You know the scene in "8 Mile" where Eminem calls himself out on everything negative about himself?
" I am white, I am a f***ing bum
I do live in a trailer with my mom
My boy Future is an Uncle Tom
I do got a dumb friend named Cheddar Bob
Who shoots himself in his leg with his own gun
I did get jumped by all six of you chumps
And Wink did f*** my girl
I'm still standing here screaming, "F*** the Free World!"
Well, I'm about to 8 Mile myself on the top 5 things I was wrong about this past year.
So without further ado, here we go:
#1: YOU SHOULDN'T TRAIN EVERY DAY
I had a mentor I hired 4 years ago who had an article in Muscle & Strength (article HERE) and how he gained 35 pounds in 6 weeks (no steroids). He trained EVERY DAY for 3 hours a day. He spoke with his training coach because he was worried about "over training." "No such thing." It's a myth. He felt like a$$ the first 10 days but adapted quick after that. Recently another mentor Wes Watson told me he's been training 7 days a week, and HARD AF, for years on end. Yes, he trains hard, I've actually seen it with my own eyes at his San Diego gym. He broke my belief about WHY we train. It's not about results. Those are a by product. It's about purposely putting as much stress on our own body during the workouts so any stress we have the rest of the day is easy. It's also about doing it for other people to motivate and inspire to have a healthier lifestyle. It's about putting us in a positive mindset so we can serve the world better. Yes, you should do mobility, stability, and have a solid training program set up.
I personally have been training 7 days a week and feel fantastic. I use a Push/Pull/Quad Dominant/Hip Dominant split and repeat:
Monday: Push
Tuesday: Quad Dom
Wednesday: Pull
Thursday: Hip Dom
Friday: Push
Saturday: Quad Dom
Sunday: Pull
I also started training abs after every session.
#2: CHEAT MEALS WILL MAKE YOUR DIET SUSTAINABLE
Piggy backing off of #1 point of purposefully stressing our bodies, this is exactly what we're doing with our diet. It should be hard. The harder it is, the easier everything else is. The more disciplined we can be with our diet, the more disciplined we can be when holding ourselves back from staying something stupid during an argument with our spouse, flipping out on another fitness professional for promoting butter in their coffee for fat loss, etc. Getting more discipline is what makes a diet sustainable. Most people fall off when it's hard, but if we have the discipline and habits to hit our diet hard when life turns upside down on us, we will be shredded for life.
#3: IF YOU'RE EATING TOO LITTLE CALORIES YOU NEED TO REVERSE DIET
99% of people think they're eating too little, and when they calculate their calories for the week (not the day), they'll be greatly surprised that their weekend upward spike in calories put them at maintenance. If a client is weighing their food with surgical precision in grams, logging it in My Fitness Pal, and eating the same deficit calories for 3 weeks, and they don't start to lose a pound a week, then it's time for a reverse diet. However, most people get so focused on the end result and pissed they aren't losing weight they just quit before they start to see progress.
#4: ICING YOUR TESTICLES TO INCREASE TESTOSTERONE
This method does increase your testosterone. But most men shouldn't be trying to boost their testosterone this way or with testosterone replacement therapy until they:
⚡️Resistance train at least 4x/week (and not lift like a pussy)
⚡️Eat anti-inflammatory foods only for 6 months
⚡️Cut out alcohol
⚡️Sleep at least 7 hours
⚡️Get their body fat under 15%
⚡️Have the discipline to adhere to macros and training hard EVERY DAY
Then, and only then, should they even CONSIDER DOING IT
#5: TRAINING INTENSITY SHOULD BE SCALED
Volume (reps/sets) and training splits should be modified, but you don't need to "build up."
Unless you haven't ever trained, I would build up first so you don't get rhabdomyolysis (rhabdo).
Otherwise, you should be pushing your body to it's breaking point, and then pushing past that every workout. Don't be a fool and let your form slip and injure yourself. But push as hard as you possibly can, every workout. You cannot overtrain, only under recover.
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I plan on making myself look even dumber now when I get to December, so I'll probably make another list.
Until then, train hard my friends!
-DC👊
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