When I started my fitness journey in August of 2017 I had two goals: 1) to lose weight, and 2) to grow my glutes. Today, I continue my fitness journey for one reason: I love it.
While I've never been overweight (I think I was slightly in college, but more in a "skinny-fat" way), my fitness goals until recently have been completely aesthetically motivated.
In August of 2017, I finally got an Instagram and began following fitness influencers like Emily Skye, Anna Victoria, Meggan Grubb, and Whitney Simmons. Obviously you have to be careful of who you follow, but Instagram has actually served as a surprisingly healthy source of inspiration and motivation for me.
I began doing workouts that influencers posted, gradually learning more about physical health, from BCAAs to progressive overload to macro counting.
For almost two years, this is the zone I lived in, very happily. My body made awesome changes that still make me happy when I see them. I'll never forget the look of shock on Gabe's face when I flexed a bicep one day and said, "Hey, look at this!" I'll never forget how shocked I was when I moved an amount of weight I thought would be utterly immovable for me. I eat 500–700 more calories a day now than I did a few years ago, and I'm not looking any heavier. Weight lifting is AWESOME on every level.
But eventually, I noticed that while my body had definitely changed, it hadn't changed enough to sustain my motivation/dedication. I worked really hard to be fit. I worked out, I ate intentionally. With the amount of effort I put in, shouldn't I look...better?
But then, both gradually and all of a sudden, I didn't care anymore. I think it was a slow-sudden culmination of growing in Christ, and—I'm serious—paying more attention to mentally/spiritually/physically healthy Instagram influencers.
I began to rest in the fact that my body is strong and healthy, and I actually really like working out. My motivation can simply be that I enjoy it.
I also started thinking about what Mik Zazon says: "What is the kindest thing I can do for my body right now?"
Sometimes, the honest answer is to eat some spinach and do a HIIT workout.
But sometimes, the honest answer is to watch Netflix and eat a candy bar.
Thinking about how to be kind to myself has radically changed the way I make choices about my body. I never realized it before, but sometimes I had sort of a creepy mindset where I would think things like, "You're disgusting. That's right, eat ten cookies, because you're already gross."
Whereas if I think about being kind to myself, I think things like, "You have a great body. Let's be respectful and not feed it trash."
Being kind to your body means you don't do things to it out of spite, whether that's eat spinach or cookies.
Letting go of my aesthetic goals has meant incorporating different kinds of exercise to see what I enjoy and what makes me feel good. I don't have to resign myself to heavy hip thrusts because they're the best booty-builders; I can do a HIIT session instead because the endorphins are insane. I can go for a walk.
Will I ever stop weight lifting? I don't think so, but not because I'm afraid of getting fat. Because I want to be kind to myself.
~Stephanie
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