The Simple Challenge That Keeps You Accountable

How pull-ups for 30 days improved my self-discipline

I started the 30-day pull-up challenge last April. It was a good way to get myself out there on social media and to help launch my clothing, home gym equipment and outdoor gear brand called Fittux. I felt as though I had little time for the gym and this steel pull-up bar felt like it could be a simple activity to help me get in better shape.

If you don’t make mistakes, you’ll never make progress. 

Day 1 I was full of energy ready to smash out as many pull-ups as I could. After posting over all our socials, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook the usual. It quickly came to my attention that I was not even doing a full pull-up, it wasn’t even a pull-up at all. It was a pathetic attempt at a chin-up. I barely stretched my arms out fully. Even though I made a mockery of myself I saw it as a learning curve, it was great how fast I could learn from a global audience.

By the time the second week came around it became a routine, I questioned myself… how am I going to finish this challenge? I considered taking a holiday, but thought to myself, I’m going to have to slog this steel pull-up bar around with me because I have no intentions of quitting. I know it’s a bit of a cliché, but I am a Goggins fan, “who's gonna carry the boats and the logs” – I know it’s a bit cringe, but the mentality is what drives me to go the extra mile, put more time into the business, lift heavier, smash through any physical or mental challenges. I didn’t expect to have killer abs in only thirty days, however I wouldn’t mind it either. I began to realise it wasn’t about quantity as I first thought, or even quality as a few viewers quite rightly mentioned about my reps. It was about consistency, making a promise to your audience and yourself and sticking to it. I learnt a lot about self-discipline.

Teach an old dog new tricks

As a matter of fact, I learnt a lot in a short time. A few references in comments mentioned terminology about muscles, and different techniques I hadn’t heard of before. After some research I found a technique by David Goggins called Nickels and Dimes. It really tests your perseverance and grit. You basically must smash out as many pull-ups and press-ups as you can. 5 pull-ups is 1 nickel, and 10 push ups is a dime. Continue smashing out as many pull-ups and push-ups as you can then tally up your total. 

By day 14 I created my own British version Pounds and Pennies. Every pull-up 10p and every press up 1p. Ironically during that video I still made the mistake of doing a chin-up, I learnt that a chin-up is when palms are facing inwards a pull up is the opposite.

Surprisingly, I didn’t turn into Arnie after 30 days of pull-ups, but I noticed my core was a lot stronger and it did help improve my form, my reps were significantly more controlled than day 1. Most importantly I learnt to continue to persevere whatever challenge you set yourself. If you are gonna say something, go out there and do it. You may not have the results you set out to achieve in my case you may not even have an audience, but you have morals, and the fact that you didn’t let yourself down is what counts.

The underdog

Let’s face it the average Joe like me, may not be the fastest, strongest or most intelligent, but we can all be the person who always finishes what they start. Instead of scrolling these workout videos, let’s start learning from one another and start doing them. 

If you are interested, you can check out the collection of my daily chin-up / pull-up videos on:

YouTube
Facebook
Instagram
TikTok

If you want to take part in your own 30-day pull-up challenge, why not tag us so we can follow along. The exact pull-up bar I used can be found here. Steel doorway pull-up bar.