You Don’t Need To Be A Cover Model To Be A Fitness Super Hero

In 2019 we can say with certainty that there is nobody having a bad fitness day on Instagram. This bubble of perfectness can be both inspiring and motivational at times, but all too often serves to make our own efforts feel mediocre or below par. Today I want to talk to you about why aiming for a cover model physique doesn’t always make you a real fitness superhero.

In 2018, Sport England ran a powerful campaign called This Girl Can. It was aimed at empowering women of all abilities and backgrounds to get involved in sport. What I loved about this campaign was that it was one of the first of its kind to send the right kind of message about the power of sport and exercise out to the masses.
In the This Girl Can campaign it featured real people taking part in sport and one of the main taglines in its feature advert was “I jiggle therefore I am”. Despite being aimed at women, this message is universal to all.
What this advert and campaign managed to do was breath fresh air and realism into an often unrealistic and over glamourised industry, something we should all be able to relate to.

According to Parliamentary statistics, obesity rates have increased from 15-26% since 1993 with the 45- 74 age groups making up the majority of this increase. Put simply a lot of us are struggling with our weight.
Despite having lost a considerable amount of weight since my late teens I still feel noticeably self-consciousness even today. I still catch myself folding my arms to cover my stomach and worry people are judging my size. Some things are so deep routed they never really go away altogether.

The honest reality is that we all jiggle, or at least those of us who are human do.

Now I would never want to take away from those who work tirelessly in the gym, pool, running track or classes to achieve their dream bodies. I take my hat off to you and commend your hard work.
For most of us though, we jiggle a little bit and that’s ok.

I hope that we see more ad campaigns like This Girl Can because the alternative is the imperfect bubble of Instagram and social media. Despite the motivation these videos and photographs can provide, it ultimately encourages us to compare ourselves to people who are often living dramatically different lives.
They might be a professional model who gets paid to train in their working day. They might be an actor working tirelessly on a new role with the best trainers and dieticians in the world. Or they could simply be people who don’t have to get up at 6am for work each day, do a 12-14-hour shift and still look after a family.

I would be the first to say you can change your lifestyle and live a healthier happier life. Dreaming of a cover model physique is fine but if you’re defining your fitness success by what you see in magazines and online you are more likely to undervalue your superherohero efforts and progress.

Sport England taught us that This Girl Can and in 2019 I am telling you that Everyone can be a fitness super hero.

Take your first steps to becoming a fitness Super Hero and start having fun with sport, fitness and exercise, that’s how winning is really done.

Andy Strong

Fundamentally FIT