Dorian’s Advice For Staying On Track During The Festive Period

The festive season is officially here…

Now for many of you wondering how you should be approaching this time and what you should be eating, drinking and how you should be training, then this blog is for you.

Now I’m going to keep this short and brief because simply, this does not need to be complicated at all.

I’m not going to be giving any ‘special tips’ or ‘mystery diet advice’ or anything like that.

In a nutshell: I advise you to try to be consistent with your training and diet, not just for this festive period, but year round. Applied consistency is the key, it’s what you should be doing anyway so that should not really be changing for this period.

Yes you’ll have a few more social occasions and there will be foods and drinks that you wouldn’t usually consume, but you can plan ahead and mentally know that you’ll be slightly off plan… which is absolutely fine as long as you’re sticking to your diet and training for let’s say most of the time.

Quite simply, just don’t overdo it.

Don’t overdo it, and you don’t need to be too obsessive.

If you’ve been training for quite some time and are in decent enough shape, then go and enjoy yourself from time to time and spend time with friends and family. Believe me I’ve seen it, I’ve seen bodybuilders make sacrifices that weren’t worth it. For example I told myself back in 1990, that if I didn’t place in the top 5 of that year's Night of Champions contest, then I would never compete again and would walk away from the competitive side of their sport to focus on other opportunities. I didn’t want to sacrifice myself nor my family for something that’s never gonna happen.

So yeah if you’re in good enough shape, then you can take a break and enjoy yourself, it won't have a negative impact on your goals, so don’t worry.

Remember, you can’t lose in a matter of days and weeks what you’ve built in months and years…

Isn’t that part of the reason for actually getting into good shape in the first place? So that you can have at least a few days off or so, and that you can do it without feeling guilty.

Enjoy yourself from time to time, enjoy life and have a social life!

Just keep on track for most of the time, I’d recommend following the 80-20 rule. 80% of training and sticking with your diet and 20% of enjoyment, it’s a good balance for most people I believe.

This goes for any period of the year really, whether that’s during Summer if you’re abroad or whenever.

Back when I was competing, I never trained on Christmas Day, ever. I could have if I really wanted to since I owned the gym, but did I need to? No.

Even the few days around Christmas, I closed the gym and didn’t train. This was the time to be with friends and family and yes I even had a little drink! I enjoyed myself with zero feelings of guilt because I knew that these little blips wouldn’t do any hard.

It gives a mental break too which is just as important.

So to wrap this up, stick to your diet and training as much as you can and enjoy yourself from time to time… just don’t overdo it.

And once this period is over, go back to your routine and be consistent.