It has been over a year now since I started lifting consistently (5-7 days a week) and it has truly changed my life. It started with my best friend Kal beginning to lift with his good friend Jeremy, and soon enough, I realized how much different he started to look and decided to commit myself to making a change along with him.

Weight-lifting is one thing you can’t half-heartedly do. If you only go two or three times a week and continue with a bad diet, you will not see any change. Eat high-protein foods and cut out the sugary drinks and limit yourself to two off days. Go with friends who already made the gym a habit and are where you want to be. If you train with wolves, you’ll eventually become one yourself.

Go online and on social media and find bodybuilders who are your height and have physique you’d like to emulate one day. A couple role models of mine are the Hodgetwins (who are also really funny and have amazing videos on Youtube), and Sadik Hadzovic, a 5’11 185-pound bodybuilder based out of New York who has won Mr. Olympias in his weightclass.

I was not very happy with myself before I made the change. But once I started seeing differences in my strength and in my body, it helped me trust the process. Results will not happen overnight, and many times I would do an exercise and would fail to do a weight that I thought I could do, but eventually, I would get it.

I’ve become very confident, knowing how committed I am to trusting the process in the weight room. Ego-lifting never affected me, as Kal and our friend and third workout partner Alfonso always made sure I was getting my reps instead of just throwing up weight.

Now, my bench press has increased 100 pounds in 55 weeks, my incline dumbbell weight has gone up 50 pounds, and my squat has not only improved technique-wise, but that’s gone up 100 pounds as well. If I can change, so can you. Trust the process.