Knowing When To Say "I Suck"

In my previous article, I told you how I’d let my body and appearance go down the drain by the time I reached my mid-30s. Like many men, I’d begun to delude myself that this was normal, that it wasn’t that bad, and that this was all just part of adulthood. Thank heaven I managed to wake up and tell myself I had a problem. I hate to think what I’d look like if I hadn’t taken that step.

I can still remember clearly the day it happened. I’d gone on a summer vacation with my family and we’d all gone to the beach with some friends. This was the same beach where I used to strut my stuff 15 years before, but now something was different: now nobody paid me a second glance. And why should they? I was just another fat, 30-something parent staggering across the sand, loaded with a cooler bag and toddler in one hand and a bag of nappies and an umbrella in the other – hardly a glamorous sight.

As I sat down exhausted, I saw a bunch of fresh, young, “happening” guys in the water. They looked about 18 or 19, carefree and with athletic, youthful bodies. It seemed that it was only the previous week when I was one of them, drawing admiring looks as I emerged from the sea. But now that was all gone.

As I watched them happily swimming, surfing and playing volleyball, with all the girls eyeing them, I started to boil inside. This wasn’t just dissatisfaction or depression anymore; it was anger. I was seriously pissed off by how unfair it was. It wasn’t right that it should all have disappeared so quickly for me. I was far too young to be this nondescript middle-aged guy sitting in the shade.

The moment had come – I knew that I sucked! I took a photo of myself and vowed that this was the last day I would ever look like that. I resolved that I was going to get back the body I used to have when I was 18, and every day was going to bring me one step closer to it. That was when The Apollo Program was born. But if I hadn’t had the courage to admit that I sucked, it would never have happened.

Admitting that you suck isn’t easy. Not only must you be brutally honest with yourself, but you also have to contend with all the Pollyanna nonsense in modern society. These days, it’s not politically correct to say that something sucks – even yourself. Being seen to be discontent is frowned upon. Don’t forget, we’re living in an age where making any form of negative judgement is considered a crime; where you’re not allowed to talk about problems, only “opportunities”; and where “everyone’s a winner.” I urge you not to fall into this trap. Learn to ignore all the pressure from people who try to make you lower your sights.

One saying that really makes my blood boil is, “Look on the bright side.” Another version of the same thing is, “Focus on the positives.” In my experience, you need to focus on the negatives – the things that suck – if you want to succeed at anything.

People who tell you to focus on the positives are trying to distract you and to make you content to settle for less. Sometimes they have good intentions, but often there’s a self-serving agenda. Whenever someone tells you to focus on the positives, the first thing you should do is ask yourself what their motive is.

Other sayings to watch out for are, “Be happy with what you’ve got” and “Cheer up and make the best of it.” More nonsense. If you look at all the great inventions that have been made, you’ll find that at their root was dissatisfaction with the way things were. If a cure for cancer is one day found, I imagine it will be because someone doesn’t think we should just “make the best of it.” And if you read the autobiographies of the world’s richest people you’ll find an interesting pattern: many of them were born into very poor families, or were immigrants, or both. Discontentment with their circumstances is what drove them to become what they did. Were they wrong for not wanting to “cheer up” or “be happy” about living in slums? Misguided? Give me a break.

Despite all this evidence, you still get a great many people insisting that it’s wrong to be discontented or to want more or better things out of life. No matter how much they suck, they’ll never admit it, and they feel threatened when you want to change your own life. They’ll try to convince you that “you look fine,” or that “there’s nothing wrong with your body.” Don’t fall for it though. If you’re not happy, that’s all that matters.

Besides for spouting all the rubbish I mentioned above, they also like to repeat junk like, “The grass always looks greener on the other side.” I’ve never understood this. Just what the hell does it mean anyway? If someone’s grass looks greener, that’s because it is greener. Are these people honestly trying to say that everyone envies what they don’t have? I don’t have my old, unhealthy body any more and trust me, it doesn’t keep me awake at night. I don’t look at my old “before” photos and feel depressed because I don’t look like that. And when you get your Apollo body, you won’t look back either. That I can promise you!