180degrees’s BodyBlog

It’s amazing how what gets said in one area of life filters to other areas of life. When you get told, "You can’t afford that daytrip" or "No, you can’t race a marathon" or "Don’t wear those clothes, they’re too tight fitting" it can be said with protection in the heart, but just being blurted out of the mouth without thinking how they affect you.

When someone you love says that, you can get the impression that you are destined to not wear clothes that flatter you or accomplish fitness goals. This isn’t encouragement, and you have to take extreme measures to ignore them. You know that they are sabotaging you with love whenever they have some extra casserole that "they happened to make too much of".

You have to learn to have faith in yourself and your view of your body can’t be skewered by someone else’s comment that you are getting bigger. (Of course you’re getting bigger, you’re working out!) To be extreme in this case means to not let them know what you are doing…yes, it means no support from them and you will have to find alternative ways to gather that support, but it also means that you will be avoiding being in a dangerous situation where an off comment can derail you.

Always find some positive thing to notice about yourself and hang onto that until the next positive arrives. Ultimately, you are not only responsible for your own diet, drinking water, rest, stretching, cardio, and work outs…but you are also responsible for being your own cheering section. Other bodybuilders may help encourage and inspire you temporarily until you can stand on your own two feet, but you are the one who accepts or rejects their comments too.

Something that just popped into my mind, when you do arrive at the point where you are positive and uplifting of your own progress, others may seek your encouragement and inspiration for their own needs. Recall what the Bible says, To those who are given much, much will be expected from them! Expect much from yourself and expect to build many others up.

Things came to a head for me this last week and a bit.

The "Big Picture" of losing some 40 - 50 lbs hit me all at once. The enormity of the task made me dry heave for a couple of minutes. It was the realization that what years of body abuse has done to me and what I needed to do to clean it up. Quite daunting to say the least.

Second event that occured is that I made a Personal Best in my city’s half marathon. Should be proud…should have experieneced runner’s high…

DIDN"T!

I was able to dig in at km 17 and again at km 20 to do the job, but there was no joy, no fire to be experienced as I crossed the finish line. I accomplished the goal with being seriously undertrained and am finding the same problem with working out.

I have lost my drive.

I need to find it or else the gym membership is just a waste of money and the time spent on the trails is just sluffing off.

What drives the others on Bodybuilding.com to do it, day in and day out? Not the ones who just put in the time, or the ones who are obsessed with fear that if they stop going to the gym, their results will disappear. But the ones who dig deep into themselves to put solid effort in even when it doesn’t show for several weeks.

I am asking for your help and imput.

Allow me a moment of self pity (had a birthday yesterday)..why didn’t I find the focus to start seriously bodybuilding 10 or 20 years ago? Some aspects of my life would be radically different now!

Okay, self pity moment done! I’m doing this now rather than wait 5 or 10 years in the future, so I don’t have anything valid to complain about.

But it is eating humble pie to discover that you aren’t as fit as you…no, I have to take responsibility for this..I am not as fit as I thought I was. The first Lifting Stats assessment was depressing and I have to remind myself that there are changes going on inside my body even though I can’t see much on the outside.

I am shifting my focus from the way I look to improving the level of my fitness. The "feel factor" is something positive I can grab onto and help me get to the next workout.

At the same time, I know I am bucking the trend of "once you’re in your fourties, it’s all downhill from there". Now, it’s a matter of balancing pushing myself a bit and the other end of the teeter-totter, staying injury free. 

…would be to look at myself critically and objectively. Once I saw that photo posted on Facebook…I actually felt horified. I never dreamt I was THAT out of shape. The picture was taken in either October 2008 or late January 2009, the latter I think…but the date was irrelevent. What is relevant, was the adjectives that kept popping through my mind when I saw this photo.

Now, I like looking on the bright side of life….rather build someone up, than tear them down. Once I see concrete success in a few weeks, I will have something new to put up. But in the meantime, this photo qualifies as "aversion therapy" -  I am NOT going to keep on a downward slope in my health, but rather make the small, daily choices that are healthy and balanced.

I can’t really express the combination of excitement and fear that I feel as I set this up, eight hours before I wake up for my first serious gym session.

Do I expect to be so sore that I can barely lift an arm? I hope not. Do I hope that the same endorphins that kick in during a half or full marathon will be present every workout? Unrealistic expectation.

BUT… I know that I have resources available to educate me, inspire me, and to assist me in carving out a new body. My male intuition tells me that there will be points in my journey that will almost seem spiritual in nature.

Opinions, suggestions, and constructive criticism, please? 

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