I heart Jessica Biel. I think she sets a great example for girls/women because she is one of the few female celebrities that are muscular and athletic and *gasp* smokin hot too? I know it is shocking but you dont have to be a teeny tiny little waif like thing to look good.

A lot of women are reluctant to hit the gym hard or be athletic because they are afraid there is a mannish unnattractive quality to women with muscles, but Biel proves them wrong. Strong and sexy are not mutually exclusive.

In the past I have shared the mindset that if I was strong and muscular I will loose femininity so I toiled through hours of cardio and avoided hitting the weights very hard. Unfortunately I was completely ignorant to how the body works and being completely ineffecient. Instead of getting thin, I would plateau and never reach my goals. It doesnt suprise me that a lot of women I talk to also believe that cardio is what will keep or make you thin, but it is not the most effective way. Increasing your muscle mass is the most effective way to increase your metabolism. Running, biking, walking etc. are good for you, dont get me wrong, but they only burn calories while you are engaged in the activity. If you increase muscle mass however, you are making your resting metabolism (how quickly you burn calories when you are not exercising) faster, thus you burn more calories throughout the day.

I know this is a prevelant misconception because I am typically one of less than 5 women in the weight room, but if you walk by the cardio room, it is packed with women. A combination of misinformation and women being afraid to look manly results in a lot of women basically spinning their wheels. I know they are working hard but they are wasting a lot of time and growing frustrated with a lack of results and thus they often give up. I know this because I used to think the same way until a friend of mine began educating me and I continued to educate myself and it wasn't until I really started lifting weights-without being afraid of bulking up-that I saw the results I wanted. In fact it is a common myth that women will bulk up if they weight train but for most women this is genetically not possible unless you are a very hard core lifter and/or genetically predisposed to being muscular.

Physically, putting on muscle has resulted in me being the smallest clothing size I have ever been as an adult and at the same time also the strongest I have ever been. Mentally, putting on muscle has made me more confident and comfortable in my own skin. I wish more women could feel that way and bringing me back to the beginning of this post, celebrities like Jessica Biel can provide a good role model for women and girls to look to. If there were more strong and healthy celebrities like her perhaps it could help women would to be less likely to engage in unhealthy behaviors and struggle less with body issues. I dont believe women can ever really be 100% free of body issues, but we can definitely love ourselves more.

So bravo Ms. Biel, and thank you.

UPDATE: So the timing of this could not have been more perfect. I was scrolling through my FitSugar blog and they linked to a website of a trainer who had quite a lot to say about Gwyneth Paltrows visit to Oprah and specifically what her trainer told the show. Amazingly this woman (gwyeneths trainer) gets paid to train a celebrity and has NO idea what she is talking about. The real trainer that wrote about it had quite a bit to say about and calls her out on all the incorrect information that a lot of women have about weight lifting versus cardio. It is a good read, she is quite colorful and sarcastic, but she knows what she is talking about. Read it here.