How To Overcome Plateaus

June 17, 2024

Your body and mind are highly adaptive to change—but once they make a change, they stick to it no matter what. This is great when you pick up a new habit, like exercising and the routines you perform before and after the gym. The only time this isn’t so great, is when your body gets too used the exercises and diet you’ve put it on.

The gains come slower, and eventually stop coming altogether, and you hit a plateau. At Diced Kitchen, we understand how frustrating that can be, but there’s hope!

Your Body Adapts

During your fitness journey, hitting a plateau is both a positive milestone for how far you’ve come, and incredibly frustrating because it leaves feeling like you’ve got nowhere to go. You can’t stop, because then you’d regress, but at the same time there’s no clear benefit to doing anything.

The first step to get past this, is acceptance. Your body and mind, although initially freaked out and sore by all this exercise nonsense, has now adapted to it. This adaptation is why it takes your body and mind a fraction of the effort to give you the same performance. It’s therefore important to accept the gains your body gave you, and the other thing it’s telling you: “I’m ready for something new!”

So Flip The Table

When your body and mind are ready to move on, they make what previously took enormous effort feel like just another normal thing. This is why you then must flip the table on your body and mind again—give them a newer, more intense routine to adapt to, while keeping the old ones.

For exercise, you can do this by performing your usual routine with increased intensity or weight, then adding several new exercise at the end. This can be exercise on new machines, or even an additional sets or reps. For your diet, you can adapt it to match the newer exercises you are including, such as adding more protein if you’ve increased your weight lifting.

Keep Changing The Script

When you plateau, your body isn’t being your enemy; it’s being you friend, and it is telling you that it’s delivered the gains you asked of it, and it’s ready to give you more. You work with it by sticking with your new routines until it’s ready to move on, then you gently advance until it’s ready again.

Your body is your ultimate workout buddy; treat it as such, and it will keep rewarding you in kind.