Creating Balance

We all have muscular imbalances in our bodies. Everyone. Some of us are more flexible on one side than the other, or have one leg or arm that's stronger, and a lot of us even have tilted heads and shoulders. Exercising should work towards correcting these imbalances, not make them worse.

The solution is simple, shockingly simple: for every push, there should be a pull.

Examples:
For every push-up you do, you should be doing an equal amount of inverted rows.
For every overhead press you do, you should be doing an equal amount of pull-downs.
For every leg extension, a leg curl.
It goes on...

A majority of people organize their workouts according to body part--shoulders, chest, and triceps; back and biceps; lower body and core-- and that's fine and good, assuming you're training at equal intensity and load for each of those days. Personally, I find it easier to do upper body and lower body, so I can organize my pushes and pulls within the same workout.

This goes for flexibility, too. I always see people stretching their lower body thoroughly, but when I see people doing upper body stretches (more rare), they are short-lived and half-assed. Flexibility is equally as important everywhere on your body, so you should give equal time and attention to everything, which includes upper body stretches!

Hopefully this will help you organize your workouts. Feel free to comment if you have any questions.