Only train how you want and still get perfect results.
Sound good?
I’d love for that to be the plan.
Personally, I’m not a huge fan of stretching so if I could never stretch again and still see results…
That’s the dream.
Now there are two schools of thought when it comes to getting results.
On one side, you have a bunch of extremists who set an expectation of perfection.
No sugar. No processed foods. Run 6 days per week. Lift 3 days per week. Stretch 30 minutes every day.
If you want results, you’ll do whatever it takes!
(Including missing all important family events for the rest of the year.)
It’s a damaging perspective – both mentally and physically.
This is the kind of message that leads to eating disorders, unhealthy relationships with exercise, and absent parents.
It’s the kind of message that takes the thing I love and turns it into some sort of penance.
Yet the other camp is also damaging.
The camp that tells you you can do whatever you want and train however you want and still see all the results you want.
Sounds great.
Not true.
Humans tend to gravitate towards extremes when the real answer often lies somewhere in the middle.
The idea of being able to train however you want and get results is a tricky one.
Technically, it could happen.
There are people who only do the things they enjoy doing and manage to get the exact results they want.
Problem is that rarely lasts forever.
You might pull that off for a training cycle.
You might get away with it for a few years.
But more often than not, the injuries slowly start to arise.
The deficiencies start to rear their ugly heads and we have to decide whether to address them or ignore them.
And when you’re so used to doing whatever the hell you want, it can be incredibly difficult to address them.
So you ignore that tweak.
You pretend that niggle doesn’t exist.
And after a while, you have various forms of tendinopathy when you “never get injured.”
It’s really difficult to get lasting results when you only do the forms of training you enjoy.
Am I saying you have to hate your training to get results?
No.
In fact, I think you should enjoy most of your training.
If you don’t actually enjoy what you’re doing 80-90% of the time, then you should probably find a new activity.
But sometimes you have to spend a bit of time doing things you don’t really enjoy in order to be able to do the things you love.
Whether that’s lifting some heavy weights…
Or doing speed work…
Or cranking the treadmill incline up to 15%…
Or stretching… [ugh]
Sometimes you have to do a bit of the stuff you dislike in order to continue doing the things you enjoy.
And most importantly, those things should ultimately be a small portion of your training.
Unless you’re currently recovering from an injury, we should do as little hateful work as possible.
Just enough to keep ourselves going and to mitigate our risk for future problems.
Now, if you are currently injured, then you probably have to spend a lot more time on the things you hate.
But as you get past the injury, your training should start to include a lot less of the hateful stuff and a lot more of the things you love.
Training doesn’t have to be extreme. You don’t have to be perfect or fill your calendar with things you hate.
It’s also not a free-for-all all. You will likely have to do a few things that aren’t your favorite.
At least if you want a better chance at results and a lower risk for injury.
The key is figuring out what that ratio looks like for you.
You need to fill your program with things you love and then shove a bit of “preventative maintenance” into the gaps.
And if you’re not quite sure how to do that, I’m more than happy to help.
Just shoot me a message and we can schedule a time to chat.