You Will Never Get in Shape Like That

A simple program for normal people

That time of year is here. There is no way around it. After a month or two of stuffing your fat face, you are disgusted with yourself. Maybe you even mixed in some binge drinking to boot. All to culminate with a New Year’s Eve booze and fat fest that will start off the new year with a heightened level of self-hatred.

The gut reaction is to do some googling, or talk to an LLM and make a plan. To optimize an entire program of the perfect workouts, and the clinical diet. This is it. This is the year. You will get into excellent shape and be a person that is fit and disciplined.

The problem is that you won’t and possibly couldn’t, even if you tried. This has been studied to death. The % of people who stick to a structured workout plan (this isn’t even talking about diet yet) for 12 months, is 3%. Those people you see in super good shape, that you see every time you’re at the gym. They are the 3% and you are not one of them. I am not one of them. The only person I know in real life who is one of them, is my wife.

Please do not give up yet, because I do offer a solution. The problem is that it isn’t sexy, and doesn’t sound fun. It is akin to brushing your teeth or taking a shower. It does not involve becoming a workout fanatic or having fitness be a major part of your personality. It just involves being a normal person. It could involve spending a little bit of money, but I will also give you a version that costs little or even no money.

What the best fitness minds and decades of literature show is that consistency trumps short bursts, by a mile. It also shows that relatively small stimulus over long periods of time is vastly superior to excessive stimulus that is haphazard. Before you start to squirm, you need to accept that you are part of the 97% of people who experience fitness haphazardly. There is a very slim chance that you’ve ever stuck to a program, in a disciplined and consistent way for more than three months, much less a year. The raw fact is that doing what you (and I, by the way) have always done, is barely better than doing nothing at all.

In fact, you’d be better off today, if you had simply taken a brisk 20 minute walk every day for the last three years, than whatever you’ve been doing. Knowing all this, what are us 97% to do? Just give in and be fat slobs that die at 68 years old of some cancer or heart disease after a decade or two of slowly deteriorating health and mounting piles of pills? Not at all. What we will do is an unsexy, slow progression of habit building. We will do it exactly on this schedule, exactly the way I prescribe it. We will not speed things up. We will not push it faster, or heavier.

We will make it barely enjoyable, but bearable. We will not get overly excited and scroll fitness reels, or read incessantly about optimization. We are not competitive body builders, or serious marathon runners. We might turn into those things, later on, but probably not. Mostly we will be normal, functioning people, who have a daily habit, that doesn’t take much time at all. We will not put fitness on a pedestal. We will not have it be a feature of our personality or interactions with others. We will get and remain fit and it will have no more emotional energy than that fact that we take our trash out, feed our dogs or brush our teeth. This must be etched into our brains. We will not change it up, get new goals, sign up for races or competitions. We will not just “add in X movement a couple times a week” or “start swimming” or “sign up for a 5k.” These are all distractions and are really just us being immature and thinking about this the wrong way. In reality, they are a stepping stone to giving up. Don’t do it. We do the plan, the way it’s prescribed, and we don’t entertain any other options.

There are 4 phases that build the base and the habit. They are intentional and must be followed strictly. There are no exceptions and no alterations. Do not try to optimize, or go too fast. Just do it and don’t think about it.

My most heretical suggestion is this. Don’t go to the gym. You read that correctly. I am telling you not to go to the gym for this. Getting yourself to the gym is a deceivingly large friction point. Remember, we are just normal people, with normal lives and getting to a gym costs a lot of time, money and planning. I will be reasonable though. If you have some situation where there is a gym right next to your office or a short walk down a hallway in your apartment or something, then fine. But you really want your home base of exercise to be your home. You wouldn’t drive somewhere every day to brush your teeth and it is important to think of this in the same way.

Phase 1 – First 90 days

Strength. Don’t worry, it’s very easy.

Many plans will try to start you slow by just walking and this has its merits, but you should actually start with strength. The reasons for this are numerous, but here are a few.

1. Walking is boring and you won’t stick with it at this point, because it’s boring. Lifting weights has a little bit of an edge to it. It takes a little more focus, and you can consciously and subconsciously track progression.

2. Strength training takes a small amount of real commitment. This is important

3. You will gain much more mental fortitude, subconsciously when you stick with lifting over a long period of time. Getting and feeling stronger is unmatched in terms of positive physical psychology, and like it or not, this is all about psychology.

For three months, we are not going to change anything else about our lives. We are simply going to add this very simple daily habit that will take us less than 30 minutes per day. I get it done in closer to 20, but you do you. It should take between 20-30 minutes.

Investment

I strongly recommend making an investment in the required equipment. Remember, this is something we are going to be doing every day for years to come. This is a one-time investment, and the only ongoing cost will be more weight, a ways down the road. Weights themselves are pretty cheap. Here is the ideal set of equipment, with rough costs. DO NOT go out and buy high end stuff. Iron is iron and buying high end stuff will make you no stronger or better. Lifting a pound of sand will make you just as strong as a pound of gold.

Barbell – 7’ Olympic. ~$100

Basic weigh bench ~$80

Power cage~ $300

Trap bar~ $160

T-bar row handle and attachment ~ $50

EZ Curl bar~ $40

Weight plates~$100 (this can vary widely. I would start with the cheapest set you can find on amazon. Something that has a couple 45’s, 25’s, 10’s and 5’s.

Total Investment: ~$830

*Optional* basic adjustable dumbbell set ~$ 140.

You can probably do better than these prices if you really hunt 2^nd hand. Everything I gave is based off quick prices for lower end stuff on amazon. The bottom line is that you can get everything you need for under $1,000. I realize that some people’s situation won’t allow for this set up in the space they have, but realistically, most people can make it work.

The Exercises

There are only 2 total workouts that comprise a total of 6 movements. 3 movements on Day A and 3 movements on Day B. We alternate A and B every day of the week and never take a rest day. We aren’t doing intense stuff here, so there is no need for rest days, which for us 97% will almost always be the catalyst for giving up on our program.

I will spell this out very plainly for those who have absolutely no experience with weight training. 5 of the 6 movements will be done on a 3X5, meaning 3 sets of 5 repetitions. The 6^th movement will be done 3X10.

Day A

Deadlift 3X5

Bench Press 3X5

Shoulder Press 3X5

Day B

Squat 3X5

T-bar Row 3X5

Curls 3X5

That’s it. Just this, every day, for years. We will add some things that are not lifting in the later phases, but if you do only this for 1 year, your results will be astonishing. Almost no one does this, because they pick hyper-optimized and complex programs that they don’t stick to.

Weight

We are going to start with comically low weight. We want to be able to do each set with a decent among of gas in the tank. We are not going to failure, because we are not maxing out gains and hypertrophy. There is not a powerlifting competition or bodybuilding show to get ready for. We are looking at an RPE of 5-6. Maybe a 3-4 if we’re sick and a 7 every once in a blue moon if we are really feeling it. If you don’t know, RPE is very simple. A 10 is max effort and a 1 is almost no effort. We want to feel it a bit, but not too much.

Now for the finer details. In a perfect world you would do this exactly as I prescribe, but we don’t live in a perfect world. So, I will list the way in which you should do each exercise and then I will list the 2^nd, 3^rd and 4th best options. I will rate them best, good, good enough and bare minimum ( you are either very cheap, or too poor). You can start with bare minimum and slowly build up the equipment, but if I had my way, you’d just go out and buy everything you need.

Deadlift

Special note: This is arguably the most dangerous movement on the menu. Spend an extraordinary amount of time on technique and keep this movement very light weight to begin with. Only up your weight in small increments and gradually. You should spend literal hours getting your deadlift and squat techniques dialed in, using comically low weight to begin with on both.

Best: Because we are going for longevity here, I use a trap bar. This is safer and easier than a standard bar bell. If you can spare $90, just buy one on amazon.

Good: Barbell. You will need one anyway for other movements. Just buy a standard 7’ Olympic barbell. You’re looking at about $100. If you’re going to do this, you should spend some time watching YouTube videos about proper technique. This is the biggest risk of injury of any movement, so please, please, please, if you insist on doing barbell deadlifts, start very light and spend serious time on technique.

Good enough: Dumbbells. You can do this with dumbbells as well. The variation that is best with dumbbells is the RDL (Romanian Deadlifts). You can get some cheap old school style dumbbell sets on amazon for like $150, or spend a little more on more modern adjustable dumbbells.

Bare minimum: Prison style. If you really can’t afford any equipment at all, then you can just use milk jugs. Just fill with water to start (just add more water each session to increase weight). But this is super not ideal. If you are going to cheap out completely, then this should be the first thing you endeavor to afford your way out of. Get some dumbbells, for the love of God.

Bench press

Best: A bench and barbell. The classic movement. Highly recommend that you invest in a bench and bar.

Good: Bench and dumbbells. This is actually just as good, but there is something about the barbell that just hits right. But if for some reason you can’t get a rack and barbell combo, then this will do.

Good enough: Floor bench (barbell or dumbbell). I hesitate to call this good enough, because it doesn’t afford as much range of motion, but it is better than nothing. If, for some reason you don’t have a weight bench, then this will do (but I don’t like it).

Bare minimum: Pushups. Pushups are great, and they are the best thing to do if you are traveling and can’t get near any weights. If you really can’t get your hands on any weights, then this is the way to start. You can experiment with different angles if they are too easy, or go to your knees if they are too hard.

Shoulder Press

Best: Seated barbell shoulder press. The reason I say seated is because we all have a tendency to want to use our legs to help get the weight up easier. When seated, we are more assured of doing it right.

Good: Seated dumbbell shoulder press. Again, I’d rather we use the barbell, but this will do.

Good enough: Standing shoulder press. Like I said, it’s better seated.

Bare minimum: Prison style. Get our your milk jugs again.

Squat

Special note: This is arguably the most dangerous movement on the menu. Spend an extraordinary amount of time on technique and keep this movement very light weight to begin with. Only up your weight in small increments and gradually.

This is a good place to start but should not be where you end. You need to really spend time on this. An injury will derail us and ruin the momentum.

Best: Barbell back squat. The classic movement

Good: Dumbbell goblet squat. Same movement, but you’re holding a dumbbell in front of you.

Good enough/bare minimum: Air squats. There aren’t more options, besides once again going prison style and finding any kind of weight to hold.

T-bar Row

Special note: This is another movement that you should spend time getting good technique on, as it can cause some injury as well. Any movement can, but this one probably comes in third place, among these lifts, after deadlift and squat.

Best: T-bar Row

Good: Barbell row. This is a slightly different motion, but if you can nail the technique it is very good. It’s just hard to control and do right, which is why I prefer the T-bar for most. If you are going to do this, spend the time on learning technique.

Good enough: Dumbbell rows. These honestly just feel weird to me and most people, but theoretically, they are fine.

Bare minimum: Bent-over dumbbell rows. These are ok, but they are very targeted and more used for body building, but better than nothing.

Super bare minimum: doorframe iso row. Another prison classic. I would seriously rather you lift a milk jug or suitcase and the edge of a chair, to simulate the bent-over dumbbell. But if push comes to shove, you can use a door frame or a pillar and either pull yourself through the door at an angle or wrap a towel around a pillar and pull yourself.

EZ bar curls

Best: EZ bar curls. Just get the bar, load the weight and do the curls.

Good: Barbell curls. Same motion, straight bar. I did these for a long time before I bought an EZ bar. They are fine.

Good enough: Dumbbell curls. Can you tell I prefer barbells to dumbbells? Anyway. These will work. Do one arm at a time and alternate.

Bare minimum: You guessed it. Prison style. Get some milk jugs. Seriously, buy some weights already.

Phase 1 Final thoughts

This is all you will do. 3 movements a day, every day. This is the only fitness related item on your menu. Don’t worry about anything else. Sure, do your best not to overeat junk food and get enough sleep. But we are not worrying about diet or recovery or any other complications right now. You can really do whatever you want, so long as you do the 3 movements a day, every day. It is ok to add weight to the movements week to week, but keep it at 2.5 to 5 lbs at a time, even if you feel you could do much more. The entire point is just to do them. All that matters is doing it every day. There are no other goals. So go ahead and eat pizza, go out for ice cream, get drunk Friday night, stay up late playing video games. I do not care. Our one and only goal is to complete the movements, every day, with no exception.

One more time for clarity. Do not add anything to your fitness mindset at all during these 3 months. The only progressions you can concern yourself with are better form and more weight. We can marginally try to eat healthier, but that is not tied to this. Whether we have a perfect eating day or gorge ourselves on pizza and mountain dew, we do the movements. Whether we sleep 12 hours or no hours, you guessed it, we do the movements. If we have the flu, we do the movements, even if it’s the bare minimum and we have to lay down after every set. I don’t care if it’s pushups in bed, deadlifting our puke-stained towels off the floor and air squatting down to the toilet to evacuate our bowels. WE DO THE MOVEMENTS.

Phase 2 – 2^nd 90 days

We are now feeling great about ourselves. For the first time in our lives, we did something really good for our health for 3 months without missing a day. We are stronger, probably a little leaner and most importantly, we have built a habit. We are probably no longer having to brute force ourselves to do the movements. We probably started doing them at roughly the same time every time. We’ve probably had a close call or 2, where we had to slog out the movements at 11:30PM. But we did it, and we will keep doing it.

Now we are going to add something very simple. I want to make this crystal clear. We are still doing the same movements, every day, with no exception. Get this into our heads. We are doing the movements forever.

That simple little thing is simply a walk. It can be outdoors or indoors. It can be on the sidewalk, in a field, around a track, on a treadmill, or back and forth in the kitchen. It can be standing in front of the tv (marching in place). It can be anywhere, in any way, but it must happen and it must last for 20 minutes.

I strongly recommend doing it outdoors as much as possible, as there are other benefits to this. But, just like the weights, it simply must be done, under any conditions. The best thing is to do it first thing in the morning. Just get up, and do the walk. If you have a dog, even easier. Maybe you are already doing this for work, or it was already an established habit. That’s great, A+. If it is the case, guess what? We are going to keep doing it, 7 days a week, along with the movements.

This is non-negotiable. The same rules apply. We are not training for a marathon, we are simply walking as a habit, every day. If we are sick, we walk. Even if its 2 minute increments between trips to the bathroom with the flu. We walk and we do the movements.

We are now spending 40-50 minutes per day exercising. We are not going all out. We are not overly taxing ourselves. We are simply doing movements and walking, every day, without exception.

It is possible our weight movements are starting to plateau. Some will have a very long runway for this and some will not. No matter. If we are plateaued at a lifting weight on a certain movement, we simply stay plateaued and keep doing the movement until we can either do more or we can’t. We are not training for a strength competition, we are simply burrowing a habit deep into our brains so that it can never fade.

As with the first 90 days, we are not adding anything else. No added movements, no running or cycling. No trying to get more distance in the 20 minute block. We are still not worried about diet or recovery all that much. As before, we can make a reasonable effort to eat well and sleep enough, but as before, we can really do whatever we want, so long as we do the movements and take the walk.

So, for 180 days, this is the program. Movements, then movements and walking.

Phase 3 – 3^rd 90 days

Diet

Yes, we are finally here. We are going to tackle food. The good news is that we have built an incredibly strong base of discipline by now. We are now doing what we have never done and almost no does. We have a 6 month win streak going and we feel great about it. We are almost certainly trimmer. We are certainly fitter. We are certainly stronger.

At this point, if you chose to just continue the movements and walking forever and not go any more phases, then you would be well ahead of most people. The food phase is the hardest one yet.

Now we reach the biggest leap. The reason it’s the biggest leap is because food is emotional. Most of us are addicted to it. Not in the same way an alcoholic is addicted to alcohol, as he can always not drink. We have to eat, and most of us derive much pleasure from doing so.

With that in mind, we are still going to allow for the pleasure of eating. We are going to eat, at maintenance, with a protein goal for the next 90 days. In order to do this, we will have to track calories using MyFitnessPal. This is the hard part. Actually eating in a calorie window is relatively easy, but we will need our discipline to diligently and honestly track it. Which means entering in every single calorie and weighing the food that we cook. Prepackaged foods have barcodes that can be scanned. When we make a recipe we will scan the code or find the food and then we will weigh it. When we eat out, we will do our very best to find the food or a similar one in MyFitnessPal and track it.

To start, we need to know what maintenance is and there is a formula. Sorry, you will need to do math. Here is what the formulas look like. The (1.3) is our little adder for being moderately active people.

For Men: (10 × weight in kg) + (6.25 × height in cm) - (5 × age in years) + 5 (1.3)

For Women: (10 × weight in kg) + (6.25 × height in cm) - (5 × age in years) – 161(1.3)

Here is what mine looks like:

(10 × 97.5) + (6.25 × 195) - (5 × 40) + 5 (1.3)

975+1,218.75+200+5 * 1.3 = 3,118.375

So, a large man like myself will need 3,118.375 calories per day, when doing the amount of activity we have outlined, will maintain weight. I know this seems like a lot, but it’s the reality. Do the math for yourself and don’t question it further.

There is one more rule. Protein. Myfitnesspal will track it for you. You are going to have to do a little more math here, but it will be easier this time. We are going to take your weight in lbs and multiply it by .75. This number will be the grams of protein you must get a day. For me this is 161.25 grams.

These are the only 2 rules. We do not eat more than maintenance, and we meet the minimum protein requirements. We fill the rest of the calories with whatever we want. Of course, it is best to do this healthfully, but at this point, we don’t care. If it’s pizza, Doritos and whiskey, then so be it. It just can’t break the calorie threshold. I will say that pizza, Doritos and whiskey will make it very difficult on you, as you will feel horrible.

If you are diligent about tracking calories, it will not be hard to stay under the calories. The protein is also very doable. It will be much easier if you get some protein powder and mix in a shake or 2 a day.

You do not have to eat to the limit every day, but we should be careful about undershooting by too much, as this can lead to a rebound day of overeating. At this point, we are not worried about the micronutrients or even really the macros, with the exception of the protein. What the protein requirement does is hem in your crappy eating a bit, as the worst things aren’t usually protein heavy. It will also support your muscle mass.

We are also still doing the movements every day. We are still doing the walking every day. We are now just adding a little bit of structure around our eating. We are still being completely normal, and not fitness fanatics. At this point, we can still do anything. We can go out for every meal and still be fine. We can go on vacation, go out clubbing or any other thing we deem to be fun, without much fuss.

When we are doing all 3 of these phases, we are being healthy. We are not gaining fat, in fact, we are probably losing some. Our bodies are now machines that work a lot better than they did less than a year ago and our self-confidence has skyrocketed. Our subconscious knows that we are being disciplined, even if our conscious mind feels that it’s not that big of a deal. This is what we want. We don’t want to spend a ton of will and conscious energy on this easy habit we’ve built. It’s simply what we do now.

Phase 4 – the 4^th 90 days

Now we are in the home stretch. We have completely transformed our health already and it’s time for the cherry on top. Everything we built up in the past 9 months has made this last step very easy. We now have 280 consecutive days of lifting weights. We are probably all plateauing in our lifts. This is ok. Just stick with it for 90 more days, and I promise you can do more after. We now have 180 consecutive days of walking. We also have 90 consecutive days slightly controlling what we eat. We’re still average people to the outside world, but we’ve done something that almost no one else has. We have built and maintained a relatively healthy lifestyle and most importantly, we have done it consistently, day in and day out. We are absolutely leaner, stronger and feeling better than we ever have. We are now ready for phase 4.

We are going to do 2 things.

1. Cut our calories by 250. Very simply. We take our calorie total and take away 250. That’s it

2. We cut out all sugary-carby “treats.” This will take some explaining.

When I say sugary-carby treats, you probably have an idea of what I mean. Don’t worry, this is the only part of this that is temporary. For 90 days, we are not going to eat junk. This means things like candy, desserts, chips, crackers, and other obviously unhealthy junk. We can still eat fruit, or rice or maybe even the occasional fries. We can eat bread even. But we are not going to eat hyper-palatable processed carbohydrates and sugar. This is not dogmatic purity. It is not about perfection. It is about behavior, and starting to have some real self-control over our eating. For example. A couple slices of bread on a sandwich or a burger is fine. A piece of pizza is not. A tasty protein bar is fine. A snickers bar is not. Croutons on a salad is fine. A bag of cheez-its is not.

We can still eat sweet things. Honey is fine, fruits are fine. We are focused, right now, on the junk. If you are honest and a grownup about it, you know what I mean. The point is to sever the emotional attachment to treats like this, which do absolutely nothing good but give us a split-second shot of chemicals in our brain.

You will quickly notice that trimming 250 calories is not that big of a deal and you likely won’t have much trouble with hunger doing so.

We will do this for 90 days and it will take us into a full year. We are still not overthinking this. We have not changed our workouts, or our calorie goals. We have not altered our diet to any kind of new, radically different thing, and decided to go keto, or vegan or whatever because we craved some more novelty.

Completing a year and beyond

We’ve done it. We’ve drastically changed our health, and we get to say that we haven’t missed a single day in an entire year. We will look back and realize, it wasn’t that hard. The daily lifting won’t feel like much at all. It will just be a thing we do. The walking will be almost an afterthought. Tracking calories is now 2^nd nature. I won’t lie to you; you will probably be craving the sugary-carby treats still. Go ahead, if you are so inclined and treat yourself at the one-year mark.

At this point, you can do more things. You can now add intensity to your lifting. You can add or subtract certain movements and start pushing for more weight or volume. You can turn your walks into runs or cycling sessions. You can choose to cut calories even more and really try to get lean. Or maybe you want to amp calories and start to put on much more muscle mass. Maybe you decide to cut carbs, or up the fat, or vice versa. Maybe you want to start tying to compete as a marathoner, or body builder or obstacle course racer.

Or maybe you enjoyed this whole experience, have built the automatic habits and want to just stay the course, doing your movements, your walks, your mild calorie control and living your life. It won’t be hard to do, at this point, as these behaviors are so deeply engrained now. Whatever you choose to do next will be up to you and monumentally easier now that you’ve built the habits.