I am Angela

I haven’t had a desire to share what’s on my mind lately. My thoughts have been consumed with frustration. My frustration has caused the usual suspects to show up envy/turmoil/insecurity/crazy expectations, etc. I was totally pissed off and really no one wanted to hear my thoughts. And I didn’t want to blog on a “I am Paleo” blog anymore.

One thing that constantly plagues me is self-doubt. If you know this about me then you are probably my husband or my dad, no one else really gets that this is something about me. Most people think I am a cocky fuck, who thinks she knows everything and it’s my way or the highway. But the things I am certain of I make sure I research, test and verify before I push like a hobo shoving his piss can at you for spare change. Everything else is a mystery to me and until I figure it out in my thorough approach my peace is in upheaval. I’m not a fan of eating crow.

So why was I in turmoil this time? What was I trying to figure out that had me so perplexed I was praying for a zombie invasion to clean up the population and seclude me with my family?

Crossfit Envy and a lack of Paleo bonding. You see I have this dream that someday I’ll be able to quit my DoD job, take off my suit and wear compression itsy-bitsy shorts and a sports bra, vice sitting at a desk I’ll get to walk around and when the mood hits pound out 10 burpees for fun, chuck the computer…hmmm, I guess I’d have to keep that…but you see where I am going.

I felt that Crossfit is the up and coming fad that would be my ticket out of the desk. There are no Crossfit gyms in my hometown and it’d be ideal to live close to my siblings and dad again and get out of the city and live in a rural area.

I started to have doubts in the way I was running The Gym Cellar. I only have about five clients and that wasn’t going to get me to where I wanted to go – DoD free.

Someone very smart told me just because you do circuit training and Olympic lifts doesn’t mean you are doing Crossfit. I was reminded that I did this sort of training before I knew what Crossfit was. I was also reminded that I only have five clients for a very specific reason.

And if I didn’t believe in Crossfit I wouldn’t be able to sell it in Altoona, PA or anywhere. I have my doubts about Crossfit, but I was willing to sell my soul to get out of the suit.

My Paleo drama. First I hate labels. So it was kind of hokie when I decided to label myself Paleo. I was already putting too much pressure on myself. You see I like heavy whipping cream in my coffee, I like bacon and sausage, I like red wine and beer, I also like potatoes and corn. I cannot afford free range meat or range free eggs. I don’t eat potatoes or corn often maybe once or twice a month. I don’t drink beer or wine often, maybe once a week, when it’s either a beer or sell the children or a celebration with a good friend. But I have heavy whipping cream in my coffee everyday sometimes more than once, I have bacon or sausage everyday too. I still don’t eat wheat, sugars, or beans though. They mess up my glucose levels and stomach. And that is what is important to me.
I visit quite a few blogs and have a few feeds on my Facebook page from various Paleo and Primal people. And someone made a comment that feeding a kid McDonald’s is child abuse. Now I think this person in particular is a 22-year old inexperienced in everything, never had a job, stumbled on to Mark Sisson’s Daily Apple blog, fell in love with it and turned into Single White Female with Mark, BUT it sparked a upraised eyebrow with me and got me thinking.

We DO live in the 21st century, it is just a fact I’d love to clue some of these nuts into. It’d be great if we could all shed our suits and shoes and run around in the wild, hunting wild boars, camp fires, fresh plucked berries, baths in the river….and then on Sunday night and we get to go home to air conditioning, toilets, showers, and clean sheets. We evolved for a reason other than marketing a new book and workout scheme. Not everything we evolved to is great – pharmaceutical drugs and most of our medical community, politics and television. But I love my creature comforts and I’m not ready to give them up! I also love that I have a car and can live 300 miles away from my mother!

Then I started paying attention to the Primal/Paleo workout ethic. And I though this is garbage. Jumping over picnic tables in a park, or scaling a 6 foot wall, or crawling like a bear across the yard is just cardio and isn’t going to give you beautiful muscles. These are great exercises to add to intervals after lifting heavy ass weight. I think Parkour is awesome and impressive; but most of the guys that do it are 5’5” 145# guys without jobs. I like my men a tad more manly (even if they are only 5’5”!) and employed. And I want pretty muscles. You can say to me that you don’t want to be bulky and you just want to be tone. But what you are really telling me is you don’t want to be fat, you want to be lean. Please stop spouting this tone shit – a muscle is a muscle. It’s either developed and you are lean enough to see its beautiful developed shape or you aren’t. Adding muscle to your body will make it healthy and feel good. Fat is a metabolic poison and will disease every organ , adding muscle cures you of this disease instantly. Tone is another marketing word that drives me up a wall.

Marketing is amazing. It has a majority of the population convinced if they buy the shake weight, or ab roller, ab lounge, ab rocker, ab horse, ab blaster and anything with Acai in it, that you will lose weight. Most of these products are $40 or more. I’d love for someone to explain how the ab horse is going to make your calves look like pretty little upside down hearts in a pair of high heels. I’d also love for someone to explain to me how we lost weight prior to a berry found in a remote part of the world and is only available through extreme extraction.

I’m just amazed at the logic in this and how anyone could believe it. I really am. I guess I am too simple. I have zero marketing skills. The sad part is that folks are so used to spending their hard earned money on a gimic book, video, supplement one right after another that they have fallen into a zombie pattern of thinking if they spend the money the results will come. (hmmm…I guess that zombie invasion did happen after all) If you come to The Gym Cellar you will be asked to work hard. You will be expected to hold yourself accountable. You will make yourself a priority or I won’t. For me that is the only thing that works. Working. Really. Hard.

I personally love lifting weights, and not just Olympic lifts. I love skull crushers and bicep curls, dips, and stuff on the pulley. And when I was following some Crossfit workouts I wasn’t doing any of these exercises and I can tell you first hand my triceps look like shit right now. It doesn’t seem to matter how much weight I can press, these puppies will only v out if I dip and crush my skull like a mo’fo. That’s just how it is for me.

And that leads me to my other conclusion. Crossfit athletes that make it to the games are all athletes in another sport. Olympic gymnastics, collegiate baseball, tri-athletes, Olympic level biking, the list goes on. Now as sweet as that would be, I am a 33 year old mom, I am not going to be able to commit to a Olympic level of training any time soon and there are more folks out there like me then there are 40 year old former Olympians or 21 year old collegiate athletes. And the folks that are out there that are looking to lose weight and get in shape and aren’t sure how to do it because of the awesome marketing skills of the shake weight and Acai berry have them confused on what they should spend their money on need me, need my approach.

There is a difference between being smart and being successful and combining the two. And that is what I would have to do if I want to be successful in opening my own gym someday. I have to offer what I am good at, what I know 100 percent works. And Crossfit and Paleo don’t work for me.

I am good at Angela’s lifestyle. I have a lot to offer in the knowledge that I have and I continue to learn something new every day. I will never say I know it all, but what I do know I know inside out. So if I shove my cocky, know it all advice at you because you asked for it…..just remember you asked for it.