Okay so let’s say your goal is aesthetic based. You want to look different, feel more confident in your body, whatever that looks like for you. Totally valid, no judgment here.

But if the only thing you’re paying attention to is the number on the scale or how you look in the mirror, you are missing out on so much good stuff.

And honestly, those two things are some of the slowest and most unreliable ways to measure progress, which means you’re sometimes going to feel like nothing is working way more often than you should.

So here are some things worth paying attention to instead.

You lifted heavier than you did last month. You did more reps with the same weight. You did a movement that used to scare you and now it felt totally fine. You didn’t have to think as hard about your form because it’s just starting to click. You recovered faster than you used to. You showed up even when you didn’t feel like it and you did the thing anyway.

That’s all really fucking good progress.

The aesthetic stuff comes, it really does. But it comes slowly, and it comes unevenly, and some weeks you’re going to feel great, and some weeks you’re going to feel like nothing is happening. If the scale and the mirror are your only metrics, those weeks feel awful.

But if you know that you squatted heavier this month than last month, that you can do things now that you couldn’t do three months ago, that you feel stronger and more capable in your actual life, those slow weeks hit completely differently.

You are doing more than you think and I’m so proud of you for it!