Regular physical exercise can help you gain muscle strength and endurance. Exercise helps your cardiovascular system perform more efficiently by delivering oxygen and nutrients to your tissues. And when your heart and lung health improves, you will have more energy to do everyday tasks. During my CAS experience, I worked out every day and ate a high protein diet in order to increase muscle mass. My main objective here was to increase muscular growth and strength.

In my MYP years, I used to get teased a lot. People used to call me thin, stick figure and all sorts of things a thin person gets called. Even my friends and family used to tell me, “get a little fat man”. So I figured grade 11 was the perfect time to get into shape, as 16 to 20 years is the age where you grow and it is the prime time to get the best out of yourself.

This is how my journey started. Firstly, I did not have any equipment that I could use in my workouts, so I used to do only push-ups and pull-ups for almost a month. After that, my uncle bought a barbell, dumbbells, and weights for himself, which later on he did not use and gave to me. From that point, I saw a huge improvement in my body shape. I worked out regularly, all 7 days for 2 hours. 3 months passed, another problem arrived, the weights that I had were limited, and because of that my progress was limited. If I did more reps that would just increase my muscle strength and endurance, my muscle mass wouldn’t increase. At that time, I asked to use the school gym which had all the equipments I needed. I got the permission to use the gym, I started working out in my free slots, and fell in love with gymming.

Recognize and consider the ethics of choices and actions Taking supplements – These items are distinguished by a deceptive array of unsupported, and frequently incorrect, claims. Cramping, headaches, nervousness, increased blood pressure, and chest discomfort are some of the short-term negative effects of pre-workout drugs. Caffeine is commonly used in pre-workout supplements. Some supplements include up to 400 mg of caffeine, which is almost four cups of coffee. Knowing about this helped me to make a choice and not use any kind of supplements during my training. I was on a natural diet, taking only natural protein like eggs, chicken, milk, banana’s, etc.

Below are the before and after photos –

This one year has been an incredible experience for me; I’m much more confident, I’m more active now, I’m much more disciplined, my focus has improved, and my physical and mental health has improved immensely.

The learning outcomes that I’ve catered to in this experience are LO-1: Identify your own strengths and develop areas for personal growth, LO-2: Demonstrate that challenges have been undertaken, developing new skills in the process, and LO-4: Show commitment to and perseverance in CAS experiences.

LO-1: Identify your own strengths and develop areas for personal growth. My strength here was that I was already into sports (specifically athletics) for 7 years, therefore I knew which exercises would help me improve my body shape, which helped me not waste my time looking for workout schedules. Moving on to LO-2: Demonstrate that challenges have been undertaken, developing new skills in the process, I’ve faced many challenges throughout this 1 year. My friends used to tell me “you won’t be able to make your body”, I wasn’t able to manage my time, I did not have equipments to use in my workouts, I had to balance studies with gymming and gaming. From not having time to do my workouts, not being able to balance my studies, facing demotivation from my friends, I am here, improved! I’ve developed time management skills, I’ve developed communication skills as i’m more confident now, I’ve developed self management skills, and last but not the least i’ve also developed social skills. LO 7 Recognize and consider the ethics of choices and actions Taking supplements – These items are distinguished by a deceptive array of unsupported, and frequently incorrect, claims. Cramping, headaches, nervousness, increased blood pressure, and chest discomfort are some of the short-term negative effects of pre-workout drugs. Caffeine is commonly used in pre-workout supplements. Some supplements include up to 400 mg of caffeine, which is almost four cups of coffee. Knowing about this helped me to make a choice and not use any kind of supplements during my training. I was on a natural diet, taking only natural protein like eggs, chicken, milk, banana’s, etc.