Resistance Training: It’s Not Just About Resisting the Gym 😅
- May 10
- 2 min read
No matter what your strength goals are—carrying all the groceries in one trip, conquering your first pull-up, or feeling stronger day to day—one thing remains true: progressive overload is your best friend.
That’s just a fancy way of saying we need to increase the challenge over time gradually.
And at ZYF, we love mixing it up to make progress feel doable and fulfilling.
Here’s how we can keep things fresh:
Add more weight to our lifts
Do more reps or sets
Train more frequently each week
Tweak our rest periods
Level up the complexity of the exercises
Let’s break down how we make resistance training work for us, not the other way around.
🎯 Smart Exercise Selection
We choose exercises that align with our goals, experience, and bodies.
Do we want to lunge like a champ without wobbling like a baby giraffe? We start with a wall or chair for support. Then, we graduate to bodyweight lunges. Then, we add a dumbbell. Before we know it, we are lunging like a boss.
🗓 Training Frequency: More Isn’t Always Better
Here’s some good news: a study on menopausal women showed that training three times a week was just as effective as six, as long as the intensity and volume were matched.
So, just two 30-minute weekly sessions are a great place to begin.
It’s not about doing everything—it’s about doing something consistently.
🔄 Exercise Order: Lead with the Heavy Hitters
We plan our workouts so the biggest, most demanding exercises come first—when we’re fresh and ready to move with power and precision. Think squats, deadlifts, and presses. We save the smaller, accessory stuff for later in the session or sometimes on their own training day.
📦 Load and Reps: Don’t Overthink It
How much weight? How many reps? The answer: it depends! We can build strength across a variety of rep ranges.
Some days, we may feel unstoppable and go heavier. Other days, we may scale back. Both are valid. The goal is steady progress over time, not perfection.
⏱ Rest Periods: Customize to Your Goals
Most of us are here because we know the benefits of building muscle.
For muscle building, rest periods can vary, but 30 seconds usually works well. To be super-efficient, we sometimes do supersets (like squats + rows) to keep things moving and muscles burning.
If we were chasing pure strength and power, we would rest longer between sets so we can lift heavier.
Bottom Line?
Strength training should feel empowering, not overwhelming. We start where we are, keep showing up, and are not afraid to experiment.
We are not just building muscle—we are building confidence, energy, and bodies that support our lives.
Join Us Next Week for Free!
If you are not a current member, you are invited to sign up for our Free Friends and Family event. You can learn more here.
If you ARE a current member, please invite someone you know to join us for this free event. You can send them this link:
We are also looking forward to our Body Recomp program this Summer. Learn more here.
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