For the past few months, I’ve been attending a local gym a few times a week. I’ve been signed up to gym at Uni, and then when I left I joined another near where I worked, but if I’m honest I’ve never gotten the full experience of being a gym member. Now, I don’t really know what I mean by that – maybe It’s the ‘seeing great results’ part or maybe it’s something else – but when it comes to gym going I used to be a fair weather friend.
Recently, however, I’ve become so proud of myself and how I’ve excelled mentally and physically.
I’ve talked before about believing that creative outlets are just the best, but I now truly see attending the gym as a creative outlet too. There is an art to working out effectively, there’s a science behind certain combinations and movements and It’s not that easy for everyone to just get up and go.
I’ve been working with a brilliant personal trainer named Wayne for a few months. The process starts when he creates a fitness plan for me and we schedule a session to go over every movement of the plan in detail. He checks and double checks that I’m recreating the moves perfectly and then we move on to the next one. He leaves me until the next session and we go through it again, this time without breaks and simply just evaluating my technique. After this, he leaves me to get on with that plan for 6 weeks mixing in cardio at specific intervals a few times a week too, and then it’s time for a new fitness plan!
I’ve decided that I want to start tracking my fitness routines and plans, so I’m going to keep a log here…
My ‘new’ fitness plan started on Tuesday, and we went through all of the moves, exclusives using the t-bar for many different combinations like squats, deadlifts and clean & press, a fitness ball, and some of the weights machines in the gym targeting arms.
I’m now writing this blog on Thursday and I can tell you the gym ache is bad!!! I mean that in a good way though, I’m not in any pain – but my targeted muscles are seriously aching from working harder than they were when I did my last plan, working different muscles again.
I’m working towards creating a fitter, healthier me, and working on body composition. It’s a slow process, but I love it. Everyone talks about how keeping fit will bring about endorphins and improve your mood and wellbeing -but it seriously does, and that’s why I truly believe it to be a creative outlet too! I was discussing it with a friend last night, and it’s really surreal how someone can be in the same place that you were a few months ago and you recognise that initial passion and enthusiasm in them and then realise that it’s definitely still within yourself too.
If your ‘New Year New Me’ goal is to lose weight and get fit.. do it. If you just want to pop to the gym for fun… do it! I tell everyone how amazing ‘Wayne the trainer’ is and working with someone who genuinely cares about the people and their stories, goals and reasons being just being at a gym is such a wonderful support. We’ve talked before about standard gyms where you turn up, you’re shown the weights area and a treadmill … maybe how to use a few machines and that’s it. Whether you’re following someone online like Kayla Itsines, working with a personal trainer, or just googling things and recreating them in the seriously cheesy words of Nike: just do it.
A blog by Amy 