The Red Pill Or The Blue Pill?

Sitting in a dimly lit room in two vintage high backed leather arm chairs, a bald man presents you with the option of selecting a pill from either of his opened hands. Choose the red pill for the option of doing something for a never ending span of time. Making absolutely no progress or changing in the way you initially wanted, but you get to be part of a community of like minded people, have fun and laugh along the way. 

The blue pill gets you to your goal in mere months. A comparative lightening speed, but it requires consistency, hard work, a lot more sweat and a little sacrifice. You can still be part of a community but it’s a different vibe. One that is much more focused and goal oriented. 

Which do you choose? Achieving nothing or achieving everything. The red pill or the blue pill? 

Assuming your intention is more than just getting off your ass and you actually want to make positive changes to your mind and body, deciding on what path you take with your physical activity is harder than ever with so many options available. A constant barrage from media, and social media spouting the total body benefits of fad X only to change to Y the very next month has everyone running from one clique to the next. Do you go to the gym and lift weights? Do you do Crossfit or F45? Do you walk, run, cycle or do other forms of cardio? Do you box? Do you do bootcamps? Do you play an individual or team sport?

To make the decision easier you only need to ask yourself one simple question : what is your goal?

Is it honestly to go out and have some fun while moving around? Working up a sweat, getting puffed, feeling the burn and getting the heart beating quickly? Is it purely about socialising with other sweaty, puffing people laughing about your boozy weekends or your children’s escapades while darting between cones or running on the spot. Telling yourself that you really push it to your limits and you’re exhausted at the end of a session. Yes the extra weight and fat you hated so much is still there. In fact there is actually a bit more now, but it’s worth it because you love catching up with the other group members and its such a community feel as you all participate in your little circuit classes. The balance of life and variety of activities keeps you so coming back for more. Paying money to a trainer who is not much older than a high schooler with the experience and knowledge of a school drop out, first year apprentice. If this is what you really wanted, then please, carry on. 

But if the goal was a little bigger than behaving like a prep student at recess, your choices are narrowed down significantly.

Most people want to change their body. They want to look good. They want more muscle, more tone, less weight and less fat.  Less weight is easy. Eat less. Less fat is fairly simple too. Eat less and do more. But the more muscle and more tone part is a bit harder. Is jogging on the spot building muscle? No. Is running between cones building muscle? No. Is kicking a pad building muscle? No. Is repeatedly falling on the floor and getting up quickly building muscle? No. Sure it gets the heart rate up. It even gets you panting and dripping in sweat but so does sweeping the driveway, and no one mistakes that for a muscle building sport. 

This is the problem with so many of these activity choices, they wont give you the outcome you originally set out to achieve. It doesn’t matter how many years you do them. Running between cones or throwing a heavy ball at the floor will never build muscle. I don’t care how heavy the ball is. (Unless we’re talking Atlas Stones and thats a whole different story.) Just because its hard doesn’t mean your body will respond by building muscle. I can walk backwards up stairs if I want to. I could make it even harder by wearing a weighted vest or holding dumbbells. Its hard and my legs will burn but no where in that activity is the stress signalling my body to use resources to build new muscle tissue. As a result i’ll get really good at walking backwards up stairs but my body wont change.

At some point simple weight loss just doesn’t cut it. Eventually you’ll want more than decreased numbers on the scale. You’ll want to look good. Not just skinnier.  You’ll want to be firmer, to fill out your clothes and get rid of the loose, saggy skin that comes from weight and fat loss. This is where these non muscle building activities will fail you.

Want a V taper to make that shirt look good and accentuate your shape? You need shoulders, lats and a back for that. Want arms that stretch your sleeves and cause eyes to wander? You need biceps and triceps for that. Want that nicely shaped ass and thighs to fill those pants? You need glutes, hamstrings and quads for that. Simply put, you need more muscle.

You need to lift weights.

You can spend years in constant search of that one activity that in 12 weeks will transform you from being shapeless and carrying too much fat and not enough muscle to looking athletic and toned with a flatter stomach, no love handles and a nice amount of muscle with significantly less fat. You will go from one style to the next hoping that the next choice will finally be the one.

You can do all of that and ignore the answer thats been sitting under chins all along: weight training.

Weight training not only forces your body to burn fat but more importantly it forces it to build muscle. It speeds up your metabolism and allows your body to handle more food. It builds a better, stronger heart. It strengthens bones, tendons and ligaments. It corrects bad posture. Whats even more great about it? You don’t need to do it every day. In fact to get the most out of it, the less you do it the better! Your body needs to rest after you do it. As any experienced lifter will tell you, you don’t change in the gym, you change when you rest. So unlike the other activities that require a constant beating day after day, weight training needs you to chill. Your body needs you to sit down for a day and process the messages you just delivered it. It needs to use that food you provided to repair and recoup.

By weight training properly you are rewarded with not having to do it that often and as an added bonus the rate in which your body will change by resting more is dramatically sped up. All it requires is consistency, hard work, a lot more sweat and a little sacrifice.

“Weight training is too hard.”

Nothing worth doing is ever easy. And by saying weight training is too hard, you’re saying everything else is easier and when did taking the easy option ever amount to anything?

Achieving nothing or achieving everything. This is your red pill / blue pill moment. 

Which do you choose?