Keep Your Chin Up

On March 13, 2024, my partner surprised me by ordering a pull-up bar for me to hook onto the top of the office door's frame. I'd been hem-hawing on whether to buy one immediately or wait until I could invest in the bench I wanted, so he made the decision for me.

I didn't order resistance bands for another 2 and 1/2 months.

What can I say? From computers to simple rice containers I fall into a research loop death trap that lasts weeks, sometimes months, all because I need to find the best of the best, subjective as it ultimately is. How does this compare to that? What are its reported weak points and strengths? Will it last a long time? Would the one I want truly make me happy even though it's more expensive, or could I settle on fewer bells and whistles? (The last question gets me especially.)

Hey, at least I decided on the bands I wanted eventually, right?

I thought it would take me a year max to progress from the heaviest band (orange in the set of 7) to no band at all for my pull-ups. Surely, surely if people could go from obese to rocking a six-pack in 6, 8, 12 months, I could do an unassisted pull-up no problem after a year of dedicated training.

Yeah, no. Nope. Not at all.

Talk about eating a slice of humble pie, because in that year I only managed to move from the orange band to the blue band, one step lighter. Then, for another year after that, I see-sawed between the blue and green band. I would consistently hit close to 10 reps with the blue band and just start using the green when I would get sick or injure myself or lose steam for other reasons entirely, which would knock me back to blue.

It was frustrating, and there were times I actively avoided doing pull-ups of any kind because I didn't want to see the decrease in rep count, but I'm nothing if not bullishly determined, and so I persevered, putting in the reps week after week, reminding myself that it's all about consistency, not speed. It doesn't matter how quickly you earn your gains if the routine itself is unsustainable, but I'll let Natacha Océane explain more on that front, since the video she made 4 years ago in response to Will Smith's weight loss journey has stayed with me to this day.

If ever there was a cheat code to life, I'd have to call it by the name "sustainability." Seriously. I was even telling my partner during lunch today how I need to take a full day off soon, and I do mean a full day off, because the rate at which I have been pushing myself with transcribing and everything else for the past however many months simply isn't sustainable, even if I keep telling myself, "You can take a break after you catch up. You're almost there." But that's a whole 'nother topic of discussion!

Sustainability is the only reason I've been able to follow the same workout routine even when it bores me to tears. Sometimes I switch to a 3-day split, sometimes a 4-day split; sometimes I add in moves I like and remove those I don't; and sometimes I pair all the moves together into supersets or take my time focusing on one exercise at a time. Overall, however, the routine hasn't changed all that much. It just so happens that pull-ups are deceptively hard, and all of my strength seems to collect in the calves.

Well! Allow me to stand with my hands on my hips à la Captain Underpants, because as of yesterday, I successfully completed three sets of pull-ups at 5, 5, 4 respectively on the next band in the progression, the purple~

I know, I know. It's not as impressive as proclaiming, "I performed my first unassisted pull-up!" but ideally, that transition only happens once. Documenting the journey itself matters to me more, and yesterday marked a milestone worth mentioning. Not too many more stand between me and the summit.

The black band follows on deck with red at the end, and, let's face it, by the time I reach the red band, I'll probably be able to manage at least a handful of pull-ups unassisted anyway, which would be preferable because I'm actually afraid the red band would snap on me.

Cheers to the journey, however much longer it may take.

Summary of Notable Accomplishments:

• (Me transcribing)

• Started Session 0 Summaries

  • Tweaked some of the templates & approaches to summarizing these scenes/sessions

• Built With Science Upper A + Lower Foundation x2

• Wrestling with my period, because seriously, sometimes that in itself is an accomplishment

This Week's Obligatory Cat Pic: Qiri