March 31st, 2012: 292 again today. Well shit, I guess I didn’t gain at least. Maybe these plateaus are inherent (not designed) to the program and will ultimately force me into very good physical condition – stronger and faster. Every day I stay in the 290’s, or yo-yo between the 280’s and 290’s, I get in better and better shape. Below the surface, I know that weight-loss is more a function of diet than exercise, but it doesn’t stop me from pushing myself to the max every day during workouts to torch as many calories as possible. So, I’m not losing weight at as fast a rate, but in every aspect of my workouts I am improving daily.
One last thing about plateaus – I think that they’re necessary in life because they separate those who are for real from the posers and pretenders. If I can beat down the 290’s and 280’s anytime during the month of April and move my plateau to the 270’s, it will help me think I’m more the real deal. Of course, then we’ll fight the 270’s. Line them up, and the program and I will beat ’em down.
March 31st, 2020: I’ve written about my exercise on the program when I first started it in 2012. I’ve skirted around specifics just because I didn’t want to put something out for public consumption that was ineffective, or worse yet dangerous. I tend to overdue the fuck out of everything, and it’s no different with exercise. I don’t start anything that way, I just get addicted to the feeling and have difficulty finding my stop-switch or even a throttle. I’m learning that even with “good” things, there can be too much.
There is nobody out there who can tell when too much is too much, regarding exercise. I looked for that someone, but after many years, I realized that person was me. This is not to say there is no information out there – there is, it’s just too much to absorb in a lifetime. Another thing is, although it appears to have worked for this person, or that person, it may not be right for me.
For example, I was told to take days off from exercise, so I’d take days off. All that meant was it now became hard to get going again the day after my day off. Or, I’d take a day off on purpose, but then the next day, something would come up that caused me to miss a workout entirely, or water it down, or abbreviate it – so I’d basically miss two days of working out. In this example, I learned that unless I planned on being a professional athlete, where my whole life literally revolved around exercise, and I had someone to monitor me constantly, then taking a day off doesn’t work for me. Besides that, although I usually get after it big-time in an exercise session, I’m still not coming close to what a professional athlete does, so yeah, I can do it every day.
The caveat in this previous example is that I learned when I had just had enough. There was no wondering when to take a day off – if life didn’t tell me to, then my body just would, there was no wondering.
My point on this example is, though I will eventually describe in detail the evolution of the Program’s regimen regarding exercise, what really matters for anybody’s success, I think, is just finding some kind of exercise that you like, that suits you, that makes you sweat, and ultimately burns off between 500-800 calories every day.
