If you could get the effects of lifting weights in a pill form, it would be one of the most prescribed, profitable drugs on the market.

I’m obviously biased being a trainer, but the linked post above speaks for itself. There are so many benefits to weight training. I would genuinely argue that the return on investment for something you can do for yourself is unmatched.

Yet, why do only 1 in 5 people in the US meet the recommended amount of physical activity that is recommended?

The answer to that is…. I don’t know.

We know the benefits, yet we don’t do it. Hmm.

I had a client this week that said, “Thanks for making exercise fun for me.”

I also happened to read this quote by Steve Magness, “The longer I coach, the more I’m convinced that it’s mostly about putting people in a place where they can perform out of joy, curiosity, exploring their potential, and taking on a challenge.

Too often we let fear, protecting our self or our ego take over.”

The fact that I had a client mention that I was making exercise fun for her and then read this quote about helping people create joy really stuck out to me.

I think part of the reason that only 1 in 5 people meet the exercise guidelines is they look at exercise as another task. Another duty that they have to check off.

I don’t know about you but as a kid, I just played. I didn’t really know about formal exercise other than an organized sport.

I would just go out and ride my bike. I would walk and balance for as long as I could on the train rail across from our house. I would go to the swimming pool. I would race my siblings and friends. I would wrestle with my Dad. I would jump on the trampoline.

Overall, I would move my body in ways that were joyful.

Now as an adult I don’t do as many of those playful things, and shame on me. I definitely should.

However, I genuinely enjoy lifting weights.

I have found that the results I get from lifting… al the things mentioned above, are a direct result from the effort that I have put in.

And knowing that my hard work led to something, brings me joy and pride.

I’m sure you can relate to that. Whether it being your significant other acknowledging that you did something around the house, getting a promotion at work, starting your own business, finishing a DIY project- all of these things give you that sense of accomplishment which can be joyful.

You taking care of your body can have that same effect.

So get out there and make things fun. 💪

“Gosh, I hate this weather.”

“These kids are driving me crazy”

“Why do these things always happen to me?”

“I hate working out!”

And before this goes too far, we all have negative thoughts and times when we are discouraged or audibly let out our frustrations. That is perfectly okay.

But when does that go too far? When do you suddenly become the glass half empty person?

I imagine that it’s a fine line that we all can tote depending upon the situation.

For example, for me I feel as though I’m more of a glass half full type of guy, however if you get me working on something that I’m not naturally good at, you’ll probably hear a lot of negative self talk/ colorful language.

Does being pessimistic tend to result in better outcomes?

The short answer is no. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. Research has shown that those who tend to view situations in a more positive light, tend to have better outcomes.

Let’s take fitness for example.

For a lot of people, getting in shape has created some scars.

You have tried many different workout routines and diets and at some point they have all failed.

You are constantly knowing you should be doing something in terms of working out and eating better but you think, “Why even waste my time? I know I’m going to fail Just like I did before.”

To me it’s pretty easy to see why you have that mentality but it’s also pretty easy to see that if that is your mentality, you probably aren’t going to have much success.

So can you change from being a glass empty to a glass half full type of person?

The research suggests that you absolutely can. It also suggests that if you want to start making changes, that you should switch from having a pessimistic view to a more optimistic one.

Here’s how:

You have to start envisioning your future and how you want it to look and you also have to adjust how you view adversity.

Both of these I think are really interesting concepts that I would love to dive more into over time. For two reasons, one I think as we get older we tend to stop imagining and stop dreaming as much about the future. We essentially become less child like, and I think that’s kind of sad. Second, doing hard shit makes us better, tougher humans. Sounds really hardcore, but that’s not it. think about when you’ve done something super challenging and the way it makes you feel once you’ve accomplished it. You don’t get that same feeling from taking the easy path.

But I digress.

What the answer to being more positive doesn’t look like is just telling yourself to be more positive. That is a start but not the best solution.

What you are going to do is think of who you want to be in the future.

“In two years, what do I want for myself? I want to be someone who goes to the gym consistently 3 days a week. I want to be someone who cooks most of my meals at home. I want to be someone who is confident in my body. Both in how it looks and what it is capable of.”

In doing this, all at the same time of understanding that it is going to be difficult. There will be setbacks but you have to start believing that there is a better version of yourself out there in the future. That your ACTIONS can influence whether or not you get there.

That last sentence leads us to the other part after envisioning and dreaming of your future, which is how you handle adversity.

There are many ways to do this but something that came to my mind as an example to illustrate what this can look like practically is something I hear one of our fellow coaches say to this clients and athletes all the time.

There are these things in life that have become universally accepted as “negative.” Such as Mondays. We have to go back to work, school, etc. You can hear the grumbles from coworkers, even from me just typing that sentence.

Yet this coach, will go around shouting, “Monday, best day of the week!! It’s a great opportunity to get better!”

He’s just reframing what you see as adversity, a difficult day, into a positive. This is part of what you must do.

“I am someone who gets up early to workout.”

Not because you loooove to do it. But for your life it’s what is necessary to achieve your goals. And you can’t go around groaning that it sucks or you’re going to want to quit.

I want you to finally have that breakthrough and become the version of yourself that you’ve always dreamed of.

I know you want that to.

When you’re ready, I truly feel that envisioning your future self and reframing adversity can be some good tools to switch from being a glass half full to a glass half empty person and actually start making some meaningful changes.

You’ve got this! 💪

Oftentimes you get stuck trying to be perfect.

In that pursuit of perfect, you don’t step outside of your comfort zone enough to push the boundaries. You stay in your nice little box, in fear that you might mess up your “perfect.”

No one enjoys losing. I’m sure you’ve heard the saying, “I hate losing more than I love winning.”

Well, what if losing is exactly what you need in order to learn how to be successful?

Walt Disney was fired from a newspaper for lacking imagination and even went bankrupt before creating Mickey Mouse. Even after creating the character, ‘bankers rejected the concept of his famous mouse over 300 times before one said yes.’

Elvis Presley was told by Jim Denny, the Manager of the Grand Ole Opry, “You ain’t going nowhere son, you ought to be back to driving a truck.”

J.K. Rowling had her now famous Harry Potter books rejected by 12 different publishers, all while living in severe poverty and depression following the loss of her Mom and her sudden divorce.

The aforementioned Michael Jordan was cut from his Junior Varsity basketball team in high school.

My favorite author, John Grisham had his first novel, A Time to Kill rejected by 28 publishers before finally one agreed to print 5000 copies.

When thinking about how it relates to fitness, what I see most often is people set barriers for themselves before they even start:

“I’m too old.”

“I’ve always been heavier.”

“My family never taught me how to eat properly.”

“I am uncomfortable going to a new gym to use equipment that I’m unsure of.”

Really all that is, is you setting up an excuse so you don’t have to feel failure or loss. You are building in a barrier to try to feel and stay safe. But internally you still long to make the change.

Our body and our brains like playing it safe though.

With me being a trainer, you might be thinking, “What do you know? This stuff has always come easy for you.”

Yet, I have had times and similar constraints that I’ve tried to place on myself.

As a kid growing up, my family generally ate at home a lot and probably healthier than some but I didn’t “know” anything about nutrition. Also, I’m not sure I even knew what a vegetable was. Do potatoes count? Especially the fried variety.

When I started wanting to make a change to my dietary habits, initially I felt frustrated because no one taught me what to do. I started to use it as a crutch because it felt difficult to know where to start.

Eventually, I decided to buck up and give it a go. However, it wasn’t easy. I remember going to the salad bar of my college cafeteria and trying to eat the raw vegetables by themselves because I knew I needed to eat some vegetables but didn’t really knwo where to start.

Talk about chocking something down.

I also had a similar experience with exercise. When I started lifting, I didn’t have the knowledge on program design or even exercise selection. I tried to piece together bits and pieces from the internet and from watching others in the gym. However, I had a similar feeling originally about not having the knowledge and feeling like when I stepped in the gym I had no idea what to do.

Through trial and error with both training and nutrition I figured things out. I don’t remember tons of specifics but I know I “failed” or did things wrong A LOT!

While fitness (exercise and nutrition) for most of us is no longer a sport, it often requires lots of “loses” along the journey to figure out what works best for YOU.

The process of trying and learning knew things also makes the experience gratifying. Which is another reason why I believe someone like Jordan can have this perspective when reflecting on his basketball career.

I’m sure in the moment he didn’t love losing. None of us do.

Yet in retrospect, a lot of valuable lessons come from stepping outside of that comfort zone to better yourself.

“I’ve been going back to the gym 4 days a week for the last couple weeks and I’m trying to trim fat. What’s your best advice?”

Here was my answer:

“I love that man! Feels good to be back I’m sure.

First, I think establishing that routine of being back is plenty of change to start. Sometimes it’s hard to change that routine and then also change how you eat.

Which is where I’m going next.

Working out isn’t super efficient at burning calories and in turn helping you lose weight.

It’s good for a lot of other things, like building muscle, getting stronger, preventing osteoporosis (lose of bone density), heart health, metabolic health etc. So you should definitely keep it up.

In terms of fat loss, find something that’s easy to change for you at first.

One of the first places for a lot of people is calories taken in through liquids. Soda, alcohol, energy drinks, milk etc. Try taking those away or switching to low calorie options.

Another easy switch is getting rid of mindless snacking. A lot of people “think” they don’t eat much but they’ve grabbed 10 handfuls of snacks throughout the day that they just forgot about.

So just stopping that alone can be helpful.

Those are generally good places to start. If you’re still struggling after that, shoot me a message.”

At this point, I’m sure that those of you who have read what I write are not surprised by my answer. For one, that working out isn’t really the answer to fat loss. It helps because as you gain muscle you’re body is more efficient at burning calories but ultimately it isn’t the main driver of weight loss.

You are likely also not surprised that I took the approach of advising this person to start small.

No one typically loves this advice but also how many times do you know people, maybe even yourself, who start and stop new diets all the time?

My goal is to help people make change that is lasting.

Changes to your diet in my experience are the hardest changes that you can make and actually sustain.

Something in our brains tells us “ screw this, I’m going off the rails” when we eat one thing that we deem as “bad.”

Have one piece of cake? Might as well have 3 and start over Monday.

These are just the things that I see over and over.

Which is what leads me to the approach of starting small.

Take away the calories from liquids that you are consuming.

Instead of the Mountain Dew, try a diet.

Pick a flavored or seltzer water to allow yourself a different flavor than just plain water.

If you do this for a few weeks successfully, you’ve built confidence in your ability to make a change.

And then you can start layering other habits on top of that.

You can look to stop the snacking. Most of the time we are snacking it is out of habit or boredom, not hunger. We walk by the pantry and just grab a handful of chips, just because they are there.

To be clear these two examples of habits you can change aren’t gospel. You can change any habit that you deem easiest at the beginning. The point is to make a small change that feels manageable to build your confidence in your ability to make a dietary change.

Next, I feel as thought something about the human brain loves a game, we love to make things competitive. When it comes to a diet, always taking things away tends to feel like a loss.

Most diets out there talk about taking away carbs, or fats or whatever it is because that is reducing the total number of calories that one is consuming. Which is fair because ultimately a reduction in calories is what is needed to create fat loss.

However, something that I like to have people do is add things to their diet.

Huh?

Stick with me.

I’ll try to have people add “x’ number of veggies and fruits to their diet per week or per day.

So for someone that eats virtually zero of either, they have to eat one serving of fruit and veggies throughout their day.

Fruits and veggies tend to be low in calories, higher in fiber and satiation. So they will leave you feeling fuller without having to consume a bunch of calories.

In turn, hopefully in the grand scheme of things you are taking in less calories which will lead to fat loss.

In doing this it also gamifys things by having to hit a goal of one serving of each versus the thought of taking away some other type of food.

Once this person got pretty good at having their one serving per day, I’d have them up it to two.

If someone has reached this point of virtually no liquid calories, they’ve minimized their snacking, and they are eating a couple servings of fruits and veggies each day there is a good chance they are well on their way to their weight loss goals.

However, one thing I wanted to reiterate is still eating foods you enjoy. Just because you “diet” doesn’t mean you should restrict yourself entirely of the things that you like to eat. There are ways to eat smaller portions of higher calorie foods you like, find lower calorie alternatives, flavor your foods to make them enjoyable, or just straight up eating the thing it is you love guilt free while also still losing weight.

I feel as thought that is important to reiterate because it feels as though oftentimes strict restriction leads people to fall off the wagon, eventually.

Find something that feels easy for you to change initially. Do that for a couple weeks to a month consistently. Then add something else that feels like an easy change and do that for another couple weeks to a month. Once you’ve accomplished that, start playing the addition by subtraction game. All along the way, make sure you are enjoying yourself and not being overly restrictive. Food is still part of your life and for a lot os us, it’s part of an experience that brings us joy, so go enjoy it while still chasing your goals.

If this helped you and you think it could help someone else, I’d love if you would share it with them!

I’m not a physical therapist or doctor so injuries and pain are certainly not my speciality. However with coaching clients, there are times that we have to navigate pain.

I’ve learned a thing or two over the years that I think can be useful.

We’ve all been there. One day you wake up and all of a sudden your knee hurts. Some of us have been there more times than others.

Which then leads to the thought, “is this what getting old feels like?”

While some of that is true, wear and tear from the “abuse” of what we have put our bodies through over time can add up. That also doesn’t mean we should just blindly push through the pain signals that are our bodies are sending us.

Like most things, pain and the management of it can be complex.

On one hand you’ll have people claiming that if you do these 5 exercises you will be “pain free” and on the other hand you have people proclaiming that you’re just getting old and you have to deal with this pain for the rest of your life.

Frankly, I think both are wrong.

I think the answer lies somewhere in the middle.

Can you expect to live your life totally pain free? No. But should you accept that have to live with this level of pain just because you’re aging? Screw that. In a lot of areas you have the ability to work your way out of that and make a change that creates less pain, versus just succumbing to “I’m old".”

The first thing that I tell clients when it relates to pain is to make sure and let me know when they start to feel some discomfort with something.

While you might not be working with a trainer, recognizing and assessing when the pain starts is probably the best thing you can do.

Versus, feeling some pain and deciding to just keep pushing through it.

You may come to the conclusion that it’s a tolerable level of pain to push through but having some self awareness when it starts can go a long way in mitigating how bad it gets.

While recognition is the first key, I’d say the next step is figuring out what level of pain is tolerable.

I like to use the simple pain scale of 1-10. If you are getting above a 3-4 during an exercise, then it’s probably best to not try to push through that particular exercise that day.

As you train, you tend to get better at this.

I, especially when I was training for powerlifting, would tend to get pain on the left side of my lower back. I got really good at sensing when it was going to be an issue and when to determine it was time to work around it for the day before it ultimately got worse.

Similarly , for you, the more you workout, the easier it will get to start sensing these things before they become too big of a problem.

The important part is to take action on what you’re noticing and not always trying to push through things. Because you don’t want to deal with that pain for longer than you should.

Lastly, and I’d say most importantly, is you have to find the amount of work that your body can tolerate without the pain creeping in.

More times than not the pain is arising from you doing too much too quickly in your workouts.

You started adding more weight too quickly. You added in more sets too quickly. You added in more reps too quickly.

Whatever avenue it came from, you basically just gave yourself too much, too fast.

So, you have to be able to take a step back and figure out where it was that you did add too quickly.

Here’s the thing, pain science is very complex. If you start diving deep into the weeds of it, it can be very confusing. But the main takeaway from the confusion, is that it’s very hard for you and I to pinpoint exactly what is causing us pain.

Many people try to waste their time thinking about, “Did I lift this with the wrong technique?”

“Did I sleep wrong?”

“Is my right shoulder slouched .000025 cm less than my left shoulder?”

Don’t waste your time and energy with all of this.

Go through the steps I presented, and unless you have an actual injury that requires medical help, eventually you will start to get better.

In the meantime, keep finding ways to train that aren’t painful.

Because if you stopped every time something caused a little pain, none of us would get healthier or stronger! 💪

As a coach, a version of this is something that I’ve heard countless times.

The fact is, we are all busy.

In order to be our healthiest self we need to prioritize fitness INTO our routine.

I’m fully aware that this can be difficult.

You have work 40 hours a week, grocery shopping and other errands, kids activities, church, social gatherings, etc. It all adds up and it can definitely make things challenging.

So, what can you do about it?

One of the easiest things you can do, is hire a coach. Biased as I may be, most clients who train with someone like me admit that having an appointment set with a coach helps keep them accountable. If left to their own devices, even when planning to come to the gym at a scheduled time, would be easier to skip without someone like me waiting for them at the gym.

However, for some simply planning workouts and actually putting the in their schedule makes the difference. Self appointing a time to train can make a big difference versus just winging it, saying “I’ll train a couple times this week.”

Another one of my favorite options is to basically create a contingency plan for the really busy seasons. While you may still already be implementing the aforementioned strategies, sometimes you don’t have a full hour or more to do your normal workout. In these cases, I like to have shorter workouts as an option. Tell yourself, that you are still going to train but condense that session down to 20-40 minutes. I personally think that this is the MOST IMPORTANT aspect to put in place. The reason that I think that is this keeps things from falling off track.

Another option, if actually making it to the gym is totally out of the question, is doing short, bodyweight exercises at home or wherever you are. Youtube is full of videos for at home 10 minute workouts, etc. if you are unsure of what to do, this is a good place to start.

In that same vain, if you can’t get to the gym, short bouts of walking sprinkled throughout the day could also be a good option to get some form of exercise.

The main thing that you can take away from these recommendations is putting some systems in place.

We all are busy. We all are really good at making excuses to get out of things that are difficult.

If you don’t put these systems into place, it will make it easier for you to quit working out.

The last thing I want for you is to stop working out!

It’s my goal to help all of you and anyone that you love and care about to achieve their goals when they relate to fitness.

So, if this relates to you or to someone you know, feel free to share with them.

Here’s my favorite post I saw from this past week:

The other day we were talking about practice that he had the night before with his group and their coach.

He was discussing what they did and how he felt that some people in the class took things less serious than others.

He then commented on how everyone was learning and creating habits from their practice whether they liked it or not.

I love that way of thinking because it applies far beyond the pickleball court. Every action we repeat is teaching us something. We’re reinforcing habits, shaping our identity, and moving in a direction, even if we aren’t intentional about it.

The consequences of our actions don’t wait until the end. They’re happening every day, often without us noticing.

Eating healthy and working out are no different.

We are all on a diet of some kind.

Whether we like the word diet or not, it doesn’t change the fact that we eat food which technically makes up or “diet.”

If you have health goals that diet can align with those goals or it can be something that takes you further away from your goals.

It is your duty, to yourself and to your loved ones to take actions that give you the best chance at living a healthy life.

When it comes to working out, if you are just going through the motions, you likely won’t be getting everything out of the workout that you should.

If I take two people and put them on the same program but one gives full effort 90% of the time (it’s impossible to give max effort every rep of every session) and another person who gives their max effort 25% of the time, who do you think will get better results?

Inherently, I think we all know this. But hearing it framed that way was a great reminder.

The consequences of our actions are happening whether we acknowledge them or not. They don’t care how motivated we feel or how we think things should go. Every choice is moving us in a direction, reinforcing a habit, and shaping who we become.

It’s easy to overlook because the effects are rarely immediate. But they’re always there, quietly adding up over time.

We’ve all dealt with upper back pain between our shoulder blades at some point.

If this is you, here’s one of my favorite ways to get rid of this pain:

Worker: “Hey man, what do you stack this creatine with?’

Client: “ Metamucil man, I’m pushing 40 years old.”

First of all, this interaction is hilarious. Second, it had me thinking that I should put out a list of supplements that I think would be beneficial for people to use.

I want to preface this with saying that I’m obviously not a doctor.

I know you all are shocked by that statement. I’m sorry to disappoint.

But the supplements I’m going to talk about are ones that are commonly brought up to personal trainers and ones that I find beneficial or not. There may be some others that are left off that would be better to ask someone more knowledgeable than me about.

CREATINE

Creatine is among the most well-studied and effective supplements for improving exercise performance. It does this mainly by increasing energy availability during high-intensity activity. Creatine may also provide cognitive and mental health benefits in some contexts.( link )

In terms of supplements it’s probably the first one that I’m going to recommend. While it isn’t necessary to take it, it’s beneficial to your training, especially weight training and it’s cheap and easy to take.

PROTEIN POWDER

Whey protein is one of the two high-quality proteins derived from cow’s milk (casein being the other). Its high digestibility, quick absorption, and well-researched benefits for muscle gain and cardiometabolic health make it a popular protein supplement among athletes and older adults. (https://examine.com/supplements/whey-protein/?show_conditions=true).

I recommend whey protein powder IF you aren’t getting enough protein through your diet currently. (1.2 to 2.0 g/kg of body weight to support muscle repair and recovery (e.g., 82 to 136 g for a 150-pound person).

CAFFEINE

Caffeine is a central nervous system stimulant that can improve sports performance and aspects of cognitive function. Caffeine or caffeine-containing beverages are often taken to help restore alertness and wakefulness to reduce drowsiness. Despite its side effects, caffeine is safe for most people, and caffeine-containing beverages like tea and coffee are socially acceptable and widely used.

If you can tolerate caffeine, it can be a performance enhancing supplement, so it is something I would recommend taking before a workout to improve performance.

These three supplements and a good well rounded diet are the three I would unequivocally recommend.

Unfortunately the word SUPPLEMENT is meant for just that to run as an addition, or enhancement to what you are already doing. It isn’t made to make up for something that you are lacking entirely.

That being said, there area few other supplements that I would recommend if you are deficient:

• Vitamin D

• Fiber

• Fish Oil

All of these have shown to have benefits

With Vitamin D, you would want to see if you are actually deficient in order to see if it were worth it or not.

With fiber, you should be aiming for 25 grams as a female and about 38 grams if you are a male. A lot of people are deficient when it comes to these numbers so a supplement can help them reach those benchmarks.

With fish oil, if you aren’t eating fish 2-3 times a week you are probably deficient in Omega 3 fatty acids and could stand to supplement with a fish oil.

If it isn’t one of those six supplements I would likely just disregard it and not waste your money on it.

Things like:

• Electrolytes- unless you work a job where you sweat a lot, or you’re doing activities that make you sweat a lot. Most of us, aren’t needing to replenish our electrolytes enough to need to supplement regularly, no matter how much as LMNT has influenced us.

• Fat burners- just no

• BCAAs- if protein intake is high enough, very little benefit.

• Testosterone boosters- just no, again. If you’re testosterone is low, or you sense that it is, go to the doctor and get it checked out. They will get you squared away, under medical supervision.

• Detox products- this is why you have a liver and kidneys. They do a pretty great job of detoxifying.

• Pre-workout- some can be beneficial but can be overpriced for the benefits that coffee or tea can give you from the caffeine contained in them.

These are examples of some products that we get asked about as trainers that I wouldn’t recommend.

As I mentioned before my opinion on supplements are that they aren’t something that you should rely on.

They aren’t something that will make big, sweeping changes in your health. Instead, you should view them as something to help fill on the gaps that you don’t get from proper exercise, sleep and nutrition.

They still have their use, so I wouldn’t disregard them, just don’t expect them to be the secret sauce.

One reason I’ve enjoyed Substack and want to keep posting here is the rise in short form media and Substack is the exact opposite of that:

I heard a similar though provoking question to this one the other day. Then I heard a message at church that related to it and so I wanted to explore this idea.

BUCKLE UP.

When I start planning for my goals I can write down about 50 things I’d like to work on. Once I get going the ideas start flowing and I realize there are a lot of things that I would like to accomplish.

I shortened this to the point that relates to the story, so you won’t be listening to an entire sermon. Take a listen to this message:

At church the other day, DawnChere read her list of goals for the summer. She joked that these goals could’ve been written to be accomplished over a lifetime but when she was younger, she thought she could get them all done in the summer.

I’m sure, in fact I know, that this isn’t something that is only common between me and this speaker.

Many of us suffer from the thought of trying to do too much.

Yet if we were to list out our priorities, would our actions be aligned with those goals?

The thought might be present of “why does it matter that I have a ton of goals?”

The nature of having a ton of goals isn’t inherently “bad.” In fact, it’s a good thing to be ambitious. However, if you’re like me, you might often feel like you’re falling short because it’s difficult to reach all those goals at once.

Going back to the first question though, are our actions viewed from an outsider aligning with our goals?

With a lot of goals, it’s going to be difficult to manage all at once.

Instead, maybe it’s time to visit the goals that are ranked with higher importance, and figure out a way to prioritize those.

Health psychology researchers Sheeran Paschal (2002) reviewed studies on intentions and behavior and found that intentions only explained about 28% of the variance in actual behavior.

Meaning:

A lot of people genuinely intend to do something, but the intention alone is not enough.

So what can we do?

In my opinion, this is the time to prioritize what it is you really want and focus in on that.

Let’s take fitness for example.

Maybe you want to get better at running, get stronger, eat healthier, lose weight, and sleep better. Basically you want to do all the things to be as healthy as possible. Which is a solid thought, yet probably not very practical.

What I would do in this situation (barring a health issue that needs addressed though weight loss), is find the thing about all of that that you enjoy the most.

For me, it would be something involving getting stronger.

I would narrow that down to something within getting stronger that I want to accomplish.

For example, bench pressing 200 pounds.

Now I would set my focus on achieving that goal.

As my actions follow that goal, I start to build new habits and now that is a part of my routine. Once that is established then I would look to the next thing.

For example, trying to lose weight. In that case I would find what fit my lifestyle and personality best there and try it. Something that has always worked well for me when I want to lose weight is I tell myself for one meal a day I have to just have a meat and vegetables. Nothing else. That is very difficult to eat too many calories on just meat and vegetables. yet I’m full and it decreases my overall calories in comparison to what I would eat in a normal meal with would likely contain some type of carbohydrate (pasta, rice, potatoes).

The important thing isn’t that my strategy works for everyone. It’s that I found something simple that fits how I live and how I think.

That’s the part people often miss. The best plan is usually not the one that looks the most impressive. It’s the one you can actually repeat.

I think a lot of us don’t struggle because we lack ambition. We struggle because we have ambition in too many directions. We want to be healthier. We want to grow professionally. We want to be better parents, spouses, friends. We want to learn new things and accomplish big goals. Those are all good things. But maybe the next step isn’t adding another goal to the list. Maybe the next step is asking:

“What matters most right now?”

“What would my actions look like if I truly believed that?”

Because at the end of the day, our lives are shaped less by what we intend to do… and more by what we repeatedly do

I love the stories and the history behind the game.

This past weekend the New York Knicks won their first NBA Championship since 1973. Needless to say the city of New York had been yearning for a championship, so it was pretty cool to see them get it done.

The Knicks best player and finals MVP is Jalen Brunson.

He scored 45 points in game 5 to close out the series.

Brunson, for an NBA player, is a bit undersized. He’s only 6’1”. For comparison, the average NBA player is 6’7”.

He was highly recruited out of high school, but despite winning two National Championships while at Villanova, he was drafted in the second round of the NBA draft.

He was drafted by the Mavericks and mainly played a backup role for them, until their star, Luka Doncic, got hurt which thrust him into a starting role. In this role he started to shine. However, the Mavericks decided to not retain his services when his contract was up so he signed with the Knicks and now the rest is history as he put together one of the great finals runs in NBA history.

You might be thinking, “how does this pertain to fitness?”

Well, we are getting there. Settle down 😉

After winning the championship, Brunson was asked where he draws his confidence from.

He answered, "My confidence comes from my work ethic. All I can think of is all the hours in the summer, every summer since I ever can remember making this a reality. I'd just be alone in the gym."

This is the quote I wanted to talk about that relates to fitness.

We often see the highlights of fitness:

• The guy/gal already in really good shape physically.

• The awesome accomplishments or crazy exercises.

What we don’t see are the boring basics that these individuals practice in order to see the highlights:

• Going to sleep at reasonable times

• Eating similar, consistent meals most of the time

• Moving outside of the gym regularly

• Working out consistently for years

• Not taking prolonged breakes from training while injured/ busy seasons of life.

These things become important over time but they are glossed over by those that see the highlights and want look/feel/move the same way.

The hard part about fitness is that the results usually show up after the motivation disappears.

The first few weeks of training are exciting. You buy the new shoes, start the program, feel the soreness, and feel like you’re finally “locked in.”

But then life happens.

You have a busy week at work. The kids get sick. You don’t sleep well. You miss a workout. You don’t feel like meal prepping.

This is where the difference is made.

Not in the perfect weeks. In the weeks where you do the basics anyway.

Brunson’s quote is a good reminder that the fruits of our labor may be delayed. This is his 8th season. in the NBA and his first championship. Yet he’s spent YEARS training hard in a gym by himself, with no cameras and no crowds cheering him on. All for that to culminate in the moments that made him a champion, years later.

And honestly, this is where I see the biggest difference between people who make long-term progress and those who constantly start over.

The people who get stronger aren’t necessarily the ones who have the most discipline every day.

They’re the ones who can consistently show up even when the excitement wears off.

When you see someone in really good shape, you can be assured that they have spent a lot of time doing the boring basics consistently to lead to that really good shape.

Fitness isn’t built in the moments where everyone is watching.

It’s built in the quiet moments:

• The workout you almost skipped but completed.

• The meal you ate even though nobody was there to congratulate you.

• The extra walk you took because you knew it mattered.

• The boring reps, repeated over and over again.

Because eventually, those boring reps become the highlight.

PATIENCE AND PERSISTENCE

Those two things are what you are going to need if you want to continue to creep towards being a fitter version of yourself.

It took me a bit to think about it, but funny enough, in terms of adding the most muscle it had to be about a year into actually lifting. Which was at the point where I had no formal knowledge on exercise or programming.

I had just moved to Missouri State and I was just starting my degree in Exercise Science, but I was in the pre-professional path and I was wanting to be a physical therapist. So, I was new to all the information on exercise science that I was about to receive. I was eager to learn but I was pretty green at that point.

While I didn’t know much about how to program workouts, I trained really hard and I trained often. I was lifting weights 6 days a week at that point. I was obsessed. It was arguably an unhealthy obsession with how much I centered my life around it at that time.

However, there is a lesson to be learned there. If I looked at the program I was doing at the time, I would be embarrassed. Buuuuuut the effort was there. I was determined to gain muscle and get stronger. I rarely missed sessions or skipped reps/sets. I was continuously pushing to do more.

I was taking my nutrition seriously as well. I was eating enough calories in order to gain the desired muscle I was looking for.

A lot of prospective clients will come to me with some version of “not knowing what to do in the gym.” Which is valid and there is something to be said for learning the basics of performing the exercises correctly and having an experienced coach run you through and establish a solid program for you. Yet, if someone isn’t willing to put in the effort to yield the results the program doesn’t matter much.

That’s one of the biggest lessons that I’ve learned as a coach: most of the results that you get are a direct reflection of the amount of effort you put in.

As coaches, it’s our job to help bring out that level of effort. We are tasked with helping you find that effort on the days you don’t feel like it.

If you don’t have a coach already, here are some ways you can do so for yourself:

• Lower the starting point- don’t put too high of expectations on yourself at the start of your journey. Also, once you’ve began the journey, you won’t always be perfect. Give yourself some grace. You’ll get off track, but just make sure you get back to it.

• Find your deeper “why”- I have a client who started working out because she saw her father slowly decline from health issues related to him being overweight. That’s a deep why. Yours doesn’t have to be quite that deep, but I’d imagine most of us want to be around and active for as long as possible. Tgat can be something that you come back to.

• Track tiny wins- did 5 pounds more this week than you did last year? Acknowledge that and feel proud of it. Giving yourself these wins along the journey helps build confidence.

• Automate your prep- eliminate decision fatigue by prepping your food or keeping your workout clothes in your car at the start of the week.

• Choose enjoyable movements- make working out fun. Choose exercises that you will enjoy that way you stick with them longer. If you hate running, try riding a bike or swimming. Hate back squatting? Well, get over it…just kidding, use a leg press.

I think the biggest lesson here can be summed up by this quote:

“Don’t let your learning lead to knowledge. Let your learning lead to action.”

―Jim Rohn

Too often, we get stuck trying to learn everything before we take the first step.

I’m guilty of this too. Heck, sometimes I do it with this newsletter. I’ll spend more time thinking, planning, and tweaking than actually hitting publish.

The problem is that knowledge alone doesn’t create results. Action does.

Sure, taking action means you might make a few mistakes along the way. But those mistakes are often the fastest way to learn. And while you’re learning, you’re also moving closer to your goal.

When it comes to fitness, most people don’t need the perfect workout plan, the perfect diet, or another six hours of research.

They need to start.

Because a decent plan that you actually follow will always beat the perfect plan that never gets implemented.

Here’s a post I made last week that somewhat goes along with today’s newsletter:

Here’s a quote I came across this week that I really liked:

“The resistance that you fight physically in the gym and the resistance that you fight in life can only build a strong character.”

– Arnold Schwarzeneggar

You remember what it used to feel like to run a mile or to lift weights, and now that you are getting back into it, it no longer feels the same. In fact, it probably feels much worse because you remember how it felt when you were in shape, and well nowwww…..

The most important thing to remember:

YOU ARE NOT WHO YOU WERE THEN

As a coach, I’ve seen this happen far too often. People start and then get discouraged that they aren’t where they used to be.

I had a client several years ago that came to me after basically failing at every attempt to get back into shape. By the time he sought out my help he had some simple instructions:

• He needed someone to meet him where he was at

• He needed someone to keep him in line and not let his expectations jump too high at the beginning.

In terms of a body transformations, he had one of the best of anyone that I have personally worked with.

He knew himself and he knew that he would be tempted to do too much too fast, if he didn’t have someone there to keep him accountable.

Which in his case, and many others, would result in an inability to live up to those expectations that he set.

So, how can you make the same changes?

The first (what I believe is the most important) is don’t put your body transformation goals at the top of your list. Changing how you look isn’t a fast process. Instead, focus on things that your body can do:

• “I’m going to walk 4 times per week for 20 minutes at a time.” - Low barrier to entry. You literally just put your shoes on and go. It doesn’t take much time or effort. Making it one of the easiest places to start, which also starts compounding your confidence in your ability to stick to a fitness related goal.

• Next, “I’m going to work to do a little bit more than I did before.” If it’s walking, go for a few more minutes. If it’s the gym, add a few more pounds to the bar or add a few more reps to your set. You aren’t going from 2 days to 6 or anything crazy like that, it’s incremental progress. Once again, that is going to help create this confidence in your ability to stick with something because it doesn’t feel daunting.

I’ve talked about this before but when I get new clients the first place I go with them is trying to help them get stronger. That doesn’t mean powerlifter or strongman level strong, unless that’s their goal. It just means them doing 5-10 pounds more than what they’ve done before.

I like to start here for a variety of reasons but the main benefit for the newsletter today is, the opposite of the body changes that we talked about earlier, you can see this progress much faster. Oftentimes, it’s from session to session. Example:

• The first week in the gym you did goblet squats for 3 sets of 8 reps at 35 pounds. The next week you did them at 40 pounds and by week 4 you are doing the same sets and reps for 50 pounds. Now, not all of that is strength, there’s some neurologic adaptations and novelty of learning a new movement, etc. Buuuuut, once again it’s going to help build confidence.

I’m sure you are sensing a theme — We are trying to find ways to create habits for getting back into fitness by making things easier on ourselves at the beginning.

Think about your job. If we switched roles and you said, “Patrick, I’m going on vacation next week, and I need you to do everything I do in a week. Don’t mess this up because my job depends on it.” But you gave me no real training, no onboarding, and no time to learn the ins and outs of the systems you work with, how do you think I would do?

I can tell you, your arse would be fired 😂

So why in the world do we do the same thing with our fitness?!!

In my opinion the best thing you can do is start slow but also hold yourself to the initial goal you place on yourself.

Assess what challenges life currently holds and how you can fit your fitness into that life. Create a plan that is reasonable and follow it for a month or so. You now have a new baseline that you can always fall back on when you find yourself slipping in the future. Once you feel as though you have that routine down, repeat that same process and see what else you can add. Eventually you’ll be to a point where you are working out a couple/few days a week while getting some movement and activity outside of the gym as well. At that point, that will just be who you are and what you do.

Send this to someone that feels like they have tried everything and can’t get back in a routine. This can hopefully be a guide to help them be easier and help them get back to a healthier version of themselves.

This was one of my favorite posts I saw this week and I thought it would be helpful to all of you:

PREACH.

I think a lot of people fail in the gym because they create plans around their “perfect.” “If all goes right, I’ll be able to do this many days in the gym.”

I’ve been there.

As you’re reading this, have you ever had a similar thought?

We get busy and we get tired. We are humans. We are always going to have other responsibilities that can pull us away from things we want to accomplish.

So what can you do?

• Have or give yourself the grace to shorten said workout. Don’t opt out of the workout, just reduce it. Tell yourself you still have to go and get 15 minutes of what is programmed for yourself done. Set a timer and go.

• Have some nutrition guidelines that you fall back on. Examples would be making sure to eat a protein and a vegetable at each meal.

• Prepare your meals for the week because you know your time to cook will be limited during the week.

• My favorite- just look ahead to what the week holds and adjust your schedule. Oftentimes we get in the thick of things and think we are busier than what we are, just because our routine changed. But really you just couldn’t workout Wednesday because of the kids soccer game, but Thursday you have 2 hours free. Our mind is silly, knowing Thursday isn’t our normal workout day so sometimes we skip over it as an idea entirely. Just take 10 minutes before your week starts to prepare a little bit.

The bottom line is that your mind is rarely going to feel like doing the hard thing. That’s why you need structure. You need a system that makes the hard thing part of your routine instead of something you negotiate with yourself about every day. It sounds simple on paper, but it can be incredibly difficult to put into practice.

Heck, I work in a gym, and even I can come up with every excuse possible to skip my own workout.

So I understand that for people with even more barriers, like finishing a long day at work, remembering to pack gym clothes, changing, driving across town, and everything else that comes with it, there are even more opportunities for your mind to say, “Just don’t go today.”

That’s exactly why having a system in place matters. The goal isn’t to rely on motivation. The goal is to create a routine that keeps you moving forward even on the days you don’t feel like it.

If you sit at a desk all day, and get that tightness between your shoulder blades, give these a try:

I stumbled upon this YouTube video last week.

The common theme and why I found it so interesting, was exactly what the title said: people have no idea how many calories that they are eating.

If I had to guess this is likely the main reason that most people truly struggle with losing weight.

It is not for a lack of effort, although at times it could be. We all know people who have gone on a diet or tried to lose weight and failed. I truly believe that for most, they are trying, they are likely just ill informed.

Watch the video and you will see how shocked these people are to be eating 500-1000 calories more per day than they thought they were.

Aside from the video, I went and looked at some other studies that looked at calorie reporting and most found people on average underreported their caloires anywhere from 20-50%!!

For most, this isn’t because they are intentionally being dishonest. The problem is people don’t have a true understanding for how many calories are in foods that they consume.

Let’s look at a couple examples:

source of photo

I wanted to show these couple of examples as ways to help you understand how the people in the first video can think they are eating less calories than they are.

If you ate a meal that contained a couple servings of vegetables, a couple servings of fruit, a serving of lean protein and a serving of a starch (carb source like a potato) you would likely leave feeling quite full. However, the calories would be rather low. Conversely, let’s say you ate like two pieces of pizza that equaled the same amount of calories. You aren’t feeling full on two slices of pizza. So what happens next is you end up eating more, either right then or later on in the day. But you don’t recognize, because it doesn’t leave you feeling full, that those two slices of pizza are high in calories. So in turn you don’t “feel” like you are eating much.

So, if you struggle with losing weight and you’re reading this questioning if you too underestimate how much you eat, what can you do?

One, you could start tracking your calories. There are plenty of apps out there these days that are pretty easy to use. You can scan barcodes and input everything you eat. This can be tedious and it isn’t for everyone. But it can be an eye opener for how much you are eating, as well as how many calories are actually in foods, like the picture of the peanut butter from above.

What I advise for most is that they track for a couple weeks. Track everything from the calories that you use in sauces and oils, to the calories that you drink. Having an idea of what you consume over a two week period can give you great insight. I don’t think it’s a sustainable approach to track for the rest of your life, but a couple weeks is a good place to start if you are interested.

Another option would be trying to just eliminate snacking. Sticking to 2-3 solid meals throughout the day, with one snack that is higher in protein. You could even add a piece of fruit or something to go with it.

If you don’t already, you could also work to add vegetables into your diet. Eating a larger helping of vegetables at a couple of meals per day can leave you feeling full, and in turn less likely to overeat on higher calorie foods.

There isn’t one perfect approach, but if you’ve struggled with losing weight you are eating more calories than you burn. So we have to find an approach that no longer has you underestimating how much you eat.

The biggest thing if you’re wanting to lose weight is learning to be mindful of what you are consuming. It has been proven that if you don’t have a plan and just think you’re “eating healthy,” you’ll probably fall short of your weight loss goals.

I was thinking the other day, what are some things that someone could do TODAY that would make a change in their fitness.

Here’s the list that I came up with:

1. Go on a walk. Low barrier to entry. Carve out 20-30 minutes in your day and just get out into nature.

2. Tell yourself that you are capable of being healthy and strong. This one may sound silly but positive self assurance can go a long way. Studies have found that higher exercise self-efficacy is linked to: better workout adherence, greater physical activity levels, improved weight loss outcomes, and higher motivation over time.

3. Getting better sleep. Stopping the late night scrolling and replacing it with something like reading (booooo lol)

4. Eating better. Eating more vegetables at meals. Trying to slow down and eat without distractions. Making sure you are getting enough protein, about your palm sized portion at each meal.

5. Setting a workout schedule. “I workout on Tuesday and Thursday at 8 am, every week. It’s on my schedule.”

6. Setting “minimums” instead of all-or-nothing goals. “I’m going to start this workout, and if I feel good or have enough time, I’ll finish, but I’m at least going to start and do 10 minutes.”

This isn’t groundbreaking new research or something that probably comes as a shock to you. However, these type of steps are often what leads to actual changes. We have all probably tried the all or nothing approach, and most of the time that approach leads to failure. Yet, we are so quick to dismiss the simple steps because they seem too easy.

So, if you feel stuck and are unsure of where to start, pick one or two of these examples and implement them today. Things don’t have to be revolutionary to make changes in your fitness, but one of these steps can get you going in the right direction.

Here’s a bonus to the usual stuff I write about. A lot of spend a good amount of time hunched over our technology, and in turn end up with a tight upper back. Below is a link to a video that shows an exercise you can do to help alleviate some of that upper back pain.

I really wanted to surprise Abbee and run a 5k with her and our kids because I knew that was something that she wouldn’t ever expect.

I ran a couple days a week at least and I was consistent with it.

I did really well all the way up until around Christmas, then slowly the wheels started to fall off.

“Missing one day will be fine.”

“Sleeping in an extra 30 minutes on the weekend is okay.” But now the kids are awake and I missed my opportunity. Later in the day just didn’t sound as good, so “I’ll do it tomorrow!”

The next thing I knew, I wasn’t running at all. And here we are May 4th, and I’m not sure the last time I did run. Yikes.

I’m sure we have all been here with something in our life. It’s easy to fall out of a routine, particularly with something that we don’t LOVE doing.

For many of you, that could be working out or sticking to some type of structured nutrition plan. Trust me, if I allowed myself, I’d be crushing some Doritos every day.

So how do we avoid this?

The first thing I always like to remind people of is something I experienced as a trainer after Covid.

In that period, many of my clients were virtually inactive for about 6-8 weeks. Prior to that though they had been training with me and built up a base for themselves.

When they were getting back to the gym, many of them feared that they would have lost all their progress. This was understandable but quickly their fears were forgotten because it took a few weeks of training and they were right back to where they were prior.

I pulled a quote about a study done on adults who took time off from the gym:

‘A new study in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports suggests even longer training breaks aren’t as harmful as previously thought. Fifty-five untrained adults either trained continuously for 20 weeks or took a 10-week break midway through. Both groups lifted twice weekly using full-body resistance exercises.

While the group who paused lost some size and strength during their break, they regained it within five weeks of resuming training, ending with results nearly identical to the continuous group. The takeaway from the study was that up to 10 weeks off won’t undo your hard work, as long as you get started again. Muscle and strength rebound fast.’( link to the article )

All of that being said to remind you that having some time off isn’t going to have you starting back from square one.

The second thing is that we can reframe our thoughts around what’s difficult and how we handle what is tough. Some days it is okay to miss a workout and rest is what we need. However, a lot of the time we need to attack the difficult things. Some days, just starting the workout is hard and we need to embrace that. Reframe our mindset that we can and should do hard things.

How often do you truly feel like working out? But how often do you feel better once you have completed a workout?

“Sometimes the most caring thing you can do for yourself is the thing you’re avoiding.”- Matt Myers from Nerd Fitness

The third thing is trying to remember why you are doing something. For instance the reason I started running was the 5k. Combined with that, I had thought about how in the future I wanted to be able to just go on a run with my wife and kids, if that was something that they eventually enjoyed. At the time, I didn’t feel like I could do that. On the days or times when things felt hard, if I could remember why I even started, it might provide more of a sense of purpose to keep moving.

The fourth thing is not trying to catch up on what you’ve missed. We have a tendency to think since we missed a workout we have to do 2 workouts tomorrow. Or on the other end, we ate poorly last night so we have to skip breakfast. Don’t do this. Get back on track and forget about the miss. One bad day won’t derail you. However, setting those unrealistic expectations, then failing at them, might have you thinking about giving up entirely.

Finally, the last thing I can recommend is trying to find the next win. It coincides with not catching up on what you’ve missed, but basically just finding the next workout or next meal that puts you back on track.

Within this, something I’ve found to be helpful is allowing myself a shorter workout than the one I had planned. Some days I don’t want to workout. However, I’ll tell myself that I’ll just workout but only do the first two exercise’s on my program. The majority of the time once I’m through with those I feel like finishing my workout, so I do. But in the worst case scenario, I stop after those two exercises but I’ve still practiced my habit of exercising.

If you find yourself slipping out of a habit:

1. Remember that some time off isn’t the end of the world.

2. You can do difficult things

3. Remember why you started

4. Don’t play catch up

5. Find your next win. Put one foot in front of the other.

If you’ve found this helpful or need help getting back on track, that’s what I do for people so feel free to send me a message and see if I can help you!

One of the most googled questions there is in the fitness category.

If you subscribe to this newsletter, I have to think that most of you are going to know what the answer is that I’m going to give. *Hint*, there’s not going to be a direct answer. However, I think this is a topic worth visiting. Who nows, maybe you’ll learn something, or maybe you’ll have something to share with a friend that asks you this question.

Nutrition

The main answer I’m going to give someone who asks me this question is that neither are particularly efficient at burning calories.

The thing that is going to move the needle for weight loss is eating less calories. You need to be in a caloric deficit in order to lose weight.

There are multiple ways to do that but the most efficient way is to get your nutrition in check.

There are Sooooooooooooo many ways to achieve that. Different diets and different rules placed around food like fasting, etc. but the bottom line is that they all achieve the same thing which is placing you in a caloric deficit. This topic is too broad to dive into today but I wanted to reiterate that point.

A caloric deficit comes form consuming less calories than your body burns.

You might still be thinking, well which of those exercises is going to help with how much my body burns?

Fair question, however our body burns calories (aka energy) from many other processes other than just exercising:

• Basal metabolic rate: The energy needed to maintain basic, life-sustaining functions while at rest, such as breathing, circulation, cell repair, and temperature regulation.

• Thermic Effect of Food: The energy used for digesting, absorbing, and storing food, which consumes about 10% of total calories.

• Exercise and movement: This includes structured exercise (running, lifting) and Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis (NEAT), which covers daily movement like walking, cleaning, or fidgeting.

Cardio Vs Weights

As you can see, part of our body burning calories does come from exercise and I still haven’t answered that dang question.

I feel like most of my job is in the grey area. Like wouldn’t you all just love for me to give you a two sentence black and white answer?!

(How I probably sound to most of you)

Unfortunately our bodies are complex and they generally don’t operate in the black and white so we have a lot of nuance in the discussions around our body’s and how they operate.

Anyway, both cardio and weight training are good for helping with fat loss. Cardio will, for equated time, generally burn much more calories, in the moment. The cool thing about lifting weights is that as our body breaks down muscle tissue during, and then is forced to work to repair that tissue afterwards which burns calories post exercise.

I would recommend that people do a combination of both weight training and cardio as they each have their benefits.

However, of course I am biased to weight training. Not only just for my enjoyment of lifting, but particularly for weight loss because the more muscle that you have the more efficient you are at burning calories at rest.

Final Answer

Stop eating like a turd.

The most efficient, likely least fun way to lose weight is to clean up your nutrition.

Put down the ice cream every night and you will probably see some pounds start to fall off.

After that, start weight training 2-3 x per week and doing some form of cardio a couple times per week. Getting more steps in everyday can also play a role in helping you burn more calories, so it’s not a bad idea to go on a walk each day.

Nutrition, weight training and cardio help each other in so many ways but if you are striving for all 3 I’ve found it to be easier at times, because it generally goes something like this:

‘I ate better, so I felt more energized to work out. Then I lifted weights, but my recovery between sets was difficult. After that, I did cardio and noticed my recovery getting better. Now that I’ve worked out, I don’t want to eat badly and undo all the hard work I’ve done.’ And then the cycle repeats.

1. Nutrition. 2. Weight Train. 3. Cardio. 4. Constant Battle to Fight Off Your Spouse/Significant Other’s “Attacks” 😂

There’s the recipe

Especially for those of us who enjoy being active and working out.

However, unfortunately a little bit of pain is a part of life.

It is definitely something that you are going to experience if you train hard enough for awhile. But you are going to experience it in life whether you train or not.

There are usually two approaches that someone takes:

1. Grit your teeth and fight through it

2. Completely rest

I would highly advise against doing either.

Pain is a pretty complex topic. I am not a physical therapist or doctor, nor do I claim to be but dealing with clients who have pain during training is juts the nature of my job so I want to give some insight into what I do and what might help you.

Here is what I tell most clients if they are telling me that they have something bugging them during a training session:

“This pain that you are feeling is likely a signal that we did too much too fast. Maybe we did too much weight, did too many reps or did too many sets. We did a little more than you were ready for and my job now is to build you up so that that feels easy again.”

From the pain science community we have learned that pain is a protective mechanism from the brain. A little note being sent that says, “Hey, something’s going on here.” Kind of like a warning light from your car.

You can have pain with and injury or you can even have an injury without pain. The brain is taking in the following and deciding whether to send the signal of pain:

• Tissue stress

• Fatigue

• Previous injury history

• Sleep, stress, emotions

• Beliefs about movement (“this lift is bad for my back”)

So, what should you do if you experience pain in the gym?

One thing we can try is to change/alter/remove some of the lifestyle factors thats may contribute such as stress, poor sleep, poor eating, negative emotions, etc.

That’s easier said than done at times.

Another thing that we can do is alter form. While that’s not always the answer, there are times I’ll have someone say “My knee hurts when I’m doing this.” So we adjust their foot position or something similar and it feels better.

I really enjoy these fixes because they help the client build that confidence that they are okay because the pain immediately dissipates.

This is one that is not so fun for us coaches, but its a reality.

That is, us checking our programming. A lot of times when a client has some sort of joint pain it can be brought back to us progressing them too quickly.

Giving them too much, too fast.

Let’s say for example:

You have a client squatting 8 sets per week and they start to develop knee pain. An easy place to start could be reducing that number down to 5 or 6 sets and seeing how well they handle that amount of load placed on the knee.

It’s not always a magic fix BUT our nervous system adapts similarly to pain how our muscles adapt to training. That is if you gradually expose a painful movement, stay within tolerable limits, build confidence and strength then your pain often decreases over time. This is called graded exposure, and it’s one of the most effective strategies in rehab and training.

One of the biggest realizations in pain science over the past few years is learning to not be fearful over an exercise.

Oftentimes, someone will get hurt doing a movement such as a deadlift and they automatically assume that deadlifts are “bad for their back.”

What researchers have discovered is that is now that you have that perceived threat, pain tends to show up faster.

When you become fearful of a movement like a deadlift , it can also push over into everyday life. Think about picking up a bag of dog food, or the groceries off the ground, while these movements don’t involve a barbell you are doing a deadlift to get them off the ground. Suddenly now you start avoiding things such as that and you start to decondition yourself and start to eventually lose some of your independence.

While it may seem silly if you’ve once been able to deadlift 200 pounds, even if you have to start deadlifting a 25 pound kettlebell, it is important to expose yourself to those types of movement patterns and build back your abilities to do those things.

Shifting your mindset from avoidance to a thought that “I can conquer this” will go a long way.

Small steps along the way will help build that confidence and mindset:

• Pain-free reps

• Slightly heavier loads over time

You aren’t going to avoid pain.

Whether you weight train or not.

Hell, even your dumb trainer might cause you to be in pain by programming you too much.

However, that doesn’t mean your broken.

Shoot I’d say that’s just a funny way of the man upstairs showing you you’re alive.

While it can be discouraging, try to switch your mindset from fear to ‘striking.’ I’m going to do the things necessary to get better.

Hara Hachi Bu

This is a traditional Japanese practice that says you eat until you are about 80% full.

Do you find yourself eating in front of a screen?

Do you find yourself finished eating, then 20 minutes later realizing you’re uncomfortably full?

Do you find that you’ve tried all kinds of dieting and none of it seems to stick?

If so, this Japanese practice might be for you.

Eating without distractions is something that I’ve been talking to clients about for a long time. In order to be mindful of the hunger cues that our body gives us, it is important that we actually pay attention to how we are feeling during a meal. Taking the time to slowly chew and digest our food.

This is exactly what the practice of Hara Hachi Bu does. Researchers have been interested in studying Japanese culture for their food habits because they have a relatively low body fat percentage for a region, as a whole.

They are finding that the habit of mindfulness while eating can result in less overall calorie intake because the body is listening to the hunger cues its’ given and people are finished eating before overindulging.

It’s estimated that about 70% of people eat while distracted with some type of screen. This behavior can lead to higher calorie intake, less consumption of fruits and veggies, and possibly some unhealthy eating disorders such as binge eating.

If the three questions that I asked initially hit home for you, maybe it’s time you give this Japanese practice a try.

Will it be the thing that helps you lose tons of weight? Who knows.

However, it is an easier fix than trying to change you’re entire diet instantly.

And let’s be honest, how is that working for you?

An added bonus and one that I might argue is even more important: you can enjoy some time in community with family and friends.

Turn off the phone or TV and have some meaningful conversations with the one’s that you love.

Slow down, enjoy the food and conversations. Listen to your body.

I had a conversation with a friend the other day and he said, “I have come to realize that none of us really know what we are doing. Sometimes I think life is this sick type of simulation that is throwing challenges at us left and right and seeing what we can figure out.”

This created a good laugh for both of us but it’s so true.

Most of the time we are all just trying to figure out the new challenges that life presents us.

The beautiful thing about life though, is we are given that opportunity to learn, almost daily.

However, one must listen in order to learn.

That is something I’ve noticed as I’ve gotten older too. Listening is a skill. You must truly open your ears and take in what others are saying in order to learn a lot of these life lessons that we feel unsure about.

You might be thinking, how in the heck does this relate to fitness? In all honesty, I might be having to stretch a little bit to get it to match but hang with me.

When it comes to fitness, people are always asking a lot of questions:

1. How many days should I workout?

2. What should I eat to lose weight?

3. Should I lift weights or do cardio?

4. How long until I see progress?

5. Should I take this supplement?

6. I read squats were bad for my knees, are they?

The truth to all of these answers is different for every person. We have some guidelines and we have some commonalities in the answers to all of these questions, but the answer lies in LISTENING to the individual.

If you are a younger individual who is just getting into fitness and you really want to get into shape, there’s a chance we could really ramp up the time you’re able to spend in the gym and on your nutrition in order to get you in the best shape you’ve ever been in. You don’t have tons of responsibilities yet or the time needed to dedicate to other areas of your life.

However, if you’re in your early 40s with kids running to practice every night, the busiest your work career has ever been and you’re trying to carve out time to go on a date occasionally with your spouse, the amount of time and resources you can dedicate to your training and nutrition might be limited. Therefore the progress might take a little longer.

With that being said, as individuals we should be listening to ourselves. Taking a step back, we should exam what it is that our life currently presents. Then see how our situation helps us answer the many of the types of questions above.

As a trainer this is the biggest part of coaching clients. Observing and listening to all the factors that clients are dealing with and helping them set realistic expectations based on those factors.

Maybe my friend was right. To some degree I definitely think he is because no two people live the same life. We are each presented with our own difficulties that we must learn to navigate and there isn’t a handbook to give us the instructions. In turn, maybe none of us fully know what we are doing.

But if we are willing to listen, to learn, and to adjust along the way, we give ourselves a much better chance of figuring it out.