Recently i sold on eBay a bunch of my old workouts and diet books from my fitness box. one person asked me if a certain product i was selling worked. tempted, i refrained from a snide comment and instead answered his question calmly and honestly: “success on the program depends on you. you will get out of it only what you put into it – nothing more, nothing less."
I've been selling off some of my workouts, past diets, and equipment on Ebay because in part 22, I talked about hitting a plateau that was hampering my fat loss. Plateaus serve only one good purpose: they tell you when it's time to shake things up because your body has adapted. One piece of equipment I sold was the Bean workout. I meticulously wrote up the advertisement and placed it online, including the reason why I was selling it (the plateau). At least twice people have contacted me and asked why I was selling it - did it work?
I could've written a snarky response like, “Did you read the advertisement that says why I'm selling it, or did you just look at the price tag?”, but I didn't. It seems a lot of people don't read when all the information's present - it's “easier” to write a question out and ask for the information that's already there. Maybe the viewers don't understand what a plateau is, in which case, I wish they would read the past article with 15 ways to break through one.
In the end, I wrote up a simple note and then ended it with the comment, “Success on the program depends on you. You will get out of it only what you put into it - nothing more, nothing less…and that's true of any piece of fitness equipment or workout you might purchase.” I was surprised afterwards to realize that statement had made it into my conscious and sub-conscious brain. In the end, the person must not have liked the response because I saw the “number of watchers” drop by one. I forget that truth bothers the hell out of some people, including myself at times.
This simple but accurate statement got me thinking about my own past endeavors in the fitness world. I've bought some junky products in the past, and I've bought some good products that didn't work because I didn't make them work.
How many times have we bought a piece of equipment, only to have it end up being used as a clothing rack? I know I have! I'm giving away to a friend of mine a piece of equipment ten years ago I couldn't live without. It bothers the heck out of my feet - especially the arches, so it's time for me to try something that won't hurt when I use it. There's a difference between pain from exercising the muscles, and pain that is the result from being ergonomically incorrect for your own body? She's much smaller than me and said once in passing how much she wanted an elliptical machine to work out on; since I'm about to move, she's getting her wish.
I used this machine faithfully twice a day for several months…about 9 years ago, but it served most of its life as a collector of clothing and dust. When I did use it, I lost 40 pounds. What you put into it, you get out of it.
I sold a diet plan that worked for me to some extent, but I stopped doing it because I went on the sharpest calorie cutting option they had, which was stupid on my part. I couldn't maintain that lifestyle, but it gave me information I later used to build on to get into my current diet that I can maintain without any trouble. Sometimes I wonder if I had gone for the medium or the slowest option, how much weight would I have lost. I'll never know because I didn't try hard enough to adjust and figure it out.
When I skip workouts, I can hear my brain quietly tease me and say, “You're missing another opportunity, Sue.” If I don't put in the time and effort to work out, the muscles will not become stronger on their own. I should print that saying out on a banner and hang it where I can see it every day. I've tried taping bathing suits to the fridge and hanging them on the bathroom door, but they never motivated me to stop and think, “What you put into it, you will get out of it - nothing more, nothing less.”
So if you don't lose weight and you've got a good product, give the product another chance. You've already spent good money on it, so why let it sit around? Dust off your box of excuses, open it up and look at them one last time, then throw them out for the trash collectors to pick up - you don't need them anymore.
If you don't like trying to find all the segments of this series, you can locate the links to them here and they will return you the exact spot on the appropriate site.
quazen.com articles by this writer can be found here
