Why?

When I was out last night I was talking to a friend who often does boot camps in the mornings. When I asked her how it was going, she said she'd stopped going because the instructor put too much emphasis on food, always talking about 'good' and 'naughty' foods, and saying that they should only eat one 'treat' meal a week. She said that she didn't want to live that way, and besides, she got enough pressure from her partner to look a certain way.

My question is, WHY do you want to look the way you do?
- Is it because someone places pressure on you to look a certain way?
- Is it because of the images you see in magazines, on TV etc?
- Is it for health reasons?

I said to my friend that no-one has ever put pressure on me to look a certain way - I do it to myself.

I don't have the goal that many do to be 'skinny'. My goal has always been to be lean. And yes, there is a difference. To me, being skinny means you are thin, but have no visible muscle (the way most models look), whereas being lean means you are muscular with low enough body fat to see those muscles.

Several things inspired me. When I was young one of my friend's mothers did bodybuilding (there was no 'figure' class then) - she was fit and strong (she later became a cop).

I saw Terminator II in my first year at university and wanted Linda Hamilton's shoulders and arms.


During university I spent a lot of time at the gym around bodybuilders, and went to watch a lot of bodybuilding competitions. I wanted to compete in one myself one day.

When we moved to Australia I started working in hospitality and my training became sporadic. I put on a bit of weight, but once I got out of that industry I began eating better and exercising regularly again. A couple of years later I started working for myself and had the flexibility to put more time into my training. I still wanted to do a figure competition but at that stage I was way too small - you could see my abs but I had no other muscle to speak of


I did my first competition 12 months later (and in retrospect that was way too soon) and have since done four more. My last competition was in 2008 and my life since has been a rollercoaster of weight on, weight off. Sometimes I think about doing another competition, but there's no sense in doing that when I'm not stable enough in my day-to-day life. So at the moment I just need to train consistently and eat well. To slowly increase my exercise until I'm lean again. Why? Because it's what I've always wanted.

WHY do you want to look the way you do?