Everything you've ever done, at any point, has led you to this moment.

Once again you get to choose whether to accept your desire and the hardships that come with it, or reject it and return to a bargained mediocrity.

Now be aware;

This isn't meant to shame you for a non-priority. Do not let me perturb you from your lack of prioritizing building muscle and shredding fat with such vigor as per the suggestion of the title.

This article could be applied to whatever your heart and soul know to be your path of excellence. Indeed, the first step to greatness is allowing the woman in the red dress to walk away.

You may however know that you're ready to completely change not just your health... but your capability in this world. You are I wrote this for. I hope all of you can use it to some degree to improve the quality of your current stage.

Step 1.

The first step is to accept your desire with 100% of your being, and use all of your available energy to pursue the transformation.

You will probably not have to give 100%. Realistically, if you're giving 0% now then anything beyond that will get you progress. The point is to release from your ego's need to make future predictions about "what you will do" and prioritize "who you will be."

You'll find yourself naturally doing the work, and as you understand the work you will understand that it will take 100% in order to see epic progress.

"All transformation begins with an intense, burning desire to be transformed. The first step in the 'renewing of the mind' is desire."
-Neville Goddard

This is the first step. To be done immediately. To be maintained forever.

Step 2.

Define your goal.

We want to take our strong intention, and define it as specifically as possible.

We can use the SMART goal system to make this work. SMART is of course an acronym for Systematic, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Timely.

Say for example you want to lose weight. An intention turned into a SMART goal would be something like "I want to lose 100lbs. I will do this over the next year with a calorie constrained, plant-based diet and regular exercise."

Step 3.

Create a meal plan.

-First, Let's Assess Your Nutritional Needs.

Determine your calorie needs based on factors like age, gender, weight, height, and activity level. This plan should identify your macronutrient ratios (proteins, fats, carbohydrates) based on your health goals (e.g., weight loss, muscle gain, maintenance).

In my opinion, this is easiest done by going to sites like MyFitnessPal, Cronometer, or using the Vegan Fitness App(you can DM me for detail, as it's still in beta but you are able to sign up) and finding the average between all of them.

Say for example MyFitnessPal recommends you consume 2100 calories per day and 100g of protein per day. When you check Chronometer however, it recommends you consume 1900 calories per day and 80g of protein per day.

Rather than becoming totally confused by these numbers, consider this your range.

Assuming you entered the same current weight/height/goals into each application, you should be safe if you're eating BETWEEN 1900 - 2000 calories per day. You should be safe eating BETWEEN 80 - 100g of protein per day.

Realistically, reflection is the key to this process and so you'll know EXACTLY what works when you start tracking your food and reflecting on your results. Don't sweat at this step!


Next, compile healthy recipes based on your nutritional needs and preferences. A good rule of thumb is to follow the Canadian Food guide.

If you know your "ideal" meal breakdown, you can add/remove elements of each meal in order to have a fruit/veggie dominant meal that's supplemented with 25% healthy carbs and 25% healthy fats/proteins.

Make a Grocery List
Based on your meal plan, list all the ingredients you'll need for the week. The app AnyList will compile the ingredients for you so you don't have to go back and forth through the grocery store.

Prep Meals in Advance
Consider meal prepping components of your meals in advance (e.g., chopping vegetables, cooking grains) to save time during the week. I don't just batch cook ingredients.... I batch cook the whole thing.

It's up to you, again you'll figure out what works best the more you simply TRY.

Monitor and Adjust
Keep track of how the meal plan works for you. We'll talk about tracking below, but as you track you will adjust as necessary based on your energy levels, satisfaction, and progress towards your goals.

Below is a simple template you could use to structure your meal plan:

*Pro-Tip*

I recommend that you also include the macro goals for each meal. This will help you make sure you're meeting your daily metric goals and you're reinforcing that intention with each meal. 

Step 4.

Create a workout plan.

Having worked out daily for 20+ years I would like you to do your best to let the next few steps be low-pressure.

Be creative and do things you'd want to TRY.

Anything done for 300+ days will bring you epic results(assuming you consider the integral elements of working out, in later sections). At step , your goal should be to learn. Anything you choose will do, because anything you choose will teach you.

The more you learn about fitness methodology, the more you can adjust this plan to perfection.

Start by considering your SMART goal. Does this goal REQUIRE you to use certain methods? Will you need to be doing yoga, or will you need to be using free-weights?

Look sharp, you need to know this at least.

(heads up. I want you to think and make your brain as big as your muscles. I also want you to trust my headlines to some degree in the future.... so there's a full hyper-specific bodybuilding plan below as well. Scroll to the bottom of this step.)
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DIY

Create a table that's 3 columns wide, 10 - 15 rows deep.

On in the top row of the left-most column, write today's date. Draw a line under it, above the next row.

In the next row, write "warrm up"

Here's what your warm-up will be until your brave/disciplined enough to build your own
20 Jumping Jacks
10 big arm circles, both directions.
10 small arm circles, both directions.

(if you have space)20ft, down and back bear crawl
(if you don't)10 more jumping jacks

In the next row, write "stretch."

You can watch THIS 5- minute pre-workout stretch for an easy plug-and play process to get you started.

Once you've written this down, go ahead and take whatever your primary discipline is going to be (yoga, calisthenics, weight-lifting, pilates) and begin to drag and drop exercises into the column, forming your routine.

This is both a super simple but potentially super confusing approach so again, let me be clear. If you don't have any semblance of what you're doing.... dragging and dropping 5 - 7 resistance training exercises and 10 - 20 yoga positions into the workout itinerary is perfectly fine.

You'll then break these down into a certain number of set/reps for resistance training, and then more than likely a number of circuits with yoga. If your goal IS to fully pursue fitness with something like yoga or spin cycle.... I'd just go take a YouTube playlist and plug it into the body of the workout.

At the end of the workout, you're going to do the reverse of what you did at the beginning of the workout.

Rather than a warm-up, you're going to do a cool-down. This cool down can be the exact same movements as the warm-up, it can be high-reps of low-weight of an exercise you did during the workout, or 5-10 minutes of light cardio of your choosing.

The choice is yours.

After this, you're going to do the stretch session again for a few minutes.

Design 3 different days AT LEAST worth of workouts using the above framework. Do one every other day, for the rest of your life.

You will create a herculean physique.

Example workout plan:

You may also have us design all of this for you(workout plans, meal plans, etc). Click here to schedule a consultation. First one's free :)

Step 5.

Track for 90 days.

I'm not going to bullshit you. I think tracking is a pain in the ass.

(You might not think so, which is a massive advantage because for 99% this whole thing is a big ole' math problem.)

Tracking is, however, the most effective path to success. Over time, maintaining a fitness diary or utilizing an app to log daily activities, workouts, and nutritional intake becomes essential. You'll also start naturally integrating non-quantitative measures of success, like improved energy levels, better sleep quality, and enhanced mood, to get a holistic view of your fitness progress. The point of tracking is to get those quantitative metrics such as decrease in bodyfat percentage and increasing V02 Max. 


*Edit*
This process is on-going. Admittedly it takes me awhile to publish these blog posts, and so stay up to date by saving this page and messaging me if you have any questions! This let's me know you're actually valuing this so I can prioritize time to add more steps :) 

Here's the YouTube video version: