7 Things I Wish I knew About Fitness

What is going on? Here are seven things myself and Kyle wish we knew before we got started training. We've done a couple of these before. So the spin is gonna be, these are things that I hear my clients being very confused about whether they're online or personal training clients. These are questions I get, and these are kind of fundamentals that will completely amplify results and change your entire mindset. Because these are a lot of things beginners or intermediate lifters may not know. So without further ado, let's jump into this. Number one is data is your best friend. The more data you can have in the gym, the better. So if you're just coming in and let's say you eat horrible foods, you have a horribly unhealthy diet, you're just eating whatever you want, stuffing your face, and then you eat one banana and it's a healthy banana in your mind, right, or some vegetables, you think you're gonna get in shape? That's not how that works. You can't just do an off workout and assume you're gonna look like Thor, right? You have to actually make sure you're managing and tracking everything. So a lot of people do this with nutrition. So logging is great, and that's something people tend to commonly do, and we've said that in the last video. But a big thing for me is actually tracking your workouts. A lot of beginners will come in, they'll just do random movements, they'll be all over the place, just completely new exercises every day. It's actually better to really track what you're doing and grow in that exercise. So following a dedicated routine, tracking the weights you're using, the volumes, everything you're doing, that's how you're really gonna improve, right? That's what's gonna force you to say, wow, I've been doing this same weight for three weeks in a row, might be time to push myself and up that strength. Whereas you just run around the gym doing random machines, you end up being that person, you're doing leg extensions like this, chilling and not pushing yourself. So for me, I just use an app that tracks my workouts. A lot of people will journal. That's gonna be your best friend, and this goes for nutrition, training, and sleep. Not so much that you wanna monitor how much you're sleeping, but you need to track and make sure you're in control of your sleep. So try to find a solid time to go to bed, a solid time to wake up. And then when you really pay attention and keep some mental awareness of what's happening, that's how you'll succeed. Numero do is know your goal and work towards it. A lot of people just come in and say, hey, I wanna look sexy, I wanna look great, I wanna be the strongest person on earth. These are okay goals. These are not tangible goals, right? So even in business and life, you can say, hey, I wanna be rich. That's great, you can dream, and you can say that every day till you die. But if you're not figuring out what you need to do in between that time to get there, so the first thing is really setting a tangible goal at the end. What do you want? How heavy do you think you should be? What kind of physique do you want? Do you wanna be huge? Do you wanna be shredded? What kind of thing do you want? Do you want strength? Do you want a big butt? Do you want little legs? You gotta really know what you want because if you just go in doing exercises, random routines, someone else's routine, you're gonna be building to who knows what goal. So for me, my goal is to be a really lean 210, so really lean out my physique, feel as healthy, strong, and agile as possible. So I do exercises and routines that work towards that. And I have this underlying goal, and I know month by month I need to be in control of my weight, I need to know where I need to be at, I need to push myself, I need to be constantly active, especially if you wanna maintain that lower body fat. So if your goal is ultimately to lose 60 pounds, you gotta know week by week, month by month, what you need to do to get there. Don't just have these big goals with no actionable steps how to get there. You really need to find tangibles, right? So you need to win. If your goal is to look jacked and massive, you're gonna need to get stronger. You need to be in control of your nutrition, sleep and eating, just adding on. You need to be really diligent with this. And I find a lot of people will just start, they'll say I'm here, I wanna get here, and they do not focus on this at all, right? Like coming, working on eating, nutrition, yes, that's the fundamentals of it, but you really gotta dive into the details. That's why with all my online clients, I really try to map out my vision for them. And even if you're newer to fitness, consult with someone. Like I get people that come in, and we'll get more into this later, but they have completely unrealistic expectations of what can be done in what time. So you really need to have a tangible and understandable goal that you can work towards. Number three, and this one absolutely drives me insane, is people that kind of, they're not moving too much, and they say, oh, muscle gain weighs more than fat, so I don't need to be losing weight. You'll typically get this with weight loss clients that aren't losing at a level they should be, and it's kind of this self-justification that hey, I'm working out, that's okay. But at the end of the day, and this is something I tell every single one of my clients, I'm gonna work you out till you're black and blue, but if you just eat it all back, we're gonna be spinning our wheels, right? We'll change body composition a bit, you'll look a little better, but a lot of people use this crutch, muscle weighs more than fat. That's just not simply the case. You will gain muscle, yes, muscle is denser. I mean, look at me. Every time I go to the carnival, I'm like 6'1", people guess I'm about 180. I'm 210 right now, and I'm pretty light for where I'm at, because muscle is heavy, right? I'm long, I have muscle on me, my legs are actually pretty dense, so that's why, yes, I do weigh more than most people that would have my frame that would call me 180. But saying so, you're not gonna gain 10 pounds of muscle in your first month of lifting, and lose no fat, or lose some fat and be the same weight. That's not how it works, and it's tougher to gain muscle when you are on a deficit. When you're getting started, and these movement patterns are new, you can shock the body and kind of have some stimulus there and gain more muscle. It's kind of the new beginner gains, and you can take advantage of that. But don't use this as a crutch. So kind of adding on to this, in terms of weight loss, if you're new and you're trying to lose weight, you need to know trends, as I said earlier, right? There are certain expectations and levels you should be able to lose at, bearing you don't have some medical disorder or something that would inhibit that. And if you have a good coach, he'll be able to take care of you with this. So I would say if you're borderline obese, like you're 250 to 300 plus, and you're really overweight, like 250 obviously if you're shorter, but you'll know, if you're mortally obese, like I'm talking seriously, seriously obese, you can do three to five pounds a week, and that can be still at a healthy level. Once again, you need to know what your doctor, you need to know where you're at. Obviously when you're out there, you can have medical issues, but you want to know the trends. And three to five pounds is very, very obtainable at that level. You see on The Biggest Loser, people are doing 10, 20 pounds a week. You don't want to be doing that. That's ridiculous. You're going to send your body into who knows where. It's just going to start shutting down. That's going to be dangerous. So you want to do this in a healthy way. But if you're really overweight, two to three pounds is completely okay. That's a healthy level to start at. Obviously as you get deeper in your levels, you have to curtail this and kind of taper off how much you're losing. But if you're just an average everyday Joe, or like someone who's been working out for a long time, like myself, I find a pound a week is pretty good to try to maintain my muscle, do it in a healthy way, where I don't feel like complete garbage. And once again, you want to taper this as your journey goes on. But you do want to set little mile markers, just like this, so you're avoiding things like crutch excuses, like muscle weighs more than fat. And if you're being consistent, it should be really easy, and it just comes down to science. Really quantitative, it's numbers, intake, outtake, you're monitoring all these factors, and that's how you'll succeed. And number four, you guys have to understand the power of measurements as well as weighing in. I feel like this is something that so many people don't understand. People will hop on a scale once every two weeks, and then just wonder why they're not losing weight. And honestly, like we were saying, what gets tracked gets managed. We have all of our online clients and personal training clients, whether you're looking to gain muscle or lose fat, whatever it is, weighing a minimum of five times a week. And that gives us the average every single week to ensure that all of them are reaching their goals. If you hop on once a week or just at random sporadic times, you're never gonna actually know if you're seeing progress. And this goes for measurements, this goes for even spending in anything in life. I have a friend who will just spend until he's black and blue, until the account's absolutely drained, and then just wonder, oh man, what's happening? Why am I not reaching my goals or my savings goals or whatever? And this is the exact same principle. What gets tracked gets managed. So make sure you're doing these consistently, and you guys will succeed. And number five, sugar does not make you fat. It just doesn't get over it. So many people believe that if they have any type of sugar, the scale's gonna go up and they're not gonna reach their goals. I had one buddy before, basically he said he had a protein shake with a couple grams of sugar, and that's why he wasn't losing weight. I think this is just a huge myth. Everyone needs to get off of this train because a lot of the people who are having sugar are having an excess of it, and that's what's gonna lead to weight gain. So minimize it, but don't believe that it's gonna actually cause you to gain weight, and you guys will have a much healthier and happier lifestyle within your journey. And number six, this is very important to understand. Less is often more. I see a lot of people taking an extremist approach, trying to be in the gym seven days a week, trying to start their diet at 500 calories and stuff like that, and it's just absolutely insane. And this is what leads to a lot of people not reaching their goals. So understand that you've gotta start at a certain point and gradually work up. You don't wanna just begin here and then jump to here because you're gonna ultimately fail within your goals. So make sure to keep that in mind and you'll succeed. Number seven, nice and simple, and this goes to all the people that are new, even myself. A lot of people think you're gonna put in your time, three months, six months, whatever it is, you're gonna get huge, you're gonna lose that weight, you're good for life, you can quit the gym, go chill out on a beach, go back to your old way of living. It's not how it works. If you're in the fitness game, you have to understand this is your life. You need to learn to make it a part of your life. You don't wanna be dieting, you don't wanna be doing any of these things. You need to learn how kind of habitual routine that you can do to continually stay in shape. It's a constant push-pull, right? You know, we're battling our lifestyles of excessiveness, Western diet, all these things, so you really need to encourage yourself to build a realistic gym routine like Kyle was just saying. So you wanna make sure you're in the gym, you know, whatever that may be for you. So just because, if you hate powerlifting, you don't have to powerlift. If you hate weight training, you don't have to weight train. You know, find what works for you. If you like doing all bodyweight calisthenics, by all means, if you like powerlifting, do that. If you like kickboxing, MMA, that's great. Just find a healthy routine that's gonna help build you up, keep you in a good shape, keep you healthy, and do the same with your diet. You know, learn to log, learn how many calories is in a banana, how many calories is in chicken wings. You know, get an eye for this, have an understanding, and really think that what you're doing now is what you're gonna be doing for the rest of your life. Build those routines, get comfortable, get confident, and that's how you'll have long-term success. So, obviously a lot of this video is a little advanced, even though it's for beginners. I know there's this whole confusing world ahead of you, so what we'd like to do is send out an invite for online coaching. Up until year-end, we're gonna be taking clients, so we're gonna cut it off for a little bit. So, if you'd like to take advantage of that, we'll do all your nutrition, all your game planning. We'll give you everything you need to succeed. We'll map out a vision for you. You can ask as many questions as you want, and you'll be completely taken care of. Like I said, lifestyle gym, nutrition, everything, we're there for you. We're mapping it out. It's easy. You will not fail with us. It's easy success. By signing up, you're taking everything off. You're taking the burden off, lifting it over to us, who have helped transform hundreds of people, and we'd love to transform you next. So, that's the end of the video. Smash that Like button, subscribe. Show this to your friend or anyone on Facebook, anyone who could use this advice, because this will go a long way, and I sure wish I knew it before I started working out. We'll see you in the next one.