It has definitely been a while since my last fitness update. I am now in my fourth month of fitness and surprisingly I have not broken my persistence and motivation to keep going. During the month and a half in which I did not post any updates on the topic, I have discovered some new things, gained new knowledge, and polished my routine. Therefore, I finally decided to share my experience and give a few more tips for those who are just starting this challenge.

No, this is not me unfortunately

I will be posting a more personal update on Friday. There I will be telling you about what changed in my rotuine, what I improved, and the overall fitness experience for the time since my last update. I will, of course, include advice, tips, and the knowledge I gained during this time, but for the post you are reading now, I will focus only on some of the essential things I believe every beginner should know. Don’t get me wrong – I don’t consider myself a really advanced guy or something, but I learned most of those things the hard way and with the help of lots of resources and advice from experienced people. Therefore, I really think the tips are valuable and I am sure anyone can learn something new. I hope it helps!

What did I learn?

I will do my best to keep this short an precise and summarise it in bullet points. I hope you find some good advice here.

• Doing the exercises the correct way – I know I mentioned it before, but I really cannot stress enough how important this is. If you do the exercise the wrong way, there will be more damage to your body than positive effects and it can lead to irreversible traumas. One of the guys I regularly see in the gym (and who I will tell you about in the next post) explained this in detail to me and now I am really trying to do the exercises correctly and put pressure to the right group of muscles (I realised how much harder it is if you do the exercises the right way, but it is totally worth it in terms of results and satisfaction).

  Our body has a natural reaction to try and simplify tasks, and this goes for physical exercise too – the body will try to do the easier thing subconsciously, which can lead to negative effects. In order to be sure you are doing it correctly, first of all, check with an instructor or online which is the right way to do it. Position yourself close to a mirror in the gym and watch your body as you do the exercise. Start with low weights but do it properly and you will see much more effect compared to doing it the wrong way with lots of weight. I witnessed this myself.

  This is a really helpful youtube channel (Athlean X) in this regard, this guy shows and explains how to do things correctly really well and gives the reason behind it. I recommend it for beginners and not only – you can learn a lot and he also has videos for people who are more advanced.
  

• The way you know you are doing it right is when you feel the certain muscle group straining itself and being pressured. This means you are hitting the right spot and training the muscles correctly. To make sure this happens pay close attention to the reaction of your muscles.
  
• Leave distractions behind – I used to go to the gym with my phone in my pocket and check my social media during breaks. This led to longer breaks than planned and A LOT of distraction while exercising. I stopped doing this and I now leave my phone in the locker so I do not get distracted by it. This way I can completely focus and engross myself in the work out session which leads to more effective exercise.
  
• 80% of the exercise is the second part of it – this means that it is more important to focus on lifting the weights down instead of pushing them up. The muscles strain way more when they need to support the weight going down and therefore it is very important to focus on lifting down as well.
• Consider your condition – another thing I learned the hard way. Instead of pushing yourself too much consider the condition of your body. When you have not had enough sleep or lack energy due to a hard day at work or school take easy, lower the weights a little and don’t overdo it. If you push yourself too much you will get a negative effect instead, so it is important to find the balance between challenging yourself and going over your limit.
• Speaking about limits – as my new friend suggested – find your limit and stay one step behind it. Don’t go over the limit but don’t stay too far away from it as well. The key to improvement is challenging yourself (without going overboard). When you feel like the exercise is getting easy, instead of increasing the number of reps increase the weights. According to most sources it is best to do maximum 10 reps per exercise and focus on more weight instead of more reps in general.
  
• Be careful with the posture – this is the essential thing when doing the exercise correctly. I learned that keeping a straight back guarantees a significantly better effect in the majority of exercises. What’s more, if you crook your back while doing it this will certainly lead to you having a hunchbak, which is extremely hard to fix. You will get the desired effect on your body but if you are not careful with your posture you will end up with a “turtle neck” and all the hard work will be for nothing basically.
  Having the right posture applies to your everyday life as well, especially when you are in front of the computer screen. Pay attention to your posture and be sure to fix it when necessary.

  I personally have problems with the right posture even when I am just walking normally so this has been a huge challenge. However, I am now mostly focused on getting the posture right during each exercise, I take my time with it and I do exercises solely for improving my posture and fixing my hunchback. I found a very useful YouTube channel with easy exercises which will help you improve your posture drastically – have a look. This guy is really good at explaining and he is also extremely funny so it’s not only helpful but really enjoyable watching his videos.
  Also, Athlean X – the guy I mentioned above also has a really good video about improving this aspect:

This is a summary of some of the new things I managed to learn for this month and a half. There are a lot of things to pay attention to when you are working out and it can be overwhelming. If you want to have results and not just waste your time it is a good idea to be patient and do things properly one step at a time. Progress comes naturally. For me, patience is one of the hardest things to master and I had a really hard time putting my effort into taking time and doing things slowly but properly. However, the results started getting way better after I started doing things correctly and as a bonus, I am improving my patience as well. Thanks for reading and stay tuned for another set of tips on Friday!

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