Complete and Creative

How to Stay in Shape While Traveling (2/3)

…continued from

Six Meals a Day

I don’t really practice this diet, but I come close. There are lots of advertised diets out there. I think many of them are BS, but I can’t confirm. However, I can confirm that this one works.

Photo courtesy of better-body.biz

As the name implies, if you’re on this diet, you eat six meals a day, a small breakfast within an hour of waking up (or else your metabolism slows down or you get hungry more easily or something like that), then a small meal every three hours for the rest of the day.

I rarely miss breakfast and then usually eat lunch between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. and dinner sometime between 7 p.m. and 8 p.m. In between the actual meals, I snack significantly. Not potato chips (yes, not even those baked ones) or candy bars but fruits and vegetables and protein bars.

Six meals a day doesn’t have to be hard to do even while you’re traveling. Well, that depends on where you’re traveling. If you’re in any industrialized country, just drop by a convenience store for some power bars on-the-go, and you’ll be good. If you know you’re going to be in area where food won’t be readily available, think ahead. If you’re heading into a jungle from the city, pack early.

Coffee and Soda and Fast Food

Quit them. (Go ahead, bring on the flames.)

Water

Drink lots. That is all.

Alcohol

Hard liquor is efficient. Wine is sexy. “Beer keg” has multiple meanings.

Tobacco

So this article is about staying healthy, right? I know. It’s cool to be thin. I hear it’s pretty cool to be dead too.

Milk

Milk does build strong bones. Don’t complain to me about being lactose intolerant. It’s all mentality. I proved that to myself.

Meat

I love to eat meat, especially beef and a few others that would do too much to perpetrate a certain Chinese stereotype. I wouldn’t say it’s essential, though. Meatlovers aren’t necessarily fat; vegetarians aren’t necessarily thin. I’ve seen examples of both.

In general, fish is the healthiest kind of meat you can eat. Eggs are meat. I prefer the whites to the yolk.

Bathroom Breaks

Humans only have two ways to detox. One is sweating. Guess what the other is. Go often, especially when you’re on the road, since you never know when you’ll get another chance. I’m not just talking about the kind for which guys can simply use a bush. Well…

Moving

This is not the exercise portion yet. I’m talking about the little everyday things you can do to stay active, like taking the stairs instead of the elevator or escalator, especially if it’s anything three floors or less. It’s okay to park a little farther from the supermarket or restaurant. You might as well start walking off those calories you’re going to put in yourself later anyway.

After lunch or dinner, take a walk. When in the office, get up to stretch every hour or so (some of my co-workers make fun of me for this, but we’ll see who gets the last laugh in about 60 years).

Traveling should naturally take care of this.

Cardio

Cardiovascular exercises (walking, jogging, running, hiking, biking, swimming, anything that gets your heart rate up) are very, very important. I do them first to get the blood pumping before I do any strength training.

Traveling should also naturally take care of this.

When to Exercise?

Morning exercise raises alertness better because it’s the first thing you do after waking up; afternoon/evening exercise builds muscle better because your body has had almost the entire day to warm up.

to be continued…