Untamed Phoenix @untamedphoenixz - Tumblr Blog

Finished up meal prep for the week a day early for the win!

Going in the Right Direction

First glancing at this chart above might make you think I’m a bit dismayed about my current weight. The reality, however, is that I’m actually pretty happy right now with this chart.

Why? The trend line. Yep, I’m up 1.6 pounds so far this year. However, I am also down from where I peaked at in May during the height of the pandemic lockdowns. Through some concerted effort, especially over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been gradually moving myself into a more fat loss driven state.

I haven’t been trying to do this overnight. It’s a gradual change as I move back towards habits I built 4 years ago and away from habits I’ve unfortunately built up over the last couple of years. (Did someone say cake? Donuts?) Little by little, I’m shifting my activity levels and my behaviors towards food to build a healthy lifestyle that is sustainable long term.

Between getting back to concentrated meal prepping, changing my diet a little bit, and lowering my caloric intake, I’ve begun to move things in the right direction regarding my weight.

Most of my weight gain actually happened in the year and a half after moving to Richmond, honestly. I reverted to some bad habits as I didn’t have a focused gym life, no social outlets at all, and the stresses of life in general. Since then, I’ve been able to stabilize the weight gain but not mitigate it.

Now, I’m focused on the next six months being a concentrated effort to bring the weight down. It doesn’t mean I will be eating zero junk, but it means building back those efforts where a donut is a treat, and I eat one… instead of a weekly run of a half-dozen donuts for the house. It means buying cake will be more resigned to holidays and events instead of “Friday Cake Day!” which has become a regular habit in years.

As I move forward, I’ll also be watching my diet closely as it relates to my recovery rates on my Whoop band, as well as how well I sleep. What we eat and drink is as critical as the work we put into our workouts every day.

Cutting calories has meant some hunger pains. I then evaluate if it’s real hunger, hormonal hunger of expectation, or simply boredom disguising itself as hunger. I can’t count how often I forget to eat while at work simply because I get busy; if I’m not busy, my food driven mind goes to “hey, food?” which is not the best solution for hitting my long term goals.

It will be a continued effort, tweaking along the way, as I work to get my weight down. The good news is that I’m headed in the right direction.

...I’ll Grab Something While I’m Out

Since the pandemic began, I’ve been relying heavily on delivery services. Whether it is Shipt, Instacart, Amazon, or various other vendors, a stead stream of packages and deliveries have been flowing into my apartment.

This week I decided to hit Costco for the first time since COVID-19 shut everything down, and also pick up a purchase at Best Buy.

The one thing that struck me as I went on my very regimented trip was that I wasn’t making any side trips. Usually a trip to Costco meant grabbing a cup of coffee on the way there, milling around the Best Buy nearby, circling over to Costco, and either grabbing something to eat there or stopping on the way back to get some food.

On this trip, I had a plan. Swing by and pick up my purchase using curb-side pickup and then move through Costco as quickly as I could and get out. It made me realize something.

When I leave the house, I relate that to food. When I would leave the house, to me that also meant “eating”. No matter how short of a trip or what it was for, leaving meant grabbing a bite to eat, some sort of coffee concoction with more calories than a Big Mac. This time I made the decision this would be a quick trip to get things done.

This realization of “missing food” has made me think about every time I leave the house. Whether it is out of boredom, routine, or a “cure for depression” (which is just usually a momentary sugar high), I always find myself eating when I am out. Out for a Target run? Grab Starbucks. Heading to Carytown? Swing by Dunkin. Hey, I’m here, maybe I’ll grab a donut. Oh, two are cheaper than one… I mean when combined. The west end shopping trip exhausted me? Guess I’ll swing by Shyndigz on my way back.

As I’ve been thinking about this “respawn” effort I am currently undertaking to get my fitness goals pushed harder, I am thinking more and more about my relationship with food. I worry about macros, diets, etc., but lately I’ve just been focused on calories in & calories out and I’ve started dropping some weight again.

I thought back across my entire fitness journey so far, and realized I was happiest in this process when I was doing cardio classes, lifting weights, doing low intensity cardio, and focused solely on calories & protein when it came to nutrition… and the reality that the summer of 2016 when I was doing exactly that was when I lost the most weight I’ve lost in my life.

So I’m evaluating my nutrition plan with that in mind, and realizing that I need to Keep it Simple Stupid and stop worrying too much on the nuances and more on what I am trying to achieve. Core to that will be once again reprogramming myself away from food as a crutch, as a boredom reliever, and as a temporary cure for sadness which is usually of my own making worrying about minute details in life.

So meal prepping, getting back to basics, and hard work. Let’s get it.

AMRAP

Today I had my personal training session with my coach. A weekly session outside of the normal WOD schedule where we work on some specific things.

Today was a brutal leg day, at least in terms of leg days on the third week back from quarantine.

What I ran into today was a mental block. We did 4 sets of squats for 8 reps, then rested five minutes. What followed was an AMRAP (As Many Reps as Possible) for one set at the same weight. I got 15. My coach was pushing me to get more, but I racked it back, complaining of some abdominal pain.

The truth is that abdominal pain was probably more in my head than reality. In hindsight, I realize I probably could have gotten at least five more reps had I kept the bar on my back, reset, took a deep breath, and went back at it. I didn’t. Why didn’t I do it? It was in my head. It was self doubt. It was fear of failure.

Even in a one-on-one session where I know someone is paying complete attention, I was still afraid of failing. I allowed my self-doubt to overcome my determination, and my body translated this into “abdominal pain”.

It isn’t the first time I gave up on an AMRAP too soon. Often my own worries take over and the AMRAP falls apart before my body reaches that point where there isn’t anything left in the tank to push through.

So what do I do about it? I refocus myself and continue to remind myself that I am stronger than my own internal struggles. That I am my own hero and my own arch-nemesis at the same time. If I truly want to be the energy filled, strong, committed hero I want to be, I must endure and become more comfortable with being uncomfortable.

Only when we push ourselves hard can we truly accomplish our goals. I have lofty goals, but I know I can achieve them. I just have to realize it will be uncomfortable, suck it up and deal with it, and push on.

Trying to conquer my fears ingrained for decades, one day at a time.

Perfection

Today, my coach asked me an interesting question. “Are you happy?” In my normal behavior, I answered with a self-deprecating “well no, but but that’s just my normal state.” It’s a self defense mechanism I’ve had since I was younger. He asked me why, I responded that I probably need a hobby.

The reality is that I have hobbies. I enjoy writing. I play video games. I want to work on more YouTube videos. I enjoy fitness stuff. I have things that I want to do and things I want to accomplish. When I start something, it tends to break down and never get done.

So I began to think about why. In between working, this nagging voice stuck in the back of my head. I could be happy, right? If I just stuck to the things that I want to do? So why don’t finish the things that I start? I will start writing something, or a YouTube video, and will just shut it down unsatisfied after about thirty minutes of working on it.

It’s because of perfection, or lack thereof more specifically. Short of perfection, I begin to shut down. I beat myself up, clobbering myself with self pity and whatever the hell the midlife equivalent to teenage angst is. After all, if something isn’t absolutely right will I get shot down and beat up by people who will say my writing sucks, my video is stupid, or I just suck at that game.

It all goes back to what I think people will think about me. Why do I care? Well, let’s take a trip back a couple of decades. (Just a couple, I’m not that old.

It’s probably a combination of things. I was a loner in school, pretty much ostracized by just about anyone. In hindsight a couple of people did try to reach out, but I distrusted everyone so much that I put my guards up. My father was completely vacant for most of my life. More than anything, though, it probably comes back to my mother.

I can still remember times when my mother would tell me how I wasn’t good looking, call me fat, and tell me I’d never be ‘attractive’ to someone. I was told how I couldn’t sing well, so why should she come to my concert at school just for the five minutes I am on stage? Why should she come to the art exhibit just to see the thing I made, she saw it when I made in the house. Over and over again, she systematically knocked me down.

My mother passed away three and a half years ago. For the first couple of years, it felt like the most painful thing ever. As time went on, I felt like blinders started coming off. Especially over the last few months, locked in the house from COVID-19, I’ve had more and more time to think about her and my past. I’ve come to realize just how manipulative she was towards me.

I would say hateful, but I can’t. I really do believe my mother loved me. However, I also realize now she saw me as something that was “hers”, a piece of property born to serve her in some ways. She knocked me down so much, told me how bad I was at things, that I couldn’t help but think of myself as a failure. If I’m a failure, then I won’t leave. Then I would always stay at home with her.

Throughout my entire life, whenever I’ve tried to do something creative, I never truly complete it because I always feel like it isn’t “good enough” because I know it isn’t perfect, and my mother reinforced that I wasn’t good enough so it could never be perfect to begin with or even close to good. I’m reminded of a quote from Star Trek: Voyager.

Borg Queen: Congratulations.

Seven of Nine: Regarding?

Borg Queen: Assimilation is complete.

Seven of Nine: 300,000 individuals have been transformed into drones. Should they be congratulated as well?

Borg Queen: They should be. They've left behind their trivial, selfish lives, and they've been reborn with a greater purpose. We've delivered them from chaos into order.

Seven of Nine: Comforting words. Use them next time instead of "Resistance is futile". You may elicit a few volunteers.

The idea of the Borg used to appeal to me because of the idea of being brought into perfection and being accepted by everyone because you are one. ‘

This evening I skimmed through some old files and photographs. I realized that I had so many half-done stories, articles, blog posts, photo projects, etc. because none of them lived up to my perfecting standards. After all, they can’t be good, I did them.

How do you get better at something? You do it a lot. You do it over and over and over again until you’re really good at it. If you don’t keep trying, you never improve. The problem is I have programmed myself to stop trying after I’ve failed the first time, instead of continuing to push.

The one exception to this rule has been fitness, to some extent. While I tried to do the fitness thing for years off and on, I never had success until I worked with Coach Andrew beginning in 2015. He was probably one of the first truly supportive people in my life in regards to my outside-of-work activities. He pushed me, he encouraged me, and he told me that even if I fell, I could always get back up and try again.

Still, when it comes to things like this blog, or videos, or gaming, I still have held myself to impossible standards. I’m constantly fiddling with the blog template, graphics, etc. instead of actually writing posts because I always feel the posts are never good enough. My drafts folder contains 15 different, incomplete postings.

So what do I do? After all, I know deep down perfection isn’t an attainable or realistic goal. I know that I can’t get everything absolutely right on the first try, and I know things will be better each time.

I’ve done a handful of YouTube videos, but as I look back at them I can see improvements each and every time. Whether it is color, lighting, composition, audio, etc. each one improved upon the prior. If I randomly asked 100 YouTube viewers would I get a bunch of people complaining about random things? Sure, but who cares. Trolls gonna troll, I have to do me.

Similarly, this blog post isn’t the greatest piece of prose ever written. It’s probably a little disjointed and might now flow as well as i hoped. Do I scrap it? I could, or I could realize that my writing will continue to improve if I keep working at it.

For video games, instead of giving up as soon as I die, maybe get back into Fortnite and just keep dying and just die a little later each time. Maybe work on my cities in Cities Skylines more and know each city I build will build my skills instead of just abandoning after twenty minutes of not completing an entire bustling metropolis.

I told my coach today I felt like I hadn’t had any “wins” in fitness lately. I started going back through some of my old lifting records. We worked on bench together today, and I did a peak of 175x5. The heaviest I benched was 190x2 back in early 2019. I haven’t really worked on bench press at heavy levels since then. So even with over a year away from the lift and nearly three months of COVID lockdown my lift is on par. I’d say that’s a pretty damn good win right there, knowing that soon enough I’ll be breaking that peak weight level and heading back towards getting stronger.

I closed my iPad several times as I wrote this. Instead of using those breaks as a chance to fail, I used them as an opportunity to clear my mind. To bring my thoughts into focus and come back to what I was writing. I realized that my goal of writing about perfection was one that I needed to do, because it’s the perfect setup for restarting my efforts to bring happiness to my life.

So I’m committing myself to write and post more, to play more games and say committed to them, do more videos and keep working at it, and find more things I am interested in and create more. To fiddle less with the details and get back to doing things that are meaningful to myself.

I’m also committing to my fitness effort because I know while I can not be perfect, every day I can change myself every day to be a little bit better, a little stronger, a little leaner. It takes time, it takes effort, it takes dedication, and it takes sacrifice. It means keeping the diet in line and staying true to what I want to achieve.

I will always remind myself of why I was called the “Phoenix” by my coach in Connecticut. Because no matter what, I refuse to give up in the end. I might burn to ashes, but I will always rise stronger. Never perfect, but a little better every time.

The Click

In the beginning of my fitness journey, I always felt like I was simply going through the motions. I hated fitness, but I was there to keep myself alive. I knew it was necessary.

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The Click

In the beginning of my fitness journey, I always felt like I was simply going through the motions. I hated fitness, but I was there to keep myself alive. I knew it was necessary.

Then April 2016 came, and I felt the “Click”. The click was this moment when I realized I was actually enjoying what I was doing in the gym. I was happy to be there. Coach Andrew showed me that fitness wasn’t just about treadmills and 4 sets of 10, but it could be much more. Functional. Heavy. Fun. He made me realize that fitness could be a part of life that brought joy, and was more than just a chore.

Also in 2016, I went to Camp Nerd Fitness. I was nervous; always a super overweight guy my entire life and here I was going to a fitness camp. I set a goal that summer before camp. I was going to drop at least 25 pounds during that summer’s “Fit Club” at my gym. Every day I came in early into the gym and got into a cardio HIIT class, and on days with no cardio HIIT got on the elliptical. In the afternoons on non-HIIT days I was lifting weights.

It was an arduous schedule that I both hated and loved simultaneously. It was shortly after my fuse blew and I felt the “click” of fitness. It sometimes felt like a slog, but I was getting stronger, losing body fat, and in general actually felt fantastic during that eight week period. In the end, I succeeded in losing about 28 pounds in that 2.5-ish months leading up to camp and went down to the mountains of Georgia for this adult fitness summer camp with a confidence; it didn’t hurt that Andrew & the ATF folks were building up my confidence the whole summer. After I got back, I transitioned into more powerlifting style training, generally pleased with where my body was for a time. Then a year later I moved to Richmond, and began sort of “muddling through” fitness. Went through a couple of coaches, trying to find my way in a new city and new gyms. Landed in a chain studio doing HIIT classes for about 9 months.

The truth is that I never really felt F45 was the right thing for me, deep down. I made myself want to believe it was. That it was sort of that “CrossFit” atmosphere I looked at from afar and generally thought it would be good… but I was afraid of injury. I was afraid of hurting myself. I was afraid I wouldn’t measure up in a CrossFit box because, let’s face it, CrossFit boxes have a reputation. Jacked, shirtless people throwing up huge weights at high speed and hammering out burpees.

So I went through the motions there, but I never really felt like I was progressing. I wasn’t getting leaner. I wasn’t getting stronger. My endurance definitely increased, but I felt “drained” after every workout to the point that I just didn’t want to do anything else for the rest of the day. Sitting at “peak” heart rate for 45 minutes just took everything out of me. My form wasn’t improving because everything moved so fast that I could not adapt or learn. “Do front squats… for 45 seconds…” doesn’t let you perfect your front squat, it simply makes you do them faster and lighter. In mid-December I saw an ad on Instagram for a local CrossFit box without CrossFit in the name. River City Fit. I thought I knew the gyms around, but this place was a mile and a half from my apartment? Really? Ok, maybe I’ll go check this out. When I got there, I learned it was, in fact, an actual CrossFit box and a CrossFit affiliate. The Owner, Jacob, talked about wanting a different culture. I was hesitant, I was scared. Did I want to go down this rabbit hole?

Jacob convinced me to take a free class. Thankfully the free class I took was front squat focused, and not some Olympic lifting where I didn’t have a clue. After the class, I agreed to sign up for a couple of months. My thought was that I was going to flip back and forth between CrossFit and F45 for a couple of months, just as a change of pace.

My first week, which I refer to as Week 0, I spent half of my time at RCF and half my time as F45. This was also the week of Christmas, so I had some time off on Wednesday, bouncing between the two gyms. I went to bed that Friday, unsure which gym I was going to go to on Saturday. They were both offering classes Saturday morning. When I woke up, I looked at my phone and smiled. I realized the right move. I was done with F45. I closed the app, opened Wodify and booked myself into the “team” class in RCF. What I found when I arrived was a group of supportive, amazing people who were so supportive of the “newbie”. Sure, I knew some lifting, but a lot of this was still so foreign to me.

The following week, New Years Day I went into F45 as my membership was still active. RCF had no WOD that day, and I wanted to get a workout in. It was also a good opportunity, having been away for a few days, to make sure I was making the right decision. It was weird, because even though the workouts at RCF were shorter bursts, even after a week I found the F45 session to be less of a challenge all of a sudden. I realized at the end of that session that I definitely made the right decision.

In Week 1 I struggled and beat myself up mentally. I kept feeling like I couldn’t do this. The moves were all new to me, and the intensity was shorted and compacted into smaller zones.

At the same time, there was something about this that felt very… familiar. It felt like a coming home moment, and I wasn’t quite sure why. As I struggled, Coach Jacob made a suggestion… let’s do some Personal Training sessions and work on the Olympic Lifts 1 on 1. I can deadlift, I can squat. These new lifts, I thought it was a good idea so I signed up for five PT sessions with Jacob.

On Session 1, we worked on some clean form. We started with PVC pipe and moved through the motions I needed to get to. He also identified some areas to work on, including wrist mobility (which has been awful forever) and strengthening my scapula. It was sort of surreal, because we also had the session on Wednesday afternoon; I always met with Andrew at Anytime Fitness on Wednesday afternoons, so it felt so familiar and yet new at the same time.

During Session 2, we hammered at form on the clean some more. We worked on the wrists, and really hammered at the form. About halfway through the session, I did a clean from hang position and Jacob screamed, “that’s it! That was awesome,” and I felt something in my brain. The click. That was it, THE CLICK! I remember that… I felt it four years ago, and I haven’t had that feeling in a long time. But there it was. I know it. That was the click. My brain came to the realization that this is it, this is what I should be doing! I was struggling, like I did when I was first learning to squat and deadlift, and that felt awesome. I was being challenged, and yet at the same time with every lift I was feeling a little stronger, a little better.

The day after, I took a rest day because my scapula was on fire. On Friday, I was in the fray again. This past week, I put in seven days in the box with a double session of class & PT. With every session, I feel like I am learning more and more. New movements, new concepts, and new ways of moving my body. I am refocusing on my body being present and in the moment, my breathing as I am more focused on the performance of the movement than just moving as fast as possible.

It was during this past week that I said those words to myself. The words that I never imagined I would say since I began this journey four years ago.

I’m a CrossFit Athlete.

Not a member. Not a client. The coaches treat us all as athletes. Andrew always treated me like that; he always pushed me as he would push an athlete. He saw something that no one had previously seen in me, and I feel like I became that. It’s why he said I was the Phoenix; I burned up and rose from the ashes stronger. It feels great to be treated as someone there to get stronger, to get better, and to push myself beyond my perceived limits. To force me to be uncomfortable so I can get better every single day. We’re focused on safety, but we’re also focused on improving ourselves.

When I left ATF a couple of years ago, I always said you can’t capture lightning in a bottle. I still believe that, you can’t recreate the defining moments of your life. In that space I had such a supportive crew of people around me. For the first time in years, I am feeling that again. Amazing, supportive people all working together to make themselves better.

I’m a CrossFit Athlete. No, you won’t find me swinging from rings shirtless tomorrow while snatching 225. Those are goals for the future. For now, I’m pushing hard and improving myself every single day. I am pushing myself every WOD to become a better athlete. Every workout puts me closer to my goals, and now that I have that feeling of purpose again, I am focused on making 2020 the Year of Phoenix; this will be the year I achieve what I’ve been chasing for four years now.

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This morning hit Renegade at F45 and this evening hit a deadlift session, nothing too intense as I am ramping back into heavier lifts. Worked up to 335x3, a bump of 20 pounds over my last deadlift session. I am going to settle in here, work on form and get endurance for higher reps. Once I hit a 10x on this weight, I’ll go up. Need to get my form back before I move this up more as I head back towards the 405 mark while keeping up my functional training. Also did some box work as I work up my courage to attempt that 18” box jump in November; it’s coming soon and then up from there. #deadlift #functionalfitness #liftheavy #goldsrva #goldsgymwhiteoak

Totes Natty, Broham

I’m completely natural. I know, I know… it’s a complete shock to you,. right?

No one will mistake me for a steroid user. I had someone ask me once if I used steroids, and I thought back to something my old trainer and I agreed… “Yeah, if I did I’d be a lot more jacked and a hell of a lot leaner than I am.” No, I am not using steroids. No, I am not on hormone replacement therapy.

I’ve mentioned on this blog before about my feelings of what I might have been like had been all-in on fitness when I was younger…

I told one of my best friends recently that I am probably lucky I didn’t shoot for the stars of that body so many years ago. The truth is, young guys who want to achieve those types of physiques pump so many chemicals into their bodies that the Dow Corning plant is probably thinking, “yeah, that’s a bit too much.” They do it through a combination of raging testosterone, raging stupidity, and a sense of invincibility. We’re all stupid when we’re teenagers.

As I mentioned then, I always had an admiration for bodybuilders. My body dysmorphia I know is primarily driven by the desire to stand out in the crowd, since I spent most of my life being beat down for being overweight or never meeting the expectations of my family.

So when I was scrolling through Tumblr recently, I came across this post which was in my feed as a “recommended post”, most likely because I “like” quite a few fitness posts. I read through this post with a combination of interest, amazement, and disgust.

“I want to make an impression with my mass.” I think this pretty much summed up what I view as the core of my body dysmorphia. I’ve always thought that “if I had swole” then I would make an impression and that people would respect, desire, and fawn over me.

Reading through this also reinforced to me a lot of what has been going through my mind over the years. I wanted acceptance, and I dreamed of getting this from “mass” and impress people with big muscles.

I never got that far, though. I always started down fitness and then backed off and ended up more overweight than before. It was a cycle that I wouldn’t break until recently.

Over the last few years, I’ve been focused on getting healthier. I’ve said it then, and I’ve said it now… no, I will not do drugs to get to my goals. It will take longer, it will be more work, but I will not sacrifice my long term health for short term “gains”. As I read through the Tumblr post, it completely reinforced this for me. Could I have been this person 20 years ago in some of the most vulnerable parts of my life? Asbo-freaking-lutely.

This isn’t me today. As I read through this, I’ve realized how removed I am from this mindset now. I think my body dysmorphia has morphed from being less about getting attention and more to wanting to prove to myself I can do amazing things if I put my mind to it. When I walk into the gym tomorrow, it will be coming from a place of positivity because of this post, because this Tumblr post “recommended” made me realize and remember what I’m really trying to accomplish, and it definitely isn’t this!

I’m focused on functional fitness, rebuilding my body, getting healthier and more mobile every day. It’s why I do F45 and combine that with some “heavier” lifts. I know if I continue to build the base, I can resume shedding body fat and get the physique I want. More importantly, I will be moving faster, better, and be stronger than ever with endurance to match. Ben the Athlete… I must always remind myself of that phrase that Coach Andrew said which made me smile from ear to ear; Ben the Athlete. Finally. I won’t go back to less.

I must Be Untamed and get to my goals. Let’s hit it!

Getting back to more standard lifting along with my functional strength training. Today I hit up some upper body work, nothing too major as I ramp myself back to 2 a days a few times a week. Also worked on some reverse burpees, otherwise known as FML in a major way. Long term goal, be able to kick myself up off the floor in one motion. Short term goal, not to flip myself backwards and fly across the turf like a tumbleweed. #chestday #liftingheacy #fitnessgoals

Ramping It Back Up

It has certainly been an interesting year in my fitness journey. It’s been an up and down journey. Part of the reason I decided to start blogging about it again was because I felt the need to right the ship that hit a huge iceberg. (That’s honestly probably a bit dramatic, but if I’m not being overly dramatic I’m not being me.)

It started off as a normal year. Was doing some focused lifting on getting my core lifts up. Then I decided to switch things up because I was getting bored and felt like I was in a rut. I began doing a more functional fitness focus on F45.

Doing F45 has really helped me overall. When I do my heavier lifts, my squats are deeper. When I deadlift, my form is tighter. In general I’m more flexible and find myself able to move better.

It has also exposed something, specifically my fear of failure. It wasn’t easy. It didn’t come naturally. It was something that had to be worked at, that beat me down, and something that made me feel bad about myself, quite honestly.

When I began my fitness journey a few years ago, I found something in picking heavy things up. It was like a fish being thrown in water, and it just clicked. Pick up heavy thing! I can do that. I felt like it was something I was doing very well and I enjoyed it. I also felt stiff and sore all the time. I shed a good deal of weight and got really strong, but I never really got the “physique” side I wanted to achieve. I did, however, change my mentality greatly on that front. I no longer was just focused on appearance.

During my days I was doing “powerlifting”, I also did functional cardio. I hadn’t done it a while, but when I went into F45 the first time my first thought was, “I can do this, I’ve done this before.” It wasn’t pretty. I was gasping for air. Not only was my conditioning shot from the prior couple of years of focusing on solely lifting, this was harder than any functional cardio class I took previously. That's was story mode, this was the hardcore mode where you only get three hearts to beat the level.

Over the course of the next few months, it got better. Not “great”, but better. I was getting back into my groove. I was feeling like me again, for a short while at least. I was doing lifts in the afternoon, classes at F45 in the morning, and it was a good feeling and rhythm.

I started getting a little bit of burnout, but I could push through it. Then one day, I received a message from my step brother telling me something I had not expected; that my father had passed away.

At first I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to feel. When I lost my mother 3 years ago, I was shattered to a million little pieces. If it hadn’t been for the people around me at the time, especially my coach Andrew, I don’t know how I would have dealt with it honestly. I was very lucky that my gym community was also there to support me and help me through it. This time, however, I didn’t quite have that broken feeling.

Instead of a broken feeling, I had more of an empty feeling. It wasn’t sadness, per se. More of just a loneliness. This was a man who was extremely religious and treated me pretty badly in my life, always distant and abandoned since my parents divorced when I was five. I was often a pawn in my parents fight. Even stil, with his passing it meant I was now officially alone in the world with no parents. They were both gone, and I wasn’t sure how to deal with that mentally or emotionally.

In turn this triggered some part of depression in me. I didn’t full realize it at the time, but this was definitely a depression trigger. I didn’t want to really do anything. I was always tired. I was always bored and not wanting to do things. I began to scale back what I was doing on all fronts. I stopped meal prepping. I slowed down on my afternoon lifts. I started skipping F45 sessions, particularly the harder cardio sessions. I wasn’t working out to my normal schedule, I wasn’t really doing much of anything. It was more of a muddling through than anything.

I’ve dealt with depression most of my life. Despite what you might hear, it’s real. It’s not just a sadness, but more of a mental emptiness that drains you of a desire to do things. Part of what I think might have been problematic this time was that I felt like I was lacking direction in life, especially fitness. While I go into F45 and get direction from the coaches for a 45 minute block, it isn’t a long term planning effort to drive me towards my goals.

This week began the new round of the F45 challenge. I decided I would use this as an opportunity to get myself going again. I knew I had to do something to overcome this sense of being directionless. So I signed up and did the assessment. It reminded me that I am still not near where I want to be physically, both in physique and in ability.

All of this has reminded me why I like having a coach specific to my needs. I don’t need someone I meet with all the time, but I like having a coach to sort of point me in a direction. I’m fairly point-and-shoot when it comes to fitness, but it’s nice to have someone guiding me. If my previous coaches knew anything, it was that they could just tell me to jump and I’d ask how high.

So this week I began getting back to normal. Getting all of my F45 classes in and ensuring my activity rings are closed every day on my Apple Watch. I did a couple lifts, nothing major, at the bigger gym as well. Next week I’ll increase that activity. While I work on ramp this up, I’ve begun considering seeking out a new coach, even if it is a virtual coach. Just someone to tell me to get my ass in gear and give me a little direction to achieve my goals.

Have my goals changed? Not too much. Physically, I’m less “swole obsessed” these days and more ability focused. I’d rather have a little bit of bulk and be able to move well, squat, jump, and lean into life than “get those mad gainz” that I was so focused on. I also realized that wasn’t going to be a feasible goal when I know everyone I saw in Instagram I was using as “fitspiration” was on a Tumblr of Steroids. I refuse to sacrifice my love for a short term physical appearance.

I’m refocusing my efforts on hitting specific goals while continuing to work on my physiques. Getting my compound lifts heavier will be a big component, but so will the athleticism piece. Finally hitting that bodyweight pull-up, for example, or being able to jump on plyoboxes with confidence. Being able to lunge jump confidently. Get better at long jumping without my feet killing me with every workout. Be the athlete I’ve dreamed about being my entire life. I know I can do it, it will just take effort, time, and dedication.

I can do this. No matter what life throws at me, I come back better. Burn me to the ground, I will rise up stronger. I won’t let anything get in my way. Phoenix Rising!

John Bolton is Out

John Bolton is out. Which means someone even worse is coming. Hitler's ghost? Kid Rock?

New video update coming soon.

F45 Playoffs & The Phoenix Athlete

Today I participated in the #f45playoffs at @f45_training_dumbarton. I started working out there in early March, just doing cardio 2 times a week. In mid-April I shifted my programming to do each morning at F45, 6-7 days a week, with a mix of cardio & strength training. I am also doing some heavier lifts 3x a week as well. It's an arduous schedule, which I can't keep up forever, but for now it is fun.

Today was Playoffs. It's a test of strength and conditioning that acts as a "benchmark" for performance. It's a teen minute, rather intense workout intended to tax the body and see how well you do.

After completing the test, I scored a 255 out of 1,000. I spent most of the subsequent morning beating myself up for not doing better. After all, I've been "fitnessing" for a good three years now, so I should be doing better, right?

As I dwelled on it, I saw my "Phoenix Award" sitting on the bookshelf and smiled. It reminded me of where I came from. An award from my previous gym in Connecticut, and particular my amazing coach there, it recognized that I nearly burned to the ground and rose from ashes. It's a reminder that, truth be told, if I hadn't changed three years ago I probably wouldn't be writing this right now. I was morbidly obese, tired, depressed, and just didn't want to keep going.

In the years I was at Anytime Fitness in Connecticut, I changed my whole life. Activity, eating, and thinking all evolved to be more fitness driven. While I was there, I did some "functional" cardio work. I did heavy lifting. It was a good combination that I found enjoyable so that is exactly what I did. I made tremendous progress, and become stronger than I ever had been.

When I moved to Richmond, I sort of found myself lost. No longer with my CT coach, I found myself looking for the next big fitness thing. Did some hypertrophy focused stuff. Did some strength focused stuff with strict form and less “powerlifting” focus. I never really felt it gel.

What I found in F45, I discovered and realized, was what made my time ramping up fitness in CT so enjoyable. It was this mix of functional work, added with my off-site heavier lifting. It was the combination of efforts to get stronger while making myself a better ATHLETE. I go back to that word, athlete, because we referred to myself as Ben the Athlete in CT because I always worked to train as one. It was never enough for me to just be “regular gym guy” but I wanted to be trained and treated like an aspiring athlete.

So two months into full time, and three months total after nearly a year and a half away from functional training, I found that my conditioning wasn’t quite what I feel it should be, and by that I mean it sucks. I found my strength, while I am very strong in short bursts, doesn’t have lasting endurance. This is where I am working to expand that and push myself truly to that “athlete” mentality I moved away from a year and half ago.

It’s amazing how sometimes we come full circle to find what we truly want. Sure, I scored 255/1000 on the test today. I also haven’t done this stuff very long recently. More over, there is a lot of stuff in the F45 regimen that simply wasn’t in my old functional programming. Rowers, box jumps, bench hops, lateral jumps and tuck jumps, etc. These are all things that are fairly new to my programming.

I have a fear of heights, and this stuff has helped me, in just a couple of months, to start to overcome that. I’ve gone for a mortified fear of plyoboxes to jumping on the 12” box with no fear. I hopped over the hurdles on the shuttle run hurdles even though I thought in my mind I wouldn’t clear them, tangle my feet up, and fall flat on my rear.

I’m at 255/1000. It’s the baseline. It’s a start. Now it’s time to continue the effort I began three years ago… build Ben the Athlete. It’s going to be hard work, it’s going to be a lot of effort, but I am committed to this and to making myself perform better, get faster, get stronger, and be an all around better athlete. My coach in CT nicknamed me the Phoenix for a reason… no matter what happens, no matter how much something hurts, no matter how close I get to burning up, I always rise up to the challenge. It’s time be untamed and get at it and build the next level Ben 3.0. Beta testing begins today, and the release is going to be damn epic!

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