Achieving a Toned Body in Just One Month: Tips and Tricks

Maybe you have a big family gathering in a few weeks, or you want to get in shape before summer arrives, or maybe you just want to get stronger quickly. Whatever the reason, if you want to get in shape and feel good about your body, you need to do full-body exercise, paired with a proper healthy diet. With effective exercise and diet control, it is possible to lose 1 to 2 pounds per week. If you do it right, you might be able to get in shape in just a month. But keep in mind that for most people, it can take six to eight weeks to see results.

Work on the muscle

Move more every day to lay a solid foundation for your body to become stronger. Before you actually start building muscle, you need to get into basic shape. If you do strenuous exercise right from the start, you are likely to be overwhelmed and give up halfway, or even injure yourself. Get off the couch, move more in your daily life, and build your endurance first.

• Try to take the stairs instead of the elevator. When using a computer or studying, stand up instead of sitting down. When going somewhere within 2 kilometers, walk instead of driving. When you want to relax, go for a walk or a run instead of watching TV. There are many ways to stay active in your daily life without even exercising.

Start with basic exercises to build your endurance. You can start with some basic exercises to strengthen your muscles. These exercises can improve your endurance and help you build a more beautiful body shape so that you can achieve real body-shaping effects through more targeted exercises.

• Try jogging, biking, or swimming. Most of these exercises cost nothing or are even completely free, and you can do them yourself without spending a fortune on a gym membership or expensive equipment.
• During the first to second weeks, you should spend about three hours a day doing these basic exercises.

Do “monkey arms.” The “monkey arms” is a great exercise for your arms and upper body. When doing this movement, hold a dumbbell in each hand. Start with your elbows abducted and lower the dumbbells to your armpits. Then swing your arms outward so that they are straight at shoulder height. Swing the dumbbells back under your arms and repeat.

• If you don’t have dumbbells, you can lower the difficulty and use food cans or other lighter weights instead.
• Pair it with squats or lunges to make it a full-body exercise.

Do a plank. The plank is one of the most effective moves you can do, significantly strengthening your core and legs compared to other core exercises. To begin the exercise, get into a push-up position. Then, lower your body so that your palms rest on the ground and your entire forearms touch the ground to support your body weight. Keep your back and legs as straight as possible and maintain this position for as long as possible.

• You want to hold this position for as long as possible and remember that holding a plank for more than a minute requires a very strong core. When you first start practicing, hold the plank position for 10 seconds, rest for 30 seconds, and repeat for about 10 minutes. Slowly increase the time you hold the plank until you can hold the position continuously for 30 seconds to 1 minute.

Do squats. Squats work your core and leg muscles, and you can even tone your arms while doing squats while lifting dumbbells. To do squats, stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, then squat down as if you were sitting on an invisible chair. To perform a proper squat, your back must remain straight.

• If you’re new to squats, using a chair or table for balance can make them less difficult.

Perform pike extensions. After the first week of frequent exercise, you can start doing some slightly more strenuous exercise. This move requires a medicine ball, but it’s a great full-body workout. Start by getting into a push-up position, but with your feet off the ground, place your shins on top of the medicine ball. Lift your hips up, rolling the ball so that the ball hits the ball from your shins to your toes. Then, lower your body and roll the ball back, slowly moving it up your body to reach your hips. Your body should remain straight throughout, with your legs in the air, and your body should form a “V” shape when viewed from the side.

• Exercise balls are very cheap, but you can also use other items to replace them. For example, go to a toy store and buy a large rubber ball. You can usually buy it for only a few dozen yuan.

Do burpees. Burpees may seem complicated, but once you get used to them, they’re simple and one of the most effective of all the full-body exercises you can do. Start by assuming a standing position with your feet spread apart. Touch the ground with your hands in front of your feet, jump your legs back, let your body become a push-up position, and do a push-up. Then, jump your feet back to the starting position, raise your hands above your head, straighten up, and jump up, as high as possible. Repeat burpees for at least 10 minutes.

• You can omit push-ups or jumps, but they make burpees more effective, so you’re better off doing a full burpee movement.

Be prepared for your body to not lose significant weight. No one type of exercise can target specific areas of the body for fat loss. Some exercises target certain muscles, but if you want to get in shape quickly, your best bet is to work your entire body using the full-body exercises described above. Focusing too much on one specific area and using exercises like weight lifting may add dimension to your muscles rather than just make them more defined.

Maintain a healthy diet

Adjust your food intake according to your level of exercise. If you want to get a toned body, you must first burn off any excess fat you may healthily have on your body. Regardless of your weight, determining the appropriate amount of food to eat based on your level of activity is a healthy choice. Talk to your doctor about caloric intake that is appropriate for your body type, age, and level of activity. You don’t have to count calories exactly, but you should use your doctor’s recommended daily intake to get a rough idea of how much food you should eat. Eating too much is not good, but eating too little is not good for your health either.

• Calories are a form of energy, and for most people, the body begins to burn fat when it burns more calories than it takes in. If you need to lose fat before getting in shape, you must make sure that you consume slightly less calories than your body actually needs. But don’t let change happen too quickly. Eating too few calories causes the body to begin preparing for famine, causing it to absorb and form as much fat as possible.
• For example, a 16-year-old girl of average height and weighing 110 pounds will need about 1,800 calories per day to maintain her weight if she exercises once a week. If she wants to lose weight, she can lower her calorie intake to 1300-1350.

Say goodbye to unhealthy food. For the sake of burning fat and your overall health, you should stay away from high-calorie foods that are unhealthy or contain no nutrients. These foods are often our favorites, but they often cause us to overeat.

• In general, you should avoid unhealthy fats or trans fats, sugar, and nutrient-poor carbohydrates. Such foods include butter, potato chips, french fries, commercial baked goods, candy, commercial pizza, mayonnaise, soda pop, processed meats, and white bread.
• You should also be aware of certain “healthy” foods. For example, fruit smoothies often contain large amounts of sugar. Fresh-squeezed juice retailers like Jamba Juice, for example, offer healthy smoothies with as much sugar as 24 sugar cubes. If you’re craving a smoothie, be sure not to add sugar, make sure it’s primarily vegetable, soy, or almond milk, and the less fruit it contains, the better.

Eat more nutritious foods. In addition to avoiding these unhealthy foods, you should eat more nutritious foods. Vegetables, whole grains, and lean proteins can provide all the nutrients you need, but eating certain fruits and dairy products can also be healthy.

• Healthy vegetables include kale, chard, broadleaf kale, broccoli, spinach, green beans, carrots, soup greens, and peas.
• Healthy grains include brown rice, quinoa, oats, bulgur, buckwheat, and barley.
• Healthy proteins include lean proteins like salmon, turkey, anchovies, and sardines, soybean kernels and other soy products, almonds, walnuts, eggs, and lentils.
• Healthy fruits include lemons or limes, oranges, grapefruits, kiwis, strawberries, raspberries, and pears.
• Healthy dairy products include cottage cheese, low-fat yogurt, and milk.

Drink more water and avoid unhealthy drinks. Water is essential for the normal operation of body functions, and its importance is self-evident in the process of building muscles. If your body is currently dehydrated, simply getting enough water can help you lose weight. Skip the coffee, energy drinks, sodas, and juices, and drink more water to help keep your body healthy and hydrated.

• The amount of water you need depends on the specific conditions of your body. The usual recommendation of 1.9 liters per day is only a rough estimate. As a rule of thumb, if your urine is lighter or clear, it means you are drinking enough water. If your urine is light yellow or darker, you need to drink more water.
• When exercising, you should keep your electrolytes balanced but don’t just drink sports drinks like Gatorade. Electrolytes are essentially “salts” dissolved in water. For example, most elements in Groups 1 or 2 of the periodic table, such as sodium, potassium, and magnesium, act as electrolytes when taken into the body with water. Table salt is sodium chloride, bananas contain potassium, and vegetables such as cabbage are rich in minerals. You can consume various salts through these foods. Eating bananas and salted nuts and drinking plenty of fluids can maintain important electrolyte balance without consuming artificial colors and sweeteners, which is healthier than sports drinks.

Try not to rely on fad diets. You will see overwhelming advertisements on the Internet and in magazines, telling you that this diet or that diet will make you as thin as a certain celebrity in two weeks. However these dieting methods are all deceptive, and some are even harmful to health. Starving yourself never works. Cutting back on calories is the right thing to do, but you still have to eat. Especially diets that promote complete fasting, such as the Atkins diet, you’d better stay away from them. Your body needs a variety of nutrients, and dietary variety is key to ensuring you stay healthy.

• It’s best to consume no less than 1,200 calories per day. 1,000 calories is the minimum, as consuming less than this greatly increases the risk of health complications such as gallstones.

Making plans

Plan your training so that your body gets stronger over time. You have to be careful when planning your training, especially the stress you put on your body. Doing too much too quickly, or only doing moves that target one part of the body, such as the legs, can lead to injury. When starting to work out, take it slow to reduce the risk of injury, especially if you’re not in good shape right now. Give your body time to rest between workouts, and do no more than two hours of intense exercise at a time. Take turns exercising each muscle group including legs, arms, and core. This arrangement will prevent you from exercising more than your body can handle.

• For example, try doing 10 minutes of monkey curls in the morning, followed by 20 minutes of push-ups, jumping jacks, and burpees. Try to walk up and down the stairs for half an hour during lunch, and swim for an hour after school.
• You can also arrange your training plan like this: ride a bicycle to school for half an hour, attend daily after-school fitness classes, and then do light aerobics for half an hour before doing homework.
• Try to do 30 to 60 minutes of light aerobic exercise every day, such as walking or biking. You can also do more vigorous exercise a few times a week.

Make time for exercise and healthy eating. By making a plan and making it a habit, you can overcome many obstacles so that thoughts like “I don’t want to… today” won’t hold you back. Just like you set aside time each day specifically for brushing your teeth or eating lunch, set aside time for preparing a healthy breakfast and exercising. Once you make up your mind, if you stick with it, doing these things will become habitual and “natural.”

• For example, add an extra half hour to your “getting ready for bed” routine. Before taking a shower and brushing your teeth, do some exercise, such as skipping rope, for half an hour.
• Motivate yourself to achieve these time goals. For example, every time you successfully stick to your plan for a week, go out and watch a movie with your friends. You can even use food as a reward, such as a delicious store-bought cookie, but only eat one piece at a time. This way, you reward yourself and prevent yourself from feeling the pain of suppressing the craving. You can even use an app like Pact to help you achieve these time goals, which will reward or punish you based on your performance.

Make exercise a part of your life. You can also choose an exercise that you find fun and that you can do as a hobby so that you do it every day because it is part of your lifestyle. This is true for many rock climbers, who go to the gym at least once a week, and for hiking every week, and for some runners, who jog every morning.

• For example, let’s say you’re interested in martial arts. In this case, you can learn judo. Find a local gym to sign up for classes and practice judo every day.
• Please choose a professional judo gym with strong teachers. There, you can come into contact with professional judo athletes and your judo skills can be improved quickly.

The most important things you need to maintain a healthy weight and a toned body is to eat a healthy diet and get plenty of exercise. This means that the most important thing you should do to stay in shape is not a special move or a secret food to eat, but rather find a way to stay motivated. You have to find a motivation that makes you want to exercise every day and eat healthy. You can use many methods to achieve this, such as:

• Do the exercise you like and eat the food you like. Doing some exercise that’s fun for you, or finding healthy food combinations that you think taste good, can keep you from slacking off and staying motivated. Try to find an exercise you enjoy, even if it’s not the most effective way to exercise. The most important thing is that you can persist for a long time.
• Exercise with other people. You could organize a jogging group or even sign up for a yoga class at a local health club with mom. Having other people exercising with you gives you a sense of accountability, making you more likely to keep going when you’re really tired or want to goof off.

Focus on long-term solutions. ‘Tis the season to go to the beach and you want to look good in a bikini. We can understand. But you have to understand that quick fixes like getting slimmer in a month are not sustainable. Unless you make major changes to your lifestyle, the weight will come back on and your muscles will loosen up again. Repeatedly losing weight like this can cause great harm to your body and can also be harmful to your health, possibly leading to diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, and hormonal problems. You’re better off focusing on long-term solutions and setting lifelong goals, not just looking good at your brother’s wedding.

Tips

• Exercise is most effective when paired with a healthy, balanced diet.
• Please warm up fully and do stretching exercises before and after exercise.
• Be flexible. You should allow yourself to slowly adapt to the fitness program.
• If you feel dizzy, short of breath, or extremely tired, seek medical help.
• Don’t overwork yourself.