What To Do When You’re Frustrated With Weight Loss Progress
Keep going.
I know. Such clickbait, right? But it’s fucking true, and I felt the need to be completely forthright about it because I’m getting asked about it more and more the further into my fitness journey I get and the more progress I share with you guys.
I was like you once. I, too, felt that if I just did the EXACT. SAME. THINGS. as someone who I admired, I would have the exact same results. I felt there was a big secret someone somewhere was keeping from me—the ultimate secret to weight loss, diet, exercise, all of it. I was convinced someone knew and refused to tell me what it was so I could get going on my progress.
NOVEMBER VS TODAY
But the truth is, there is no secret answer. Well, there is but it’s not at all the one you’re looking for. You know the answer as well as I do, and it’s an ugly one. It’s the answer no one wants to hear. No extreme diet, extreme workout plan, or certain exercise will get you closer to your goal faster. That’s not how this works.
THIS SHIT TAKES TIME.
You can change your nutrition habits tenfold and lift the heaviest you can, but the key ingredient to weight loss progress or general physical success is consistency over time. Think about it like this: Let’s say you just chopped your hair. We don’t know why you would do such a thing. Maybe it’s quarantine, maybe it’s a recent breakup, maybe you just lost your mind for a second. Regardless of why you did it, you did it. You leave the salon feeling confident but once you’re home and facing your new, shorter self in the mirror, you panic. Instant regret sets in and you seriously contemplate speeding back to the salon to collect your slashed locks off the floor so you can super glue them back to your head. Of course we know you’re not gonna do that. So you quietly resign to just waiting it out, because there’s nothing else you can do. Your hair grows back quietly overtime. You don’t wake up every morning or even every week expecting to see another few inches added back on because you know that’s not how this works—that would be insane. Or let’s say you take heart medication. Do you pick and choose which days, weeks, or months you’re going to take it and stick with it? Do you take it for a full week then forget for another? NO. You don’t. Because, that too, would be insane.
DECEMBER VS TODAY
Now, take everything I just wrote and apply it to weight loss and seeing true progress. Just because you kill it with nutrition and working out for a week or a month does not mean you’re going to suddenly wake up and be at your goal weight/goal body/what have you. When you approach things like that, you are f’ing yourself in the b before you even start. That’s what we call a temporary mindset, and becoming and staying a baller are long-term, permanent goals. I mean, really—what sounds better: Rushing out of the gate at 100MPH and kicking your own ass day in and day out for a few weeks or months while being miserable, enjoying your short term goal once you reach it, then having to start all over again when you ease up and get back to square one OR easing into a consistent, low-level ass kicking that is more than sustainable and that, after a certain period of time, you barely notice anymore but from which you’re somehow are reaping all the benefits?
Yeah, that’s what I thought.
MARCH VS MAY
If I sound intense, it’s because I am (I prefer to refer to it as "passionate” though). I’ve spent a lot of wasted time trying to figure out a shortcut and even more wasted time getting angry when I didn’t immediately see change. “I’ve been eating clean for a fucking WEEK and didn’t skip ONE workout, and yet my favorite jeans still don’t fit and I’m not down 5 pounds?!” It’s hard to accept that some, if not most, things in life take time and trust me, I get it. I’m one of the most impatient people I’ve ever met. When I decide I want something, I want it NOW. Not tomorrow. Not next week. RIGHT NOW. But bitch listen: THAT ISN’T HOW THIS WORKS. It’s not temporary. It’s not for right now. It’s not a quick fix. It’s not a mother fucking sprint, bitch. It’s a MARATHON. Even if you sign up with my trainer, Meg, or someone like her, it’s not a quick fix.
THEY ARE NOT GOING TO SOLVE YOUR PROBLEMS, BITCH. THAT’S UP TO YOU.
FEBURARY VS APRIL
Trainers and coaches don’t have a magic pill that suddenly motivates you and propels you in the right direction. They will help you. They will give you suggestions and guidelines. They will hold you accountable. But it’s up to YOU to show the fuck up, stick to the guidelines, put in the work, and hold your goddamn self accountable at the end of the day. Oh and listen — you’re going to fuck up. That’s a part of it. Making the mindset shift from “quick fix, fast results” to “slow and steady wins the race and keeps off the weight” is not for the faint of heart. You’re going to go way over calories, miss workouts, get your period and want to throw a drink in your reflection’s face. But the difference between the people who see long-term success and the ones that don’t is simple: We didn’t give up. We said “I haven’t come this far to only come this far.” We didn’t let one or 6 days of shitty behavior and fumbles ruin it for us. We accepted it, promised to do better tomorrow, and we did, bitch. We did.
xox,
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