Yeah, last month I explained why no one else cares about how hard you work. And they don’t — but you have to work hard anyway. Because if you’re not working hard enough, you’re not going to make progress.
And the truth is this: 99.9% of the guys I see in the gym don’t work hard enough. And it’s no coincidence that they’re always using the same weights and have pretty much the same physique, after days, weeks, months, even years of drudgery.
First, I gotta ask: if you’re not pushing yourself, why the fuck are you in the gym in the first place?
And second, you gotta ask: how do you know if you’re working hard enough?
The easy answer, of course, is that if you’re making progress, you’re working hard enough. But what if you feel like you’re busting your ass and not making progress? Is it possible you’re not working hard enough? That’s a tougher one.
What’s Enough?
Here’s how you find the balance between working hard enough and beating yourself into the ground:
- Again, if you’re making progress, you’re working hard enough.
- If you’re getting injured, you’re either doing something wrong or doing too much. In either case, you need to start by backing off a bit.
- If you’re not making progress, and you’re not getting hurt, you need to dig a little deeper. Ask yourself these questions:
- On the heavy days of your program, do you feel pretty wiped out afterward, or could you probably repeat that session in the next day or two? If it’s the latter, you haven’t pushed hard enough.
- Do you ever miss lifts? You should never aim to fail, but if you’re working hard enough, occasionally you will miss a lift, no matter how strong you are and how good you are at attempt selection. If you’re going 8, 10, 12, 16 weeks without missing a single lift, my guess is you’re not pushing hard enough. If you’re missing more than a handful of lifts, you need to back off.
Obviously, this isn’t a comprehensive questionnaire, but I think it’ll get you pretty close — and that’s usually more than good enough.
So: are you working hard enough?