30-Day Fitness Challenge: 30-Day Fitness Challenge: Day Four

30-Day Fitness Challenge
30-Day Fitness Challenge: Day Four
| Your Active Challenge  | Your Exercise Challenge - Strength  | Your Flexibility Challenge  | Your Nutrition Challenge  | Your Mind/Body Challenge  | Your Day Four Checklist

	from Paige Waehner You're now on day four and, hopefully, you're finding the challenges are giving you some insight into how you eat, how you move and how you take care of yourself. If you're ready, scroll down through the challenges and get ready to build a little strength, scrutinize your kitchen cabinets and, best of all, take some time for a total body relaxation.
Your Active Challenge
	Your Active Challenge
	Set an alarm to go off every hour. Take at least 1 minute to stand up and stretch, walk around or take a break. Begin this challenge from the moment you start your day and continue for at least four (or more) hours.
Sponsored Links
Your Exercise Challenge - Strength
	Your Exercise Challenge
	Take at least 15 or more minutes to perform the exercises shown in this Beginner Strength Workout. Other Options: For more advanced options, please visit my Workout Center where you'll find a huge variety of workouts. Some more advanced total body workouts include: Total Body Beginner 2 Total Body - Intermediate 10-Minute Strength Basic Total Body
Your Flexibility Challenge
	Your Flexibility Challenge
	Perform the following stretching exercises twice today, once after your strength workout and another at any time throughout the day. Do each stretch at least one time and hold for 15-30 seconds: Hip Flexor Stretch Hamstring Stretch Lunge Stretch Chest Stretch/Ball Full Stretch As always, you can always choose a different routine from my Flexibility Workouts or choose your own stretches.
Your Nutrition Challenge
	Your Nutrition Challenge
	Research one staple food item in your pantry or refrigerator and determine whether it's healthy or if you need to find a substitute. For this challenge, choose something you eat regularly but haven't looked at the label to see what's inside. Some examples might include: Bread, pasta or rice Spaghetti sauce Energy bars Cereal Yogurt Chips or crackers Choose just one item and read the label. Use your journal to record the pertinent information - calories per serving, fat content, carb and protein content, fiber, sugar, salt, etc. The next time you go to the grocery store, give yourself an extra 5 minutes to read labels of other brands and see if you can find a substitute with lower calories, less fat and/or more fiber.
Your Mind/Body Challenge
	Your Mind/Body Challenge
	3-Minute Total Relaxation Lie down in a quiet place and close your eyes. Begin by tensing and contracting your muscles starting with your feet. Curl your feet and toes, then hold that as you move up and squeeze the calves, then the quads, then the glutes. Hold the lower body and feet very tight and move up, contracting the abs and then the arms, curling your hands into tight fists. Keep holding everything tight as you squeeze your shoulders up towards your ears, clench your jaw and squeeze your eyes shut tight. When everything is tight and tense, hold it for 5 seconds, feeling your muscles start to burn. Then on a long exhale relax everything, letting your muscles melt and your body sink into the floor as the tension drains away. Continue relaxing and breathing for at least one minute or longer.
Your Day Four Checklist
	Your Day Four Checklist
	How'd you do with your challenges today? Use this checklist to cross off everything you accomplished or make notes on what you didn't accomplish and why. You can also use the checklist to make substitutions for any challenges that didn't work for you or create even more challenges for yourself.
Paige Waehner
Learn Something New Every Day
Enroll at About U for More Online Learning About U is our collection of free online courses on About.com. Each online course is sent to you via email on a daily or weekly basis and will help you learn new skills, solve common problems, find shortcuts and quick tricks to simplify your busy life, or just learn more about your world.

Search About

Missing Lesson: http://exercise.about.com/c/ec/26lost.htm

Cancel Subscription: You are receiving this email because you subscribed to the About 30-Day Fitness Challenge: Day Four as damuscleman0424@gmail.com. If you no longer wish to receive emails from us, please click here: http://about.com/nl/usec.htm?nl=exercise_26&e=damuscleman0424@gmail.com About respects your privacy. Our Privacy Policy. Our Contact Information. 249 West 17th Street New York, NY, 10011 © 2009 About, Inc.