1: Be Patient!

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve fallen off the horse because I did not see results as quickly as I had hoped. While I believe it to be true that nobody physically advances at the rate they hope for, I have a notoriously stubborn body. It took me a while to realize that achieving my ideal shape would be that much sweeter because I had to work for it harder than others.

The truth is, virtually nobody embarks on a fitness program doing all the right things. Either their diet is faulty, the workout routines are ineffective, or the participants lifestyle is non-conducive to the achieving of their own goals. It has taken some people a lifetime to get all the pieces of the puzzle together. I certainly did not. My puzzle was definitely missing a few vital pieces, and because this led to ultimate failure, I quit my routine several times in the past. I wish I had been more patient as I learned to refine my lifestyle and routine.

2: Be Diligent

The key to being diligent in a workout program is to make it as much a part of the daily grind as brushing your teeth or taking a shower. I noticed in the past that skipping gym days led down a very slippery slope. To exacerbate the situation, I would often skip the gym to pursue very unhealthy activities, like nights out drinking. Next thing you know, I had completely fallen off the wagon. Once I started thinking about hitting the gym as something I had to do or needed to do, instead of something that was optional based on my mood, I was finally locked in. When you hit the gym like more depends on it than just breaking a sweat, it is a completely different experience. It’s a pump like no other.

3: Give it Your All

One of my biggest problems has always been pushing my limits at the gym. Especially when I’m working out alone, I have had a tendency to cut my sets short, or wimp out on the weight. Part of it is my need to be more in tune with my body’s limits. In the past, however, I lacked the psychological drive and motivation to really push muscle groups to failure. One major help in this area was acquiring a workout partner, which I will discuss later. Even without someone else’s motivational energy, I have slowly figured out how to push myself to my limits. By focusing on how far I had come, and how far I wanted to go with my goals, my psychological factor was finally dialed in. I just wish that I had figured it out sooner.

4: Shake it Up!

Sure, there is something to be said for having a bread-n-butter workout routine, but it shouldn’t be the same repetitive, brainless endeavor every single time. The old me would hit the gym every workout day at the same time, doing the same exercises without any variation in form, quantity, or set/rep set-up. Not only did my body acclimatize to the workouts and halted muscular hypertrophy, but workouts became so boring that I soon found myself completely disinterested in hitting the gym at all. My new program has a backbone of tried-and-true exercises like deadlifts, bench presses, and squats, but allows me to throw new or modified exercises in on a daily basis to stimulate new muscle growth. It also allows me to be intellectually creative in the gym, changing my workouts from a brainless ritual into a complete workout for my body and mind.

5: Listen to Your Body

This rule is probably the hardest for me to truly follow, and I have struggled with it for years. It’s not that I wasn’t trying to listen to my body in the past, but I’m pretty sure it was speaking Spanish at the time, or at least it seemed that way. At any given time, I could be over or under-training my muscle groups and not have known any better. I would also occasionally throw my back or tweak my neck doing certain workouts with bad form or inappropriate weight. I wasn’t listening to my stomach either. Frequently, I ate too much of the wrong things and not enough of the right things, and my energy levels and body fat percentage struggled as a result.

Finding the right amount and type of calories to eat has been far more challenging than I could have anticipated. However, I am much closer to the right balance now than I used to be. For instance, I used to consume roughly 90-120g of protein a day at 190 lbs. Now, at 225 lbs, I consume about 250-275g of protein a day, with a healthy balance of fiber and complex carbs, all while consuming roughly 30-40 less grams of fats a day.

6: Lifting is Only 1 Part of the Equation

I used to believe that if I hit the gym a few times a week, I could eat however I want and run up bar bills every night. I quickly learned that one side of the scale does not balance out the other. I only started to see minimal progress once I overhauled my nutrition and lifestyle to better suit a healthy life. You simply will not get six pack abs by downing a six-pack of beer on a nightly basis. I tried, and it wasn’t pretty. After cutting back on the junk food and late nights out, I realized I also needed to start some cardio.

I have traditionally avoided running like most people avoid root canals, but it really was my best option for shedding the fat. With my cardiovascular overhaul, I found I also had more energy in the gym as a result. While it took me a very long time to realize it, all the other changes I made in my diet and lifestyle created a positive feedback loop that trickled into each and every workout in the gym. I now have more energy, stamina, and raw strength than ever before in my life, far more than I could have achieved though bodybuilding alone.

7: Ignore the Myths

My goodness, I have heard some ludicrous things. “Eat turkey and cauliflower after every workout… it’s like steroids!”, or “Do a set of 10 pushups every morning before work, and you’ll get huge”. There is a lot a bull-crap to sift through out there. One dead giveaway of the nature of such claims should have been that the people telling me such things were either much smaller than me or completely out of shape altogether. That’s like Lindsay Lohan teaching an AA twelve step program if you ask me.

Once I integrated myself and my own experiences into the gym community, I was able to draw off of other people’s successes and failures to draw my own conclusions. I was able to see in real time what was working for people and what wasn’t, whether it was a new supplement, training program, or dietary regimen. It wasn’t until I actually tried such modifications myself that the cycle completed itself, and I was able to share my experiences with others about what works and what doesn’t.

8: Find a Friend

While this ties into the previous point about integrating myself into the gym community, there’s something to be said for having a single, committed workout partner. Aside from the obvious benefits of having a spotter, there are several reasons why having a partner early on would have kept me on the right track. First of all, a workout partner is counting on you to show up on a certain day at a certain time. When I used to skip gym days, I was really only letting myself down. I would have reconsidered if someone else was counting on me.

Secondly, a workout buddy would have been helpful in managing my form. It’s often hard to tell if you are doing an exercise with poor form unless you evaluate yourself from a 3rd person perspective. Finally, a workout partner would have been a good motivator for me, both physically and mentally. Workouts are more fun and challenging when a little friendly competition or encouragement is thrown into the mix.

9: Form First!

To me, form has always been a dirty 4-letter “F” word. My early days in the gym would have made for a great instruction manual in what NOT to do. I threw weights around like Richard Simmons on a NO Xplode overdose: lots of flailing, minus the short-shorts of course. I had no control whatsoever. I rushed through sets, and for all I knew the term “muscle isolation” was referring some sort of physical ailment. My first time working out with an experienced lifter was a revelation to both of us. We both realized that I had no idea what I was doing. After that first workout, with controlled, slowed down sets and lighter weight, my muscles felt like I had just went 12 rounds with Mike Tyson, except my ear was still intact.

10: Keep Yourself in Check

One thing I can honestly say about myself is that I am not usually an arrogant person. I have had relapses from time to time, however, when my head gets a little too big. This usually happens right before something humiliating puts me back in my place. Looking back, I really wish that I realized how behind the ball I really was with my fitness level. I was occasionally stricken with a terrible disease, ILS, or Imaginary Lat Syndrome.

I would strut around with my arms lifted like I had jalapenos in my armpits, and considering the fact that my lats were about the size of jalapenos, it must have looked pretty silly. While I can say that I do not and have not dropped weights or grunted like a constipated grizzly bear while lifting, I feel like if I don’t keep myself in check, I could someday end up just another self-absorbed iron jockey. All I really want to do is be healthier next month than I was this month. True progress speaks for itself.