Just A Guy Thing

This is a guest post from Adrian over at 36Pounds.com, the place for skinny guys who want to gain muscle.

Yes, the gym can teach you something. It?s not just about who lifts more, has bigger biceps, better abs or can punch harder. There are incredibly important lessons about life that the gym can teach every man. And if you can actually learn them, I guarantee that you will become more successful in life!

Here are four of the most important lessons I?ve learned from working out:

1. Mental toughness

So let?s say you are doing a set of bicep curls. You have done 8 repetitions and you start feeling that burn in your muscle. It seems like you can?t do more?is that it? You stop doing it and go to rest? NO! You need to pump out another two reps! Why? Because you are not pushing yourself to the limit if you stop now. You can do at least another repetition when your muscles are burning.

You might hear that little whiny voice in your head saying that you can?t, but you have to defeat it! You have to learn how to defeat that person in your head. If you do, then you will learn HOW TO NOT QUIT WHEN THINGS GET HARD IN YOUR LIFE! There is a great saying: ?When the going gets tough, the tough gets going?. That?s what bodybuilding teaches you.

Mental toughness is incredibly important for a man. We are wimps without it.

2. Patience

If you want to successfully transform your body, you have to understand that you won?t do it in a week, or even a month. Impressive transformations take time. You have to work your ass off for a long time (if you want to look incredibly muscular, ripped, etc. then it will take at least a year). Those guys who went from skinny to buff most often have been working out for years. The same applies to losing fat.

If you keep training for a long time I promise your patience and willpower will improve, especially if you push yourself to the limit in the gym each workout.

3. Pay the price

Everything comes with price tag attached to it in life. For free you only get boredom, unhappiness and other things you really don?t want. But if you want success then prepare to pay the price. In bodybuilding it?s the gruelling workouts. And if you work out hard then after some time you will look in the mirror and be satisfied with what you have done. And looking back at the process you will understand that the price wasn?t so big at all?

4. Set goals

We men need goals. We need something to aim for. We feel awesome when we reach some goal that?s important to us. And it happens in bodybuilding too.

You start with a dumbbell that you can lift 6-7 times and set a goal to lift it 10 times. After some time you do it. It feels incredible to take a new, heavier dumbbell and go through this small journey again. It means you progress, it means you improve. It?s just a small example of setting goals. Start setting small ones, achieve them and then go bigger. That?s how life works!

Getting stronger, healthier, sexier, and more confident are just some of the benefits from lifting weights. But the four life lessons I outlined above are even more important. Success breeds success. And if you succeed at these ]four, you will without a doubt BE successful in other areas of life.

I hope this gave you some food for thought on whether it is useful to start working out. Or maybe it gave you some motivation if you are already lifting. Pleasure to share it with you guys!

Check out 36Pounds.com for more training tips.

photo credits: top rich115, bottom: Gio JL