The Fitness Journey
This is the story of my biggest health & fitness lesson after 31 years in this world full of dragons, snakes and biblical size disasters.
It started 15 years ago when I stepped into a gym for the first time in an attempt to overcome the bullies. A bit later, the new grounds were to be respected and make the girls like me. I was at the age of 16-18 at that time.
I did get to a happy place, but eventually, life happened. As they say, ”shit hit the fan” and I had to grow up fast. I had to pay bills, deal with work responsibilities and even look after a 2 years old stepdaughter at the age of 22. What a jump that was…, from partying and living life to barely paying the bills and being a stepdad.
I was working hard and changing jobs from a leaflet guy at a strip club to a dolphin trainer in a dolphinarium. At some point, things got 17 X harder and I had to escape Bulgaria in search of a solution, so I took one flight and landed in Luton, London with a suitcase full of summer clothes and 10 euros on the 14th of September 2014.
At that time, fitness was far from a priority for me. It was a coping mechanism that for some reason kept me going. I noticed that every time I made some progress with the ”main” challenges in life (work, relationships), I was training regularly.
The ”Fit-Unfit Cycles” Of Life
Ironically, every time I made any significant progress with a business or a job to the point where it was busy and exciting, I was pausing the gym so I have the time to deal with work stuff and hopefully get a life sooner. That was my way of thinking and what comes after will resonate with many of you.
After stopping the gym for a month or two, life was getting progressively harder whilst the challenges were accumulating. Eventually, when things were unbearably tough, I would start going to the gym again, and within a week or two, I’d feel like I was on top of the world again.
My philosophy was to get myself to a nice body shape quickly and smash life whilst I paid zero attention to the process and was simply doing any technique I knew of to lose weight and build muscle.
This process was repeated for a good 15 years period, whilst I lost businesses, jobs, relationships and my health on multiple occasions.
The Risks Of Mental Health Disorders And Suffering
At one pivotal point, I decided to dedicate the remainder of my life to calisthenics training and make a business of it. I started with a massive amount of determination and my goal was to get in the best lean body shape ASAP so I can start monetising.
In 6 months I lost a ton of weight and dropped down to 69kg with a body fat percentage of below 10%. I was training twice per day and eating 1700kcal without fail. Eventually, I felt like I got this 100% until shit hit the fan once again. It was ugly as hell.
I was fighting for survival, trying to pay bills and make the next moves on my fitness coaching dream whilst studying and attending expensive marketing classes. With the accumulation of problems, I lost control over my diet and training and developed Body Dysmorphia and Binge Eating disorders that made me gain all the weight back, and lose all the performance whilst battling intense depression daily.
At that point, my dream was about to vanish. I realised that I’m either not good enough or something was missing. I must be missing something and if I don’t figure it out I risk going through the same cycle over and over for the rest of my life. There was no chance I could reach my dreams this way.
Love The Process, Not The Goal
That is when I became obsessed with studying and learning from the best in the world. I learned to differentiate between influencers and real experts with experience and science-backed knowledge. I created one of the best online communities on Clubhouse for fitness professionals called Limitless Body And Mind and I spend hundreds of hours leading conversations about anything related to health & fitness with the best athletes, scientists and coaches in the world.
I became obsessed with understanding my behaviour and creating strategies for overcoming my negative habits and building better ones.
This is when it hit me. I realised that all the time for the previous 15+ years I was focusing on the short-term (1-2 years) goals without prioritising my health above my business and relationships when things were tough. And because I had the short-term mindset, whenever shit hit the fan (something that happens in everyone’s life with certain regularity) I was considering that to be the end of that cycle of training.
I was living in cycles whilst other people who were putting in half of my efforts had it all.
I began to realise that life happens to everyone and the only way to deal with it is to become good at dealing with everything at once. It seems overwhelming at the beginning and nearly impossible at times but this is the only way to build a body that lasts whilst building a successful business empire and a family at the same time.
Final Words Of Advice
We all have to see the truth that health is only maintained with fitness and they’re both Essential elements of life which cannot be neglected. We have to focus on becoming good at the process of keeping it all together without quitting when things get hard but continue searching for ways to handle the challenges of life without giving up on our health and fitness.
Eventually, my friends, you will become good enough and this is exactly when you’ll start loving the process. It’s like driving a car for the first time. It will be scary at first and you’ll do mistakes but once you become good at it you can start loving it.
Once you learn to love the process then nothing in life will ever stop you. Good or bad times, you’ll be training and only getting better because this is what you’re good at. Get to that point in life, and nothing will ever stand in your way again.
People often say that I am relentless and nothing stops me. Well, this is a good half of my secret to unwavering mental resilience and peak performance.
I hope you enjoyed reading it! Please support my efforts to help men become the best version of themselves and share this story with your friends and family.
Together we’re unstoppable!
