Who do you wanna look like?

They're on the magazines or the web, on your mind, or just on your mirror - what's better?

By ChulucanasGym

When you begin to train into a discipline, as bodybuilding or fitness to have an example, is unavoidable we look for a reflex or a referent turning in our sport achievement's goal.

"I'd look like..." is an usual answer among rookies, who usually become researching the life of those referents in many cases, as much as they turn that wish for real.

Is this a possitive attitude? It depends, so let's analyse the three possible scenarios about referents: models, archetypes or self-lovers.

The models, by definition, are all referents who became to achieve as much as their names and images are strongly linked and placed into the discipline we practice. Many times, they are part of a fashion vogue, so the model who was the masses idolatry 40 years ago probably has been replaced by a another one as each decade or each time range has passed on.

The possitive: As assummed as a mentor, someone which good example is good to imitate in other words.
The negative: Believing that everything working for that one will work for me too, when the first we have to have in mind is any organism is similar to another one, even having a strong genetic influence.

The archetypes are the possitive ideas we have about someone or something, adding a set of specific or very specific characteristics about we consider as perfect. They don't ask about a brand necessarily but our own aknowledgement and what is reflected in designing our own idealization.  Said another way, it's like having a model with a body but without a face in special, a name in particular neither.  It's not a "I'd like to be..." but "I want to be...". In some cases, archetypers could look like some Dr. Frankenstein taking an arm here, a leg there, a torso beyond,  so conceiving the human body as a set of exchangeable pieces in extreme.

The possitive: There's not an obsession to follow someone punctual but it becomes an addition of everything for creating someone quite different, inexistent, but turning into our best goal.
The negative: our archetype exceeding so much our expectations that turns into an unreachable obsession as much as it creates a guilt or frustration feeling.

The self-lovers don't see anybody else, think of an ideal neither, only go ahead as much as they can  and their actual achievement is their partial or final goal, indeed. It's hard to assure if this is  a symptom of much vanity, much self-esteem, or a rare hybrid of both, but they are not paying attention  about anyone nor anything as a referent.  They are their own model and archetype as well.

The possitive: It's possible they're more realistic when setting a goal not falling into the obsessive compulsion of being like somebody else.
The negative: They could fall easily into conformism as much as they don't set goals neither, only training for what comes on.

The advice for trainers and trainees is having the time to talk personally about their each one's sport tasks. The trainer must be much careful about not creating a profile who gets easily obsessed, frustrated, guilty or comformist. The trainee has to have in mind that training  must have two aspects: discipline and amusement. If your sport activity is another  cause of stress, then it is not becoming a healthy lifestyle.

Learning about myself knowing what my advantages and limitations are, knowing  to work them in my favor could be the starting point for everything. Then, choosing a model, designing an archetype or being a self-lover will be a very personal decision based upon reason instead of emotion.