nursenic’s BodyBlog

Over the past several months, I’ve been approached for fitness and health advice by many people. I’m always flattered by it and I am more than willing to share whatever I can in order to help them achieve their goals. However, it seems that the majority of the these people want an easy answer . They are searching for some magic response that will lead them to the results they want. They ask “what’s the secret,“ mistakenly believing that there must be an easy way out or some sort of mystery or puzzle to solve.
When I tell them what has worked for me and what my regimen is like, it seems that most of them don’t like the words that come out of my mouth. In fact, I can actually see faces change when I explain that fitness requires dedication, commitment, hard work, sacrifice, and a lot of time.  For many people, especially those who have never been involved in fitness, achievement of their fitness goals requires  a complete lifestyle overhaul. This kind of change is hard.  I’ll be the first to admit that the journey isn’t always fun or easy. There are times when I’d rather skip my workout to sleep or replace my salad with a big piece of cheesecake.  However, I’ve learned that the rewards make the sacrifice worth it.  I’ve also found that I appreciate my personal achievements more because I have worked harder to attain them.  These realizations motivate me to keep striving for more.
I try to explain these truths to the people I encounter, often just to find that revealing “my secrets” to fitness success seem to leave them disappointed, disbelieving, or simply no longer interested. Is it easier for some to believe that fitness and health can be found in a pill or 10 minutes on a new machine rather than with months of consistent training and eating right?  As crazy as it sounds, I think, for some, it is.
While this certainly disappoints me, I guess it is to be expected. Watch TV or read a magazine for a few minutes and you are bound to be bombarded with quick fixes for every dilemma in life, not just weight loss and fitness -related issues. Due to this fact, it is absurd for me to believe that all the people I talk to will “get” the truth- that health and fitness gains only come through “good old-fashioned hard work.” However, that won’t stop me from sharing what I know to be true and hoping that I am able to get through to at least a few.