Stop Skipping The Gym (How To Start Now)

Stop waiting for the "perfect time" to start your fitness journey because it doesn't exist, and the cost of waiting is higher than you think.

In this episode, personal trainer Jermiah Blount breaks down why weightlifting is an essential tool for long-term health, regardless of your current experience level. 

We understand how to overcome gym intimidation by starting simple, the critical role muscle plays in protecting your body as you age, and how the discipline you build in the weight room translates directly into mental resilience for life's biggest challenges. 

Whether you're a beginner or looking to optimize your routine, this conversation provides the blueprint for building a stronger body and mind for the decade ahead.

0:00 — Meet The Heavyish Method
1:18 — The Power of Walking
2:26 — The Real Cost of Inaction
4:56 — Why You Need a Trainer
6:52 — Muscle: The Organ of Longevity
8:48 — Lifting & Men’s Mental Health
13:14 — Gym Discipline Translates to Life
16:06 — Training for the Future

"Your health will be more expensive not to start now than trying to make that next dollar and then try to focus on your health later."

"We need that physical stress daily. When we're put in that type of situation, that's where we feel like men."

"We're not lifting for today, we're lifting for a decade from now."

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About Jermiah Blount: Jermiah has harbored a deep passion for health, fitness, and strength ever since his tenure in the Air Force. He finds fulfillment in assisting individuals in enhancing their lives by promoting strength, well-being, and proper nutrition through the utilization of Heavyish principles.

Check us out at:
https://www.instagram.com/heavyishgym/
https://www.tiktok.com/@heavyishgym

#weightliftingbenefits #fitnessjourney #healthylifestyle

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

When we lift heavy, we boost our testosterone. It drives us. It's our driving function. Without testosterone, we wouldn't be effective warriors. Without testosterone, we wouldn't be effective men, effective fathers.

SPEAKER_00 0:12

Welcome to It's Supposed to Be Heavy with Jeremiah Blount, a show about strength, longevity, and building a body that carries you well for decades. Because resistance creates adaptation. And some things are supposed to be heavy. Let's get to work.

SPEAKER_01 0:29

Hi, my name is Jeremiah Blunt. I am a personal trainer out of Franklin, Tennessee. I am the creator of the heaviest method, and today's topic is health benefits of weightlifting outside of the gym. This is a big topic that I want to talk about when it comes to you getting started as well. So a lot of people are intimidated by the gym. A lot of people feel like they have to start in a gym. A lot of people feel like they're not ready, they're not in the proper shape. There's so many reasons that people choose not to start when reality there's no perfect time. So literally, there's equipment everywhere nowadays. There's pull-up bars, there's bars, there's adjustable dumbbells, a barbell. You can start off with a barbell, especially if you've never trained before. They have different weights from 15-pound aluminum bars, 22, 33, and everything in between, right? So when we want to start, we got to figure out that hey, we just need to do it. Do I suggest supervised? Absolutely. But there are plenty of creators on the internet and things along those lines that have beginner videos that you need to sit down and watch or go along with, and they're absolutely perfect. For some of you that maybe weight training isn't your cup of tea right now. Maybe some of you just need to start walking, right? So when we are struggling with self-doubt or commitment or things along those lines, sometimes you just gotta do it. Right. So even if it's you get off work, you have 20 minutes, you don't know what to do, go for a walk, right? Walk for several weeks, get in that routine, and then start adding. Once you get to a certain part when you're comfortable and you don't feel comfortable with the gym yet, get a weighted vest, start walking with a weighted vest. From there, go to your local store, Walmart, online, Amazon, wherever, and you can order a set of dumbbells and then start from there. You can do several things with a dumbbell. Once you get comfortable with that, then start thinking, hey, maybe it's time to go to the gym. Maybe I need to focus on this. Maybe I should start with a barbell and then continue to grow. But the biggest thing is there's no time to start. I know life can be busy. I know life is crazy. Family, kids, grandkids, just job, life in general, especially in today's world, we all have to work constantly just to keep going. But your health will be more expensive not to start now than trying to make that next dollar and then try to focus on your health later. Medical bills are super, super expensive. Medications are super, super expensive, insurance is expensive. And there's a lot of insurance programs out there that will either pay for a personal trainer or they'll reimburse you for a personal trainer. And that may be something that you should look at with your insurance company.

SPEAKER_02 3:39

Yeah, when it came to me personally, the reason why I started working with a personal trainer is I am one of the worst victims of coming to a plateau for weight. When it came to bench, squat, whatever workout, I would get to a heavy-ish weight and I would try to master that weight. I'd try to say, all right, if I can do two sets for 10 reps with no struggle, that's when I can start moving on, which is definitely not the way to go because you want to constantly put your body under that stress because by the next time that you're doing that newer weight a lot faster than you really believe you are. That and having, like you said, someone supervise. If I'm by myself in a personal gym or maybe just even a public gym that I pay for, and it's just like a not very busy hour, and I'm trying to hit a new weight, and I just can't hit it, and I have the bar stuck on me, and I can't get really a lot of help. That was a lot of things for me. I had that personal trainer right there. I had a little extra security, which I think is a main reason why, for me at least, getting a personal trainer, and I think a lot of people should really do that because that and the knowledge is just an endless funnel of knowledge that not only that, when we work out, and I've done it, I know people that have done it, especially if you're in a higher rep range.

SPEAKER_01 4:51

We tend to get to a point where our brain gets bored of what we're doing, especially when it comes to like arms and things along those lines, and we don't tend to push ourselves as hard as we should. If you're in a gym with a big glass window and something's going in the parking lot, we'll get distracted. We all have conversations in the gym, those things happen, but when it comes down to it, we're working out, and if we're doing three sets of 10, three sets of 12 or something along those lines, we tend to get to that last set and we have reps left in us. But because we are human beings, we just get bored with it and we don't tend to push ourselves. When you have that personal trainer, especially if you have one that you have that emotional connection with, you don't want to let them down. And they're there to push you. So you tend to get a lot more out of it and out of yourself in that type of environment than just going by yourself. Or even if you have a workout partner, sometimes when you go with your workout partner, if you're both not feeling it, yeah, you push each other, but there's still that, what are you doing after the gym? How was work today? All these things that go on that were in a professional environment tend to be eliminated.

SPEAKER_02 6:09

100%. I remember when I first moved into Tennessee before I met you and I had a previous trainer. It got to the point where I wasn't going to the gym to work out with my personal trainer. I was going to talk to someone while I just happened to be working out and just getting that kind of idea of what we're doing and get my mind off of my work life, everything that's going on. Because it was with him, it was just, hey, how are you doing? Let's get to work, let's see what we can do today. And that's where that emotional connection. And I felt like if something happened that I had to cancel last minute, I was, you know, dreading the text to send out sorry, I got something going on. Because you do what you do feel like you're letting someone out of it.

SPEAKER_01 6:48

Absolutely. When I've had I've talked to a buddy of mine, he's a personal trainer as well, phenomenal guy, brilliant guy. We talked about it before. And sometimes when a client leaves and you get that text, it almost sounds like a breakup text. And I understand the business, and people come, people go. We all hope for that two, three year client. When sometimes they stay longer, but it's just the way the business is. And especially if you and your client have that great connection, it's like a breakup. It's funny.

SPEAKER_02 7:18

A couple of trainers I've heard before, they refer to the muscle as the organ of longevity. And I get that because it's your muscles are what's keeping you standing and sitting up as of right now. You can't do anything without any kind of muscle. And like you were saying earlier, just starting off by getting walking to get you a little more acclimated to using those muscles and strengthening them. Why do a lot of trainers consider it longevity as the muscle?

SPEAKER_01 7:45

So when we look at our overall health, and when we build muscle, it protects us. If you don't have the muscle to protect your bones and your organs and things like that, then impacts, heavy impacts, things like that can damage organs. If you haven't added strength training to your regiment, then osteoporosis can be a thing. And then bones can be broken easier. And as we mature, we've all heard the story where our grandmother, our grandfather fell and they fractured their pelvis or something along the way, and then within a year they passed away because they're so hard to recover from. But starting in weight training, building that muscle to protect that bone, can save your life. And it helps with your brain function and just your overall health, especially for men. You know, we're driven by testosterone. Lifting heavy helps us keep our testosterone high.

SPEAKER_02 8:48

Yeah, and to add on about the brain function and the brain health. I'm someone who's a Gen Z. We're younger in the gym, we're just now getting straight into our careers. We're finishing up college. And a lot of people, you see it all over the internet now. Gen Z are just all in the gym doing some kind of fitness, trying to get off of our phones a little bit because there's the world with everything going on, social media, and just in general. How have you seen people going into the gym that really helped their mental health as a whole?

SPEAKER_01 9:17

Especially for men. We're primal creatures. And we need to be stressed daily. And I don't mean by mental stress from work, physical stress. We need that daily. When we're put in that type of situation, that's where we feel like men. Well, you're able to go in there, you knock out, you work out, you take charge, you're lifting heavyweight, you're primal at that point. And it's important for all men to continue that. Like I said, when we lift heavy, we boost our testosterone. And without our testosterone, we're nothing. It drives us. It's our driving function. Without testosterone, we wouldn't be effective warriors. Without testosterone, we wouldn't be effective men, effective fathers. And testosterone in itself is an issue in today's current times. And it's just something that masculine men need to come back. And I don't mean, and there's a lot of people that feel negative about masculine men, but we need to come back because that's where every great war, every great man was a masculine man.

SPEAKER_02 10:30

Kind of going into the more health benefits side of everything is in general, how much weight lifting and just how much working out do you notice a general improvement of the heart health or the health in general? Is it like once a week?

SPEAKER_01 10:43

Um, so we want to strive for two to three times a week. Can you see benefits from once a week and you are doing everything else right? Because remember, weight training is such a small part of your journey. This isn't very important, but it's a small one. You should always be focusing on sleep, you should always be focusing on hydration and nutrition. And with once a week, you can absolutely see growth and things along those lines, but it's going to be very slow. Two days a week, you're getting better. Two to three days a week is where we're at, right? And now, if we incorporate more, then that's great. Four to five times a week. But you really want to focus on recovery time as well. And that's why I keep on saying sleep, because we recover when we sleep. Getting that good quality sleep so that way your body recovers. And then when you are on your down date, if you want to do some walking, that's great. Go for a little walk, things like that. But you need to actually recover, right? Find something to shut your brain off. Get those cortisol levels down, play some video games, not stressful ones. I know people like their Call of Duty, but I've heard some pretty angry people on there. Maybe some Minecraft. Maybe some Minecraft, something that you could just shut your brain off. Read a book, go for a walk outside, get some sun, and take your shirt off, let the sun hit your chest. Do those type of things that actually help you recover. Don't feel like you just got to hammer it and hammer it. Because all you're gonna do for most people is gonna affect you negatively, you're gonna get smaller, you're gonna get weaker. So really focus on that recovery as well.

SPEAKER_02 12:17

Is there ever a chance or a situation where you're doing too much training? There's been times I've heard people I work out six, seven days a week, and I think I like my rest days personally. Yeah. And I know some people have just are so on that routine where they're just every day.

SPEAKER_01 12:34

So when it comes to the body, yes, you can over-train, but you have to look at it as in not just your physical health, but your mental health as well. Um if you are the type of person that wants to train six to seven days a week, make sure that you have some lighter workouts in there. Don't just try to hammer it all the time. Because some people live lives where the only peace they get is at the gym. Some people don't go out to the clubs, they don't go partying, they don't do these things that a lot of people like to do or go out and drink and things like that. When they go to the gym, they're getting away from their stressful jobs. They're getting time to breathe, they're getting time to focus and focus their mind. So if you are one of those type of people, then just make sure that at least two days a week you're going in just to get a pump, right? Not necessarily shoot for the moon and go as heavy as you can, but maybe do some lighter workouts, focus on some arms, some biceps, things, abs, calves, things that can handle the loads of more frequently, and just not train so many major muscle groups so heavy.

SPEAKER_02 13:43

Just look at some accessory work on what mental lessons from lifting carry into life in general, like business and anything outside of the gym, really? Like, where do those lessons come into play?

SPEAKER_01 13:55

So if you can go to the gym and you are consistent at the gym, and even on your worst days, you're showing up to the gym, then that's gonna show up in your life, right? So if you're the type of person that is storming outside, you're still gonna go to the gym. If it's snowing outside, you're still going to the gym. You wake up and it's just this day, I just want this day already over, but you can still go to the gym, then that's gonna be that you are pushing through in everything, right? You're having family issues, but you're you're there for them, you're strong for them. Work is absolutely horrible right now. You have all these meetings and everything is going bad, but you're pushing through, right? So you're training yourself by doing things like that. Going to the gym when you just don't feel like it is helping you train your mind to do it everything else in life. Well, there's just some things as human beings, we gotta do things that we just honestly don't want to do, right? But if you can go to the gym when you just honestly don't want to, then you can do those things that you just don't want to do and succeed at it.

SPEAKER_02 15:01

I remember back when I really first started getting back into weightlifting, I would get home from doing a full body or whatever I was doing that day, and I would drink my protein shake and I would sit on the couch just because it was 5:30, 6 o'clock, I haven't even got a chance to eat dinner yet. And within five minutes, I am neck back, mouth open, snoring all loud, and just out like a light. And then I would wake up an hour later, and in two hours I'd be ready to go back to sleep. Obviously, I'm burning a lot of calories and a lot more energy, so I'm tired a lot easier. But how improved does sweep quality get as you continue to train and lift weights?

SPEAKER_01 15:43

So when you are training, right, the biggest thing is trying to bring down your cortisol levels and things along those lines. Like I said, quality is super, super important. We all want to strive for eight hours of sleep, but in some cases, honestly, that's just not feasible. So getting power naps is excellent, right? Because some of us with our lifestyle and trying to get into the gym and do all these things, it's just not feasible to get that eight hours of sleep because some of us are just that busy. But if you can find the time with your training and catch a 30-minute to an hour power nap, it's gonna help you benefit your body because, like I said, while we sleep, we recover. So doing those type of things, you know, getting your protein in, taking a little power nap so that way your body can recover is not a bad idea, especially if you're one of these people that can only get four to six hours of sleep at night. We're not lifting for today, we're lifting from a decade from now.

SPEAKER_00 16:39

Thanks for listening to It's Supposed to Be Heavy with Jeremiah Blount. Train hard, recover well, stay capable, and remember aging is mandatory. Weakness is optional. See you next time.