I went through a long period where I just wasn’t seeing any results from my training.
I’d show up and put in the work, but couldn’t seem to move the needle.
My solution?
Push harder. Train longer. Eat “better.”
What happened?
As you might have guessed… Nothing good.
I ended up exhausted and injured – and the more I pushed, the worse it got.
I couldn’t figure it out. Everything I’d always heard told me if I worked harder, I’d just get better.
So I figured something had to be wrong with me.
Maybe I just didn’t have enough discipline.
Maybe I just needed more willpower.
Maybe I just had to wake up earlier and do more work.
Nope.
I wasn’t recovering.
The more I pushed…
The harder I worked…
It just kept making the problem worse because it was the problem.
–> Too much training, too little rest.
–> Chronic stress, no stress relief (turns out training is also stress)
–> Constantly tired and still hoping to make progress
Instead of bashing my head into the wall, I needed to take a step back and figure out how to use a sledgehammer.
So I worked on my recovery.
Instead of just throwing more volume at the problem, I made the stuff I was doing actually count.
I started doing less, better.
I also decided to stop ignoring things like food and sleep and actually make an effort to give my body what it needed.
And what happened?
I quickly started seeing results.
Instead of just making it through, I actually started making progress.
Am I still tired?
Sure. I train a lot and I train hard.
But it no longer feels like I’m constantly on the verge of breakdown and I’m actually seeing results for all my hard work.
Problem is, I still see this in so many people.
Just this week, I’ve had “the recovery conversation” with four different people.
And it’s not like I don’t talk about it often with the people I coach.
it’s just an easy trap to fall into.
It’s easy to find yourself in the “grindset” lifestyle that’s been so lauded by influencers – many of whom forget to mention that training is their entire job and they’re often on pretty significant amounts of steroids.
I mean, it’s pretty easy to push that hard when you have nothing else to do and don’t actually need to sleep.
But for the rest of us, we have to train smarter, not necessarily harder.
Does hard work matter?
Of course.
But it has to be the right hard work.
So if you’re constantly exhausted and not seeing progress, then it’s time to make a couple changes.
1 – Actually focus on recovery.
Stop saying you care about progress then ignoring things like sleep and food.
If you’re not eating enough and sleeping enough and doing something for stress relief (and no, training is not enough) then you need to do that.
You could have the best program in the world, yet it wouldn’t mean anything if you aren’t recovering.
So actually do the stuff that allows you to see the results from all of your hard work.
Sleep.
Eat.
Hydrate.
Stress relief.
And no, you’re not going to get around all of that by taking a greens powder or doing some red light therapy.
You actually have to do the work.
2 – Train better.
If you’re already focusing on all of those things, and still not seeing progress, then it’s probably time to change your training.
If you’d like a hand with that, then you know what to do.