At the beginning of the year I decided to bulk as part of my fitness journey. I started the year of weighing 80.2 kg and my weight goal by the end of the bulk was 85kg. I had the workout part of the bulk down, that is going heavier at the gym. I slowly progressed from squatting 275 lbs (≈125 kg) to 315 lbs (≈143 kg) and by peak bulk I was squatting 405 lbs (≈184 kg) for 1 rep. The diet requirement for the bulk on the other hand was the rather challenging part. I switched up my diet completely and began eating six meals a day. The first meal as early as 6:15 am when I returned from the gym and the last at 9:00 pm, an hour before my bedtime. (More details on my diet and workout program in my next article where I elaborate my fitness journey). I reached my weight goal in June and exceeded it in July. That was not a part of the plan however, in the month of July I was preparing for my fourth year finals which was starting on the 1st of August and during exam season I can’t afford to cook and track my calories as much. I usually just order food and eat whatever I crave as long as it meant I didn’t have divided attention from my studies. I finished my exam weighing 87.7 kg. If I find a picture I’d attach it.

Having exceeded my weight goal I decided to go on a cut with no weight goal in mind. Just until I was satisfied with the results. I started the cut off desperate and took the wrong approach with it. I started of with intermittent fasting for the first week and I cut my calorie intake drastically. It was way below my maintenance calories even. Essentially I was taking one meal a day and what I realised was: I had low energy throughout the day and I was losing muscle mass. I was never full and it increased my tendencies to binge eat whenever I was hungry.  

I decided to be patient about the process and spread the weight loss journey over a period of 6 weeks and track my progress (which I did. I’d insert the file below) and that’s when I decided to implement the 10,000 steps into my daily routine. 

Tap the link below to purchase the weight loss tracker from my shop:

Weight Loss Tracker

For the purpose of this article I’d pay more mind to the journey of 10,000 steps a day. In my article on my fitness journey over the past three years I’d talk about my diet, my workout routine, how I started, the challenges I faced and the do’s and don’ts to achieve a good physique.

Walking has been proven to be an excellent exercise for weight loss for a myriad of reasons. That’s inexplicably why equipment like the stairmaster are a goldmine for many gyms. Nonetheless, let me explain it to you in the simplest way. Our body has two main energy sources; our glycogen stores and our fat stores. Research has shown that during high intensity training (HIIT) workouts (sprinting, skipping) our glycogen stores are activated more. However, during low intensity workout such as walking our fat stores are activated more than our glycogen stores. Thus, walking burns more fat than running. 

If there is one thing I observed right from the outset of this challenge, it is the fact that you don’t hit 10,000 steps in a day by going about your daily activities casually. It is surprisingly difficult to hit 10,000 steps.

It takes a lot of intentionality to tick it off your to-do list. Before I began this challenge I was averaging 2500 steps per day and majority of that came from moving around the gym during my workout in the morning. The rest of my day is usually slow. I spend most of it working behind my laptop, sleeping or reading with casual interruptions from Shade, my fur baby.

So I decided that I’d have to go for walks after dark. The first week was exciting because I discovered a lot of places in my neighborhood I’d never knew existed. It became a part of my day that I looked forward to. More so I got an amazing playlist for the walks.

Call me an overachiever but after the second week I decided that perhaps I could challenge myself and go further than 10,000 steps. I decided to average about 12,000 – 15,000 steps and that meant I had to change the route of my walks. I began to feel more exhausted after my walks and although it was a relaxed stroll I did begin to break a sweat. 

This was more than just a weight loss journey for me. As someone who is ecstatic about productivity and self development I wanted to explore every hidden gem of this new habit so I decided I’d be weighing in daily, reporting my blood pressure, and tracking all other data points to see how it goes. 

To track my steps, I used my phone. I do not own a smart watch but using a smart watch such as the Apple Watch is the most convenient approach to count your steps. That’s because an Apple Watch uses a combination of GPS tracking and arm motion when estimating distance and steps. 

Like I said I track my steps with my phone, which isn’t the most accurate measure because I don’t like to bring my phone with me wherever I go. So I’d find that I miss out on a lot of steps every day. And as I’m learning so far, every step counts. 

So right now as I key this into my drafts it’s 10:44 pm and I have 8153 steps, which means I need to walk around until I hit 10,000 steps. It’s my life.

Recent studies have shown that just 4000 steps a day leads to better health outcomes, but 7500 steps is ideal for most people. Regardless, I’m going to stick with the 10,000 steps goal..

Quick ad:

Hey there, I just wanted to let you know that my shop is currently live. I sell productivity essentials (all digital products) like my weight loss tracker and habit tracker which I’ve been using for the past three years. But there’s more, I also have budget planners, self care checklists, digital journals, monthly planners and 2025 goal planners. For as little as a dollar. Checkout my shop to purchase yours in order to chase a productive lifestyle and hold yourself accountable.

https://www.clarksonduku.com/shop

I think the one thing that I’m realizing is that my life up until now, at least over the past couple of years, has been quite sedentary. I have been lifting weights regularly and I consider myself an active person. But if there’s one area I definitely ignored for a good second, it’s cardio. The only time of the day I really get my body moving is in the gym, during my workout. Then there’s school, sitting for hours and then work, working behind my laptop. So I’m not getting up and moving a whole lot.

Perhaps I’ll get up to go to the bathroom or find something to eat. But my steps and my movement overall has actually been quite low. I tried to mechanise ways to get in my steps as early as possible. So it’s not this thing that I’m always thinking about like, “am I going to have to walk at 10:44 PM at night again just to make sure I hit 10,000 steps?” I just didn’t think that’s an appropriate way to build the habit. I wanted to do it in a sustainable way. In a way that I might be able to carry on with this habit long term. School isn’t in session at the moment but what happens when school resumes and the rat race continues? 

So eighteen days into the experiment, the first thing that really started to work for me was focusing on incidental exercise. Incidental exercise is any movement done in small amounts that adds up over the course of the day. We all have choices that we make each day that impact the amount of movement we get. Like taking the stairs instead of the elevator, walking the longer route to the gym, or pacing around my room while I read.

Incidental exercise requires less effort than carving out a dedicated hour to go for the walk and can be built off everyday activities and routines. So I began making different choices every day, and I started to notice a difference. A few 100 steps here, a couple 1000 steps there. This alone wasn’t getting me across the finish line, but it was still nice to see some progress. My brother began to join me on some of my walks and it was actually easier because we end up talking the entire walk and it made the walk feel much shorter.

One thing that I have started to do recently that has helped out immensely is to really slow down and try to actually enjoy each and every walk that I take. Early on, I’d gotten into the habit of rushing through my steps. I find myself in that awkward place somewhere between walking and jogging but once I started to slow down, I could take in the joy of my walks. I started listening to podcasts while on my walks, I relished in my love for classical music, I explored new routes and scenery in my vicinity and this has honestly become my favorite thing about the walk. There are stunning views and moments of complete immersion in the quiet that you lose track of time. And just as I started to find the joy in walking, I also started to notice some results.

I’ve done more cardio, I’ve climbed more flights, done more steps and had more walking and running distance. The calories burned has gone up from 420 calories a day to 640 plus per day. 

So today (06/10/24) I’ve just had one of the busiest days yet, blowing past 10,000 steps with little effort. And the reason I’ve been able to get so many steps is because I’ve just been doing household chores all day. I’ve done all the laundry, cleaning, sweeping, mopping, changing bedsheets, just mention it. When I have these days where I’m just naturally moving about, I’m able to get a lot of steps in.

If I’m being completely honest, just because there were days that felt effortless and days where I enjoyed my walks doesn’t mean it wasn’t still a little bit annoying. There are days where I had to wake up from sleep just to get my steps in, days where I had much going on but had to still get my steps in and days when I was busier than normal but couldn’t compromise on the goal. Essentially, it’s always a great feeling to get this notification.

I walked 10,000+ steps every day for 30 days and *drum roll*, I feel a lot better. I do. I feel a lot better now that I have gotten this extra cardio in, even if that cardio was as simple as walking more. Now let’s talk about the data. Obviously my number of steps taken went up. I averaged 12,140 steps per day and I walked a total of 407,213 steps over the course of the month. My weight dropped by 5.5 kilograms over the past month but my diet was factored into it.  Starting the month at 84.6 kilograms and ending the month at 79.1 kg. I have become much leaner, my mid-section is tighter, my abs are more visible, I am more vascular and I feel much lighter when doing body weight workouts. This is what I look like now.

Babe prefers me looking much leaner so I’d continuing along this tangent because wetin my babe like adey do (I’m a finished man). Genuinely though, I’m excited to see just how leaner I can get.
And finally, the additional steps didn’t change any other data points like my blood pressure or resting heart rate, which were at healthy levels to begin with.

To hit 10,000 steps daily, I think it’s quite a realistic goal for me personally. I do intend to walk more, and I do want to try to increase my daily average to 15,000 steps per day. Some days we’ll be less than that. Some days we’ll be more. And I plan to reach this goal by repeating some of the things that worked best for me over the past 30 days. That’s walking whenever possible, even when it’s more convenient to take an Uber (joking joking, it’s the lack of funds talking). Also I want to try to slow down and enjoy my walks as much as possible instead of rushing through them like I need to use the washroom.

If you like this article please leave a like and a comment. I document lots of habit experiments on my blog. So if you’d want to follow me on this journey, please like and subscribe to my newsletter. Thanks for taking time out to read. Have a lovely week ahead!❤️