Table of Contents
Introduction: Time Is Prime: Just Give Me 12 Days! xi
Slimming and Shaping Your Body 1
The Shape of Things to Come 3
Blueprint Your Body 11
Master the Mind-Body Connection 27
The 12-Day Body Shaping Miracle Workout and Diet 35
How to Reshape Your Body in 12 Days 37
Prepping for the Next 12 Days 51
Figure Fixes: Customizing Your Workout 63
Cardio Meltdown 131
My Figure-Shaping Nutrition Plan 151
Epilogue: Beyond the First 12 Days: Look Better than Ever, Forever 171
Workout and Diet Customizations for Special Medical Conditions 191
Additional Resources 207
Scientific References 209
Index 213
Read a Sample Chapter
12-Day Body Shaping Miracle
Change Your Shape, Transform Problem Areas, and Beat Fat for Good
By Michael Thurmond WARNER WELLNESS
Copyright © 2007 Michael Thurmond and Provida Publishing, LLC
All right reserved. ISBN: 978-0-446-52766-8
Introduction
Time Is Prime: Just Give Me 12 Days! I've got less than two weeks to get in shape for a commercial. I look terrible right now. Can you help me ... please?"
The panic in the model's voice was real. So was the desperation.
Calmly, I responded, "Sure. Meet me at the office at ten o'clock, and we'll formulate a plan."
What I had in this client was someone who had let herself get soft. Extra pounds had piled on, and now remedial work was needed to give her body back its sexy curves, in a very short span of time-less than two weeks. I get calls like hers all the time.
Models, actresses, and others want their legs, buttocks, abs, arms, and other parts of their figures to look as firm and lean as they can be on the set. And why wouldn't they? After all, looking great is their livelihood. Which brings me to you. There's no reason why you can't look picture-perfect, too-and get there rapidly.
How rapidly? Let's just say that if you play your cards right, there could be 5 to 12 pounds less of you in 12 days, with a whole new shape emerging to boot.
I don't blame you if you're skeptical at this point. How can someone get back her gorgeous shape or even reshape her body in 12 days-or, at the very best, see visible changes?
What I will tell you right now is: This is what I do.
I get people back in shape fast. I do it for desperate models who have impending assignments. I do it for actors and actresses who must be in top form for upcoming roles. I did it for people on ABC's Extreme Makeover who had to be at a healthier weight prior to, or after, having plastic surgery. I do it for guests of my Spa Body Makeover, who come to California to trim down in just a week or two. I do it for clients in my business, Body Makeover Systems, Inc., who want to fast-track their way to shapelier, more defined bodies. This is what I do. And I have been doing it for more than 25 years.
If you give me just 12 days, I'll do it for you, too.
The 12-Day Body Shaping Miracle is a program of special exercise techniques, coupled with diet, that is designed to alter your body shape so that it gets closer to that ideal of feminine attractiveness: slim waist, streamlined hips and thighs, firm butt, and a lifted bustline. If that's what you want, if that moment has finally come for you, if you're tired of fooling around with exercise programs that don't produce results, then this is the book for you. The program you are about to read will change the shape of your body. You'll learn how to shape and define every area of your body so that you can almost literally sculpt it to achieve a predictable outcome. By predictable outcome, I mean the exact way you want your body to look. If you've tried other workout methods in the past but they haven't done the trick, and you have become discouraged in the process, you can now succeed.
The secret: targeted exercise, performed with special movements and employed in a workout that you create and customize for your trouble spots and your unique body type. In addition, you'll be introduced to a totally different approach to cardiovascular exercise that will accelerate your fat loss, but without the drudgery of high-intensity workouts or hours doing cardio. By moving at an acceptable pace and using a special form of breathing-what I call Abdominal Breathing-to oxygenate your body, you'll become trimmer and more fit, plus feel more energetic and invigorated than you have in years. Diet-wise, you'll learn how to recharge your metabolism with food so that you begin to shed fat efficiently, revealing your firm curves.
You'll learn more about these techniques as you and I get further into this book. For now, though, I need something from you: a commitment to unlearn just about everything you've ever been taught about exercise. And I need you to be a willing spirit. Give up your couch time and prepare to become more active. Release what you've been taught or what you've read and be prepared to relearn an entirely new way of exercising. Be open, be willing. Look at it this way: a fresh approach to exercise may be just what you need to get out of a workout or weight-loss rut.
In particular, if you've never done resistance training before, count yourself among the fortunate. You're a blank slate upon which the most effective ways to do it can be written!
Or maybe you have exercised in the past, but without seeing much improvement in your shape. It's one thing to get fit by working out-and that's a great benefit-but exercising without seeing your body become shapelier, trimmer, and younger looking can be a waste of time, like saving money but getting no return on your investment. That's crazy!
Undeniably, the reason you haven't been able to drop those unsightly, unhealthy pounds and resculpt your figure is that you've been exercising incorrectly for your body type. Everyone is built differently; everyone comes in a different size and shape-which is why cookie-cutter or one-workout-fits-all approaches to exercising don't make the grade. How your best friend exercises may work for her but do little for you. By contrast, this program completely customizes your workout to your own body type, trouble spots, and metabolism so that you can see dramatic and rather rapid results.
Through my exclusive Blueprinting system, you'll determine your exact body type. Body type refers to your bone structure, your percentage of fat to muscle, your overall proportions, your metabolism, how your body reacts to food. Although every body is different, there are five specific body types, and you're one of them. Knowing your individual type is the first step toward reshaping it to your desired dimensions and following an eating plan geared to your own individual metabolism.
I'll show you the best exercises for your body type and problem areas-exercises that reshape your body fast. If you need to flatten your belly, then I'll show you the single best way to do it. If you need to lift your buns, I'll show you how to have high, rounded glutes like you had when you were younger. If you need great-looking legs, I'll give you exercises that target, tone, and resize your thighs. No, you won't have to do thousands of reps to achieve the shape you want. Working out like that won't give you a tight, toned figure-it will give you a tired body! Once you know your specific body type and understand which exercises work best for you-then do them-you will get to your desired shape quickly.
Before I put another word down on the page, let me say that this is not a fitness book. You can be very fit, yet not even come close to looking the way you want to look or having the body shape you desire. Runners, for example, are very fit, but many are string-bean gaunt, with few appealing curves to their physiques.
So no, this is not a fitness book. This is an art book. You will learn how to look at your body as if it were a piece of raw stone, then visualize the perfect statue you want it to ultimately become. Take in your hand as your chisel and sandpaper my special ways of exercising and dieting and before long, you will have resculpted your body into an aesthetically pleasing new shape. Unlike conventional ways of working out-going to the gym and pumping away on all that equipment for hours at a time-you will discover how to exercise your muscles to shape your body and look exactly the way you want.
Here is the bottom line: How you contract your muscles determines how your muscles look. If you want the long, lean graceful look of a ballet dancer, you can have it. If you want the well-defined, powerful grace of a gymnast, you can have it. If you want the sculpted look of a fitness model, it's yours. How you reshape your body is up to you.
So effective is this approach to body shaping and body sculpting that you can literally see your muscles reshape themselves in a single workout. That kind of near-instant feedback can be so exciting to see, you'll get hooked on this new way of exercising. Every time you use it, you'll be excited about where you can take your body next! You'll have the confidence and the motivation to continue through the initial 12 days and beyond. Once you start on this path, you'll want to keep going. Before long, you will have the toned, curvaceous proportions that can properly fit into a pair of jeans or a skimpy bikini.
But don't take my word for it. Here is what some of my recent clients have posted about their success on the www.provida.com and bodymakeovers.com Web sites.
"My husband and I are winding down Week 1. Already we have both noticed changes in our bodies. I have had those lovely handles on my sides draping over my pant line. Today I woke up, slipped on a pair of jeans, and I couldn't believe my eyes: The love handles are disappearing."
"Even into the 190s, I always had a waist that was very defined and proportionally small, but I'd gotten so fat that it finally went missing. It's back! I caught it reflected in the mirror as I was walking by."
"Cellulite-we all hate it. You know: that cottage cheese look on the behind and legs and wherever. One evening I was looking at my leg while in a short nightgown. My husband looked up from his book and said, 'All the cellulite is gone. Your leg is smooth.' Oh, my gosh! I ran to my full-length mirror and did the close inspection we all do at some time. I was so excited. All visible cellulite was gone."
"Well, I can't believe it. It's been two weeks, and I'm down 22 pounds! I must admit that I was a bit of a skeptic at first but ... for the first time in my life I think I have hold of something that is going to help me get the weight off, especially in my thighs, which I've been carrying around for a long time, and keep it off." With this book, I'll teach you, in step-by-step fashion, what these clients have already learned: how to resculpt your trouble areas by selecting specific exercises to tone and shape where you need it. Just as you might remodel your house, this process all starts with a plan to take you where you want to go. This book gives you that plan.
What will happen over the next 12 days will be nothing short of amazing, as long as you stick to the program. You'll learn moves and techniques that will streamline your trouble spots, tighten what needs to be tightened, lift what needs lifting, give your figure symmetry where there was none before, and, in short, transform your shape. Fat will start receding from your body the way the ocean leaves the shore at low tide. Your journey will be challenging, no question, as you learn this truly innovative way of working out and eating.
Why 12 days? So often I have less than two weeks to get clients into shape. Sometimes I have only a week! There's nothing magical about 12, although it has often been seen as a mystical, or even a lucky, number down through the ages. Whether you believe in luck, pluck, or whatever, though, this 12-day program works. It is based on scientific principles of exercise more than anything else, plus more than 25 years of my own experience doing physique makeovers. It is a simple solution to the perfect-body equation.
Please understand: When I designed this as a 12-day program, I did not intend it as a gimmick. Gimmicks don't work. They never do; they never will. What I'm introducing you to is meant to be the beginning of a better, more efficient way to exercise-a method that can surely change your shape very rapidly, and if you continue to use it, you can develop the sexiest, most beautiful body you've ever had. Twelve days is what it will take to show you that this is the best way for you to exercise to change your shape. By the end of 12 days, you'll see flattering and remarkable improvements in the way you look and feel. So flattering and remarkable, in fact, that you'll be motivated to make this method a way of life.
For you to get the body you want, you must approach this program as a priority assignment, with your total focus on achieving the shape you desire. That means you must concentrate, a day at a time, on following the diet and exercise instructions given in this book, without deviating from them. This is something that is simple and something that is doable.
What happens after the initial 12 days is that you're on your way to establishing a new exercise habit! The 12 days get you started, and once they're over you'll be able to see a change in your body. If you do this program correctly, if you learn how to contract (flex) your muscles, if you follow the cardio portion of the program, if you do your diet, if you rest your body, this program will set you on the path toward being sculpted and streamlined, with your exact desired specifications taking form. You'll emerge stronger and more self-assured.
How to Use This Book
What I've just described is exactly what can happen to you when you start working out according to your body type, using moves designed to correct and streamline your trouble areas while staying true to my dietary principles of balanced, metabolism-boosting nutrition. You can also chisel away those soft spots and replace them with shapely curves.
I have organized this book around two major parts. Within each part are chapters that cover the specifics of this plan. It is best if you read through the entire book first to get familiar with the plan and what you'll be doing. Then go back, chapter by chapter, and put into action each part of the plan. One of the first actions you'll take, for example, is to blueprint your body (chapter 2) so that you'll know which body type you have. Then you can customize your diet and exercise program to that body type. Next you'll want to get into the proper attitude in order to motivate yourself mentally for success and think like a makeover winner (this is covered in chapter 3).
Part 2 covers the exercise techniques and principles on which the 12-Day Body Shaping Miracle is based. These are specifically designed to reshape your body, burn body fat, and build shapely muscle in all the right places. You'll learn which exercises to do for your shape and how to exercise correctly for more rapid results. Your diet is critical to success, so make sure you follow the nutrition plan for your body type. This information is outlined in detail in chapter 8.
I have also included three appendices. Pay particular attention to appendix A, which covers exercise and nutrition exceptions if you have any special medical conditions, such as diabetes or high blood pressure.
Like so many of my makeover clients, with these techniques and this plan, you'll ultimately be able to show off your sexy curves and great new body.
Are you ready for a transformation? If so, give me 12 days, and you, too, will start to see a lean, sexy body that you'll love.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from 12-Day Body Shaping Miracle by Michael Thurmond Copyright © 2007 by Michael Thurmond and Provida Publishing, LLC. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
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