Learning to Breathe

Dear Readers,

This blog entry is very personal and dear to my heart.  I have been thinking about this post often for the last 3 months but could not write it until now.

Sometimes a coach needs to be reminded of what it is like to play on the field.  As a fitness coach, it is easy to forget how hard it is to count calories and take time out of my schedule to train and do cardio.  Sometimes I forget that I’m the freak.  I’m the crazy person that likes to workout.  And the truth is, it is easy for me to do it often because I work at a gym.  Every day I’m reminded of it.  I don’t have to leave work and go to the gym before arriving home.  I don’t have to wake up at 4:30am just to get a workout in before going to work.  Until recently, I have never even counted calories consistently for more than a few weeks at a time.

In January, I decided to go on a bodybuilding prep diet.  I was inspired by a book by Drew Manning called Fit2Fat2Fit.  He gained 70lbs in six months and then lost 70lbs in the next six months.  I read his book and I highly recommend it, but I was left wanting.  I wanted to know more about this psychological process.  I wanted to really feel what my clients had to go through.  I wanted to know what it was like to feel like something would be immovable, or never be over.  The only way for me to do this was to find out for myself and put myself through weight loss for an extended period of time.  So I gained about 5 pounds (putting me at 165lbs) during the holidays eating whatever I wanted and then hired Ethan Smoorenburg, a talented up and coming preparation coach, to write a meal plan for me.

This meal plan placed me through tedious dieting.  In this diet, every single calorie and gram counted and there were no rest days.  There were no “cheat days” in which I could eat whatever I wanted and not log the calories.  Every single calorie had to be accounted for.  I wanted to go through this because I wanted to understand YOU.  And now, after having lost 21lbs and 10% body fat in 3 months, I feel like I understand you a little better.

From Jan. 4th to Mar. 23rd, through Ethan’s tedious meal plan, I lost 21lbs and went from 19% Body fat to 9%. I went from 165lbs to 144lbs.

I’ve learned that through the hardest times and the times when I meet immovable objects, the greatest therapy is simply to allow others to listen to me. I obviously can’t hear you through this blog, but there may be a way for me to acknowledge how you feel. My hope is that through doing this you can find some sort of comfort, some sort of way to get you through this day, and some new way to view what seems to be a mountain.

I am learning how you feel. You feel like you’ve been running a race for years. You want to power through and run full-speed but you can’t do it without remembering that you’ve gone full-speed too many times, only to find more miles to go. You are out-winded. You feel like every time you breathe in as much as you can, it’s not enough. You are still tired. You are still found wanting. You are still gasping for air.

You are tired of being a guest in someone’s home and not being able to eat the meal that they’ve provided. You are tired of being embarrassed because while everyone’s talking and congregating, you’re calculating calories on your phone.  You are tired of people judging you and treating you like a snob just because you are trying to improve yourself.

You look around and you see people living their life indulging on the things they want. They look the same as you, only you’ve been slaving for months just so that you can reach par. The body fat percentage that so many people have is what you will have to slave over for years to achieve.  You sit at work or at home, bored and hungry, and you feel like your body is eating itself yet the scale does not move. Despite your good behavior, you feel like you’ve gotten nowhere.  You are tired of finishing a meal and feeling hungrier than you were when you started eating.

You have had thoughts like this:  “Is this what a life of fitness is supposed to be like? A constant gasping for air? A place with no pit stops and no rest? When will I look at myself and not be disappointed in what I see? Will I ever be satisfied?  Why is it that every small victory that I achieve is submerged by a longing for something else? When will satisfaction set in? Will satisfaction set in?”

An interesting thing happened to me when I finally reached the single digits in body fat;  I didn’t care.  I looked at the mirror and thought: “This is it? This is what people dedicate so much time and effort for? A six-pack? It looks weird on me.”  I know that sounds crazy, but I am not lying.  It really did go through my mind.  Doing this helped me realize the point of all of this.  The point is that we do not wait until we reach our fitness goals to be happy.  Yes, we do need to stay focused, but do so while learning when to breathe.

“If you want only one thing too much, you’ll be disappointed.  The best thing you can do is appreciate the little everyday things.”  -Augustus McCrae, Lonesome Dove

Take your breath.

If you are wondering when you should breathe, take this advice:

When you lift your child up without shoulder pain…     BREATHE

When you get an extra notch in your belt…     BREATHE

When you dance with your wife or husband and can think about how pleasant they are without trying to just catch your breath…     BREATHE

When you work in the yard without taking a two hour nap after exhaustion…     BREATHE

When instead of watching TV, you feel the urge to talk a walk alone or with your loved one…     BREATHE

When you realize that you’ve been consistent with your calories and macros for a week…    BREATHE

And when you sleep at night knowing that today, you did your best… BREATHE

 

Today, if you will, think about the moments in your life when you’ve learned to breathe and post them to the comments of this blog to help others like you.  Thanks for reading.

A Picture of Skinny Gray

A Picture of Skinny Gray

Over the years, I have heard many complaints from my clients.  If you think about it, my job is primarily too serve those who want improvement.  Most of the people I deal with want improvement because they are disappointed with their bodies; and nine times out of ten, it is for weight loss.  If you are one of those men or women who envy the people with a skinny body type, a.k.a. “skinny b*tches,” then I would like to share a few things that might make you feel better about yourself and see them in a different, and more sympathetic, light.  

One of my all-time favorite books is “The Picture of Dorian Gray” by Oscar Wilde.  If you are unfamiliar with the story, it is about a young man named Dorian Gray who is painted by his friend.  The portrait is so beautiful, that Dorian immediately envies it because the portrait will remain in its youthful state without ever aging.  Dorian realizes that he himself will not; and he is doomed to lose his beauty at one point or another.  At the moment of this realization, he wishes that the portrait will be stained with age and that he can stay young forever.  As the years pass, with each sin that Dorian commits, the portrait becomes more flawed and damaged and Dorian’s youth remains.  Dorian lives a wanton lifestyle and is eventually driven mad because of his sins.

There are many scholars who have different opinions about what this book is about, but I think that what Oscar Wilde was getting to is that punishment demands perfection.  Stay with me, I’m getting to the point.  Dorian Gray was catapulted into sin because he never received physical consequences because of his actions.  There is purification in punishment.  With most sins, consequences follow.  If a child disobeys and touches the stove despite his mother’s instruction, he is burned.  Because of his disobedience, he immediately feels the consequences and no longer touches it.  In a just world, what good is anything that we do, good or bad, if there are no consequences to anything?  

“If we wish to receive positive results when we do right, then how can we justly request that we don’t receive negative results from our wrongdoings?”

Here is where we apply this principle to the subject of health.  We must realize that people who are naturally skinny, no matter what they eat, are NOT the blessed ones.  They are cursed. I can’t tell you how many people have looked at my dainty wife and envied the fact that she used to eat whatever she wanted without gaining a pound.  The truth is, she used to look exactly the same but was not “healthy” at all.  (For the record, my lovely wife has developed excellent health habits and all is well.)  We can look healthy on the outside but be in terrible health on the inside. 

 

The truth is that if you are like me and gain three pounds the minute you even smell pizza or look at Oreos, you are BLESSED. (Do you really mean that Luke?) YES, I do.  You are blessed with a natural accountability that will keep you on track.  Sure, it’s harder to be like us, but if we see the effects of unhealthy habits instantly then it will encourage and motivate us to change.  If we just moved along eating whatever we want and never exercising, then it will inevitably take vengeance on us through disease or injury.  

The goal here is health, NOT vanity.  I can have a client that can change his unhealthy habits and get healthier without losing a pound.  If the habits change without the weight, we have still succeeded.  The problem is that we are physical creatures that cannot help but to be influenced by the vain society in which we live.  I know it’s hard but we must have hope and see it this way.  It’s hard to look at yourself in the mirror and hate what you see even if you know that you are healthy on the inside.  But we cannot loose heart.  The purpose of it all is to BE HEALTHY; and to prevent disease so that our loved ones can not only have us here on Earth longer, but have the best of us while we are here.  And be encouraged, because when healthy habits come first, the weight-loss and a healthy-looking body usually follow.  We just cannot make “good looks” the end.  Good health is NOT a means to looking better, it is the GOAL.  

Health is the end, not the means.

So to those are naturally skinny, please know that good genetics and a “skinny look” or “fit look” is not evidence for good health.  And be encouraged to workout and eat healthy like the rest of us.  Plant yourself around people who seek good health for the right reasons and join us in the fight against preventable disease!  For those like me who gain weight easier, stop hating the way you are and be grateful that you have a body that holds you accountable.  I promise you, when you arrive at a later date healthy enough to run around with your grandchildren and/or great grandchildren, you will thank God for blessing you with a body that kept you in check all of your life.

Be encouraged. Be healthy.