Progress is non-linear... and that's okay
Wanted to share with you some words of wisdom from a colleague of mine that have really stuck with me recently: "Progress is non-linear, and that's okay." Some of you who've been on the fitness grind for longer than I have may read that and think, "Well yeah, obviously," but I suspect I'm not the only one who needs to hear and internalize these words.
Whatever your goals, whether you want to lose weight or get huge, whether you're chasing that PR mile time or trying to dunk a basketball... you're likely going to experience setbacks, and that's okay. I see tons of incredible and inspirational posts on this subreddit and others where someone goes from fat to fit in a year and while I'm so impressed by and proud of those people for their monumental achievements, I would be willing to bet that such profound transformations aren't the experience of your average Redditor. This certainly has not been my experience.
The TL;DR of the below is this image.
I graduated high school at around 195 pounds (88.5kg). A chronic benchwarmer in my perennially mediocre early attempts at athleticism, I mostly stuck to band and school in those later high school years. I went off to university and put on the freshman fifteen, topping out at around 210. My junior year, I decided something needed to change. I signed up for a half-marathon that was about 5 months out. This was ambitious, considering I had never run more than a 5k before, but I stuck to my training plan, started incorporating resistance training into my routine, and took steps to un-fuck my diet. I learned a ton during those few months and dropped from 210 to about 185 during my training.
I maintained this weight for a while, and when I moved cities for graduate school, I began making weightlifting a priority. I didn't know a lot, but I was eager to make gains and read voraciously anything I could find about lifting and nutrition. My best friend and I would lift 5 days/week after class and for the first time in my life, I began to see myself as strong and capable. I went on one hell of a dreamer bulk and over the course of about a year, went from 185 to nearly 220. As you might infer from that time frame, much of this was not lean body mass.
Since then, I cut to 185 again, bulked again (still mostly the wrong way) back up to 203, moved cities for work, got a girlfriend and got lazy, gained to an unhealthy 209, broke up with said girlfriend, got motivated by said breakup, cut down to 178, where I was proportionally the strongest and most in-shape I've ever been, and then COVID hit. I put on probably 6-8lbs from early April to early August, which I've spent most of last month and this month trying to shed. There have been numerous setbacks along the way... and that's okay. Rather than beat myself up over these, I think it's more helpful to acknowledge what happened, learn from your mistakes, get back up, and keep going.
Anyways, sorry for the long and meandering reflections. Thanks for reading if you've made it this far. Keep pushing. Get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Lift those heavy ass weights. Do that brutal long run. Drink more water. Un-fuck your diet. Treat yourself with kindness. Be better today than you were yesterday, and better still tomorrow. We're all in this together.
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