PUSHING YOUR LIMITS
Think you’ve hit your ceiling? You haven’t, I promise. I know that many of you are completing the January Program this week...congrats! Have you noticed that you've pushed yourself and have become stronger, or maybe you're still modifying and doing your push-ups on your knees after 3-4 reps? If you have pushed, have you noticed that your body has changed?
Most women come to SLB with the desire to change their body and become the best version of themselves. When developing new workouts, my main goal is to increase your lean muscle mass, keep you interested and make you happy so that you can push yourself to become your most powerful.
We focus on increasing your lean muscle mass because that is a major catalyst in decreasing overall fat. We achieve this through cardiovascular resistance training via Cardio-Cheer-Sculpting. And boy, does it hurt at times. Have you ever heard the saying, “What doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger?” At SLB, most of you learn how to push through your (good) pain and allow it to help you gain strength and earn the physical and mental results that you're striving for.
Many of you become frustrated, or stop when an exercise becomes painful – not injury pain, but the burn that occurs when you are fatiguing your muscles. Tbh, you can’t find your limits without testing them, and you can’t test them unless you’re willing to push through the good pain. If you can breathe and you’re not injured, then you’re absolutely fine to keep going. Don’t have heart rate anxiety. Breathe through the uncomfortable, because it's at that exact moment when you're creating changes in your body.
If you never change your diet for the better and do the same workout everyday (with the same modifications) and never push through the burn or leave your “comfort zone," you will never see change. So, in light of completing the January Program this week, make it your goal to channel that pain and strive to get in that near perfect breakdown, one more set, OR - hold that half plank for one more rep.
Here are some simple mental tips that work help you push through your workout:
Break it up. Think about tackling the workout in smaller increments. Cutting the full length into two, 25-minute halves is a lot less daunting and you won’t have that pit of dread that usually starts brewing long before you press play.
Stop watching the numbers Be present! It isn’t all about the numbers. Just like a watched pot never boils, staying fixated on reps, how many minutes you have left or how many calories your burning will only make the time pass more slowly, and will keep you from ever getting fully mentally “in the zone.” If it’s a hard habit to break, put a piece of tape over the time counter on your screen or your HR monitor.
Go beyond aesthetics Sure, having a killer bod is an incredible side effect of SLB, but for a lot people, “wanting to look amazing” isn’t something that they’re actually emotionally connected to. I’ve found that thinking about strength is more powerful when you’re trying to power through a plateau.
Know your why I say it all the time, but it’s so important to know and connect with your true north and set goals.
Really feel it Find something you enjoy about what you’re doing. I always like to feel like I’m punching above my weight. You’re doing SLB because on some (sick, masochistic) level, you enjoy it, right? Remember what you “like” about it so you enjoy the sensation of building muscle rather than just thinking of it as just a painful experience.
Be grateful for the body and mind that allows you to move When I teach live and our hearts are in our throats I always remind people what a privilege it is that they can move. It’s easy to forget that working out is a gift. Some people have physical limitations that prevent them from being able to move so be mindful that you are lucky you get to do 100 squats and lunges today!