Whatever oats can do, Amala can do better

8 things gym bros won’t tell you about your summer body goals

Writer: Ogunleye Oluwagbemisola

DataXplore Analytics will help you launch your data analytics career. Join their 12-week intensive virtual training

We understand that you have other concerns from academics, like how you woke up at 6am on January 1st and decided that you want to change your life starting with your body. As if your fyp read your New Year’s resolution, you can’t scroll past two videos without seeing fitness content, and now you’ve decided that you want your summer body goals before June.

Yes, the spirits have possessed you to start your fitness journey today but before you pay for that gym membership or start that workout plan, we have a few tips on how to get the best value for the money you put into your body. Come, let’s put you on game:

1. Know what you want: If you are looking for a big chest and you spend the entire month running on treadmills, sorry to break it to you but you’ve just wasted a whole month’s gym subscription. Did you pay 25k a month to use the treadmill? If yes, why bother? Just go outside, wear your Crocs and run from your house to the main market. Whether your plan is to lose weight or to gain muscle, how you approach it will determine whether you find what you are looking for. People who want to lose weight do cardio, while people who want to bulk up do strength training.

1. There is nothing you want to know that the internet cannot tell you: personal trainer is 50k keh? Wetin do chatgpt? Wetin do Reddit? Even if you don’t have anyone in the fitness game who can tell you what is real and what is unnecessary, you can figure it out with a few Google searches. Tell Google what you want to achieve and you can start from knowing what to do to get there.

• Improvise: Can’t afford a gym subscription or dumbbells? Carry 5kg oil kegs, fill them with water and hang them on a curtain rod. Can’t afford cute gym fits? Wear a T-shirt and an old pair of joggers. Can’t afford protein powder or oats? Eat wara and beske.

• Don’t consume too much fitness content: everybody and their daddy will try to sell something to you. Protein powder is 100k keh? How much is one kilo of chicken? Be sure you absolutely need something before you buy it. As a beginner, you are still figuring out what works for you. Don’t spend money on buying things you don’t need, it will burn you out. They said gym gloves are 12k? Buy a roll of bandage and wrap it around your wrist and palm; it does the same thing the gloves will do and for 11,500 less, too.

• Whatever oats can do, amala can do better: Yes, working out is only 20% of the equation, but your diet is the remaining 80%. You don’t know what to eat because all the healthy food recipes you see online have mozzarella cheese in them. You can do the same thing low-fat pasta will do with rice, beans, eggs and cucumbers. The key is knowing what food groups these foods belong to and how to combine them. One spoon of rice, one spoon of beans, two spoons of carrot and cucumbers with two eggs and plenty of water will do what low-fat pasta will do. Just reduce your amala portion to one and increase your meat portion to three, you don’t need to break the bank on Greek yoghurt.

• Talk to real-life people: if you have a gym subscription, how does it feel to be a billionaire? You are one of the few billionaires in this generation. Know that what you are paying for is community. A community of people who were once like you and will help you out with the gym equipment instead of leaving you to break your neck in the name of training muscle. Go to a gym where nobody knows you so that you won’t be afraid to embarrass yourself. Embarrassment is the path to greatness.

• Your body will not look different for a while: after two weeks of drinking ginger, cucumber and okra, are you really expecting to see six-packs? You won’t begin to see any noticeable changes for at least two months into your fitness journey. It may take as long as three years to get to where you are going. There is no quick quick solution, you just have to trust the process.

• You are allowed to backslide: discipline is key but sometimes you’ll be tempted to go back to your old habits like puff-puff and eating more plantain than rice. That’s perfectly fine. Don’t judge yourself too harshly. The goal is to have more healthy days than junk days.

Extra tip: Look out for gym bros and muscle mommies trying to toast you in the gym, they are bad people. Send this to someone just starting their fitness journey. Like and subscribe for a wider reach. We are rooting for you. 🧡

Launch your Data Analytics Career and turn your data skills into opportunities with DataXplore Analytics.

TFS (The Family of Students) is a community of university students; we connect university students and bring the best out of their university experience.

Join us on WhatsApp

Join our group of University students on Telegram

Follow us on Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn ( Linktree)

See our interesting TikTok videos here 👈🏾

Buy TFS merch

Thanks for reading Letters from TFS! Don’t forget to subscribe.