As exciting as the holiday season can be, it can also be extremely stressful and busy. There are "to do lists", travel, parties and planning. December is a really busy time for my business and family, so I can relate to obstacles that are presented and the temptation to skip workouts, stay up later and indulge more than usual.

As a Health & Lifestyle Coach, my goal is to educate people that the holidays can be fun and indulgent provided you have healthy lifestyle practices in place.

We are human.

We are going to eat a little more dark chocolate and sip a little more bubbly this month, but that doesn't mean you should throw in the towel entirely and wait until January 1st to regroup.

Don't do that.

It will have more repercussions than you think. If you completely derail from your lifestyle for 7 days for example, it takes 1.5 (11 more days) times that to revamp your metabolism, detox from sugar, kick cravings and clean the slate again.

It's not only worth it from a motivational standpoint, but from a health perspective too. Your body is forgiving, but if you continue to diet and then binge and diet and binge again, your body will eventfully tell you to get lost and no longer function at the capacity you'd like it too.

Here's the exciting part!

From day one, I tell each of my new clients that they need to clean the slate and forget about all of the conflicting information they've learned in the past about health, fat-loss and fitness.

We have been told for decades that the only way to get fit and lose fit is to count calories and spend an hour a day, 5-7 days a week killing it at the gym.

Nope, that is not only nonsense it's not sustainable. What are you supposed to do in your 60's, 70's, 80's etc?

Fitness should be purposeful. You only need a small amount of exercise to elicit a metabolic response in the body to transform the physique, kick-start the metabolism, lose body-fat and improve overall health. This is 20% of the equation.

The remaining piece of the equation stems from your daily health practices-aka, your lifestyle (diet, water, sleep, stress management, supplementation etc.).

Now that you know you only need a small amount of exorcise, I'm challenging you to a 25 Day Christmas Challenge to keep you motivated and dialed into your fitness over the next 25 days!

Starting December 1st, I'll be posting a new fitness video (including beginner modifications) that you will be able to complete in 5-10 minutes.

All the videos will be some sort of compound burpee variation that will include flexibility and mobility drills too. You will have to complete 25 repetitions of each exercise and that is it! This will be just enough to get your heart rate up and stimulate your muscle tissue but more importantly, keep you on track this holiday!

Stay tuned for your next steps in another blog post!

Happy holidays!

Hugs, kale & squats,

Christine xo