Six-Pack Abs

The Quest for Six-Pack Abs

A lot of guys (and some gals) would like six-pack abs. But for many, wanting a six-pack is like wanting to have money by winning the lottery. It's a great dream, but we're not doing anything about it except maybe playing the numbers once in a while (by hitting the gym sometimes and trying to eat less.) It won't work.

News flash

• Almost no "nice-to-have" goals are ever accomplished. You must have passion.
• Almost no goals that are fuzzy are ever achieved or achieved by winging it. You must have a specific plan.
• Almost no goals are ever achieved with a few good tries. You must be focused and put forth sustained effort.
• Almost all goals are abandoned if we don't see results. You must measure your progress.

So let's say that you, like me, actually believe that you have a passion for six-pack abs, want to develop a plan to achieve them, are dedicated to staying on track and persevere, and have a method to measure progress. With the will to do all that in place, what's next?

Six Packs-Abs Basics

First, we need to educate ourselves. There's no point in starting if we don't know what we're getting into. Here are some of the basics about six-packs abs.

Getting Six-Pack Abs is Not about Health or Fitness

The search for six-pack abs is a vanity and status goal at its worse and a goal of discipline and fortitude at its best. The quest for six-pack abs is like a quest to brave the elements and climb Everest. Sure, you have to be fit to tackle the climb, but the goal is done for the achievement of it, for the personal challenge, not for the health benefits. Climbing Everest can get you killed. Although working on six-pack abs is unlikely to end in a fatality, it can be unhealthy. Be honest with yourself about why you want six-pack abs, because it's that vision that has to sustain you.

Abs May Not Be Made in the Kitchen, but They are Exposed There

If you have a layer of subcutaneous fat covering your ab muscles, the fat will hide your muscle definition, regardless of how well-developed those muscles might be. To expose your abs to the world, you have to have a very low body-fat percentage. For men, this means getting your body fat percentage down to around 10-12%. The average in the United State is about 25-30%. For women, getting your body fat down that low is pretty extreme, and frankly, I wouldn't advise it. My recommendation for females who want a super-fit body is to stop when the stomach is flat.

A woman looks fantastic at about 25% body fat and a guy looks really good at around 15% body fat. I don't know the actual numbers, but I'm guessing I'm around 20% or a little more body fat in this picture:

and around 15% or a little less in this picture:

I have spinal fractures, so to stabilize my spine, I keep my core muscles engaged at all times, but you can see that the area around and just below my navel is far too big, even on a tall, thin guy like me, to allow the lower part of the six pack to show.

Living within strict dietary guidelines is vastly more important to get your body fat down to ab-exposing levels. Ab muscles heal and develop relatively quickly, so abdominal exercise, while valuable, is far from the focus.

To Get Six-Pack Abs, You Probably Have to Fight Your Genes, and That's an Epic Challenge!

Nature wants you fat; it's a fact. Not super fat, that's bad, but a little fat. Having six-pack abs is not natural. As you burn more and more fat, your body slows down your metabolism to arrest that process. You body wants to maintain fat for health and protection. It's only your mind that wants six-pack abs, and in most fights between the body and the mind, the mind loses. Ask most smokers.

In my thinner picture, you can see the faint outlines of a four-pack. The difference between a subtle four pack and a visible six-pack is huge. The body will fight you to keep that last bit of stubborn weight, so it gets harder and slower and more frustrating the closer you get to your goal.

To summarize, six-pack abs are not natural, they are not necessarily healthy, and they are very hard to achieve. If you want them, it has to be because you accept the current cultural idea that they will make you look really good, or you have to see them as a personal challenge and achievement, or both.

The How-to

Since actually doing the work of getting six-pack abs requires dropping body fat to absurd levels, you need three things:

1. A Strict Diet (to keep the body from storing more fat and to use what it already stored)
2. Exercise (cardio to burn fat and core and oblique exercises to create definition)
3. Passion (along with vision, and fortitude)

There are many sources for six-packs ab diets and exercise routines, so I won't try to add another here. What I may do in a later post, however, is share my specific diet and routine I am using on my personal quest for six-pack abs.

If you are going on this quest with me, I salute you! (Though I am also tempted to recommend a psychological examination for us both.)

Despite the picture I am painting about this questionable goal and the extreme effort required to achieve it, six-pack abs are far from impossible. There are quite a few men and women with great abs, and you know what? There is this amazing thing about humans. If we see that others can accomplish something,it means that we can accomplish it too. It might take more effect or less, but it is possible.

So educate yourself, examine your motives, make a plan, and get to work! Let's do this!