Here Are 6 Stupid Mistakes I Made as A Gym Beginner
In my 14 years of lifting weights, I’ve tried everything.
I’ve failed at times.
I’ve succeeded at times.
But the experiences I’ve had have brought me here today.
And now as a doctor and health and fitness coach, I see many people going through the same struggles.
So if I could go back in time to when I was a gym beginner, I’d tell myself to avoid these 6 deadly mistakes.
Mistake 1: Focusing on fat loss first
One of my biggest mistakes (especially during my teen years) was spending so much time in a fat loss phase.
I wanted abs, which if you’re in this position, I totally understand.
But I started from a state where I was skinny fat, so I had no muscle at all and fat covering whatever I did have.
This means I looked skinny, but didn’t have any definition either.
Muscle mass peaks in your 20s and 30s, and you naturally lose about 8% of your muscle mass per decade afterward, and after 70, you lose 12% of your muscle mass each decade.
So it’s especially important to start putting on muscle at a young age.
When you’re a teen and early 20s, your body is still maturing and growing – It has the most anabolic environment imaginable.
So utilize this time to put on muscle because it will never be as easy as it is then.
I started lifting when I was around 13, and after a long bulk (I’ll talk about my mistakes on this shortly), came a long cut.
For me, it was about half the year in a calorie surplus and half the year in a calorie deficit.
And let me tell you something, I didn’t grow in height after I started lifting.
Not because lifting stunts growth – it doesn’t do that.
But because I was restricting the calories required for me to grow.
I was always one of the tallest kids in school growing up.
And in 8th grade, I stayed the same while everyone else grew like weeds.
At least I got wider.
So unless you are ACTUALLY fat, like a doctor told you you are fat or you can grab your gut with two hands, spend the MAJORITY of your time putting on muscle.
More muscle will also help with fat loss in the long run.
Muscle is metabolically active tissue, meaning it requires a lot of energy (in the form of calories) to be maintained.
A fat loss phase while eating more is the dream.
Mistake 2: Overdoing the bulking phases
So in the first mistake I mentioned how I wish I stayed in a calorie surplus for longer.
But at the same time, when I did a calorie surplus, I fell into the thinking that eating more will equal more progress.
And that is not true at all.
For my first few years of lifting, I did crazy bulks and crazy cuts.
My first year of lifting at 13/14 years old, I ate 3500 calories a day, gaining about a lb a week.
I gained around 30 lbs in 8 months.
I thought this would result in massive strength and muscle gains.
It didn’t.
It was massive fat gains.
And this made the process very demotivating.
And then I had to spend months cutting the fat off.
It was not worth it.
Do not use “bulking” as an excuse for stuffing your face and eating way too much junk.
You are only going to look and feel awful.
Take it slow, aim to gain about 2 lbs a month if you are a beginner.
It’s a long process but will add up over time and be much more fulfilling.
Mistake 3: Not understanding consistency
Mistake number 3 is not having a proper grasp on consistency.
I always heard Youtubers and fitness trainers telling me consistency was the most important factor to getting in shape.
And it is.
But consistency can mean a lot of things.
Is it going to the gym at the same time?
Eating the same things over and over again?
After a few years I figured it out.
Proper consistency is knowing that you will be (or should be) doing these for the rest of your life.
After a certain amount of time, exercise and eating right just starts to feel like a normal part of your day.
Same way when you were a kid and you started brushing your teeth on your own.
You may have skipped, and your mom smelled your stinky breath and told you to go to the bathroom immediately.
Now, I hope you just brush your teeth without really thinking about it because it is just a part of your day and who you are.
Similarly, as a teen boy you eventually started growing facial hair that you wanted to shave.
Or if you were a teen girl, and you grew armpit hair that you wanted gone immediately.
You just trim or shave it now.
No second thought.
Same with eating and sleeping.
Understanding consistency was a massive help for me, so it’s important to internalize this message.
If you know you will be in fitness the rest of your life, the stress often goes away.
Any form of impatience to reach a goal is reduced because you know, this is who you are now.
You just know you shouldn’t quit.
It’s about getting into the proper mindset.
With this, you have to LIVE like you are the fitness guru, the ripped guy/gal with abs on the beach that everyone looks at.
What are they thinking about?
Where are they parking their car?
What is in their fridge?
What are they ordering at a restaurant?
With this mindset, you can take the best journey toward your goals.
And it teaches you proper sustainability with your diet and not stressing about little periods where we inevitably fall off track a bit.
Mistake 4: Lack of structure
The next major struggle I experienced myself, along with 90% of my clients, is the lack of structure.
I give a similar speech to a lot of my clients and it directly is from experiences I had especially in the first 5 years of my training.
So to me, there are two different types of structure.
There is the microstructure, particularly with meals and workouts.
If you are going through your training sessions just winging it, you’re in for a world of stagnation.
Workouts don’t need to be meticulously planned, but when they are to a certain extent, it will allow for more progress.
There is a science to the workouts.
And while a lot of my audience was built from posting workouts on Instagram, trying a new social media workout each time you are in the gym is not most optimal.
It’s important to look at the bigger picture of a workout program.
They are structured with the goal of hitting the right amount of sets and reps, and progressing in the long term.
For sets, typically it is 10-20 sets per muscle group per week.
There must be some sort of repetition of exercises so you can practice them enough to improve.
Practice does make perfect here.
Competitive athletes practice their movements over and over again.
Muscle increases strength, but there is also the nervous system.
With repetition of movements, the nervous system can become more efficient at recruiting ALL the muscle fibers you have.
That is how relatively small athletes can put up some big numbers.
And with that, utilize progressive overload to add weight, reps, or sets over time.
As for diet, that is my last mistake I’ll talk about.
But in short, you can’t just wing it either.
You have to have some sort of plan or framework because diet is most of your results.
So beyond the microstructure, there is a macrostructure, the bigger picture.
Truth is, there will be times where fitness is hard.
Pretend we are talking in December.
What challenges does someone face in December?
Maybe they have more time spent around family or around food.
How are you navigating those challenges before they come up?
I’m thinking about it leading up to Christmas. Come January. It’s freezing.
When I lived in Chicago, it was literally dark at 4pm.
I’m definitely not as active as I would be in July or August.
But at the same time, in the summertime I may be traveling more, going out and enjoying the weather.
These are all challenges that need a plan.
One of the biggest patterns I see is people having a weekend trip, and they fall off.
The holiday season hits, and they fall off track and can’t get back on.
If you are planning ahead and know there will be a lull in your training, you could taper down exercise frequency.
So if you can only make it 3 times a week for a few weeks, you don’t ruin all momentum and motivation because these periods are planned.
But it’s more than just inconsistency.
If you’ve read any of my other newsletters, you know I like to think of myself as a video game character.
I have all these skills I can level up to Level 99.
My traps are already at 99.
But my legs aren’t.
My endurance isn’t.
My flexibility isn’t.
When I’m not motivated, I switch to working on another skill.
Over the long term, you will become more well rounded and since you’re always adding new tactics in your routine, your routine will stay fun and exciting.
Mistake 5: Not controlling the weight
Stop training like a fool.
Not in the workout program sense, but with the exercises themselves.
Almost every time I’m in the gym, I see (usually) a younger guy absolutely flinging the weight “Sam Sulek style” with zero control or time under tension.
In lifting, there is the concentric where you are actually lifting the weight, and the eccentric where you are lowering the weight back down.
Most muscle and strength gains come from the eccentric.
So if you are not controlling the eccentric, you are limiting your progress.
And the thing is, you are already in the gym lifting weights.
Go the extra quarter step and control the weight to maximize your progress.
Take 2 to 3 counts to lower the weight as a guide.
I didn’t do this for my first 5 years of training in an attempt to focus on strength gains, and it definitely limited my growth.
And on a similar note, just use good form.
I’ve had a herniated disc, hip strains, ab strains, rhomboid strains, bicep and tricep tendonitis, and many more.
This was all from improper form and fighting through grueling (visually and physically) sets.
As a rough baseline, for the chest, keep it puffed to elongate the muscle fibers, and press and fly with your arms at about 45 degrees to the side.
For back, reach your shoulder blades in the direction of movement on the eccentric and retract them back when you’re doing the exercise.
Elbows close to your sides will target more lats, and elbows flared will target more rhomboids and traps.
Lateral raises should be done in the scapular plane with your arms slightly in front of you, not the sides.
For full body movements, brace your core like you’re about to take a punch.
If you want more form guides like this, let me know and I’ll make a separate video!
Mistake 6: Not paying attention to diet
This mistake will make or break you, and it’s all about diet.
A lot of people get off put by diet.
You think you have to give up snacking on junk food, eating at restaurants, enjoying chicken nuggets, or giving up wild nights with the boys.
False. I’ve built a pretty good physique eating some sort of junk food almost every single day.
In recent years, I have pivoted to a more whole foods related diet, just for health though.
There won’t be much added benefit for physique purposes.
Because you truly can eat whatever you want and still make great progress in the gym.
Calories in vs calories out is the biggest determinant.
It is a matter of thermodynamics and the laws of physics.
So for anyone reading this that is still new to the fitness game, you don’t have to give up the things you enjoy in the effort to get a good physique.
Like I mentioned earlier, it is about having structure and a plan.
For me, it’s having an if it fits your macros style plan where I have a calorie and macro target based on my size and goals.
I’ll then do intermittent fasting as my schedule for eating, usually starting my eating window around 12 pm and finishing around 7 pm.
For food choices, 90% is a carnivore combined with a Mediterranean style diet, so a lot of meat, fish, fruits, veggies, yogurt, and olive oil.
And the other 10%, I have some fun. Abby loves to bake, so there are desserts in the fridge.
The foodie in me tries new restaurants, food trucks, and recipes.
There can be balance.
Look at the bigger picture of calories and macros.
Another aspect to make dieting less daunting is to think of calories over the course of the week, instead of day.
If you are eating 2000 calories a day, you can now think of it as 14,000 for the week.
And I wish I knew this much earlier in my life.
This looks a lot less overwhelming and allows for some flexibility.
So these are my mistakes from my 14 years of training.
So my takeaway.
The key to building muscle is to stay in a calorie surplus for as long as possible.
Keep it slow to put on muscle and minimize fat.
Keep a structure with your diet and training.
Control the weight.
Stay consistent. And consistently reading my newsletters.
I’ll see you next week.
If you need more help with maximizing a busy schedule, or with proper training and nutrition to build muscle, lose fat, or improving your health markers, fill out the application below and I will reach out when I have spots available!
Best regards
Dr. CP