Friday Thoughts 72
Welcome to this week’s edition of Friday Thoughts! Let’s get into it.
JOIN the Spring Daily Walking Challenge
Get ready to get your steps in the Spring with the next iteration our Daily Walking Challenge.
All the details:
Sign up HERE or under “EVENTS” on the Member’s App.
What: 20 minute walk each and every day for 30 days
When: March 20-April 19
Why: new habit building, reason to get outside with longer days and warmer weather.
Win: Just like last year, anyone who goes 30/30 (tracked by the honor system) will be entered into a raffle to win a new pair of training sneakers. Last year, we had nine people complete 30/30!
Desire to train/trusting your inner voice
The Starretts’ concept of desire to train has really helped me over the years. The idea is that once training becomes a part of your life, you’re good at sticking with it because it’s an important habit. When that happens, it pays to listen to your body and trust the voice in your head that tells you when to rest.
When you're building discipline, sometimes you need to ignore that voice. I often joke at the gym that the thing I do most often is make things easier for people. And that’s because I truly believe in the desire to train—the body knows what it needs, and you can learn to tune into it. It all comes back to playing the long game.
One line that stuck with me: We don’t have to be dogmatic and stick to the program; instead, we have to be highly consistent.
Sounds familiar, right? It aligns perfectly with one of our Core Values at GAIN: Consistency and Moderation Over Intensity.
Program Ramblings
Because of the ideas above I have a huge confession: I don’t follow a program. I haven’t for some time, and usually just guide my training based of what goals or events I have coming up combined with how I’m feeling that day. Last year, I took 9 months and hired a weightlifting coach to prepare to a weightlifting meet. I got so freaking strong. It taught me that specializing in something can really help you excel at it. It comes with a cost though, after some months away from that sport, my max lifts are probably 20-30 pounds lighter, never mind my technique rusty.
Heading into the summer I thought, well I lifted a lot and got really good at it, I’m just going to run a lot know and see how it plays out. All summer I only ran and it honestly did work. I was stoked on running, my body felt good and I tackled a couple of big efforts. With the Mount Washington Road Race coming up this summer, I’m planning to get very dialed in and tuned up to push it hard.
I’ve been working on a program for myself, and it’s a big scary to write a plan like this for yourself, and I’ll be walking the tight rope of trusting my past self, who wrote the workouts, versus my current self who’s accounting for desire to train and everything else that’s going on. It’ll be a fun expereiment, and once that training is in full swing I’ll share everything I’m doing, and how it’s all going.
Don’t You Dare Drink Water
This video encapsulates Instagram fitness information so well.