As the warmer month’s approach and clothing gets systematically less and less, sometimes not out of choice but due to comfort (or Instagram for the narcissists) the advertising for weight loss challenges and body transformation programs heat up almost as quickly as the weather. As a gym owner, it is a our biggest time to capitalise on peoples insecurities that have been built from either a winter of inactivity or mediocrity.
The idea of this blog is to reaffirm the actual reality it takes to get significant results. I know this is going to sound like a preachy blog that not everyone wants to hear, but in all fairness we need to listen. Before you go out and invest good hard money on ‘cleanses’ or ‘30 day challenges’ the actual reality of you being in a better position at the end of this 95% to the negative. Sure you will lose kilos or even some body fat but it isn’t sustainable. Within a month or two especially over our most indulgent time (Christmas and Christmas festivities) you will be back to where you started before we hear about another incident from a rugby league player.
What do I suggest to do instead?
I am not going to sell you a miracle cure or a magic program that my gym offers blah blah blah. I do not care where you train or what you do but the reality of sustained weight loss, or as I prefer, fat loss is a planned program at home and the gym where you are consistent over a long time. Just like the financial industry the fitness industry can complicate things to make us sound very important and that everything has a specific method, mode or apparatus that will yield more success. But the reality to getting in better shape is not hard. I will tell you the 5 limiting factors that hamper or stop you getting in better nick.
Number 1. Nutrition
With so much conflicting shit out there I actually don’t blame the public for not knowing what to do. So let’s keep this to a couple of lines.
If you are carrying excess fat around the mid-section, then you have taken the piss for too long when it comes to shitty foods simple as that. You have had either too much of these foods = sugar, simple carbohydrates – which include pasta, noodles, bread, rice and alcohol. For the guys who don’t eat this stuff and have put on weight then you are a different kettle of fish and we will touch on that later.
Number 2. Training regime
You either don’t move at all or don’t move enough. For the guys who don’t move well this is simple = MOVE.
For the guys who do train or move a bit. Firstly, let’s classify moving. Walking isn’t enough, neither is one session a week at the park with your trainer who does two handed boxing. Yes, it is better than nothing, but that mindset has to change as that is not good enough especially if you want to get better results. So, invest in someone who know what they are doing, invest in someone who has constantly upskilled themselves not just a nice guy or girl trainer who are nice and have done 7 week course, invest in a well learned trainer/coach as they will put you on a path that will improve you not just for the here and now, but further forward which encourages the consistency needed to have sustained results. Constant progression is needed for adaptation remember this.
Number 3. Injury/Illness
Ok there’s two kind of injury I feel, people with genuine issues and the people who want to have genuine issues. This may sound harsh and it is not always the “injured persons’ fault. For too long to many people have been given, what I call “catastrophized diagnoses’.”
This means pseudo health professionals tell people they have a plethora of issues to attract repeat business. I am sick of hearing “my chiro told me my ribs out” or “my hips are out of alignment” or I can’t squat cause my physio told me it’s too hard on my knees, or a Exercise Physiologist saying your glutes don’t activate. All horseshit! Obviously every injury has to be treated differently and with respect but I cannot fathom pseudo practitioners catastrophizing little niggles to which it indoctrinates their clients in to thinking they are stuffed for life.
Usually, if you have a specific practitioner that encourages repeat visits for everything (except for few instances I do admit) then run away because they are more than likely, shit! Ultimately Their job is to stop you from having to see them and if they don’t have that plan then they are phony. Also if they say stop everything! Then go to another one as everyone can do something, to many allied health practitioners put the handbrake on to much without realising that inactivity breads more injury. Alternative activity methods should be encouraged instead of the standard stop everything, as that is lazy practice.
For the people who have genuine ailments and injury that must be addressed then suffice to say it is going to be harder for you. This is the unfortunate reality, but it doesn’t mean you can’t get better, or you can’t get to where you want. It just means it may take longer or we must adjust the strategy. Never see an injury/illness as fatalistic, we can get there it may just be a different way.
Number 4. Psychology
Too many of us underestimate the effect our psychology has on fat loss and general wellbeing. There is the physical apprehension it creates when people have anxiety about going to facilities or even the apprehension of putting yourself in an uncomfortable position during a workout. The very notion that the juice isn’t worth squeeze, and to be honest some facilities even I experience this apprehension and I am an avid gym goer. So, this actually discourages the person to even attend at all because of some bad experiences they once had. That’s one element of the psychological limitation.
The other is the actual chemical imbalances that cause diagnosed or undiagnosed mental issues. To many of us have inherited imbalances from our parents to which it effects our physiology. These kinds of people have either not enough anxiety/depression to avoid the gym completely but just enough to either overtrain, not sleep, not eat well, etc etc. This very type of person usually lives on the edge both at their life, home life or professional life. Don’t get me wrong these guys aren’t going around with the machine gun, these types of people are the guys you see every day. We all have times when we are up and down, but they are a few that always struggle to either sleep well or are so busy because of standards they themselves implement. Or they just have a little bit of self-hate (not extreme) where they work hard but sabotage themselves constantly.
These guys are always fighting a battle and making it harder for themselves and when we are in these states our stress hormone (cortisol) is very active and this very hormone is a fat storing hormone and it triggers up regulation of many other body processes that effect fat loss. They might be training hard, eating well but not having the success that should warrant the effort. It is because these poor buggers aren’t sleeping/recovering, they are either in constant stress elevating either poor eating habits or not eating enough which all have negative effect on the fat loss machine.
This isn’t even going into the guys who have significant diagnosed issues that will affect fat loss dramatically as some drugs etc can affect the very make up our physiology to which changes the game when it comes to fat loss.
Number 5. Physiology
Now this is the last resort, 90% of the time we don’t have to go to this depth. But if we have done everything else and still you are stagnated then obviously there are some other powers at work. This can be a variety of issues from polycystic ovaries, endometriosis, thyroid deficiencies, insulin abnormalities, heart diseases, certain drugs for congenital disorders are just to name a few. Getting blood work and gives us a blueprint of maybe some pathology that might be causing you to not be where