much sleep you really need.

In the Army they taught us that you need 8 hours a night. I don’t think I ever got 8 hours sleep when the Army was setting the schedule! They also stated you can work for up to 48 hours without sleep before performance really starts to drop off.  I don’t now if they just told us that so we were mentally prepared but I can tell you can from experience you can perform on a lot less sleep than you think.  Don’t sleep your life away.