There are days when your workout is a breeze, you feel strong and coordinated, fast and powerful. But then there are days when you can't motivate yourself to face the treadmill, and each additional rep is so hard that you want to give into the pain, put dumbbell down and hit the shower early. Its at those moments that that little annoying voice in the back of your head speaks up, you look fine, don't worry about it, one bad workout is not going to kill you.

 

But you know better. You know that not hitting that 10 on the treadmill is only going to make that mobilized fat melt slower. You know that going easy on your bicepts is not going to make them peak. You know that yes, you do look fine but you don't  want to look just fine, damn it. You want to look super-fine, because let's face it, it feels sooo good to have a body others only dream of it.

 

For me achieving that coveted body means putting up with meal-replacement bars and shakes, it means taking flax oil, it means turning down a glass of wine or a piece of chocolate, it means giving all that I can at the gym six times a week. And it means donning a little red bracelet from time to time.

 

 

The great Batman herself once wrote that when she pushed herself harder than she thought she could, "I would visualize my legs as blue and silver metallic robot legs, bulging metal quads and the whole bit. Beacuse in my mind, my wobbly legs wouldn't do 160 for reps, but for these wicked cyborg legs, that was EASY!" *

 

Batman's advice is to see yourself as part of an "alternate reality where you're an elite secret agent, a commando, the bionic woman, or Ms. Olympia." * For me, that translates into visualizing myself as Sara Pezzini of Witchblade. Pez was originally a Marvel comics heroine, a NYPD cop armed with a magical gauntlet that once belonged to St. Joan of Arc. In the late 1990s, Pez was portrayed by the stunning Yancy Butler in TNT's mediocre made-for-tv movie and later series.

 

So, yes, its kind of weird, but when I put on my red gauntlet-like bracelet, I can psych myself enough to run faster and longer than my previous HIIT. I can lift heavier, and I relish more in the muscle aches that follow.