365 Days of Planks: 4 Truths I felt to the Core
1. Easier but not Easy
You’d expect after enough days in a row, doing a plank a day would become as habitual as brushing your teeth but it never quite does. Even with alarms, a commitment to post on social media and an accountability chat group I would find myself nearly forgetting or putting it off. The truth of the matter is that doing a plank will never feel as important or necessary to do as brushing your teeth.
2. Your core is stronger than it looks
You do not need to have six pack abs to have a strong core and having a six pack does not necessarily mean you have a strong core or mental fortitude to do one. It was about month 3 when the Barbie movie was released and the famous stars made a perfect example of this truth. A media post revealed Margot Robbie could in fact hold out a plank longer than Ryan Gosling. Even with his shining washboard abs and Kenergy, Ken was no match to Barbie.
Whilst this challenge was more about consistency than intensity the additional dare from a friend to hold a plank longer than Gosling was irresistible. In the following months I built my endurance to surpass Gosling I also noticed that looks or other sport performance could not predict strengths in other abilities. Logically I knew this but doing this plank challenge heightened my awareness of how easily appearances can influence our perception of what it means to be healthy or fit.
When we set out to achieve what is best for our health we need to be wary that other people’s motives or interests do not get in our way. If you want to optimise your health, start celebrating more of your body's abilities instead of its looks.
3. Social media proof is a double edged sword
Posting a photo of myself doing my plank daily on social media definitely kept me accountable to completing my challenge. But it also came with the unintended consequences. The same tool used to motivate me could also defeat the overall purpose of continuing to care for my body. Admittedly some days after the 3 minutes it took to do the plank and post it I’d stay on my backside scrolling for another 30 minutes. Even without posting, simply having access to an app with immediate dopamine-inducing effects increased the likelihood that I would sit back to scroll.
Despite the potential benefits of shared content, time spent consuming content is also time spent out of action. Time that you could be using to move your body or move closer towards your personal goals. Many apps effectively exploit our reward systems, making it that much more difficult to design personal reward systems that foster lasting health habits. So the cost-benefit of utilising technology as tools to support health will need to be more thoroughly considered before I use or recommend it to others.
4. You don’t know who you might be inspiring
As most habits go, the start is always exciting and inspiring. The first month or so I received a lot of engagement and interest to join in my challenge. And as the novelty wore off I intentionally found unique places or invited strangers to join me to keep it interesting but even I started to feel like I might just be bothering people rather than inspiring them. But you never really know. It was in the moments I’d least expected when someone I hadn’t spoken to in ages would make a comment or friends and family from overseas would send me photos of their planks.
