Just Your Best

When I think back to where my fitness journey started, I recall that I spent months if not more than a year of my early twenties trying to better myself and “failing”. Today I don’t quite think of it as failing because all the struggles, all the slippery slides back to old habits followed by giant leaps towards bettering myself ultimately led me to losing 60 lbs in a year and changing my life in a way I never expected. Deep down I just wanted to lose the weight to “look good”, but what I didn’t expect was just how good it would “feel”!

It started with a gym membership and a dream, followed by skipping workouts, eating out, and binging TV shows in bed instead of running off my worries… One night I was feeling particularly weak; I wasn’t in a dangerous situation, but my PTSD from a bad relationship had me feeling triggered and all I could think was, “If I needed to run, would I even be able to run fast enough?” A light switch turned on when I changed the anxiety-ridden conversation I was having in my head with myself. I thought, what if I was strong enough to defend myself and I didn’t need to run?

I’m just shy of 5-feet tall, so feeling small and defenseless has been a part of my being for as long as I could remember. But that next morning I went to the gym and never looked back. I started working out every day, and I mean every day. Holidays and all. I started eating right, I cut out all processed food, drank more than enough water every day… I made big changes, but I couldn’t have done it at all without a few tips and tricks I learned along the way. And I’d be a jerk to not share them, so here we go:

Motivational Quotes

They say, in 2 weeks you’ll feel it; in 4 weeks you’ll see it, and in 8 weeks you’ll hear it. It was quotes like this that drove me and kept myself motivated. I was determined to “see what happens when you don’t give up” and watch how “what seems impossible today” would become my “warm-up one day”. 

Quotes consumed my life, which is a habit I’ve kept up still to this day (7 years later). I set them as my phone screensaver, and my room at home was coated in ones I printed or wrote on sticky notes. Today they are all over my home office and in the bathroom. They’re literally everywhere so I’m always reminded why I never want to give up.

Doing the Hard Things

There were a lot of times I got on a machine at the gym only to learn I couldn’t even do 1 rep in the beginning. I couldn’t even do a sit-up when I started or plank for longer than 8 seconds. I used those as my base lines; I would continue to go back to things like that until I could finally do 1 rep, and then 3, and then a whole set. The longest I’ve planked was over 3 minutes just trying to prove to myself I was catching up to a very fit friend one day, and if you’ve ever planked before, you could only imagine how determined I had to be to accomplish that!

Rather than feel discouraged by my lack of abilities from the get-go, I would fix my ponytail and come back to it another day until I could check it off the list. Practice makes perfect, and that was my mantra every day. I was sure to remind myself too that all the physically fit muscle men and women around me in the gym had to start somewhere too, that I was not alone in the journey I had ahead. Everyone starts somewhere.

Trying New Things

The gym isn’t for everybody, so if you’re looking to get into a good fitness routine, you have to try a lot of things on to see what you like first. I liked joining a local gym that had a variety of classes available, so I got to try everything from yoga, pilates and barre to HIIT (high-intensity interval training), TRX (total body resistance training) and boxing.

Running on the treadmill or around the neighborhood has never been my favorite, but for some it is and that’s awesome! For me, I find that strength training and challenging classes like pilates and barre are my favorites, and so that is what I stick with. Fitness doesn’t have to feel like a punishment, and when you find the right workout for you, it certainly won’t feel like one! When you truly love what you’re doing, it doesn’t feel like work (outs!)

Gym Buddies

Having a gym buddy is the best way to stay motivated. When missing your workout means your friend is also going to miss hers, you’re less likely to skip it because you don’t want to do that to your gym buddy! It also keeps you going because if your friend is doing it, you’ll want to do it too.

My favorite part about having a gym buddy is the gossip. Gossip is one of my favorite cardio’s! There’s nothing better than my weekly Monday workouts with my bestie; we meet up at the gym, hop on a treadmill or stairmaster and just vent about our days and everything that’s gone on since the last time we talked.

A gym buddy doesn’t just have to be at the gym too. If you live somewhere with a nice spot to go for a long walk, that’s a great workout too, and it barely feels like it.

Real Role Models

I was inspired in my fitness journey by women who worked hard physically to get to where they are. Today, that might be someone like Ilona Maher, Olympic medalist women’s rugby player for USA. She is so inspiring to listen to and just follow on social media. She shares stories about real challenges we all face, and her positive mindset is something to aspire to.

There’s no cheat code to becoming great at your sport, it takes hard work, day in and day out. Instead of following celebrities that never talk about the gym or focus on the fancy sides of their lives, I followed women on social that regularly shared the gym selfie, the stories of how they got to where they are, and more about their grit.

This is also important in the sense of who you surround yourself with. It’s a lot easier to commit to your goals when it’s a regular conversation in your daily life. My mom has always been an inspiring role model to me, and I think her positivity towards growth and change has always been a big inspiration in my journey. Whenever we talk, at least one of us is talking about a workout we had the past week or a new class we’ve tried and loved. Having someone like-minded to talk to and check in with on your fitness journey is so valuable because it makes you feel less alone, and it normalizes it in a way; if you’ve never been to the gym before, it might feel like a completely new and different change in your life, but having a friend or group of people that are on the same page helps to make it easier to transition to a new lifestyle.

Commit

At the end of the day, this is the number 1 factor that goes into a successful fitness or weight-loss journey. You have to find what’s right for you, what inspires you, and do it. It’s all about “discipline”, which is the word I wrote on all my notebooks and even put as the background on my phone to remind myself to keep going, alongside inspiring thoughts like, You’ve made it this far, let’s see what happens when we don’t give up. I checked in with a journal every night before bed to record my progress, what I had done, how the day went, what I ate, how I felt, and all the good stuff. It only took an extra 2-3 minutes from my day, and was usually a very relaxing thing to do while winding down for the night.

You can do anything you set your mind to! I hope these tips help you in your own fitness journey and I know you will reach all your wellness goals if you believe in yourself and put in the hard work. After a while, it won’t feel like “work” at all though, it’ll be a part of your normal routine.