Recently I’ve seen a few social media posts from a guy who has been working out for 11 years. I don’t follow him and can’t remember his name right now but basically he is in decent shape but not super muscular. He also shared the image in poor lighting that didn’t highlight his muscles like you see most fitness influencers do.

He got ridiculed. Most comments were all about how he should look a lot bigger after all that time. But the good news is that a lot of healthy, fit, natural body builders came to his defence.

People have a false sense of what it means to be fit because the people they see on social media are jacked up and have rather unrealistic physiques that are too hard to maintain. Some use steroids to enhance their growth. Others have chiseled abs, and that involves not just physical training but a very strict diet. And of course they only take photos in the best light after doing a ‘pump’ to maximize their size.

Here’s the reality: adding just 10 pounds of muscle is hard work! Adding 10 more after gaining your first 10 is significantly harder.

Six years ago I was overweight and started a fitness journey that I’m still on. It took me a year to lose just over 25 pounds. I did this with regular cardio, weights, and reducing my snacking using intermittent fasting, (basically, no snacking food from dinner to a late breakfast 5 days a week). I accomplished this in one year, then it took me 5 years to build my weight back up with 13-14 pounds of good weight. That’s right, my gains average are less than 3 pounds a year… and I’m thrilled with my progress.

Gaining muscle is hard. Unless you take the route of unhealthy supplements like steroids, you aren’t going to bulk up any time soon. Will you see results from your hard work? Yes. Will that mean that you get a lot stronger? Yes. Will you see a massive difference in the size of your muscles? Probably not without considerable effort over a long period of time.

Being fit doesn’t mean that your body looks like a body builder. It doesn’t mean that you walk around with six -pack abs. It does likely mean that you are feeling better and stronger than you were a year ago. It does mean that you are making small gains that you might notice even if others don’t.

Don’t buy into the delusions of ideal fitness that influencers share on social media. They aren’t sharing the sacrifices they make to look like they do. They are sharing month old images of when they were jacked up for a competition because they can’t maintain that look day to day… or they are making unrealistic dietary or lifestyle sacrifices to keep looking that way, so that they can sell you their program, or suppliments.

Find a way to make fitness part of your life, so that your quality of life can be better in the years to come. That’s it, that’s all. And once you’ve figured that out, appreciate all the small gains, because realistically that’s all you’ll see, small gains over time… and that’s a good thing no matter what the bulked up and juiced up influencers say.