Malcolm Gladwell is famous for his book The Tipping Point where he shares his research on how certain ideas build up to a particular point and then explode into a phenomena, evident on the web with sites like Twitter (which was around for years before the media latched onto it when Ashton Kutcher hit 1,000,000 followers) or essentially any popular blog which often have one huge peak of traffic that pushes them over that “success” line.
While this idea of the tipping point is often used when talking about marketing I feel it can be transplanted into pretty much any situation that requires sustained effort – ectomorphic strength training for example.
There are a few lessons that you can learn from the tipping point:
- It gets easier. Climbing the initial hill towards the tipping point is where all your effort is exerted. After that point is reached, while you’ll still obviously have to continue putting in the hours to achieve or maintain your goals, it won’t be as daunting. The early days of strength training and eating more food are difficult. Put in the hard work now and soon enough the process will be second nature to you.
- You need to push past the point where you want to quit. Everyone has that point where they’re 99% convinced it’s a good time to just give up and set their sights on an easier goal. This is always right before the tipping point; right before something big will happen like making a breakthrough with your progress or a certain idea *clicking* and making all the difference.
- Those final few reps matter the most. Every set you do has its own example of the tipping point. The first few reps are essentially irrelevant, they’re just warming you up. But then at a particular point, when your muscles begin to ache and you want to give in – that is when muscle growth is stimulated. That is when you have to push the hardest and have the guts to work through the pain.
Progress can be slow at times but big changes come in droves. All you need to do is not give up. Start building strength and don’t stop.
