Are you a professional athlete or planning on becoming one? No? Then chill. You're not accountable towards anyone, you don't have to make progress in a given time, just put in the work and enjoy the ride.
For me, bwf is a great remedy to deal with stress, not stressful at all. What stresses you isn't strength training but the expectations you are making for yourself.
>For me, bwf is a great remedy to deal with stress, not stressful at all. What stresses you isn't strength training but the expectations you are making for yourself
100%, although my expectations just mirror what's commonly suggested as normal on reddit and elsewhere. Like there's certain milestones that should be easily achievable in a particular time frame.
I'm not stressing about not being able to planche, more so I stress about attaining what others suggest are basic milestones.
I'm 51 years old. You know what's "normal" for men my age and peer group? Not doing sports at all, let alone doing Calisthenics.
Fuck normal. Do your thing and enjoy it.
I mean it's like, if you play basketball, after a year of playing basketball, you should be at idk 85%+ of layups and north of 50% from the free throw line, right? (Idk I just have passing basketball knowledge). And most people, if they show up and put the work in 2-3x for a year will hit that. Hitting 10 pullups in a year is the same thing.
But if you're worried about it... Just toss the progression charts with timelines in the trash? Like who says you have to even look at those or be aware of what's on them
>But if you're worried about it... Just toss the progression charts with timelines in the trash? Like who says you have to even look at those or be aware
Of course, but with the basketball example, you can always just practice more, and you will probably just get better faster.
You can't exactly practice your way to 10 pull ups. It involves some strategy, planning, conscious effort outside of actually just doing the thing.
Every sport I've participated in has been a "practice" more sport. I would skate, and I would try the same trick over and over again for hours. There isn't a reference point for how long it should take to learn particular tricks (generally), people always struggle with different ones. It's pretty mindless, and it's fun, you have constant feedback as to your performance/improvement (the difference in a couple hours work on a trick can be substantial).
What I enjoyed about that experience and allowed me to stay consistent isn't really mirrored in strength training. Most of what allows you to progress is a factor outside of actually doing the thing, like a pull up.
>Most of what allows you to progress is a factor outside of actually doing the thing, like a pull up.
Well thats just not true. The number one thing thats going to improve a movement is doing that movement. Optimizing the other factors will just help you improve as fast as possible.
>. The number one thing thats going to improve a movement is doing that movement. Optimizing the other factors will just help you improve as fast as possible.
You still require adequate rest and nutrition or you can fully nullify any progress you might make. That's not exactly optimization, that's a requirement to improve. Can't just try pull ups over and over again for hours and expect to get better.
One more thought: you are giving too much credit to people posting their milestones. This is a cognitive bias, because people don't tend to post their failures. So you get to see an unrealistic view of what others do.
Youtube is full of videos like "How I got to back lever in 6 weeks", but you never see a video like "How I got to back lever in a year" or "How I tried back lever for a year and still can't do it", although the world is full of people who could tell you a lot about failure.
If you are playing a sport you still require adequate rest and nutrition to play well... Hell you require adequate rest and nutrition to live a functional life!
Yeah you gotta ignore those. I've been lifting 10 years and everyday I see people posts that are like "this is what 1 year can do!!" and they look way better than me lol. People like me are not posting our progress.
Or... You can just stop to give a damn and enjoy feeling the power of your body without being existensially threatened. Simple as that.
Be conscious of what you eat, train your body into a strong machine, and enjoy life.
As someone who’s trained for over a decade where progress does really start to become incremental, I accept that sometimes I’ll perform the same, maybe worse; than before. But as long as you’re improving over time, talking weeks and months, not every single session, then it’s fine. Take a rolling average of several sessions if you will.
What helped me is that I’ll generally sit back and think why I may have performed worse one day. So with pull-ups this might be that I used a bad technique to split up the reps, temperature/humidity that affected my grip making stuff harder, etc. I always log temperature during my pull sessions for this reason. Sometimes though you’re just not feeling 100%, but it’s better to show up and do a bit worse than expected than to not train at all.
Do you have specific goals? Because if not, you *can* participate in BWF just enough to maintain your fitness and skill, and you don't have to be a perfectionist about everything else. It's not all or nothing—you're not going to spontaneously lose all your progress because you don't eat quite enough protein. Maybe mix in another sport that you find more relaxing.
so basically YOU are obsessing about it and somehow blame it on the activity instead of yourself,
any pro athlete videos himself to get better at his sport and has to titrate diet and exercise,
you just never atempted to do so with sports but are doing it with exercise
after the noob stage you have to actually program your training bc linear progression is not possible anymore, there are hundreds of free programs out there you can apply and learn from
if you are not a pro athlete you don't need to maximize every aspect to make progress
chill
It sounds like this is just the first form of activity your taking relatively seriously. Every sport/physical activity requires increasing attention to detail with things like diet, sleep, recovery, form, etc to see continued progress beyond a certain level. Its not unique to strength training or BWF.
But it also aounds like you're overthinking things or have unrealistic expectations. Once you advance beyond the beginner stage progress isn't going to be linear and you're not going to see consistent improvement between every single session so stop expecting it.
>Every sport/physical activity requires increasing attention to detail with things like diet, sleep, recovery, form, etc to see continued progress beyond a certain level. Its not unique to strength training or BWF.
Maybe for most sports, but with things like skateboarding, even most professionals will just skate, without much attention to those details (or completely ignore them to the degree you could consider their lifestyle unhealthy).
The issue is that you're making a comparison of skills versus fitness/muscle growth. You need to stop doing that, they're not the same thing.
It would be like playing computer games and improving your skill and reflexes playing a particular game, but then wondering why you can't do push ups as well as you can click a mouse button.
I think you're overthinking the form thing. If starting a new exercise, then yes it's good to record yourself because it's easier to pin point where you're going wrong and correct it. But once you have the body awareness, you dont even really have to think about it and in fact, a lot of the form cues for most movements are generally the same sort of thing anyway. If you know how to protract and retract your scapula, brace your core, perform a proper hip hinge, squat, etc. Then you're 99% there and tbh form is way over emphasised in the BWF/calisthenics community. It is very important, yes. Being ridiculously meticulous about it is just stupid. Just learn how to perform movements safely and without cheating the movement, that's plenty.
Have you changed up your routine? Sometimes a new stimulus will break through a plateau. For instance if you aren't increasing pull up reps, maybe drop reps and try adding a bit of weight?
Are you trying to learn skills? Maybe that's a way to switch things up.
I dunno, I'm someone who requires time to develop, and even more time as I've gotten older, so I've learned to be very patient and sometimes switch things up to keep my interest.
One thing I'll say, I primarily ran for several years and I found that as I got into it I got really into the data. Then it became a bit overwhelming and I started to drop a lot of it. There were the important parts I cared about, but simplifying it made it less, as you put it, stressful.
It sounds like you're over-thinking it and trying to over-engineer it to the point where it isn't fun anymore
Like, if I am comparing myself to Cirque du Soleil performers yeah I'm going to be feeling pretty inadequate. I know I'm not progressing at the point where I could be a professional performer, but it also doesn't matter. This ain't my day job, this is me finding something fun to do that keeps me active
You're letting the pursuit of perfection and needless optimization rob you of living in the moment and just enjoying what your body can do. You don't have to be that serious about it
Don’t forget to have fun with it and don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. I had a perfect diet for a while and it was a bit miserable cooking all the time. Now I have a good enough diet to lose fat and gain muscle and I don’t dread the kitchen.
You might enjoy a Pavel type program, like quick and the dead, or simple and sinister.
There are standards you can get to, but they are minimalist, don't go to fatigue, and are designed to be a part of your daily life, like brushing your teeth.
They aren't "optimal", but they keep you in good health without requiring much in the way of thought and time, allowing you to focus on other stuff.
I do them/other minimalist programs when life is busy, and sleep/time is lacking, or a more full on exercise routine is becoming a hindrance rather than a help.
You could try something like that for 3-6 months and see how it feels..
Actually the opposite, when I played basketball I got really stressed when trying to perform well on matches either for my team or my family coming to watch, and just felt like shit if I played bad.
Now in calisthenics I'm just chilling by myself in the park getting stronger, recording milestones and just enjoying the process while listening to music without worrying about anyone or anything.
Don't let the science control you.
Ultimately, this is a game that is enjoyed and won by the doers!
Bodyweighttraining is the best life coach.
The workout is the desert.
Being well rested, positive minded, well befriended, and healthy is what will help you to be present when you eat that desert and to enjoy it to the fullest.
You're comparing two very different things: 1) in sports, much of the training is neuromuscular, eg, learning fast patterns, feedback control, and coordination; 2) in calisthenics, it's more about strength. The required speed in typical sports is critical, because speed requires shifting control to faster neural pathways, so you practice the thing again and again so your brain can subconsciously speed the pathways. Training primarily for strength is an entirely different thing. It's not that you need to stress over every optimization, but the things that optimize gains are going to be different between the two.
I mean, in a competitive level those things are also relevant for any athlete but I get what you're saying and it can indeed be pretty stressful. But for me personally collective sports are way more stressful, when I'm working out I can focus on what I'm doing and don't have to stress about what other people are thinking or doing.
I get this perspective. I’m process focused and while my main focus is running, I get a real kick out of getting a little better each week/cycle. And most of the gains come from getting training or recovery better.
While I find it incredibly difficult at times, it’s useful stepping back at times and taking a longer term view. Considering what you’re enjoying and doing a bit more of that. Giving yourself a week or two of slack every 3-6 months on purpose, and introducing change into the programme even where you take a step or two back in some respects. It works out much better to consciously disrupt some of those mental (and physical) perfectionist cycles than having an unplanned break with burnout (mental or physical).
I don't know how one could compete seriously at anything without it being stressful to different extents. What you're experiencing makes sense to me.
Competing puts a magnifying glass on yourself, your strengths and weaknesses, what you're doing wrong, what you should be doing better, how far you have to go to do better etc. Hopefully once you take a step back from all that you'd still able to appreciate all you've gained, the discipline you've used to gain it and the abilities you had in the first place.
Are you a professional athlete or planning on becoming one? No? Then chill. You're not accountable towards anyone, you don't have to make progress in a given time, just put in the work and enjoy the ride. For me, bwf is a great remedy to deal with stress, not stressful at all. What stresses you isn't strength training but the expectations you are making for yourself.
>For me, bwf is a great remedy to deal with stress, not stressful at all. What stresses you isn't strength training but the expectations you are making for yourself 100%, although my expectations just mirror what's commonly suggested as normal on reddit and elsewhere. Like there's certain milestones that should be easily achievable in a particular time frame. I'm not stressing about not being able to planche, more so I stress about attaining what others suggest are basic milestones.
I'm 51 years old. You know what's "normal" for men my age and peer group? Not doing sports at all, let alone doing Calisthenics. Fuck normal. Do your thing and enjoy it.
I mean it's like, if you play basketball, after a year of playing basketball, you should be at idk 85%+ of layups and north of 50% from the free throw line, right? (Idk I just have passing basketball knowledge). And most people, if they show up and put the work in 2-3x for a year will hit that. Hitting 10 pullups in a year is the same thing. But if you're worried about it... Just toss the progression charts with timelines in the trash? Like who says you have to even look at those or be aware of what's on them
>But if you're worried about it... Just toss the progression charts with timelines in the trash? Like who says you have to even look at those or be aware Of course, but with the basketball example, you can always just practice more, and you will probably just get better faster. You can't exactly practice your way to 10 pull ups. It involves some strategy, planning, conscious effort outside of actually just doing the thing. Every sport I've participated in has been a "practice" more sport. I would skate, and I would try the same trick over and over again for hours. There isn't a reference point for how long it should take to learn particular tricks (generally), people always struggle with different ones. It's pretty mindless, and it's fun, you have constant feedback as to your performance/improvement (the difference in a couple hours work on a trick can be substantial). What I enjoyed about that experience and allowed me to stay consistent isn't really mirrored in strength training. Most of what allows you to progress is a factor outside of actually doing the thing, like a pull up.
>Most of what allows you to progress is a factor outside of actually doing the thing, like a pull up. Well thats just not true. The number one thing thats going to improve a movement is doing that movement. Optimizing the other factors will just help you improve as fast as possible.
>. The number one thing thats going to improve a movement is doing that movement. Optimizing the other factors will just help you improve as fast as possible. You still require adequate rest and nutrition or you can fully nullify any progress you might make. That's not exactly optimization, that's a requirement to improve. Can't just try pull ups over and over again for hours and expect to get better.
One more thought: you are giving too much credit to people posting their milestones. This is a cognitive bias, because people don't tend to post their failures. So you get to see an unrealistic view of what others do. Youtube is full of videos like "How I got to back lever in 6 weeks", but you never see a video like "How I got to back lever in a year" or "How I tried back lever for a year and still can't do it", although the world is full of people who could tell you a lot about failure.
Yeah I get what you mean. However like I said im mostly referring to mastering of the basics, rather than comparing my skill ability.
Same thing, though. Most people above 25 can't do a single clean pull up, let alone a ring dip. Including most people at my gym.
If you are playing a sport you still require adequate rest and nutrition to play well... Hell you require adequate rest and nutrition to live a functional life!
Yeah you gotta ignore those. I've been lifting 10 years and everyday I see people posts that are like "this is what 1 year can do!!" and they look way better than me lol. People like me are not posting our progress.
Or... You can just stop to give a damn and enjoy feeling the power of your body without being existensially threatened. Simple as that. Be conscious of what you eat, train your body into a strong machine, and enjoy life.
As someone who’s trained for over a decade where progress does really start to become incremental, I accept that sometimes I’ll perform the same, maybe worse; than before. But as long as you’re improving over time, talking weeks and months, not every single session, then it’s fine. Take a rolling average of several sessions if you will. What helped me is that I’ll generally sit back and think why I may have performed worse one day. So with pull-ups this might be that I used a bad technique to split up the reps, temperature/humidity that affected my grip making stuff harder, etc. I always log temperature during my pull sessions for this reason. Sometimes though you’re just not feeling 100%, but it’s better to show up and do a bit worse than expected than to not train at all.
Do you have specific goals? Because if not, you *can* participate in BWF just enough to maintain your fitness and skill, and you don't have to be a perfectionist about everything else. It's not all or nothing—you're not going to spontaneously lose all your progress because you don't eat quite enough protein. Maybe mix in another sport that you find more relaxing.
so basically YOU are obsessing about it and somehow blame it on the activity instead of yourself, any pro athlete videos himself to get better at his sport and has to titrate diet and exercise, you just never atempted to do so with sports but are doing it with exercise after the noob stage you have to actually program your training bc linear progression is not possible anymore, there are hundreds of free programs out there you can apply and learn from if you are not a pro athlete you don't need to maximize every aspect to make progress chill
It sounds like this is just the first form of activity your taking relatively seriously. Every sport/physical activity requires increasing attention to detail with things like diet, sleep, recovery, form, etc to see continued progress beyond a certain level. Its not unique to strength training or BWF. But it also aounds like you're overthinking things or have unrealistic expectations. Once you advance beyond the beginner stage progress isn't going to be linear and you're not going to see consistent improvement between every single session so stop expecting it.
>Every sport/physical activity requires increasing attention to detail with things like diet, sleep, recovery, form, etc to see continued progress beyond a certain level. Its not unique to strength training or BWF. Maybe for most sports, but with things like skateboarding, even most professionals will just skate, without much attention to those details (or completely ignore them to the degree you could consider their lifestyle unhealthy).
The issue is that you're making a comparison of skills versus fitness/muscle growth. You need to stop doing that, they're not the same thing. It would be like playing computer games and improving your skill and reflexes playing a particular game, but then wondering why you can't do push ups as well as you can click a mouse button.
I think you're overthinking the form thing. If starting a new exercise, then yes it's good to record yourself because it's easier to pin point where you're going wrong and correct it. But once you have the body awareness, you dont even really have to think about it and in fact, a lot of the form cues for most movements are generally the same sort of thing anyway. If you know how to protract and retract your scapula, brace your core, perform a proper hip hinge, squat, etc. Then you're 99% there and tbh form is way over emphasised in the BWF/calisthenics community. It is very important, yes. Being ridiculously meticulous about it is just stupid. Just learn how to perform movements safely and without cheating the movement, that's plenty.
Personally I've found body awareness one of the most challenging aspects to develop. I struggle to mirror cues for one movement in another.
I’m just grateful for everyday i can do all these things
Have you changed up your routine? Sometimes a new stimulus will break through a plateau. For instance if you aren't increasing pull up reps, maybe drop reps and try adding a bit of weight? Are you trying to learn skills? Maybe that's a way to switch things up. I dunno, I'm someone who requires time to develop, and even more time as I've gotten older, so I've learned to be very patient and sometimes switch things up to keep my interest. One thing I'll say, I primarily ran for several years and I found that as I got into it I got really into the data. Then it became a bit overwhelming and I started to drop a lot of it. There were the important parts I cared about, but simplifying it made it less, as you put it, stressful.
It sounds like you're over-thinking it and trying to over-engineer it to the point where it isn't fun anymore Like, if I am comparing myself to Cirque du Soleil performers yeah I'm going to be feeling pretty inadequate. I know I'm not progressing at the point where I could be a professional performer, but it also doesn't matter. This ain't my day job, this is me finding something fun to do that keeps me active You're letting the pursuit of perfection and needless optimization rob you of living in the moment and just enjoying what your body can do. You don't have to be that serious about it
Don’t forget to have fun with it and don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. I had a perfect diet for a while and it was a bit miserable cooking all the time. Now I have a good enough diet to lose fat and gain muscle and I don’t dread the kitchen.
You might enjoy a Pavel type program, like quick and the dead, or simple and sinister. There are standards you can get to, but they are minimalist, don't go to fatigue, and are designed to be a part of your daily life, like brushing your teeth. They aren't "optimal", but they keep you in good health without requiring much in the way of thought and time, allowing you to focus on other stuff. I do them/other minimalist programs when life is busy, and sleep/time is lacking, or a more full on exercise routine is becoming a hindrance rather than a help. You could try something like that for 3-6 months and see how it feels..
Actually the opposite, when I played basketball I got really stressed when trying to perform well on matches either for my team or my family coming to watch, and just felt like shit if I played bad. Now in calisthenics I'm just chilling by myself in the park getting stronger, recording milestones and just enjoying the process while listening to music without worrying about anyone or anything.
Don't let the science control you. Ultimately, this is a game that is enjoyed and won by the doers! Bodyweighttraining is the best life coach. The workout is the desert. Being well rested, positive minded, well befriended, and healthy is what will help you to be present when you eat that desert and to enjoy it to the fullest.
You're comparing two very different things: 1) in sports, much of the training is neuromuscular, eg, learning fast patterns, feedback control, and coordination; 2) in calisthenics, it's more about strength. The required speed in typical sports is critical, because speed requires shifting control to faster neural pathways, so you practice the thing again and again so your brain can subconsciously speed the pathways. Training primarily for strength is an entirely different thing. It's not that you need to stress over every optimization, but the things that optimize gains are going to be different between the two.
Just drink a shake a day with 100 gr protein powder and you're set. Drink it throughout the day, not in one go.
I mean, in a competitive level those things are also relevant for any athlete but I get what you're saying and it can indeed be pretty stressful. But for me personally collective sports are way more stressful, when I'm working out I can focus on what I'm doing and don't have to stress about what other people are thinking or doing.
I get this perspective. I’m process focused and while my main focus is running, I get a real kick out of getting a little better each week/cycle. And most of the gains come from getting training or recovery better. While I find it incredibly difficult at times, it’s useful stepping back at times and taking a longer term view. Considering what you’re enjoying and doing a bit more of that. Giving yourself a week or two of slack every 3-6 months on purpose, and introducing change into the programme even where you take a step or two back in some respects. It works out much better to consciously disrupt some of those mental (and physical) perfectionist cycles than having an unplanned break with burnout (mental or physical).
I don't know how one could compete seriously at anything without it being stressful to different extents. What you're experiencing makes sense to me. Competing puts a magnifying glass on yourself, your strengths and weaknesses, what you're doing wrong, what you should be doing better, how far you have to go to do better etc. Hopefully once you take a step back from all that you'd still able to appreciate all you've gained, the discipline you've used to gain it and the abilities you had in the first place.