Welcome to the first ever edition of “Superheroes in Training!”
Recently, I published an article on Nerd Fitness that discussed the three keys to success: education, inspiration, and support. Starting this week, I’m going to attempt to have three articles per week published on Nerd Fitness. Yup, you guessed it:
- Monday – Education
- Wednesday – Inspiration
- Friday – Support
Hopefully you’re already aware of this, but Nerd Fitness is way more than just a blog – there’s also a rapidly growing group of 4,000 superheroes-in-training all working together to building better bodies and better lives. This community is FULL of folks from all walks of life: those just getting started on their journey, others who are well on their way, and even people who have already had tremendous success and are eager to share their wisdom, struggles, adventures.
Each Friday, I want to highlight all of the great stuff that’s happening in the NF community around the world.
I have a hunch this is going to evolve drastically over the weeks, so please share your input with what you’d like to see in your Friday articles. I know weekends are a very tough time to stay dedicated, so hopefully these bursts of support and stories of success will keep you firing on all cylinders.
Oh, and by the way…the guy in the picture above sporting the NF t-shirt? That’s Mike Bridgman, the guy who DESIGNED Nerd Fitness – the picture was taken while he was biking across the country. No big deal.
Post of the Week
In this thread, Rhino was looking tips on “how to stay strong when you are feeling like you will go to the dark side?.”
The best response came from awsd00:
1. Stop caring what other people think.
Example: I used to be all self-conscious about going to the gym, but now I’m like “…why do I care so much? I’m off my ass, off the couch and not at home being lazy!
2. Go into the gym, keep your head down, do your thing and get out as quickly as possible. Being there for 2 hours means nothing if you didn’t get a good work out if you could be there for 30 minutes and get a better one.
Example: I used to think a good work out meant being there for an hour or more. Nope. I can get in and out in 30-45 minutes and feel just as tired and well-worn.
3. Do not listen to everything everyone tells you. Take advice from strangers with a grain of salt.
Example: First day at my new gym I was doing the seated calf press machine. At my school I can do 210 almost with ease while this one was giving me trouble. Little did I know I was just doing it wrong and the machine was set up differently. He showed me how to do it properly but then told me there was NO way I could do it at 210lbs – absolutely NO way. Well guess what, once I figured out how to do it properly I can do that machine at 190 to 210 so HA!
4. Give yourself more credit for what you’re doing.
Example: I used to get mad that I wasn’t seeing INSTANT results. But guess what – it took more than a week to put on the weight and it sure as hell is going to take more than a week to get it off! Just be proud of the fact that you’re making progress. Don’t give up on yourself!
5. Learn when to say “no!”
Example: Foods. More specifically BAD foods. Junk food? No! Fast food? No! Deep fried foods? No! Extremely processed foods? No! TV Dinners? No!
6. Learn to cook!
Example: I’ve been learning new ways to cook, new things to cook and new recipe ideas. No excuses. I don’t care how crappy your pots or pans are – find a way around it and make it work for you. Be resourceful! And most of all – cook your own damn food!
7. Congratulate yourself for being awesome.
Why? Because you are. Human beings are amazing. We can do so many things, make so many choices and basically have the world in our hands. You need to start thinking like that!
8. Last tip of awesomeness: ONLY DO THINGS YOU LIKE!
Example: I thought working out had to be like 20 minutes of cardio THEN doing the rest of my work out. Nope. Wrong. Sitting on a machine isn’t doing anything but making me abso-fucking-lutely miserable. If doing the cardio machines is not your thing, don’t punish yourself by doing them. Do the work out YOU want to do or else you’re just going to stop working out all together. That was my issue in the past. I was MISERABLE working out because I didn’t bother to try new things to see what I liked. Don’t do this!
Woots of the Week
If you do something awesome, congratulate yourself for being awesome. And tell us about it!
Who cares if it sounds like you’re bragging – we’re among friends, and we love to see our friends succeed. So, we have a Woot Room where rebels can post their successes.
Like these:
Congrats to Strickland and his wife for running the Donald Duck half-marathon! Despite it being his first half-marathon, he was able to finish with an average mile time of 10 minutes and 5 seconds. Dang!
Thanks to Nutmeg for starting this epic thread on Before/After pictures. It’s awesome to see how much progress has been made in such a short amount of time.
Congrats to Wildross for benching 315 lbs. Um, holy crap!
Brian Bigelow for getting accepted (and dominating) the Fire Academy. Sounds like an all around life-transformation to me…Optimus Prime would be so proud!
Blogs of the Week
We have some awesome writers in the NF community, and since we just added some blogging capabilities to the boards, let’s feature the week’s best blogs as well:
Supervitali’s incredibly inspiring post about how much he’s changed over the past two years. Overweight to a 6-pack? Yup. It’s awesome.
John’s post about getting picked last to play ice hockey, a sport he just picked up since moving to Canada. We’ve all been there in gym class – here’s what Josh went through, and how he dealt with it. One of my favorite reads on the boards.
Rebel of the Week
Charlotte from Georgia, reppin her NF Hoodie at her first ever 5k!
True story: Charlotte ran the 5k in four minutes, saved an orphaned puppy from a burning building, rescued an orphaned kitty stuck up in a tree, and then worked out a plan to balance the US Government’s 2012 budget in fifteen minutes on a cocktail napkin (just for fun). Now, I’m not going to say that crazy things happen when you wear a Nerd Fitness Hoodie, but they TOTALLY DO!
Own a NF hoodie or NF t-shirt? Take a picture of yourself doing something epic and send it in to [email protected] so we can feature you on the site!
Are you not entertained!?
So, thanks for being a part of the first ever Friday community post…what else belongs in here?
More full articles?
More links to awesome message board posts?
More pictures?
Yes, I know we have like 25 contest winners to announce (sorry about that), we’ll announce them all next Friday!
Oh, and I know we have some success stories here in today’s post…but wait til Wednesday of next week – I’ll be featuring easily the most incredible Nerd Fitness transformation I’ve ever seen. I guarantee your jaw will drop.
Tomorrow, I head down to Austin for five days, and I’m damn excited. If you’re going to be around Tuesday night in the city, join us!
-Steve
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