Do you ever find yourself looking at your own social media profiles? Do you look at pictures you’ve posted on Facebook, Instagram, and/or photos and videos you’ve stored on your phone/computer? I tend to do this occasionally... I promise I'm not a narcissist though😅
Weight-lifting
I was looking at my photos and noticed the progress I’ve made over the course of 3 years since I started lifting. Now, I started lifting basically on my own; I got help from a weight lifter friend at first but once I realized I work out better when I lift alone, I started going to the gym by myself.
The learning curve was huge! This included looking up workouts online, learning different exercises and what each one focuses on, modifying my workouts to fit my goals the best, and eating right. I didn’t realize how important it was to eat the right types and the right amounts of food until about a year ago. I know this has been over-said but eating more is the key to seeing ANY progress concerning muscle growth. Sure, I looked somewhat “toned” but that wasn’t my goal.
I'm just glad that weight-lifting for women is becoming more of a norm now. YAY!!
HERE ARE SOME PICTURES OF MY PROGRESS SINCE 2014!
2013
So here is me a year or so before I ever stepped foot in the weight room. Notice my skinny baby arms 🙀:
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At this point, I was eating quite unhealthy; snacking on oreos and chicken-in-a-biscuit late at night in my dorm room, eating pizza multiple times a week, including very little protein/carbs/fats in my diet, staying up till late and not getting enough sleep causing me to doze off in classes, and occasional drinking.
2014
Here’s me a few months after I started lifting:
At this point, I was learning about the main compound exercises like squats and deadlifts and working on good form. However, instead of form over weights, focusing on upping the weights got me.. Noob!
2015
Here's some progress in 2015:
I finally started seeing changes in my upper body. No more super skinny arms 😄
2017/2018
And here’s me now:
I skipped 2016 because I injured my lower back. I either wasn't squatting or deadlifting correctly. Because of this, I completely stopped doing these exercises for months and only doing low weights later on.
Last year (2017), starting the summer, I finally felt like my back healed so I took every precaution I could to not injure myself again before resuming those exercises. These included stretching for 10-15 minutes before my leg days, stretching after for 5-10 minutes, REALLY focusing on my form instead of the weights (because of this, I've been on a plateau for a year or so now but that's ok since my squatting and deadlifting form has been much much better), and finally, including that mind-to-muscle connection when I'm exercising instead of browsing music/social media during workouts or by sitting on my phone for 10 minutes between sets.
Progress Isn't Only Visual
The physical progress isn’t too big considering how it’s been 3 whole years since I started lifting. Like I mentioned above, this is because I realized I was only putting time at the gym 5 days a week but not fueling up my body enough in the kitchen to allow it to grow. Since last year, I’ve really started noticing what and how much I eat and the results are definitely showing.
Taking on a challenge to change your life in some positive way takes time and patience. Despite the ups and downs in the learning process, there's always lessons you learn every step of the way. In my 3 year fitness journey, I grew physically, emotionally, and intellectually. I can 100% attest that consistently working out has made me confident and raised my self-esteem A LOT!
Changing the type of food I ate, the amount of sleep I got, the amount of water I drank, figuring out the best times for my workouts, the types of exercises that work for me, etc. was quite a challenge and it took me a long long time to deduce and stick to them.
Counting macros and calories may be a good idea for someone like me who can’t really estimate well or keep good mental track of what all I’ve eaten in a day. It’s just a little bit of extra time and effort that I just can’t get myself to put in sadly 😖.
Hitting Plateaus
Before I realized I wasn't eating enough, I found out that I had hit what they call a plateau which basically means I couldn't up the weights for the longest time. Now, I'm not a professional in this area so I don't know if hitting a plateau is a legit thing or not. However, I do know that I, personally, only thought I had hit that evil evil thing.
There were a few things I wasn't doing correctly: not eating enough, not going heavy enough at the gym, and not focusing much on the form at first which lead to minor but painful back injuries (rookie mistake) which kept me from doing some compound exercises for months.
Motivation
How did I get into weightlifting in the first place? Well, a good friend of mine had asked me multiple times to go lift with him at least once. I kept putting it off saying "Ahh maybe some other time" until I finally pushed myself to do it. Haven't stopped lifting since then!
What kept me interested? The gainz ;) but mainly, the feeling that you get after working out and eating healthy is unbeatable. The endorphins really change your mood, make you motivated, confident, and just determined to get things done.
Share YOUR Stories
So there it is; a quick summary of my 3 year long fitness journey! :)
How has exercising changed YOUR life? What were some of the biggest challenges you faced in your fitness journey and what steps did you take to accomplish them? What are your 2018 goals fitness-wise or not? Feel free to share your stories with me and the other Steemians in the comments below! :)
Cheers,
Reez
Credits: The first (gray) divider is from 
Last 3 images are from Pixabay.com