For years and years, I knew how to push my body to the limit. But that was just it—to the limit means without respect, without listening to my body, without truly knowing and loving my body. When I really started to respect my body, my body started taking care of me. This is the goal of Are You Ready! and its Inner Compass program—to show you how to listen to your body, learn to love and respect your body, so that your body, in turn, will take care of you.  Although I miss my mother every day of my life, I am forever grateful for the lesson I learned from her: She inspired me to treat my body with care, and perhaps more important, she inspired me to help others learn to treat their bodies with care. I want people to treat their bodies as sacred vessels because I know when this happens, all the years of false starts, yo-yo diets, bad voices in their heads telling them to eat or not to eat, whatever, will come to an end.  “Are you ready?” That’s one of the most important questions I ask any new client. Until you are ready to make these lasting changes, there is nothing I can do. But when you are ready, I will move mountains to help you get what you want. When I work one-on-one with people, I help instill this personal self-respect, and after that seed has been planted in the soul, it will grow and grow. But it needs water, food, and lots and lots of love.

Indeed, my book is for anyone who struggles with getting back in charge of their life. This book can work for someone who wants to lose 10 pounds or for someone who needs to lose 200 pounds. Mostly this book is for the people out there who want to change a behavior that doesn’t work for them anymore. This book is for the person who needs to find the true friend that lives in each and every one of us. This book is for anyone who has decided that today is the day that he can take charge of his life.

Are You Ready! will not only guide you to lose weight and get into the best shape of your life but, most important of all, give you the tools to rewire your brain so that once and for all you understand your relationship with food, tap into tools that can change your self-sabotaging behaviors, and finally assert control over how and when you eat. This is what your Inner Compass is all about. When you begin your Inner Compass journey, in Part 1, you will come to a unique way of understanding what makes you tick, and cultivate the tools and know-how to reinvent your relationship with food. The Inner Compass plan offers a four-step strategy, including “Are You Really Ready?,” “Accept Where You Are and Forgive,” “Love Yourself,” and “Change Your Internal Tape Recorder, Change Yourself.” In each of the four steps, you will gain insight and practical strategies so you can overcome negative thought patterns and bad behaviors, and replace this old system with one that is self-empowering, self-loving, and self-motivati
ng.

In Part 2, “Stepping Up to the Plate: Your Diet,” you will then become familiar with my easy-to-follow eating plan, which is a simple, healthy way to help you lose weight. In the beginning you will be asked to do some calorie counting and portion control, recording what you eat and when you eat in your food journal. But in a matter of a few weeks, you will be so familiar with how much and what types of food to eat, you will be able to eyeball amounts and forget about counting those calories. You will have earned the right to make the best possible choices for yourself.

You will be eating plenty of whole foods that are nutrient dense, clean, and naturally low in calories and high in fiber. One of the keys to this plan is making sure to eat every four hours. This not only offsets hunger, but keeps you away from triggers that cause overeating or unnecessary snacking. Chapters include “It’s an Eating Plan, Not a Diet,” “Your Food Journal,” and “Stress Busters.” Of course, I’ve worked in creative food lists, tips on eating on the run and in restaurants, and ideas about how to navigate travel. You will see how to seamlessly integrate this eating plan into your life in a daily way, lose the weight you desire, and realize you never have to diet again.

Part 3 of the book focuses on my fitness plan, which requires minimal equipment, can be done anywhere, and suits any level of fitness. So whether you haven’t lifted a leg in ten years or are already running twenty miles a week, this fitness program will strengthen you, tone you, and improve your cardiovascular health, which all maximize and enhance your weight loss. The fitness plan is broken down into two phases. In Phase One I ask everyone to begin with four weeks of pure cardio, which enables you to make exercise part of your routine and get your body moving, as you change the way you eat. At the end of this four-week period, you are ready, both physically and mentally, to start Phase Two, which adds circuit training and core challenges to strengthen your upper and lower body and core (the muscles of your abs and back that strengthen and stabilize your spine). The more familiar you become with the strength-training exercises, the more motivated you will be to expand your repertoire of individual workouts.

The more fit you become, the more able and excited you will be to increase the intensity and duration of your workout.  Throughout Part Three, you will also find tips on how to make your workout part of your daily and/or weekly schedule. You’ll feel inspired to stick with your new regime because you will have the confidence and commitment to do so. Taking all that you gained from your Inner Compass work, you will learn a completely new orientation to your body and how to work out so that you will never quit again. And when you see how much clarity of mind and focus you gain by working out, you will be self-motivated to find that time. It may be a cliché that exercise gives you energy, but it’s true nonetheless. Exercising the body sharpens the mind, making you able to get more work done in less time.

So are you ready? You bet you are!

Excerpted from "Are You Ready?" by Bob Harper. Copyright 2008. Reprinted with permission from Broadway Books. All rights reserved.

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