Just Show Up

My personal method to avoid burnout.

Motivating message from Mr. S

After I graduated college in May 2016, there was an in-between period where I had to figure some stuff out. I had secured employment at a startup called CoachUp and I had locked down my first “Big Boy” apartment in the North End of Boston. The job began immediately, but the move wouldn’t be until September. I had roughly a quarter of a year to figure out the “stuff” one needed to be an independent adult. The greatest lesson I learned to help me get there?

Just. Show. Up.

I know what you’re thinking, “This guy is NOT going to figure out all that adult stuff in one quarter.” You’re correct, dear reader, but I think having that sort of lofty goal is what helped drive me to at least begin the process of becoming a responsible adult… and just beginning the process is the heart of “Just Show Up.”

Like I said, there was a lot to figure out, but I’m going to focus here on a fitness plan. I had finished my last year of Volleyball in my Senior year, retiring as a 4-Time Sportsmanship Team Award winner (turns out you just need to shake the ref’s hands after every game). But in completing my volleyball career, I was left without a regular workout routine to keep my body and mind in shape.

I’d like to pause for a second: I am cognizant that not everyone reading this may have the same sort of relationship I do with my body. In the rest of this piece, I’m going to talk about weight loss, calorie counting, and perhaps some body positivity. I’m not a doctor; do not take anything I share here as medical advice. I won’t be giving exact weight numbers, and my intent is not to shame anyone who does not have a fitness routine. If this still makes you uncomfortable, please feel no pressure to continue reading. I’ll catch you next week.

I’d had a glimpse of what a lack of routine was like during the two semesters I spent at my college’s other campuses. I did not like how I looked without a regular workout plan, but more importantly, I didn’t like how I felt.

The great thing about being a member of a sports team is you’re kind of forced to have a workout routine. Even when I returned from those semesters abroad out of shape, I could return to a healthy level of conditioning pretty quickly due to regularly scheduled practice and game times.

But here I was post-grad without any regularly scheduled practice or game times.

I decided to set a goal weight for myself. I didn’t have access to the school fitness center anymore, and I wasn’t willing to shell out the cash for a monthly gym membership. I decided I would track my calories. The weight loss method of “calories in, calories out” (CICO) makes a lot of sense in my brain. All you gotta do is make sure you burn more calories than you consume. So it was simple: I’d run a few miles, track my calories burned using a FitBit, and track my calories consumed using MyFitnessPal.

I figured I could reach my goal weight by the end of the quarter. I looked at that number as a beacon, the finish line I would meet after carefully tracking my ins and outs. I found it was pretty easy, and coming out of my last ever period of regular schooling, I enjoyed the normalcy I found in maintaining a schedule: wake up at 6 a.m. every day, run, shower, go to work, come home, chill.

Look at me, ma, I’m being an adult! I’ve got a schedule and everything!

It didn’t feel like a tremendous effort, and before I knew it, I reached my goal weight with some time to spare. But this isn’t a tale of me reaching my goals and living happily ever after… Once I hit my goal, my foot came off the gas. I had, afterall, reached my goal, so what’s the point in continuing?

This pattern repeated over the years. For myriad reasons, I would start a routine and stop a routine, sometimes meeting my goal and sometimes forgetting it altogether.

This went beyond just fitness. I’d start a new youtube channel with the goal of “I’m going to get to 100,000 subscribers by January,” or I’d try to learn a new language in one month. (for more on the YouTube Channel Graveyard, check out this piece)

Looking back, I feel like my post-grad life was filled with a lot of confusion. That period stretched on for quite some time, taking up new projects and then forgetting them when the finish seemed impossible to reach.

I started to wonder what the point of it all was… If I were to reach my goals and then just give up and backslide once they were achieved, why bother trying in the first place?

But something changed just a few years ago: I realized I had a fundamental problem with my goals. The problem wasn’t having unrealistic goals; it was having goals just for the sake of having a goal.

If hitting the goal becomes the whole point of doing the work, I’ll either quit early or lose momentum after I get there… That is, unless I actually believe in what I’m building.

The change I made was simple: the work became the goal.

For a while, I still kept an endpoint in mind (lose this many pounds, lift this much weight), but the real goal is broken down to the simplest step: show up where the work happens. If my ultimate goal is to lose weight, then I am going to consistently show up at the place where that happens.

I feel like I’m perhaps being a bit too vague here. Let’s fast forward from post-college 2016 to 2021. I was living at home with my parents in post-Covid Los Angeles. I was re-emerging into the world after isolating at home in the same bedroom I grew up in. It felt like I was starting all over again with the process of becoming an adult.

Once again, I wanted some sort of fitness routine that would help me onto a healthy path. There was a small gym about a 10-minute walk from the house. I had grown an affinity for weight lifting; running was in the rear-view mirror. I didn’t set out to lift a whole whack of weight or grow my biceps by a certain number; I just decided to show up and lift weights at the gym on a regular cadence.

On a basic level, I told myself that I didn’t have to do anything once I got to the gym; I could just walk there, clock in, and leave if I wanted to, but I had to show up.

A funny thing happens when you push yourself to simply just be in the place where work happens… you end up doing work.

I don’t think there was a single time where I walked to the gym and then immediately walked back. There were definitely times where I only did half a workout instead of a full workout, but I’d say I had a 100% success rate at doing a workout when I simply just showed up to the gym.

There’s absolutely additional structure and discipline needed for a successful fitness routine. I didn’t just show up and then suddenly lose body fat and gain muscle. If you’re curious, I follow the principle of progressive overload: basically every time I do a weight-lifting routine, I increase stress on the muscles in at least the slightest way possible. I’ll add more weight, do more sets, or even just do one more rep.

I went back to look at where I started, and with my bench press alone, I’ve increased the weight I lift since then by 33%. Not bad! And it wasn’t even my goal to lift that much in the first place.

“Just Show Up” has helped me get through a lot in life, not just build healthy routines. It’s helped me with relationships, it’s helped me with meeting new people, it’s even helped me go to the dentist.

I feel driven to write about it this week because that’s also the philosophy behind this column. If I set out to get to 10,000 followers on substack or to earn $100,000 by a certain date, I think I would have already given up.

I won’t lie to you: I do want my audience to grow. I want the silver play button on YouTube. I want the recognition. But if my primary directive is to hit a number, I know I will fail. In my experience, the numbers only come when work is the focus. And making work the focus is as easy as showing up.

My goal for this column is to show up with an email in your inbox every Saturday at 5:05 a.m. Pacific Time. I do that by making sure that I show up at my computer every day and write just a little bit. Hey, I even wrote for like 10 minutes on Monday right before I went to bed. None of that was usable, by the way, but it was helpful to get rid of some bad ideas. And knowing that I contributed just a small amount the day before helped push me to show up again the next day, and the day after that.

Thank you for showing up today.

I’m glad you’re here. I’ll see ya next time.