Let’s get one thing straight right off the bat. You’re not a movie star. You’re not a sponsored athlete. You don’t make a living being a runway model. You’re not paid to look good. You likely lead a 9 to 5 - or a 4:30 to 11 if you’re me - kind of life. You have work, school, university, kids, responsibilities, bills, and Cairo traffic to go through. You’re a bonafide honest to God real person. And it’s fucking frustrating.
Ideally we’d all like to be paid to look like that, sadly, we can’t
You see, because of the media saturation we’re exposed to on a daily basis, we’ve gotten to a point where we think that unless we look like chiseled Greek gods, then whatever the hell we’re doing just isn’t quite cutting it. That’s why you find people cutting corners on plastic surgery, quick fat loss schemes, dangerous supplements and more. The pressure on us is just too much. But this is when you need to realize that those people who look the way they do in all those magazines and movies only look like that because they’re paid to do that. That’s their life. They don’t have a 9 to 5 job. They have someone else taking care of their kids. They have someone filling up their fridges and plates. Their bills are taken care of. They’re not you. They’re not most of us.
You NEED cheat meals in your life
I think realizing that is arguably one of the most important mental blocks one can bypass when it comes to fitness and health. How you can be the best possible - and healthiest - version of yourself while still adhering to the realities of your life with all the responsibilities that come along with it. This bring us to the topic of today’s blog post, and that’s dealing with the rules of the fitness games.
I go by a very simple rule in my life, if you’re good 80% of the time, the other 20% will not be the one to bring your progress down. That’s not to say you should indulge in those 20% either, on the contrary, you ought to view it as a reward or a treat seeing how good you were with your nutrition and exercise. Take nutrition for instance, many people, myself included, can be a bit hardheaded with their nutrition especially if they have a history of being a bit on the heavy side of the scale. They go through these phases where they fear carbs and fats and live like bunnies that regularly feast on tuna and grilled chicken. That’s not a healthy way to be. You need balance in your nutrition just as you do with everything else.
You can stray off the track, so long as you get back on it right away
You need cheat meals. Yes, need. I’ve explained it in length over previous posts regarding the hormonal and chemical effects of cheat meals. But they’re more than just mechanisms by which you can boost your metabolism, they’re mental breaks that give you a sense of freedom. Wholesome nutrition shouldn’t be restrictive so much as as it ought to be selective. You should eat better quality ingredients, with as much organically grown produce/meats/dairy as possible. It’s about feeding your body the best quality fuels in order to get the best possible results. If you’re eating right 80% of the time, the 20% when you’re improvising will not be detrimental so long as it’s not pure junk food. If you’re craving a burger, by all means, have one! Just don’t go for the McDonald’s option - because that’s about as much of a burger as my cat’s got killer instinct (he failed at killing an ant one).
Breaking the rules is when you go completely rogue. Breaking the rules is when you assume that just because you’re on vacation in the States for two weeks, you can gorge on low-quality foods like a little piglet and neglect your exercise altogether. Bending the rules is about finding that delicate balance in order to stave off madness. It’s about knowing that even though you don’t feel up to running 5 KM today or dishing out a legs day workout, or if you feel like eating a pizza, that tomorrow, you’ll get out of bed and kick ass again.
No comments:
Post a Comment