Reposting my OC
I understand it’s a joke but I wanted to throw some other numbers out there for people to consider, since resistance training can massively improve your quality of life and it’s very common for people to believe it needs to be a full time job to see results. For disclosure, I am a trainer but don’t offer services via lemmy
But you can get head-turning, people-ask-you-questions-unprompted levels of muscular with <5 hours a week in the gym. And that’s the full time commitment for what I’d called a “serious trainee”, any more than that is mainly for people who simply love training as a form of recreation and actively want to spend more time lifting.
Most of my clients do 2.5 hours a week and still get great visual results, albeit more slowly. More importantly, you cash in on quality of life benefits with shockingly little weekly commitment. Even one session per week is enough to feel huge improvements in energy and endurance during day to day tasks, improve your metabolic health, improve your bone health, improve your mental health, as well as experience the whole cascade of improved injury outcomes (for example resistance trained individuals are less likely to fall, less likely to be injured if they do fall, and are more likely to make a full recovery if they do get injured).
It’s extremely worth starting, for all ages and genders. Again, apologies for being overly serious under a joke. I like to leave little comments like this under popular gym posts because it occasionally results in someone beginning or returning to training
I know there’s probably isn’t your area of expertise, but I don’t know where else to ask.
Are there any gym memberships out there that aren’t completely sketchy and impossible to cancel?
Definitely, and actually you would be surprised. A lot of places introduced no-contract memberships after covid. Lots of places went out of business too, then all that equipment went up for sale for cheap and lots of new places ended up opening.
But the main thing to look for is small, privately owned gyms. I can really only speak to my area, but I have several. The most common arrangement is simply that you pay monthly, can cancel any time you want, but every time you sign up again there’s a sign-up fee. One other place I know simply charges an extra $10 per month for a no-commitment membership.
Keep an eye out, again for smaller privately owned commercial gyms in general, but also for specialized gyms such as those that cater to powerlifting, olympic lifting, or strongman. Usually they are lacking in “amenities” that drive the price up, and are less likely to have predatory subscription schemes in general. The only downside is that these places can seem very intimidating at first, but the community is likely to be very welcoming
Find a locally owned gym. Ask what their policy is on day passes, month to month, contracts, etc. The cost will be a bit higher than Planet Fitness, but they probably won’t screw you, and the community tends to be way better.
Also, if you want to get fit, I highly recommend finding a gym that is either “fun” or offers classes. Rock climbing, gymnastics/acrobatics, martial arts, etc tend to be more fun and engaging than showing up 3 days a week to do 3 sets of 8, and if your goal is to just generally get fit and healthy. For that matter, there are also often groups meeting up all over cities for free or cheap to run, cycle, walk, boat, play sports, etc. And if you’re really dedicated to some kind of lifting, having a time and place to show up, where you know you will see friendly faces trying hard together is far more likely to keep you consistent. This is why crossfitters are often ripped, despite crossfit being a dumb training philosophy - it got the fundamentals right: get people to show up consistently and try hard by making a welcoming community that gathers at a regular time and place. Often powerlifting, oly lifting, kettlebell, strongman, and off-brand/crossfit-style gyms will offer regular classes where people train together for this very reason.
If you have a community center nearby, you can see if they have gym equipment. Those memberships should be simple to get and cancel.
As a sweeping generalization, this is only a problem with chain gyms.
If you need a solid litmus test though, call them during core hours and ask for a quick tour. Nearly all indie gyms will let you pay for a day pass or similar if you’re new (though that isn’t always part of their posted rates). If they won’t let you test the waters without signing up for recurring payment, it’s not a gym worth going to.
Can confirm.
Having an progressive program tailored to one’s goals is key. In the first 6 months of going to the gym I wasn’t seeing a lot of results. It was certainly better than nothing; I was learning the exercises, developing the base level strength to handle beginner weight levels… But where were these newbie gains everyone was talking about?
It wasn’t until I got on a good plan that I started making noticable leaps in strength. A year in, I decided to add in some cardio (just a 2 mile run) and suddenly I started blowing up.When I finally got my routine optimized I could be in and out of the gym in an hour. 3 times a week, that was it. If I was tight on time, I would simply do my run on my off days.
So daily investment of 30 to 45 minutes.
You can buy a cheap weight bench and you won’t even have to go to the gym. Hell, you can buy a cheap rack, too, like I did and do every exercise in your home for free.
You can accidentally lose 45 minutes just zoned out on the couch flipping through channels, so time-wise, it’s about the best ROI you could ever make.
Does it have to be with the gym? Is there anything that generally being active doesn’t cover?
Joint health, bone density, and strength/muscle mass are things you will miss out on if, say, you just play ultimate frisbee. But getting stronger doesnt have to be 3 sets of 8 on bench. You can get essentially the same health benefits by engaging in sports that train strength, like martial arts, acrobatics, or rock climbing. That said, many people who do any kind of physical activity aggressively typically find that they enjoy lifting at some point in their athletic careers, as lifting itself can improve athletic performance and ward off sports injuries, due to the controlled and progressive nature of gym work, as compared to the more chaotic nature of real-world activities.
A commercial gym is not necessary!
So “general activity” I can only assume is stuff like going on walks and hikes, playing sports, enjoying the outdoors, and so on. This will generally fall under the umbrella of cardiovascular exercise which is extremely good, and you should do
Resistance training is typically performed in much shorter bouts of intense activity. It’s very convenient in a gym, but you can do pretty much everything you need with the right setup (bench press is very similar to pushups, for example, which don’t require equipment.)
The biggest challenge outside of a gym is how to progress movements. For example, once you can do 50 pushups, how could you make it harder so that the movement would be appropriately challenging, and not take all day? And then another issue sometimes can be training the muscles of the back without equipment, typically done via pull-ups and rows.
But ultimately everything is doable! Check out the youtube channel “Hybrid Calisthenics”, he’s got a ton of excellent content aimed directly at this question. He also sells cheap gymnastics rings which handily solve the muscles-of-the-back problem, if you have somewhere to hang them from (even a tree!)
I mean, the limitation of calisthenics isnt the back, but the legs. Not to say there arent good leg exercises, but the legs are so strong that you have to get pretty creative pretty quickly if you want to keep progressing them.
The other thing I want to note is that a lot of people gravitate towards calisthenics because you can do it at home, and they feel uncomfortable in a gym, so they decide to try calisthenics rather than face their gym anxiety. And while this can work for some people, for most it will hamstring their progress since exercising alone at home is almost custom-designed to kill motivation and habit formation, and thus will stop people from staying consistent and getting the results they want. In addition, calisthenics progressions are often pretty big leaps, and it can be frustrating to be able to rep out 20 on one exercise, and then be shut down by the progression.
If you think that calisthenics is cool, or you dont have the money for a gym membership or equipment, or if there are no gyms around you, then go for it! But I would suggest you do your workouts somewhere other than at home (like at a local park) and that you try your best to meet up with others with a similar interest, as these are the things that will make the habit stick.
Another vote for checking out hybrid callisthenics. They also have a website with a basic routine including instructions and links to videos explaining all of the progressions for each movement that is free to use and a great resource for people who are new and need some direction.
Its about control. Being active is great overall but could leave some weak spots or even be wearing things out. Certain muscles might not get worked quite right or to their full range of movement. Working out with good technique and variety should hit all your muscles and identify any tight or painful spots you need to work on.
If you’re after results, like increased strength, endurance, or a better physique, then thats where training comes in. You have to push to near failure to demand muscle growth. If you start biking 5 miles a day, those first few weeks and months you might grow a bit, but eventually that 5 miles won’t be as challenging and you’ll plateau in terms of strength and endurance. Thats where training, either training the muscles or doing more cycling, really starts to work. Thats how you grow and start improving again.
It’s quite possible to do resistance training at home, and it’s particularly affordable if you use resistance bands, which also take up extremely little space.
This is true, but you failed to mention that resistance bands are the least satisfying form of resistance
They feel fine to me, and are a little safer to use for noobies in some positions since they have progressive resistance.
I believe they are also considered better suited to the elderly or those who sustained shoulder injuries in the past.
Look up calisthenics. You can do it for free with 0 equipment and gravity. Stuff like pushups are under this category. I’ve been doing it for years
So I guess the trick is, and has always been, consistency?
Honestly I would say consistency is somewhat overrated in the grand scheme of things
ALERT. ALERT. OVERRATED DOES NOT MEAN BAD
Consistency is obviously extremely good. I used to preach it. But honestly, I took on a client with severe intermittent health issues which results in them having about 50% adherence (meaning they miss, on average, about half their training sessions)
And they ended up progressing just fine lol
Actually I feel like a far bigger risk is for people to assume they need to have perfect consistency, then drop training altogether when they aren’t able to meet that high standard.
The critical thing to understand is that resistance training is EXTREMELY potent for beginners. Even inconsistent effort will do pretty amazing things for your health
What i really meant by consistency isn’t really being perfect anyway, it’s more about longevity, as in, being imperfect, but over a long period of time, ideally as long as you are capable.
I really appreciate all the info you’re giving! It’s really encouraging.
I was a high level athlete growing up, so my only previous example of what was “enough” is hard to live up to as an adult working in an office, but seeing as ive been going an average of 7-8 hours per week, that makes me feel a lot more confident that I am, in fact, doing enough.
So thank you :)
I can’t imagine 40 hours a week of endurance training being anything but detrimental to one’s health. The pain of stacked up micro injuries would be unbearable.
Lots of pro runners run over 100 miles a week, once you’re there it’s not so bad. Cyclists will do even more, bike packers get excited by the idea. As a kid I went to canoe camp and we would paddle for 40 hours a week sometime. Not sure if I should include through hiking.
So it’s more of a hobby, really
Yes but it’s a hobby that makes you stronger, healthier, and more confident
Now you just need a Harley and you will never see a woman again.
Lol. Got moto as a chick magnet. Instead it just attracts middle aged men.
In leather.
And helmets
Depends where you are.
Its cause you got it for the wrong reasons. Its more attractive when you got the bike for the bike and yourself.
Chill, I’m just repeating a common joke in the moto community
One woman’s opinion:
Bigass muscles are hot on a guy with some body fat. Sumo wrestlers and rugby forwards are WAY hotter than bodybuilders.
The men who don’t make a big deal out of it and then they take their shirt off and they’re muscly, that’s way more fun than a guy hanging out with his sleeves tucked up.
Sumo wrestlers? Dude wtf :))
Modern pro bodybuilders are definitely not beautiful, they’re more of a spectacle. But sumo wrestler is definitely a type.
Pro bodybuilders look good imo, but not during competition season
Kirishima Asakoryu Wakamotoharu and Wakatakakage
I ended up in bed with a guy who does a lot of karate last month, his muscles were really nice and he had this tight square abdomen and it was impressive to feel and obviously the result of a lot of hard work. And I thought “no belly at all? Awww”
a gay friend of mine once said to me, all men are gay until proven straight and bodybuilders completely epitomise that
Toxic
As a male, this is counter to everything ive been told about sleeves. I’ve been told that rolled up sleeves are basically lingerie for men when done right.
How rolled up?
Marines look great with the sun’s out guns out tight forearm cuff thing.
Or in the context of “this guy has been swinging a pickaxe”, yes. Men doing physical labor is hot.
In everyday life, walking into a restaurant with your t-shirt sleeves rolled up like Clavicular makes you look like a fuckboy.
Yea t shirt sleeves tucked is ridiculous, but standard sleeve tuck i get. I don’t personally do it because i find it way too tight around the arms to get anything done.
Is there a word for “a group of gym bros”?
A set of bros
A ripple
Dude if my physique got me a whole bunch of compliments from a bunch of dudes, that’d be awesome.
Try riding a motorcycle.
The Honda Trail isn’t exactly the sexiest thing about. Still have gotten a compliment from an old dude which is always awesome, ya know it’s good when the old bastards like it.
The choice to buy a tiny, ultra reliable 125cc instead of a bigger bike for the same price, or a cheaper, but less stylish or maintainable bike is sexy to the guys who know what they’re looking at.
I have both a 125 and a 90. The 90 is what I was learning on or in my case relearning since it’s not too dissimilar to my old electric bicycle I used until I started driving. The 90 will probably be relegated to proper offroading along electric company and water company roads.
Bros are all that matters
the homoeroticism and deep insecurities of bodybuilders will never not amuse the shit out of me
Wear nicely fitting clothes (tailored if you can get them), be warm if you’re approached, express genuine interest in what the other person is saying. Bonus points for sense of humor.
This, but I’ve found you can also skip the clothes for most women. Your clean, normal clothes are fine. Women will look past that figuring they can fix it later. They hone in on the important things first, at least the ones with any experience.
You mean my three wolf moon shirt and sweatpants won’t look bad? Score
Same with having a nice car lol
Definitely
Damn I need to start working out
This also works with Beard Bros. You’ll have all the men giving you compliments and women asking you to shave it.
See what you gotta do if you want ladies is grow a mustache. Ladies looooove a stache.
Source: am lady. Love stache.
Back before I transitioned I had a beard and got a ton of women into it. In particular they loved that it was soft and conditioned. On the other hand apparently I was hot, so they may have just been into me regardless.
Got complimented out of the blue about a somewhat beard-shaped stubble that I was growing out by a female friend, and my brother’s girlfriend has practically forbidden him from clean shaving. My dad had a beard when he met my mom. Maybe it’s our genes, but I think there are faces where a beard works and faces where it doesn’t. Same as with hair styles, some guys can have a mullet and still look decent.
oh well, may as well enjoy the vibes.
Wear a nice wrist watch. Not a smart watch, something classy. I have one as a gift and I get compliments from other (arguably straight) men all the time. I have never had a woman mention it (I have had women compliment my shoes, shirts, glasses, etc, so this isn’t a " zero sample size" issue either.)
What kind of shoes, shirts, glasses etc. do you wear? Asking for a friend
Crocs, tweed, wraparound bifocals.
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Lol. I love this joke.
But also, I feel the need (a crime in the shitposting community, I know) to point out that, in fact, most women find muscles on men attractive, and if you are a man trying to attract women, while getting jacked isnt the end-all-be-all, you could certainly have a worse strategy. If you don’t believe me… well, go bench 225 and cut down to abs and get back to me.
If you are benching 225 and have abs already, then the problem is much simpler. The reality is, the modal woman interested in men finds stereotypically masculine things hot - being jacked, riding motorcycles, being able to fight, making lots of money, being good at sports, being a leader, etc. But all of these things are sort of like making upgrades to your car - you can do an engine swap, upgrade the suspension, replace the exhaust, add a spoiler, and put flame decals on the wheels. But your car isnt going to go anywhere if you don’t take your key and put it in the ignition. Similarly, being really hot and attractive in a bunch of different ways isn’t going to get you laid if you can’t meet a new woman and ask if she wants to bone without being weird about it.
Which - funny enough - is illustrated in this very comic. Gym bro hits the gym, walks out expecting girls to fall all over him, and gets no response because he doesn’t talk to them.
well, go bench 225 and cut down to abs and get back to me.
That’s a bit of an ask, it would take several years of training hard to reach a 225 KG bench press.
Also funny how it’s 225 specifically and not a round number.
2 plates on each side. 45*4+45lb bar (or 20x4+20kg bar for the civilized) 100kg is a nice round number lol.
I have worked out for a decade and can only do 150 lol
In the situation of that comic, talking would not improve his chances much, though. That is a totally wrong place, and time. You go and stare at women just walking by like that, and they will assume you are some creep.
Hard disagree. The main character of the comic is taking an active interest in improving himself through living a healthy lifestyle. In his interactions with others, he behaves in a friendly and genuine way. In the panel you are describing, he is essentially striking a flirtatious - but masculine - pose and attempting to make eye contact… which is the default way that women will typically try to indicate openness to potential suitors. The location appears to be a public park, which is a very normal place to interact with strangers.
Really, saying it is the wrong place at the wrong time is an interesting thing to say, because what is the right place and time? You say this like there is some sort of set of rules, like those Victorian books of aristocratic manners, about when it is and is not appropriate to interact with someone. If you have such a book for the modern era, I would love to read it… but I have seen neither hide nor hair. Instead, it seems like the “appropriate” time and place is a mythical moving target. Even if you specifically have some sort of idea of places you personally think are appropriate - wait ten minutes and someone will come along to contradict you. Gym? No. Class? No. The park? No. The club? No. Coffee shop? No. Dance class? What you’re not here purely for the sake of learning a beautiful art form? Ew, no. In my view, the only places really “appropriate” for meeting women are:
- Explicit “singles” events - where the women present will consist almost entirely of women looking for committed, long term relationships.
- Dating apps, which everyone hates.
- Completely accidental interactions.
In all these situations, men are heavily disadvantaged in achiving their goals of finding partners to have sex with, since the first two will always have an extreme disparity between men and women with the same goals, and the latter is, by definition, impossible to make happen or seek out.
I propose a different idea. Any reasonable, sex positive person will tell you - sex is no big deal. It is just like anything else. Okay, then let’s treat it like anything else. Suppose you like metal music, or playing tennis, or building neat bicycles. When is it appropriate to say hello to someone with this context? Like, suppose you are hanging out in the park, and see someone walking by carrying a tennis racket. It’s reasonable to walk up to them and say “Hey! I see you play tennis! Me to!” And then maybe you can talk some more, and actually both of you are looking for tennis partners, and you have a lot of fun together. Or maybe you are sitting outside a cafe, and someone rolls up on their pennyfarthing. It wouldnt be out of turn for you to say “Wow, that’s a sick pennyfarthing!” We can even see an example of this in the very comic above, where guys come over and talk to our bro-hero in the park about lifting.
Now, maybe Mr. Pennyfarthing is having a bad day. Maybe he runs the national association of neat bicycles, and your bike is just so under his standard that he is already bored of talking to you. Or maybe he is an alcoholic who lost his job and his pennyfarthing is the only means of transportation that he has and he is so fucking tired of people commenting on it, FUCK! And so maybe when we try to strike up a conversation, he won’t be interested, or might be grumpy, or might even go off on us, saying we are assholes for bringing it up. But that doesn’t make us assholes - after all, we were just trying to strike up a friendly, fun conversation.
Similarly, if a girl walks over to the cafe rocking a bodacious ass in skintight booty shorts, it is perfectly reasonable to say “wow, you look like you have an interest in being a sexy human - me too!” (in so many words, lol). And maybe she’ll feel anxious, or pissed off. And maybe she’ll run away sobbing, crying “I didn’t ask for this luscious badonk, it’s a curse!!” But much like Mr Pennyfarthing, that is her problem, and none of this means that we are bad people.
Which kind of brings me to the last point I wanted to make, which is your use of the word “creep”. It seems like your justification for this is that he is staring at women - but there is no indication that he is staring at women at all. In fact, the joke of the comic implies, to me at least, that literally as soon as he shows up at the park he is inundated with guys wanting to talk about lifting.
But suppose he was staring. Let’s consider his actions and intentions. We see no evidence of ill will towards women - in fact, he has gone to great efforts to make himself more appealing to them. And without some sort of malintent, such staring should be considered, at worst, a social faux pas. After all - we look at things we are interested in, and at people we would like to speak to. But sometimes we don’t initiate because we are shy or anxious. And if bro is not even aware that it is a social faux pas, he can hardly be blamed for doing it.
But working backward through the line of reasoning in your comment, we see - he seems creepy because he is staring, and because he seems creepy, he must be a creep, and because he is a creep, talking to women can’t possibly help him. To me, this chain of logic seems to be making a lot of logical leaps that aren’t justified, and instead I think it is something of a post-hoc rationalization which essentially boils down to slut shaming.
Men who want to have sex with women are bad - which is why we know this man is bad, and everything he does is bad. Any effective strategy he might adopt to gain a more enjoyable and fulfilling sex life, like working out to have a hot body, noticing potential sexual partners, or interacting with those potential sexual partners, are therefore also bad. But since polite society is nominally sex positive, calling him a slut would be in bad taste - and so instead he is called a creep, under cover of “protecting women” - ironically, shaming him for doing the very things that most women would find attractive: being hot, being socially confident, taking initiative. And the overall social effect is a net negative: since trying to be an attractive and sexually successful man is liable to get you labelled a creep - a term that implies not a lack of attainable skill, but a fundamental moral failing - the men who are most likely to take effective steps towards being appealing to women are men who don’t care about being good people.
Thank you for coming to my TED Talk
