Let’s face it; plateaus are a major pain. And because it’s a guarantee that you will encounter at least one of these road blocks while trying to lose weight, it’s important to learn how to tackle them ahead of time.  With an arsenal of the right tools and a kick-butt mindset, you can and will bust through any plateau. Here’s how.

Fuel your body “correctly." The majority of clients that have walked through my door ate “healthy” before they ever met me. They counted calories, relied on low fat snacks, added fruit and veggies when they could and saved the fried food for special occasions.
 
So why couldn’t these same people move beyond their “set point” (what their body wants to weigh) and just reach their goals already?  The problem was, these clients were eating “healthy” and not eating “correctly” and consequently, their bodies refused to budge.
  
See, your body will always hit an immovable plateau when relying on deprivation methods like cutting calories or carbohydrates or over-exercising to lose weight.
 
The solution is to stabilize your blood sugar levels by eating a meal or snack with a good balance of protein, carbohydrates and fat every three to four hours. When blood sugar is stable, you naturally release stored fat, increase energy, eliminate sugar cravings and in combination with the right exercise, increase your metabolism to lower your “set point." In short, stable blood sugar is the only way to permanently break through a plateau.

If you want to learn more about how to stabilize your blood sugar, check out Body Confidence, written by Nutrition and Fitness Expert (and my personal mentor), Mark MacDonald. And you can catch up on one of my previous articles here.

Go natural. So what do I do when I need to climb my way over a stubborn plateau or squeeze myself into an itty bitty bikini? Well, I don’t starve or deprive myself, that’s for sure. Instead I focus on incorporating mostly high quality, natural, unprocessed food into my daily meals.

Unprocessed, natural food will always keep you fuller longer and stabilize your blood sugar best to help you reduce bloat, cut body fat and reveal sexy muscle. Like I tell my clients, going natural, even temporarily, has a shrink-wrap-like effect on your body. Picture tight, toned, sculpted limbs, abs, glutes… you get the point.

So instead of say, a turkey wrap for lunch, I might have roasted chicken on a salad with veggies. By replacing the high sodium deli turkey and processed wrap with naturally roasted chicken and fresh salad, I’ve created an unprocessed and more satisfying meal that will keep my blood sugar stable and help me reach my goals faster. 
 
Switch it up! I’m a power walker. I like to break a good sweat while maintaining a steady heart rate to burn maximum fat. This is a good example of “red or slow twitch” muscle fiber training. But I also know how important it is to train my “white or fast twitch” muscle fibers.  These are the fast twitch muscle fibers we all have that are activated during sudden burst of energy and intense movements.
 
Most people only train one way or the other – they go slow and steady (think marathon runner or power walker) or they go high impact and intense (think sprinter, spinning or aerobics). The challenge is, we all have red and white muscle fibers and for maximum results, it’s important to activate both.

So if you always power walk or jog at a steady pace, it’s important to add interval training into the mix about twice a week to activate your fast twitch muscle fibers. And vice versa. If your cardio workouts are always super intense, it’s time to put those slow twitch muscle fibers to work with moderate paced cardio like walking on a high incline or jogging at a steady rate.

I can’t begin to tell you how many people I see that perform cardio inefficiently and could be getting so much more out of their workouts with a little education. When you’re stuck at a plateau, the last thing you want to do is waste more time!
  
I recommend working with a personal trainer to learn how to develop a solid cardio plan that includes both interval and fat burning cardio into your weekly routine. Or check out Body Confidence; you’ll find everything you need to take your workouts to the next level including correct exercise duration, protocol, intensity, scheduling etc.

Add resistance training. It’s a fact: muscle burns fat and increases your metabolism. The more of it you have, the faster your metabolism will be. Plus muscle adds sexy tone and shape to your physique. The challenge is, training incorrectly could very well lead to a bad injury and lots of time spent on the couch recovering while eating ice cream.  Not the way you want to go. Please work with a pro on this one!

One of the most challenging jobs I have as a Nutrition Coach is convincing my clients that the annoying plateau they’re stuck at is just temporary. Now is not the time to give up.
 
So the next time a big, scary plateau is staring you down, fight back!  You may just take your body further than you ever thought possible.