Self love first, fitness competition second

      I hear a lot of women say that they want to do a bikini competition as an incentive to lose weight or "get in shape". This very rarely goes over well. I know many women contemplating the idea of competing in a figure or bikini competition, but this is not a wet t-shirt contest.
      Before considering competing, you need to be 100% happy with who you are as a person, but you also need to love your body the way it is. Everyone knows that this sport is physically exhausting, but no one realizes that the hardest part of the whole competition process, is the mental game competitors go through. If you are unhappy with the way you look, competing is not a good "goal" or "push" that you need in order to lose weight.
     Imagine being in the best shape of your life. You have the six pack abs, gorgeous shapely shoulders, lean legs, you look like a model and you most likely are the person in the best shape when you go to the pool, or the grocery store, people stare at you, because you look THAT good. When you get backstage at your first competition, everyone looks just as good as you, if not better. No one backstage looks you in the eye, they look you up and down in your teeny bikini, and assess whether you are a threat to them when you step on stage or not. The night before meeting your competition, you were feeling very confident in yourself, and maybe you thought you would place 1st or 2nd, but after meeting everyone, your self confidence takes a hit.
   After stepping on stage, you can get a judges feedback a week or so later. Now this part, is usually the make or break of a fragile competitor. You worked for 6-12 months, eating chicken and rice, 6 times daily. You put in the work and did everything in your power to get onstage, but according the judges report, you need larger calves, you have too much fat on your hips and legs, and your shoulders are not big enough, better luck next year.
  I have seen this time and time again. Competitors get their feedback and go completely off the wagon. After enduring such a restrictive diet, they gain 20-30lbs post competition and they give up because of what a judge said. The judges job is to be completely honest in how they see you, because you are to take their critisizm and build onto that for the next time you step on stage.
  If you are going to compete, it should be for yourself. Winning should never be the sole purpose that you are stepping on stage. I step on stage in order to challenge myself. With each time that I step on stage, I try to bring in a tighter leaner, better physique. Competing shouldn't be about a trophy, proving someone wrong, or weight loss, it should be about competing with yourself everyday. When the judges feedback comes back, do not take it to heart. If you brought in a second set of judges, they would place every competitor differently than the first set of judges did. Take what the judges say, and work to beat the physique you brought in the first time you competed.