Embracing Your Natural Potato Form
Could This Be a Valuable Health and Fitness Strategy?
(Apologies if this is offensive to anyone, hope it can be taken with a grain of salt).
I was never a buff body builder type.
Like countless others, I have perused and closely scrutinized the stories and fitness guru articles. I have skimmed the Michelangelo-statue-like photos and testimonials found on countless fitness websites, social media pages, and top magazines. I have tried my hand at working out, eating healthier, and enhancing my physical routine. I have pushed myself to physical and mental limits to break a few. But still, I have never been able to sculpt myself into the ideal shape and form. In fact, my weight has continued the trend of gravitating upwards over the course of months and years.
Things were easier for many of us in our teens and early twenties. For me, having a non-scaling mid region was a cake walk. Moderate exercise and standing several hours a day helped keep me mostly skinny(with the exception of my small bulging belly). There was a time I could eat like a horse and gain no weight. Then as I got older (and took to a desk job), the calories started finding the way to my midsections, thighs, and other areas I didn’t even realize I had before. And this is where many of us, never worried too much about our complexion before, start to pull our hair out about our physiques. Maybe we were okay with never modeling on some fitness magazine cover. But that was just it, we never had any extra bulging regions we needed to cover.
So how do I come to terms with numbers climbing on the scale and my limbering up on the body-mass index? Little did I realize, the big secret to getting “in shape” was in front of me the whole time. The secret is to embrace your natural shape, whatever it may be. For many of us, that is our “natural potato.”
Why fight against your natural “tator-ness?” Honestly can you stop the natural forces of gravity pulling your lower regions closer to the Earth? Are you able to make the extra mass building up around your belly, thighs, and random regions magically disappear? Instead of trying to hide it or lose it, why not savor the extra bulk that surprises you in the mirror or when you try to bend over? “You only go around once,” the saying goes. So, why aren’t those extra pound rounds and roundabouts we didn’t ask for an extra blessing?
Okay, maybe we all secretly desire shapes opposite of potato. We hope for physiques like the “mighty carrot,” — all thin, tight, and so elastic to bend every which way. We want to get our muscles all big and gamy like bulks of brocolli or cauliflower, hopefully lulling in possible admirers for a sample. We dream of the youthful freshness embodied in fresh greenness of kale, spinach, or extravagant lettuces.
But potatoes, yams, and related vegetables shaped like trams have their own appeal. They are transmutable to countless textures or forms — whether salty french fries, loaded baked potatoes, or potato pancakes. Heck, just like so many other staples potatoes are plucked, sliced, and prepared in countless different varieties based on culture or area around the globe. So, potato-shapers should be able to savor their versatility. What if your extra rolls and curves are shock absorbers or seat warmers? Potatoes can also can absorb extreme heat and withstand deep chill. What if your extra mass keeps you warmer in those cold winter months?
For eons, it seems that our societies have been telling everyone, regardless of gender or age , that they have to fit those ultra-svelte molds of Renaissance portraits or statues. You have to strive for the molded biceps and triceps, the tightened thighs, and the abs of steel. We even get to the point where our water containers have to be buff boxes!
Certainly, the highest of commendations are owed to those who devote hours to pressing hundreds in weights at the gym or devoting whole afternoons to the elliptical. These great folks epitimoze the grandest of hard work. But let’s not forget that other shapes beside the idealized bodybuilds take great resources and efforts to form as well.
You see people who press those weights almost every day and build up the muscles? Super-amazing! Well, it’s also hard work to press an office chair with your rear all day long as you sit and process office and computer documents or assist clients on the phone and digital sphere! You hear the phenomenal stories of booking it hard on the Peleton bikes or running the marathons. What about someone booking several cups of coffee and extra sweets as they burn the midnight oil? We all can appreciate the results of hard-core fitness and bodybuilding and all of the beach running, locker room displaying, and social media selfies that follow. This desire to show off the most rare and alluring of human physical forms seems to persist through each generation.
Yet we do not celebrate those who show the most enchanting of curves and rolls just by bending over or jumping up and down. Why don’t we ever see the Renaissance sculptures of the extra masses and rounds? Where are the beach running models who can jiggle their whole forms to match the rising and falling of oceans waves, or even imitate the strange flucuations of jellyfish?
Please no offense to anyone, no matter what their shape. Again, the highest of commendations to those who are able to diligently build their physical frames. But what if we direct our focus only to those top models of finesse? What if our own personal fitness and health goals are aligned so tightly with the most suave of shapes and figures that we forget all the rest? We potato-likes may go to the gym or strive to exercise daily, but only see the scale needles move down a smidge at a time. Smidges seem like thousands of miles between those bulging sides and those abs of steel. How easy it is to be let down after countless rude reality checks.
By embracing, and perhaps even celebrating, one’s shifting “potato-form,” might one be better positioned to transform themselves into a healthier “potato-version?” Might they celebrate each step of the journey to better health rather than pushing too hard towards a far-off, unreachable goal? Again, we are not saying that the Michelangelo-chiseled frames or the bionic biceps are unnoble or wasteful pursuits(quite the contrary they are profoundly valuable). Rather, they are but one form of amazing model fitness and strength.
Human health and fitness are unboundedly complex domains(like any other). Exercise and physical fitness should be done “at a level that challenges the individual.” Find something that works for you, and start where you are. Don’t compare yourself to others. Just set reachable goals to help get you to new shapes and fitness levels you want to reach. Also, variety can be the spice of your fitness regimen just as it is of life. If you find exercise types that also help to develop and shape your whole person, helping with cardio, endurance, strength, balance, and other areas, then you can find yourself reaching new levels of physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health.
And eating healthier does not mean you have to go on some mega-tofu or air-only diet that leaves you feeling fasmished and irritable. Especially if you are potato-shape, you need your nourishment! Start with small steps to overall healthier eating like adding more fruits and vegetables to your daily plate, drinking more water and taking vitamins or supplements, and adding new healthy recipes regularly to your regimen. Even if you start by replacing those french fries with baked potatoes, you are off to a good start!
Yes, perhaps embracing our natural potato form is a wonderful starting point for improved fitness, diet, and overall health(as well as greater self-valuation)! What would the world be like if everyone was the same shape, frame, or build? Certainly supermarket produce sections for, for one, would be bare with nothing but a few typically thin and crisp vegetables. And while it is crucial we maintain overall high levels of fitness and health to help prevent health decline and add years to our health, it is true we only do go around once. What if embracing our rounds(rather than despising them) was actually our first step to seeking better levels of health and overall well-roundedness?
