Chris Green
First, thank you for tuning in. I believe it’s so cool to have a community that want to grow. Not just physically, but in all areas of your life. Today, I want to discuss how you can smash your goal this year. I will be breaking down Mean Green, “Core 4” program. We will dig in deep to see if this is something you can incorporate within your workouts, or maybe even your daily routine as you live life. With it being February, it’s super important we realize it’s only the second month of the year. We make these big plans every year and percentages show us that most people fall off by the second month. Whew! I’m glad we’re not average. So let’s discuss how winners win.
The “Core 4” is a belief within the Mean Green system that we should not just operate within our workouts, but in life. It’s a breakdown between breathing, mobility/ flexibility, control, and movement. Today, I want you to be open minded. I know you may have seen something on Youtube and the girl with the product on Instagram, but I want to share with you a system that can change your life.
Breathing: So I believe we all should be able to agree on one thing, this is the most important component of life! The more you breathe, the more you live. The less you breathe, the less you live. That’s no secret. It’s two things I want to make sure we cover today within breathing. First, as crazy as this may sound, we skip the importance on how to breathe. I know you’re thinking, come on Chris. I know how to breathe. Well, as I have trained, this year going into my 15th year in this industry, I notice one thing. I have to remind people to breathe more than having your chest up on a squat or lock your arms out on a press. Breathe Milton. Inhale Lisa. Exhale Jimmy. Jason, holding your breathe on that plank may make you fart if you keep straining and not relax and breathe. LOL! Seriously, muscles need oxygen. Period! If breathing is so important to us to exist, why do we forget to breathe during workouts? It’s simple. Every routine you have developed within your brain, you have been conditioning over and over to learn how to implement. For example, you didn’t wake one day and know how to do a proper squat. To me, it’s harder to learn a proper squat than it is to breathe. Feet flat. Toes outward so your knees won’t cave in. Chest up, Butt down. Keep your heels on the ground at all times. Eyes up. There’s so many things you have to remember to perform a quality squat. However, the more you do it, the better you become. Can you image putting heavy weight on a barbell for the first time and you go out and try to perform a squat with weight on the bar. I’ll kill the mystery. It will be a disaster. Now, take that same example and think about you going out to workout for the first time. Without someone teaching you how to breathe, working out can be a disaster. When do I exhale? When do I inhale? Why should I hold my breathing going down on a squat? How can I stop my heart rate for going up so fast? Am I suppose to breathe slow when jump roping? As you can see, there’s many factors within breathing. Again, the more you do it, the better you will become. That’s why it’s so important to slow down and understand breathing within working out. It’s a key source for you to get results. I get it, it’s not sexy. I know most of you do not want to go into a class and work on breathing for 1 hour. At the same time, without understand how to breathe, you can cause some extreme challenges.
Okay, my second point will be a lot shorter than the first point, SMH. I truly believe in mental health. Breathing helps big time. I love how workouts can be the practice fields for some battles in your life. When you’re doing the assault bike and you’re on there for 10 more calories. OMG- “We all know that bike be trippin.” The goal lis to keep your heart rate down. Therefore, as you take those huge deep breathes, controlling your exhale slowly. You then notice after moments, your designation of achieving the following calories have been conquered. I truly believe we are creatures of habit. The way you do one thing, is the way you do most. What happens when the unexpected life situation takes place? What happens when you have to make a judgement call that will effect everyone. Or, maybe everyone in the room is looking at you for an immediate response. Your brain can easily take you to a place of what you been condition to do. In this example it would be… Breathe! Sometimes focusing on breathing can be the vary thing that save your job or relationship.
Mane! I love fitness. I truly believe it can not only change your body, which is the “makeup” of why most people start working out. The truth is, there’s several other reasons why most people workout. I’ll discuss that maybe another day, but I truly believe as we discuss breathing, fitness can change your life for the better. It will make you a better person. Most importantly, a healthier person. Welp, I have so more I wanted to say within breathing but it’s super important to remember this is a blog, not a book. I haven’t even started mobility/ flexibility, control or movement.
So, I’ll end this blog here. I hope you enjoyed the content we discussed. If you really enjoyed this blog and would like for me to continue and finish the other 3 components of our “Core 4” at MGT, screen shot this blog on your phone. Post your screen shot on your story on Instagram with the link to this blog. If I see 10+ shares, I’ll finish. Make sure you tag MGT on IG at @meangreentraining and why not, tag me too at @TheReal_MeanGreen. Again, thank you for tuning in. It means the world to me that your trust me and my opinions on how belief at MGT can help you become the best version of YOU! See you soon, Let’s Gooooo!
Alex Alavardo
I’m so excited to kick off the first ever Mean Green Coach’s Corner with you guys! We are going to bring insight to our personal fitness journeys, goals and tips/tricks with working out. We look forward to you getting to know us as coaches a little better every newsletter!
Fitness has always been apart of my life from a young age with little league softball, high school basketball/softball, college inter-murals and now going on 6 years working at Mean Green. I’ve always found fitness as an outlet and a time to see how far I can challenge myself mentally and physically.
As 2022 is upon us the word I want to focus on is Consistency. Even on the days you may not want to show up to the gym – just come! Showing up for yourself and creating those healthy workout habits is what’s going to build fitness into your lifestyle and not just a phase. Set a weekly goal for yourself to workout at least 3-4 times per week by booking your classes in advance and finding yourself a gym buddy to keep you accountable.
As you keep that consistency this month, I challenge you to focus on 1 aspect of your fitness that you want to improve on. For me personally, it will be my flexibility and mobility. These 2 aspects of fitness are key to that deep squat I’m wanting to achieve like my friend Mui in the 6:15pm class! Carving out 15-30 minutes per day to work on my mobility this month will be my focus. What will your focus be?
Milton Green
Wow, it’s March already! Keep pushing and if you haven’t started now is the time to get rolling. One of the biggest challenges during this month is what I like to call “ Festival Season “. From the Rodeo to every weekend being some sort of food based festival, this is the season to buckle down and not let your food choices slow down your fat loss goals. I believe there is no way to out train a bad diet, believe me,I have tried. Embrace delayed gratification and remind yourself you are eating for a purpose, not pleasure.
I have been coaching in some form for over 20 years now and have been tremendously blessed doing so. The Golden Rule “ treat others like you want to be treated “ has been a critical component to helping others achieve their goals. I get it! I know what it feels like to have put on extra weight and feel a little insecure because of it. I understand how life can throw curve balls and you have to adjust. Being a trainer has given me the opportunity to treat others the way I wanted to be treated during some struggles in life.
Mean Green has been a healthy way for me personally to deal with stress and when going through some of those struggles in life, I remember feeling like I had two choices. Commit to doing stuff that would have been unhealthy or start a new fitness journey. I’m so glad I decided to switch from coaching grade school students to being a fitness instructor that focuses more on helping adults achieve their visions of a healthier lifestyle. Being a coach has helped hold myself accountable when it comes to staying in shape and making healthier food options, honestly I do not know where I would be physically and mentally had it not been for MGT.
You can do it! If I can do it I feel anyone can, start your journey and focus on being consistent instead of motivated. Motivation may get you started but doesn’t always last, you can not always control what happens in life day to day, but you can control showing up, so show up.
Bobby Butzke
Well, here we are people, it’s April. Spring is in the air and the weather is nice, for the moment. Just wait it will be summer soon. It’s my birthday month and what better way to celebrate than with sharing my journey and thoughts about fitness? We all want to look good, lose weight, get in better shape, eat right and keep those pounds off, right? That’s why we made those New Year’s resolutions back in January. But April seems to be the turning point for most who started that fitness journey back then. This is the month where most start making excuses why they can’t make it to the gym, or I can have an extra cheat meal this week, so on and so on. This is the month where you stay with it or like many, quit their resolutions or goals. Either way, consistency is the key factor. You either, consistently make excuses or you consistently keep doing the right things to get better.
Consistency! It helps us or it hurts us. You must choose, yes, it’s your choice. Choose to keep your resolutions and goals to continue to grow, continue to eat right, continue to be better than the day before, the week before, the month before, you get the idea. You have to keep moving forward if you want to get better, be better. Yes, you will see some setbacks at times and that’s ok. You must fail at times to understand how to succeed. Look at it this way, you have a choice. Choose to be better, do what it takes. Now, you’re saying to yourself, Bobby that’s easy for you to say… no it’s not. I’ve made some terrible choices, failed, and now I live with those choices.
My journey into fitness started after poor choices. I was doing that I “thought” was right about my eating habits and diet. As it turns out, I wasn’t eating correctly, and it cost me. I have Type II Diabetes. So, after that I went to nutritional classes to learn how to eat the right way. What I can and cannot eat, how much to eat, when to eat, etc. After that is when I decided I needed more. So, I joined a gym, a CrossFit gym to be exact. It was great, it gave me the workouts and exercise I needed to help keep me healthy. Through the gym I developed consistency, I had to go every day. If I missed a day, I felt bad, like I was cheating on my wife. Not that I know what that feels like, LOL. I would never… back on topic. A couple of years later I came to Mean Green Training. Here is where I decided to learn more about fitness, I really took things more seriously. I read and studied about HIIT training and German volume training. I began trying to master the breathing technics required to do these different workouts. Everything was clicking for me. The point is I had to fail to be who am today, a better me.
This month I will be 51 years old. I see others my age and they ask me why I do it? Well, I want to be better than I was, I want to be around to help my children and grandchildren. I want to take care of myself in later years and not have them take care of me. Most make the comment, I can’t do that. I hate that word, “can’t”. We’ve all heard the saying “can’t never could”, well it’s true. If you continue to tell yourself you can’t do something, then you believe it. I was raised and taught I can do anything. You can do the same, if you tell yourself you CAN do it, then you will start to believe it. You can do it, you just must tell that little voice in your head, “F%&#-off, I CAN DO THIS!”. I say this to all my classes when I’m coaching, “you can do it just tell that little voice to F-off. It’s you against you and no one else”. You have to be the one that makes that choice.
So, stay consistent with coming to the gym, eating better and getting better. Make those resolutions and goals you set for yourself come true. You CAN do it. Make April the turning point for the better you. No excuses. Look at it this way, six months from now you will either have six months of excuses or six months of progress. The choice is YOURS!
Clairissa Walker
Hey, Coach Walker here and I am happy to kick off this month’s coaches blog. One of the biggest challenges I see people facing today is food choices, knowing what control means in the ”World of Food”. Knowing that you can’t out train a bad diet is just “facts”. I know from my personal struggles with food. I am human just like you. I feel bad when I cheat on my diet, I feel bad when I over indulge in something but I really just feel bad.
What people don’t tell you is that to become “consistent” you must make mistakes that impact your health to create real change. Personally I had to change my mindset to H%%$!ll Yessss….. When it comes to my personal food choices, because, let me be honest, I was trying to out train a bad diet. I had to make “consistency” my only option when it comes to doing what is needed for my health. I had to sit myself down somewhere and research food options.
Yes, I said research because not every meal plan works for every person.
Research led me down the path of my love of cooking more and more. I am not just talking about my mother’s creole dishes. I am talking about clean eating dishes that helped me not only look great but feel great from day to day. I made a choice between Fuel or Food……….. I Chose Fuel. Fuel comes in many different dishes like Egg Roll Stir Fry, Cauliflower Wings(homemade sauce) Yummy, Chipotle Honey Skewers, Taco Stuffed Zucchini Boats and much much more.
Lastly, let’s make May about preparing a dish that you have never made before. Create something that doesn’t also make you look good but feel good.
What will you cook this month??
Jason Miller
Hey Mean Green Family it’s me Jason here and I’m joining you in the Coaches Corner for the month of July. This year is flying and we are half way through it. With this month it will be more time of traveling and enjoying the days and nights before the holidays approach. But do not stop working out and living the healthy lifestyle you did before to get the results with all the events you have around the summer time.
You may not work out as much as you did at the beginning of the year but keep pushing. Embrace the journey, the balancing act, and the good and bad days. If you don’t embrace and accept that this is part of your overall healthy lifestyle. Get ready because once you look up the holidays will be approaching and with all the holiday parties and work events you will see yourself losing your results that you worked so hard for at the beginning of the year.
Let me give you a little of my background. I have been a trainer 8 years but grew up playing sports and had a very active lifestyle. You see how fast that metabolism is at a young age but slows down as you get older. I am very sociable so before entering fitness i ate what i wanted. Once i learned bout nutrition it was an eye opener. I had to learn how to balance holidays eating a lot with my family and friends and still enjoy food without over indulging. As i learned i could still go out to events and just control the consumption of food and drinks. I could still enjoy myself and have fun. It will be hard at first but once you learn how to balance between healthy lifestyle and social events it will be easy.
Just remember this when enjoying the summer and Holidays: Don’t beat yourself up over a bad day, a bad snack, a bad week. Just don’t let that bad week turn into weeks and then, months. It will be a major setback. Take it day by day and workout to keep those results showing.
Have Fun and Enjoy Life!!
David Martinez
” August is like the Sunday of summer.“ – unknown
I love this quote because I believe we can all relate. As someone who “ lives for the weekend”, when Sunday rolls around, I don’t think of Sunday as a complete relaxation day. For me, Sundays are one of the most crucial days to prepare for the upcoming week. I know the results I feel/see at the end of the week will be because of the preparation I put in on Sunday. Whether it be not sleeping in, meal prepping, active recovery, etc. I know that if I’m not being proactive on Sunday it will affect my workouts, my sleep, my mood, and physicality.
I wish I could say I always had that mindset. It took years of yo-yo diets and “magic pills” to realize my mindset wasn’t on a balanced lifestyle. I wasn’t prepared to put in the work when I needed to and the results showed. When I first started doing Boot Camps the weight just to start burning off and I got so excited because it kind of felt easy. I found a group of people that made working out fun and rewarding. But I never really changed my eating habits, drinking, and random sleep schedule. Eventually I would hit a “wall” and slowly gain the weight back, still went to the gym just not as often, started over eating again, and depression would set it. This went on for years. The never ending cycle. What I was missing was structure. I wanted the best results without all the extra work. It wasn’t until I realized that the real work wasn’t even at the gym. I had to make small changes first and create a routine that I could build on. Eventually those routines just became a way of life. Sundays would become a very important day for me and my goals. I took control of what I could so I was prepared for what was out of my control.
August feels bittersweet. I mean technically it’s still summer but we all know it means the “fun time” is coming to an end. If we can treat August as a Sunday then it’s time to prepare for the new season. This is the month to be proactive and take control of how the rest of your year will affect you. Someone who just lives for the summer body, only to lose focus once it’s over and erase all your hard work and sacrifice that got results. Or someone that knows to prepare and stay on top of their goals. It’s all about having a balanced lifestyle. A healthy lifestyle that encompasses your relationships, work, fitness, and emotional happiness. That’s the great thing about being on a fitness journey, you get to choose who you wanna be. Let’s make August a great month to make time to take care and love yourself.
“Life truly is what you make it. The purpose and meaning of life is the purpose and meaning that you give it.“ – Steven Redhead
Harmony Cyrus
Well helloooo October!!
Fall is definitely here and I’m so happy to kick off this month’s Coaching blog as we are heading into the holiday season. This is my favorite time of year because of course we get a break from that summer heat..oh wait I forget we’re in Texas lol.
Okay let me firstly introduce myself. I’m Coach Harmony aka, H-Money, Hurricane Harmz, or just Coach Harmz. I’m a native of Los Angeles, California. I relocated to Houston to further my education in a degree that’s collecting dust on the shelf as I type this. I have always been athletic and have probably tried every sport there is to play. However, after having my son and becoming a full time mom my fitness and overall health started to decline. It wasn’t until I realized that three flights of stairs dang near required an oxygen mask I knew I needed to get my health back in order before it got way out of hand. This led to the start of my journey with Mean Green Training.
Starting off as a member of Mean Green I realized after a few months that my calling was bigger and I had a bigger role to play in this community. So, for the past 7 years I have been learning and growing as a coach. In the past couple of years I have grown my understanding on people’s relationship with food. One of the philosophies I live by is, “Eat to live and not Live to Eat.”
As the holidays are quickly approaching we must remember all of the hard work we put in this year or last couple of months. The holidays is the time of year where we can easily gain 10 to 15 pounds. This is why we must control/change our relationship with food and not look at food that is considered unhealthy as a reward but as another avenue of our nutritional journey. I always tell clients, “If you want a cookie, have a cookie!” You may be reading this and think I’m crazy but I want you to imagine you as a kid being told not to do something. It only made you want to do it more right? It’s the same with food. If you want something then have it. Now I’m not saying go and eat the whole pack of cookies because it is still about control but what I am saying is.. if you allow yourself to not feel shame about having a cookie your mind begins to stop obsessing over the cookie because it now knows it’s okay to have one. Yes!.. It’s okay to have your favorite candy this Halloween.
I’m still working on my relationship with food. This is definitely a journey however, I’ve realized that the more I take the shame away from certain foods the better I am with choosing foods that help me live and feel good. October is a good month to start practicing and molding our relationship with food so by time we go into the next few months we can have a better understanding on how to navigate your nutrition and holiday eating traditions.
So I leave you with this, Eat to Live but have the damn COOKIE!!
