I started writing this a few times, stopped, changed the bit that I thought was most important to focus on, changed again... This has been challenging to write because there are SO MANY important bits to focus on, and I wanted to cover them all - without writing a 500 page essay... Numbers. We all have an idea that hard work should be rewarded. We join the gym, crush some hash tag brutal work outs, dial in the nutrition, and then jump on the scales only to find that the massive drop in weight that television has led us to expect simply hasnt happened here in the real world. We get discouraged. I worked hard! I ate salad for a month! I DESERVED to lose more weight!! If we are determined, at this point, we make the effort to find out why our expectations have not manifested in reality. But unfortunately many people see a number that disappoints them and see it as a sign that they have tried, tried everything, and nothing works. So they stop. Their gym membership gathers dust. The old eating patterns - the ones that put them into the position of wanting to lose weight in the first place - return with a vengeance... All this from a number. A snapshot in time that does not differentiate between fat, water, bone density, lean mass... A number that tells you what you weigh, not who you are or what you have achieved so far with your gym membership. I do use callipers to measure skinfolds with people, and with these we do get a more accurate picture of what is happening in your body - body fat down, lean mass up means your body composition is changing even if the scales are not. But this has its flaws too. When someone is new to training, and they have a history of eating and drinking in a way that supports carrying excessive body fat, they often will have issues with inflammation. When pulling skinfolds on someone who is inflamed the fat is hard to move, and often the skinfold readings are lower than they should be. As the person cleans up their diet and starts to train effectively the fat starts to move more easily. This means I can now get an accurate skinfold measurement, which is often higher than the initial measurement. This makes me excited - the person is now less inflamed, healthier, and therefore able to make more effective progress. Unfortunately seeing higher BF% after several weeks of training hard and eating well does not make most people excited. In fact it does the opposite. Numbers. We are conditioned to use them as a measure of success. But what if there were other ways you could measure success? What if consistently having protein and vegetables for breakfast every day was a win? What if drinking enough water every day was success? What about sticking to a training program even after it got hard? What about being fitter? Being stronger? Gaining confidence? Moving better? Reducing pain? Having more energy? Trying something new? Mastering something new? My point is this - please do not ever let everything you have achieved so far be rendered invalid because of a number. Celebrate EVERY success. Be proud of EVERYTHING you are achieving.
Posted on: Thu, 22 Jan 2015 01:02:54 +0000
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