Hey there! In case you are new here, I wanted to introduce myself and give you some background about my fitness journey. My Name is Stacey. I am from Colorado. I grew up in the Denver metro area and moved to Durango, CO, a few years ago. I live in a neighboring New Mexico town as my boyfriend, and I just bought a house. We are so excited to have our home and to begin our life together. It has been super busy lately with the house hunt and various life things. So it’s been a while since I posted last, and I am finally ready to dedicate my time to writing, posting, and creating content!

Throughout the years, I have fallen in love with fitness. I love pushing my body to its limits. I have had struggles with consistency. I know that to see any results, consistency is critical. That is a non-negotiable fact. I have learned many things over the last decade about myself and how to keep myself engaged in my fitness journey. Motivation will not always be there, but building habits will always be there.

My fitness journey began about a decade ago with my discovery of yoga. After going to my local yoga studio every single day, I discovered circuit training, which inspired me to learn more about strength training. I fell in love with pushing my body and those gym endorphins. After I moved to Durango, I fell in love with hiking and backpacking. After all of that, I wanted to learn more. I got my NASM-CPT in 2020 and then got a job at the rec center teaching fitness classes. I am so excited for the future ahead with my career and my current fitness goals.

Read my previous post about my entire fitness journey over the last decade. For the most part, my focus right now is to be more consistent with my workouts to create a solid foundation to further my fitness goals. I learned so much in the last decade, though I wish I knew then what I know now, I have the knowledge that I have now to achieve those goals.

Now that we have settled into our new home, I am working on determining what routine works best. I was trying to work out after I get home from work, but that was not happening. So now I am waking up early to work out. I used to wake up early to work out for a while and I love starting my day with a workout. So I am working with my own strengths to build those habits.

Strength Training

Even though my fitness journey has been over the course of the last decade, I have yet to achieve any of my goals. Between a lack of consistency, trying to do much too fast, and not having a good plan I have gotten in my own way to achieving my own fitness goals.

Now that I have more knowledge of what I am doing, I feel more confident in creating a good plan that I can remain consistent with.

Strength training is my biggest focus for my workouts, but the focus is to focus on unilateral (single arm) movements to complement the compound movements. My goal is to create a solid foundation of core and posterior (backside of the body) strength.

Eventually, I want to build muscle mass, but right now I need to focus on the supporting muscles before further increasing volume in terms of weight. This way, as I increase my weight, my form will remain strong. I do not want my form to suffer whenever I do increase the weight to begin building muscle.

Mobility

I want to make sure I am doing something to increase my likelihood of remaining mobile as I age. I still want to be able to hike and backpack and do all of the physical activities that I love to do.

Incorporating a mobility routine will help counteract all of the repetitive movements that are present in my everyday life. I sit all day for work, previously I stood all day at my previous job. Both are very repetitive movements on the hips. My core is very weak and underactive, so along with hip opener stretches and core work, I am incorporating some supporter muscle work for my upper body. This will further support my strength training goals to create a strong foundation to build muscle.

Cardiovascular

I have asthma and I love to hike, so I need to work on my cardiovascular health. Right now any strenuous activity is very difficult due to other health issues (that I may go into more detail about later,) so as of now, I am incorporating an incline walk or an outdoor walk into my routine. This way I will still work toward improving my cardiovascular health, while also working toward doing more intense cardio exercises too.

I have noticed that doing more and more cardio does help improve my asthma, little by little. I want to continue to work toward improvements, even if I do very little at a time to be able to achieve that right now.

Nutrition

Overall, I am working on getting micro and macro nutrients into my diet. I am eating at a slight deficit, but nothing dramatic. I still want to incorporate my indulgent foods, while focusing on whole foods providing my body with the fuel it needs.

I have struggled with consistency with my nutrition in the past, so right now I am focusing on small changes at a time rather than everything all at once to ensure sustainability. Consistency with nutrition is key to achieving any fitness goal.

Career Goals

I am going to be brief on my career goals. I am currently working at my local recreation center as a fitness instructor, teaching 5 classes on Sunday. But eventually, I want to have fitness be my full-time. job. One day it will be.

I offer virtual personal training here.

This program is a virtual program for beginners who want to learn to create a healthy and active lifestyle. With my program, I will help you navigate nutrition and learn how to make healthy choices, and live a more active and healthy lifestyle with a custom workout program for the duration of the 6-weeks. Please note that all sales are final, individual results will vary and will require you to do the work and manage your expectations. No results will happen overnight. This is not a crash diet or “results in 30 days” type of program. This is a beginner’s guide to learning how to live a more healthy active lifestyle.

If you are here and reading this, that means you have an interest in your health and fitness. That is so good; I am so excited for you! Taking care of your body is literally the best thing you can do for yourself in the present and the long term.

I find that quote so inspiring. Hard work will pay off in the future, but you also have to live in the moment, and I feel like taking care of yourself is doing both. You are doing good for yourself now as well as for your future self.

If you are interested in learning more about all things health and fitness, follow me on Pinterest, Facebook, and Instagram @myactivelife_stacey. I am now offering nutrition and personal training online coaching programs. These six-week programs are designed to help you create lifelong healthy habits with nutrition and fitness. Click here to learn more!

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