Hey Everyone, I hope things are treating you well.

This past month has been crazy for me and I was wondering if I could get some advice on getting back into the swing of things.

Long story short, stress with school has propelled me into the land of terrible food choices and skipping gym trips.

In order to bring down my stress as I pack my things to move back home (I am becoming a commuter for my final year of undergrad), I want to have a winter workout plan. I am looking for ease of access (I prefer no weights), enjoyment quality, and overall success given sticking to the plans.

I love dancing, and martial arts inspired work outs. I am also looking for both strengthening and toning effects. Also any tips/motivations that help you all out would be greatly appreciated. I want to avoid those awful winter Blahs!

I'm a student too, and I know how hard it can be to stay on plan when you're so busy and stressed! I would suggest in terms of motivation to try and go back to one healthy habit at a time. Maybe by eliminating a certain junk food you've gotten into the habit of eating. I think when people get off track they make the mistake of panicking and trying too hard to do everything perfect all at once. Allow yourself to ease back into it

As far as plans, have you looked at blogilates.com? She has some great workouts, challenges, diet plans and its all free! For me, I find exercising outside to be the most rewarding and motivating though(also free) so I go hiking and running on trails near my house or on the weekends will go to some farther away trails.


Good luck! I'm sure by taking it one step at a time and being patient you will be back on plan again in no time!

I used to be fairly hard on myself. You should be using weights! You should be eating 1200 calories! You shouldn't have unhealthy treats! You're tight on money, you should tough up and job outside! On and on it went!

But what I've decided to do for winter is this - buy a gym membership because $20 a month is cheap if it means staying healthy. If I want to go and jog every day, I'll jog every day. Weights are cool but my goal is to survive the winter when I know my mood will be blah.

If it weren't a bit much, I'd have gotten a rock climbing membership. It's fun and exercises your entire body. Oh, and Tae Bo! I have a Tae Bo DVD and holy crap...it's hard. It's about an hour long and totally exhausting but you might find something like that fun.

As for food, my boyfriend points out when I'm eating unhealthy but I explained to him that I can have unhealthy food within reason. If I don't eat any candy, if I never have any fries, never eat a slice of pizza, etc. I'm going to go nuts.

I'm basically in mental survival mode. Maybe if you take a "stay the course" attitude it'll be easier. I find that I get more ambitious once it begins warming back up.

Thanks guys. I am pretty sure I am in the "I gotta just get through these next couple of weeks" mode. Right now I am home for break, and finally eating regular food so I am feeling better about life in general.

Once I get settled (and it stops raining) I plan on walking my dogs some, so I am looking forward to that quite a bit.

So glad to hear you're feeling better