New Year, new challenge: Embracing the absurdity of a bodybuilding resolution

January shows up every year assuming you’ve got your life together. It expects organisation, motivation, and emotional stability by week two. Clean slate, fresh start, new year, new you.

I am none of those things. What I am, however, is someone who has decided that this is the year I enter a women’s bodybuilding contest.

Pause. Breathe. Laugh if you need to.

Yes, a bodybuilding contest. No, I don’t know what possessed me. Do people have faith in me? Absolutely not. Do I have faith in myself? Also no. What I do have is a long history of questionable life choices made right after New Year’s, usually when my brain is still reeling from December’s excess.

I think the idea crept in because I spend an alarming amount of time around competitive bodybuilders. My Gen Z best buddy competes. I’ve watched the prep, the misery, the macros, the mood swings, the existential crises triggered by rice cakes. I’ve been there for the struggle. I’ve nodded supportively while secretly thinking I could never do this.

Naturally, this led me to think: I should absolutely do this.

Let me be clear. I do not have his commitment. I do not have his willpower. I do not have his ability to say no to dessert with the moral strength of a monk. What I do have is boredom with the usual New Year resolutions. Eat better. Exercise more. Cut sugar. Drink water. I’ve done these. I’m doing these. They don’t scare me anymore. Apparently, fear is now my benchmark for personal growth.

At work, they think I’m a star. This is purely because I go to the gym consistently. Consistency, it turns out, is very convincing. My diet, however, is chaotic at best. I eat well until I don’t. I balance protein with feelings. I maintain my weight through what can only be described as negotiation. Am I fit? Debatable. Am I strong? Sometimes. Do I qualify to stand under stage lights in a skimpy bejewelled bikini with confidence? That remains to be seen.

My boss is deeply unsettled by this plan. Not by the discipline or the challenge, but by the visual. The tan. The muscle. The pose. The real possibility that I might show up to work one day casually discussing glutes while mentally practising a front double biceps (which, to be clear, is not what women’s posing actually looks like). I’ve never seen professional concern manifest so quick.

My gym friends know me better.

They didn’t show support. They laughed. Proper laughter. The kind that takes a moment to recover from. I am now the punchline in several ongoing jokes. Every time I lift something heavy, someone tells me I’ve already won the whole thing. And when I skip cardio, someone makes a note for my “competition prep”. This is friendship.

As I write this, my family remains blissfully unaware. I’m saving that conversation for when I have more information. Or confidence. Or visible muscle. Or all three. I can already hear the questions. Why? Are you okay? Is this a phase? Have you lost a bet? Right now, I have no answers that would satisfy them.

What I do know is this. Starting again in the new year doesn’t have to look sensible. Sometimes it can be just plain ridiculous. At other times it looks like choosing a goal so absurd, you can’t hide from it. Going back to work after the holidays is easier when you’re secretly training for something no one expects of you, including yourself.

Will I actually do it?

I don’t know. Will I quit dramatically halfway through? Possibly. Will January judge me for trying? Definitely. But for now, I’m back at work, back at the gym, and back to starting again, armed with protein powder, misplaced confidence, and a plan that terrifies everyone involved.

Including me.

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