Procrastination is the gateway to trouble, especially if you're interested in building any serious, measurable, gains in size, strength, or athletic performance. For you, procrastination is a setback. The more you lack motivation and procrastinate, the more you stretch out the process. You procrastinate at the expense of your gainz. And that's the truth. So is the fact that the reason you're procrastinating is because you have to do something you don't want to do. In other words, you have to eat a frog. That's right, a frog.
I once read a little book on personal development called Eat That Frog, by Brian Tracy - a motivational public speaker and self-development author. With over eighty books to Tracy's credit, including NY Times best sellers, Earn What You're Really Worth and No Excuses, that have been translated into dozens of languages. So, I figured Tracy might know what he'd be talking about with this gastronomic analogy being implied by eating a frog. But, it could fill a book?
It actually did, but in a nutshell... every one of us has something important to get done today that we're dreading doing. It might not be as off-putting as eating a frog (especially a live one), but it’s still distasteful to us. So we stall. We waste time. We get distracted easily. We move slowly. In other words, we procrastinate. The point of Eat That Frog was, instead of putting off what we hate to do, that is exactly what we should do first. If you get it out of the way and move on, your productivity will begin to soar.
When it comes to bodybuilding, most of us have a muscle group or body part that is the most difficult for us to develop and that doesn’t respond the way we expect, or would like. I could get my chest and arms big and ripped just by looking at the weights. I may be exaggerating a bit, but building my chest and arms just weren’t a problem for me. Abs, shoulders, back, glutes, upper legs—no problem. Lower legs? Big problem. My calves just wouldn’t respond for me like my other muscle groups.
What happens when we don’t get the results we want? We get discouraged. We move on to something we like better. It’s great that you can pump up your arms to over eighteen inches without breaking a sweat, but if you have chicken legs, that’s what needs improving. That’s the frog that you have to eat.
Prioritize!
When you put together your workout program, the area, or areas, of your physique that you have difficulty getting to respond must be put in the beginning of your workout, because they obviously need the most attention. In other words, you do what you least like to do first. That’s when your body has the most oxygen and fuel to focus on an area that is resistant to growth and development.
What I mean is, eat that frog first!
I don't give workout and nutrition advice that's easy. If your looking for the path of least resistance, I'm not your guy. Building your body is going to be tough work and that means you're going to be eating some frogs. So, hit what’s hardest for you first. Don’t mess around. Don’t start chatting with everyone around you. Take it as a personal challenge.
But here is the good news: frogs are high in protein and low in fat, and they taste like chicken. So go for it!