“How would RPE work for life?”
I’ve been looking into some new strength programs over the last few weeks and although I knew about RPE (Rate of Perceived Exertion), I hadn’t ever really dived into the subject. Now with some of the programs I’ve been looking at using this system, I’ve been reading more about it.
If you don’t know what it is in relation to lifting, here’s an excerpt about why it’s important from the Barbell Medicine website about it:
“Performance on a given training day is related to many factors, including many the lifter may not be able to control. Things like previous training stress, sleep, nutritional status, motivation, time of day, injuries, training environment, etc. all play a role in what a lifter’s performance level will be on a particular day. Using RPE to select the weight accounts for all of this because it allows the lifter to “feel” out the correct weight.”
Basically it’s a scale of 5.5 to 10 – 5.5 being a warm up weight and a 10 being a max effort. The RPE scale doesn’t change but where you are physically in relation to that number will. As you move through the warm up sets and the first working set, you would be able to assess your situation and adjust as you go through your session.
It’s a cool concept for lifting but that’s not what this is about.
As I was reading into it, and about the scenarios where it helps to adjust, I couldn’t help but think how this theory could help in our daily lives.
How often do we go into a day with a set plan of goals only to have multiple things go wrong, not achieve them, and then chastise ourselves for not being productive enough?
I do it all the time. I get myself quite flustered and angry when I don’t achieve the tasks I set out to do, even if there are a stack of things against me that day. I gauge myself on a preconceived set of plans that simply haven’t taken into account all information at the present moment.
I guess it’s about asking ourselves more questions and being aware of our current state. If I attack an important task but the previous night I haven’t had much sleep, my nutrition was poor, I’ve been super stressed and can’t concentrate, then I simply can not operate at an optimal level. In this instance my RPE 9, or important task, would be a much lower output than a version of myself that doesn’t have the above issues.
So, my question to myself remains – “How would RPE work for life?”
Pursue your potential
Dice
*Post Edit*
I started writing this piece last night and I have really been trying to hold myself accountable to publishing every night but I just couldn’t quite get it right and I certainly don’t want to publish something that I’m not happy with. Amy had to come out at 10:30pm and recommend that I “sleep on it” and attack it with a fresh perspective today. I went to bed a little grumpy at myself for not getting it done on my preconceived timeline. Ironic, I know. So in answer to the above question – I need more self-awareness for this to work. In this instance it would have been perfect. I gave my max effort at the time and it wasn’t quite the “lift” I had expected so I had to pack it up, re calibrate, and re attack it another time. I’m a bit happier with it today.
Inspired Lion 
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