life

Your abnormal is my normal

Thank you for all the responses on my last post, where I told the story of how I got into strength training and got in the best shape of my life this year.

There was a certain response that I received quite a lot, and I want to zoom in on that.

The gist of it can be summed up as follows: "I could never do that."

People were talking about my dedication to exercise and the strict diet that I followed to achieve the results that I did.

And here's the funny thing: this cutting phase was easy, I barely had to change anything about my lifestyle.

Training? Stayed the same: 4x per week, which has been my habit since 2020 (I had a gym at home, so the Rona didn't stop me).

Nutrition? The meals I ate were the same, only the amount of food I could eat changed.

For example: my usual breakfast (oatmeal, 1 scoop of whey, milk/water, almonds, fruit) was exactly the same during the cutting phase, but instead of 80-90 grams of oats I ate 40 grams. And I was more careful with how much fruit I added. All this to drop the calories to stick to my temporarily lower kcal budget.

Do this for each meal, and voila, you are eating in a caloric deficit, meaning you will lose weight. Add "training hard enough" in the mix and you can be almost entirely sure that you lose bodyfat and not muscle mass when your weight drops.

Other than eating my normal meals with different amounts, I made sure I ate more veggies than normal to keep my stomach busy, and I really did not snack at all. When you eat only meals (which was already my habit), even in a cutting phase the meals can be decently sized.

For a long time I could eat 4 meals a day: breakfast, lunch, dinner, pre-bed at 9PM. When this rhythm stopped working I simply dropped the pre-bed meal and the fat loss continued.

Do you now see why the cutting phase was so simple?

This way of life is my normal. It isn't called lifestyle for no reason.

Your abnormal is my normal.

And what is considered normal is truly wild to me!

eating a shitty diet
knowing almost nothing about nutrition, or wildy untrue things about nutrition
being nearly completely sedentary
having low muscle mass
drinking alcohol in problematic amounts
not exercising at all
having back pain, neck pain, all sorts of pains as a result of the sedentary lifestyle

Too many people blame things on "getting older" while ignoring what they don't do. There is a different path.

And don't come at me with "I am too busy" to choose a different path. Please. Aren't we all? This isn't a factor that sets you apart from everybody else.

Time passes, regardless.

You have to eat, regardless.

Your body exists, regardless, little aches and all.

The truly wild thing to me is that, even if you truly don't have time to exercise, you gotta eat. Why not eat healthier then? What's stopping you? What's the reason you eat like a toddler?

I have a list of like 10-15 meals that I enjoy, and that are healthy. I cycle through this list endlessly. Solved.

Meal prep is hard? It doesn't have to be. Figure out a meal you like that is easily made with components (this is often a pasta or rice meal with veggies and a good protein source). Create a huge batch of this meal, put it in smaller containers, take it with you to the office. Bam, you have a good lunch.

No, the truly dividing and deciding factor is: will. You have to want it. There has to be a why. I can't make you, nobody can make you.

Society is full of temptations when it comes to food. In too many countries, the car is the default mode of transport, making you miss out on gym of life activities such as walking or cycling.

Yes, the cards are stacked against you. It isn't your fault that you are where you are now.

Yet, the only one who can change it for you, is you. What is abnormal for you now can become your normal. You can change.

However, when you start out by telling yourself that you can't do it, you have lost before you have even started.