Comfort zone

Welcome to afitnewyou!  Today I would like to remind you that in order for you to reach your fitness goals you have to go beyond your comfort zone.  Muscle, and the other systems of our bodies, adjusts, and more importantly adapts, to stress and pressure.  For example, you’re most likely not going to get “sore” from moving the way you do during your regular day-to-day routine.  However, you might be “feeling it” more the day after you did some extra physical activity.  The same idea should be used every single time you are in the gym; if you want to see a change with your body, you need to push your muscles past their normal limits.  Strength gain and weight loss only come after the body has a need to adapt.  Give the body the reason it needs to change by pushing it beyond your comfort zone.

I usually spend this time telling you about a specific client who relates to the topic at hand, but the truth is that I find too many people in the gym who are not reaching their fitness goals because they are working too comfortably.  For example the client who “hits” the elliptical for 45 minutes 3 times a week but is not losing body fat because her intensity level is too low to get into the proper target heart rate during that time.  Or, the client who is in 70’s who wants to train for a more functional life but thinks exercises on the Bosu ball to be impossible so he doesn’t try progressive exercises on it.  It’s also the client who weight trains 5 days a week and hasn’t seen an increase in strength and / or muscle mass because he hasn’t progressed properly.  Truth is there are a lot of clients in the gym who become discouraged that they are not reaching their fitness goals even though they train frequently.  The one thing many of these people are missing, including the three I mentioned above with completely different fitness goals, is that they are not pushing themselves outside of their comfort zone.

Determining the most efficacious training regiment could be accomplished with elaborate physiological tests, basic tests that personal trainers can implement, and / or even much research.  But you could also push yourself to achieving your fitness goals simply by working beyond what’s comfortable for you.  You don’t have to “kill” yourself training, but pushing beyond the comfort zone should be easily recognized by anyone who has done anything in the gym.  If your fitness goals involve cardio work, turn it up another level or two, or add an incline to what you normally have been doing.  Anyone who has spent cumulative hours on the cardio machine know exactly they set the machine at to work comfortably, and they know the level where they would be pushing it…so turn it up and push it!  Those of you who are well-versed in body weight training for its functional benefits, probably know their comfortable repetition number that they hope their personal trainers request.  But you also know how “going a little deeper” in your lunge or adding a medicine ball to your squat feels…not quite as comfortable.  But that’s ok, as long as the exercises are still performed correctly; so push yourself to a level that is out of your comfort zone.  And the weight trainers, with their books and logs, undeniably know how many reps and sets of a weight can be completed comfortably.  They should think about how much quicker they would reach their personal best if they asked someone for a “spot” to push out that one extra rep each set.  I’m not saying it will be easy, but it will be beneficial.

I’ve said it time and time again, working out should be just that…work!  And work shouldn’t be comfortable.  It can be familiar, but in order for your body to physiologically change, it needs to be pushed.  You don’t really need an elaborate test to figure out how much to push; just push yourself beyond your comfort zone.  You currently are where you are because of all you’ve done already.  You will be where you want to when you push past your comfort zone.  It’s a simple but not so comfortable way to a fit new you!