I Stopped EXERCISING for 2 WEEKS! | Did I lose muscle? Gain weight? & WHAT I ATE during my rest

Ever since quarantine started, I've been exercising consistently almost every single day. Because I didn't have a lot of equipment at home, I had to shift from doing solely weight training to incorporating more bodyweight movements into my workout routine, and the workout type I mostly stuck to was HIIT. Now, even though it's not recommended you do HIIT every single day, I ignored what the internet told me and I just kept doing it. Sooner or later, this working out all almost became obsessive, and I started ignoring the signs my body was giving me to lower my intensity. At this moment, I knew I had to change something. So after months and months of working out, I finally decided to give my body a proper rest, but not just for a couple of days, but 2 weeks. Throughout this video, I'm also going to be showing you guys what food I eat during my 2-week rest, and just so you guys get a little perspective of what my diet looks like when I don't exercise. FYI, right off the bat, I'm going to tell you guys that my diet actually does not look different at all. It's basically the same. Will this long rest affect my body? Will I lose muscle, gain weight? We will find out. This is my day 1 physique, and I'm actually not going to measure myself or weigh myself, even though it could potentially help in this challenge. You guys, I remember weighing myself almost every single morning, and it is discouraging sometimes. I feel like at the end of the day, the most important thing is how you feel. You feel feel good, that's all that matters. Usually I would wake up at 6 o'clock to work out, but because we are not doing that for the next 2 weeks, I decided to set that time aside for meditation. You guys, meditation has literally been a game changer for I feel so much more relaxed in stressful situations ever since I started incorporating meditation into my life. It's crazy to think that only 5 minutes of just focusing on your breath can really make a difference. So definitely set aside some time to meditate if you haven't already. And then I also journaled on top of that, and I wrote a to-do list to start my day. If you guys are wondering how I manage my time, how do I balance school, YouTube, and everything else, a to-do list is the answer. Writing down all the things you want to accomplish for the day will get you more productive and get you more motivated for sure. There will probably be a test on that similar kind of half test next clinic. For breakfast, I had some oatmeal combined with chocolate protein powder. I mixed it, added some flaxseed, some almond milk, and also some syrup for some extra sweetener. I also topped my oatmeal with banana slices. Mango, grapes, and it was so, so delicious. Oh, I also added nut butter. And for dinner, I had cheese balls from Costco. I had salad, broccoli, potatoes. It was good. And then for dessert, I had a Lindor. Today's breakfast was so, so exciting. I had pancakes, and a lot of them. I added a lot of peanut butter as layers and a lot of fruit and also maple syrup. I love pancakes. Honestly, I don't think I know anyone who doesn't like pancakes. Like, pancakes are just the best breakfast food ever. For another snack, I had dates because they are definitely my to-go for sure, and then some walnuts again. And for lunch, I had avocado with rice cakes. Right now I'm taking a 45-minute walk just around my neighborhood. It's a cold but a very sunny day, which is great. I'm getting in a dose of vitamin D, always super, super nice. The only form of exercise, or the only form of movement I'm going to be doing is walking. I need some sort of movement in the day. That means just walking around for a few minutes, then that will do. Today's dinner, we ordered pizza, something I haven't ate in so long. It was so good. Domino's pizza is the best. I also had some salad on the top, and I had this little cake for dessert. For this breakfast, I had a smoothie bowl and I also topped it with banana slices. Now you guys, something I find really interesting and something I just noticed is I have bananas for breakfast 99.9% of the time. I always have it as a topping. I just realized that, but this breakfast was really, really good. Hey you guys, so I'm at work right now and I'm on my break, so I decided to have a little snack and I'm gonna have this Pure Protein bar. It should fill me up for the rest of my shift, which ends at around 6:45. So yeah, for dinner I had zucchini, 2 chicken wings, and mac and cheese. That was So good. Okay, so the first question I have is, what happens to your body when you don't work out for 2 weeks? So there really isn't a straight answer to this question as it depends on so many different factors like your age, body, and fitness level, etc. But the one thing I find really interesting and a little bit unfair is the fitter you are, the sooner you'll notice signs of detraining. Now at the start, at the beginning, I thought it would be the complete opposite. But after reading more into it, it kind of started to make sense. Because your body is used to training at a higher level, you'll notice a difference sooner than someone who already hasn't been training regularly to begin with. But with that aside, only a week or two of rest from the gym or home workouts isn't going to have a huge impact on your overall fitness or physique. In terms of loss, the only loss you could see is water retention or lower glycogen levels. Now, when it comes to body strength in general, it can be maintained without the gym for up to 3 to 4 weeks. So after 2 weeks of just not training at all, it really won't affect your strength. You'll most likely still be able to do many exercises without much difficulty, like push-ups. It's important to take everything I said with a grain of salt because again, every single body is different and it really depends on what you mean when you say not exercising for for 2 weeks? Do you mean you're not doing any high-intensity workout but are still moving your body one way or another, like walking for example? Or do you mean you're like not moving at all, you're just sitting or laying down all day? You have to keep those in mind when it comes to how much muscle you're gonna lose or how much weight you're gonna gain. So that was kind of my simple version of what happens to your body. If you want to check out a more in-depth version of this topic, definitely check out Natasha Ocean's video. She uses science to back up her answers, and it's honestly so, so informative, and it's definitely gonna teach you something new about the body, and it's really interesting. So definitely go check it out. I'll leave it in the description below. So that was first question answered. It's officially been a week of no working out, and this is how my physique looks like. I'm not gonna comment on it just yet, but this is how it looks like. For today's breakfast, I had rice cakes, peanut butter, banana slices, and honey drizzled on the top with some chia seeds for some extra fiber and And also, you guys, it snowed today, which, I mean, I wasn't super excited, but at the same time I kind of missed it, so that's that. And then I also had an RX bar for snack. For lunch, I had avocado and toast with a hard-boiled egg and bell peppers on the side. And for dinner, I had leftover pizza with some dressing. So now I'm going to share my thoughts of one week of not exercising. How do I feel? Even though I do miss waking up at 6 AM every single morning, not exercising after a week is not really affecting me that much. If anything, this rest is definitely much needed. It's a great opportunity to refresh my mind and body and put me in a better place when I do start exercising once again. And it's not like I'm not active at all. I still go on 30 to 45 minute walks most days, and believe it or not, I still feel accomplished and satisfied at the end of the day. And even though I'm not sweating or out of breath when I'm walking, I still feel good, and I still feel like I've had a good amount of activity for the day. Walking is definitely really, really great and much needed if you decide to take a rest from training from the gym or home workouts. Overall, week 1 isn't too bad, and honestly, I don't feel like I'm missing something, or I don't feel like anything's different. I'm loving it, and hopefully week 2 isn't too brutal as well. This was today's breakfast. Also, I'm really, really sorry if all my meals are really repetitive. For my next what I eat in a day, I'll try to be a little bit more creative with the meals I make, just so you know, you guys get a variety because I bet it can be boring just like watching me eat the same food every day. Anyway, for snack I had another RX bar, and for lunch I had 2 hard-boiled eggs with lots and lots of vegetables while doing my math homework. For dinner I had a hamburger with some fries. This was very good. And then I was still hungry, so I had some pineapple as a bedtime snack. For snack, I had a protein bar while watching Fences. Comment down below if you guys watched it, it's really good. And then for lunch, I had rice cake with cream cheese, salmon, bell peppers, and also some soup, which was so nice and cozy, great for the cold weather. And then for dinner, I had grilled cheese, veggies, pierogies, and some salad. I also ended off my night by having a pumpkin cheesecake. So the next question is, should I lower my calorie intake when not exercising? So just because you're not working out, it doesn't mean you have to force your body to eat less. At the end of the day, it's all about listening to your body and eating when you feel hungry. With that being said, even though you shouldn't restrict anything, it's still really important to be mindful of the type of food you're eating and how much of it. Because you're going to be burning less energy when you're not exercising, you would possibly have to adjust your calorie intake just so it would match your activity level. Of course, as you guys saw, there were days where I had pizza and other high-calorie foods, which is okay. If you have 2 bad days of eating, that won't ruin your progress. It won't cause you to gain weight. It's all about how healthy you're eating long-term. So it's okay to have dessert every day. It's okay. Even if you're not exercising, it's completely fine to have dessert every day. Yeah, that was second question answered. Today's breakfast was lighter than usual. I just had a banana chocolate protein shake. And then for lunch, I had 2 rice cakes, one with peanut butter and jelly and the other one with avocado. Now usually my family and I like to make sushi every couple months, so we had sushi for dinner and it was so delicious. And then to end off the day, I had some ice cream. So this is the final physique update, and I mean, if I were to be picky, I could have maybe spotted a few slight changes in my body, but In reality, I'm not really seeing much of a difference at all, which is just here to show that no, in only 2 weeks you most likely won't see any difference. Okay, you guys, so the challenge is over and it's finally time to reveal my thoughts on taking a 2-week rest and if I liked it or not. After 2 weeks, that's when it hit me. Who am I and why am I not exercising? Felt like a part of me was missing. I felt kind of unhappy and almost unproductive. I've been living an active lifestyle for as long as I can remember, and exercising is something that makes me feel happy, makes me feel complete. It's a part of me I'm scared to lose. After 2 weeks of not working out, I felt out of shape. I felt like all my progress just disappeared. I was worried I wouldn't be able to do 30 push-ups or hold a handstand for a long time, but of course those thoughts were just me overthinking and in reality only 2 weeks did not change anything. Needless to say, I am proud of myself even though this challenge is honestly super hard for me. This was an experiment and hopefully you learned something new from this. Hopefully you also enjoyed this what I ate portion of this video and it gave you a little perspective of the type of food I ate during my 2-week rest. Remember, it's more than okay to treat yourself even on rest days. It's all about eating mindfully. It's all about balance, and it's all about eating a combination of both nutrient-dense food and food for the soul. So yeah, that was the video. I hope you guys enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed making it, and I'll see you guys next week. Bye!