Building Confidence

I guess I got so used to doubting my physical capabilities because I've not been in this kind of physical shape before. Sure, junior year of high school I managed to lose 30 pounds, but then I was skin and bones. I also eventually put that weight back on by the time end of freshman year of college finished. Whoops.

But now I'm currently at a net loss of 15 pounds (started a year ago at 200 pounds), and am remarkably stronger than I've ever been in my entire life. And I'm not even exaggerating on that. Back in junior year of high school, and my lightweight 160 pounds, I thought I was in the best shape of my life, but now that gets knocked down because my strength was incredibly low. Also I was probably dangerously thin back then. I mean I look at pictures from 2015-6 when that whole phase went through, and I look super gaunt. Anyways, I digress. Nowadays, I can bench technically over bodyweight (since I lost 5 pounds after coming back to college, so I did bench bodyweight but then losing 5 pounds make it over), I can lat pulldown 125-130 pounds for reps, I can curl 30 pound dumbbells with relative ease, and a whole slew of other exercises.

Last night, my friends (who are at 55-70 pounds lighter than me) were doing chin ups, and I thought that at my weight and since I still struggle trying to do pull ups, I figured I'd not even be able to do 1. I did 6 in a row before my strength gave out. So I exponentially surpassed my expectations, and I intend to just do a lot more chin ups to build my strength to eventually a pull up. I mean sure I can lift all the weight that I want from lat pulldowns, but it's different than actually lifting my body. Chin ups are also used as progressions to pull ups, so I'm super stoked about my progress.

Anyways, I guess I should have more confidence in myself and my abilities. With less self-doubt, there's no telling where my potential ends. This feels great, and now I want to try testing my limits on a lot of other things to see if I was the true obstacle holding myself back.