When you feel your body is reaching a plateau level, it’s time to readjust.
I am beginning to realize that while I may have the desire to still do the same workout routine I did back when I was a stay-at-home mom, waking up to make it to the gym as soon as it opened at 6 am before returning home to my husband and kids to prepare breakfast as they started to rise for the day, being a teacher now, that schedule no longer works.
While I don’t like to hit the gym in the evenings, I find that I have to give myself no excuses to get a workout in. My personal sacrifice when it comes to time and opportunity has always been led by prioritizing my husband and children first. I know I’m not the only who has felt this way when admitting I am that kind that feels guilty for leaving my family just to get my nails done (I average twice a year since age 23) or simply, hit the gym if all are up and together. So, if my husband is coaching, I am there, close by, doing some kind of workout in another room. This is a “no excuses” for my mind and body and at the same time, comfort to my heart and spirit.
At the gym, all have their own routine and rituals. This is how it is and understandably so, I believe, mainly because we all have different goals, traversing through the road of attaining good health for the heart, the mind, the body, and of course, the spirit.
There is so much inspiration to be gathered around a room full of people aiming for a better self. I see different shapes and sizes and know after so many years that smaller doesn’t mean healthier and more muscle should not suggest stronger, either.
Having my own commitments to revel into each time I find myself once again facing my own challenges, I have become aware that what others do for their body doesn’t always work for mine nor suggest that the results would be the same. Every “body” is absolutely different.
The ultimate bottom line I find to be the reason for different shapes and sizes is not just genetics. In the same realm of one’s full component of who they are, I point out that we all also eat, sleep, and face daily challenges differently within each of our different lives.
Controlling our weight, to me, is controlling the self. When Eminem suggests “You better lose yourself”, thankfully he was referring to music, not to a chocolate cake. And yet, you know that chocolate cake could be your ultimate ”go-to” when it’s time to eat your feelings. When you are feeling some kind of way, delving into a chocolate cake while listening to the full lyrics of ”Lose Yourself” may be just that ”Don’t judge me!” moment of silence for all those around you. Still, the consequence is all yours and ”I told you so” quietly awaits.
Plateauing is arriving at knowing… something must change.
I gather year to year from philosophical talks and various infomercials of one way here and one way there on how to think of managing the body. While there are those that have given great results, the inability to maintain a happy body and happy mind is what keeps the health and fitness business booming- we lose ourself.
Call it pride, but I would rather read and do my own research through observation than to have someone else tell me what I should do. This is why in addition to my readings time to time, I watch senior predecessors before me around the gym closely while also listening to what they do to keep themselves healthy and trim.
In my years of observing others, reflecting on what I see have continued great results, the following is what I’ve arrived to understand and witnessed with others as essential to attaining and maintaining any physical goal:
Decrease Sugar Intake
Sugar is the most prevalent legal drug out there. That statement was no means backed up by medical research, but mainly from a regular human species who knows how much better and tastier foods and drinks are with added sugar. From coffee to ketchup, taste has a vast difference with the absence of sugar. And yet, the bulging stomach we start to carry or see continue to grow- that didn’t come from the coffee or the mashed tomatoes. Test the “burning” of water, fat, and sugar on a pan. What you see is reflective of how your body handles sugar.
Increase Water Intake
The world is approximately 70/30 water and land. Our bodies start off during infantile stage as roughly so, but interestingly lose water as we grow. Balance doesn’t mean equal in this matter of harmonious existence. Nature has its own water cycle: evaporation, condensation, precipitation. Our bodies water cycle? Just not so natural if we negate the understanding that we must create the precipitation piece by providing the essence of our bodies need to stay hydrated. Test a dried out grape or any vegetable for that matter by soaking it back into water and what do you get? Voila! As with anything, too much can also be damaging. Keep it like earth, 70/30. Your skin, digestion, and energy level will tell you too much or too little. A car wash leads to the understanding that water is the essential to washing off residue. Internally, what should wash off best of all that we put in?
Decrease Stress
A balance between good and bad stress is keeping one on their toes, but not tripping on them. Getting ready for a new job is great for preparatory strength. Staying up all night thinking about the new job’s demands is not advisable by any good means. I kid you not that when I find myself letting go of what I have no control over, my skin is balanced and soft- not dull and dry; my body feels leaner and not bloated; my thought process alert and at peace- not tired and weary. One may lose weight in the process of stress, but this far equates to a healthy inside producing strength for the body. A happy mind leads to a happy body. Test out a machine by trying to make it work faster or harder than it should… don’t. The consequence is thus, preventable.
Increase Rest
Working out 5-7 days a week is great if the body has time to rest in between. Pushing oneself without much rest in between, on the other hand, catches up like a brand new car versus one that has had great mileage. Eventually, the body needs more rest in between to recuperate from any extremities we intentionally or unintentionally put it under thinking it’s what we always do. You may have been a brand new phone with less need of charging in between at first, but we all know that nothing stays just as easily chargeable in the long run. And even when that phone is fully charged, take note of how much faster the battery burns due to all the applications we have added. That offload option? It’s there for a reason.
Decrease Workout Time
This may seem controversial to what I truly believed in my younger years, but burning myself to the limits left me needing to sleep more just to recover even back then. With so much accumulation of “life” trying to weigh me down as the years progress, one has to accept that the weight on the shoulders is much heavier now than when younger. When I say I love to workout, I honestly think that’s a blessing- I truly do. However, more days, weeks, and years of the same workout grind eventually plateaued to a “been here, done this so many times- why are you still working out this way thinking the outcome will be the same after so many years when you have more weighing you down?” That weighing down is all life’s pressures. I realize that longer doesn’t mean better in my later years. All it does is give me strain thinking, “I don’t have enough time in a day!”
Increase Workout Level
This leads me to the final part that I have come to arrive at as the main reason why I have resulted back to regaining control of my metabolism. Hitting the gym 2-3 times per week now has given me the same results as I had when hitting the gym 5-7 days per week at even less workout session each time. How? It is what you do when working out. The body is one spectacularly amazing bright system that I’ve learned can adaptively settle to the “norm” we create. If you were once losing weight or gaining muscle with a workout that no longer gives you steady results or worse, has let you down, backward, it is because like a relationship, the body has learned your ways and can now be complacent to your created “convenience”. To avoid being seen as the “same-o, same-o”, push hard and be eccentric each time. The body doesn’t need a long workout, just a worthwhile one that takes the breath away.
Respectfully, there are those who have yet to experience such change and challenge of having children, experiencing the body’s hormonal shifts from before it ever took such blessed sacrifice of carrying a child for approximately nine months before the inexplicable pains of childbirth to the skeletal parts essentially dislocated having made room for being with-child. Five children after, I humbly state that this body of mine has taken some shifting within two decades of carrying, naturally delivering, and desiring to return back to “shape” again. Those chapters in life are something else that had not one experienced even a portion of what such can do to the heart, mind, body, and spirit, there is not much that can be said to relate. Even the body itself struggles to relate! (You must find humor where you can!)
A body goes through changes and I had to respect that I couldn’t just push my body to its limits for a long period of time as I used to. With just quick anaerobic pushes, I am able to exhaust my body in a shorter period of time, saving time, providing me some found sanity with time.
Yes. I still love to join dance classes, but truly, that’s for the heart and spirit- just being around good people who love to dance. My personal workouts are what keeps me truly in shape. They don’t have to be long and they aren’t anymore. They just have to be really good, hard pushes each time. I want my body to remember the burn.
All bodies are different, but the pieces I mentioned above are all for one. Omitting (excessive) sugar, drinking enough water, decreasing stress, increasing rest, decreasing workout time while increasing workout grind- try it. You may not see a quick turnaround or a full out capacity of immediate celebration, but I believe you will see better in your maintenance- mind, heart, body, and spirit.
