I Just Want To Be Toned
What If I Want to Be Toned Too?
Wrestling With Desire, Honesty, and the Language of Change
I hear it all the time:
“I just want to be toned.”
And if I’m honest, it gets under my skin. Not in a loud, dramatic way — more like a quiet itch. Like a word that doesn’t fit the sentence it’s in. A goal that doesn’t belong to the person saying it.
Because “toned” isn’t a real thing. It’s not a process your body understands.
It’s vague, market-tested language. The fitness version of buying an iPhone because everyone else does. It sounds like desire — but feels like disconnection.
And yet... here’s the uncomfortable part:
I want more muscle. I want less fat. I want to look better in the mirror, too.
So what makes my desires more valid than theirs?
Because I say “stronger”? Because I frame it as “performance” or “longevity”?
Am I really that different — or just better at dressing my vanity up in noble language?
That’s what I wrestle with.
I preach patience, presence, listening to your body. And I mean all of it.
But I also chase aesthetics. I also have days where my training choices are driven by how I want to look, not how I want to feel.
So who am I to roll my eyes at the word “toned”?
Maybe it’s not the word that bothers me.
Maybe it’s what it represents:
Not the desire to change, but the disconnection from the desire itself.
When someone says “toned,” it often feels like they’re not really home yet. Like they want change — badly — but they’re only able to ask for the change they’ve been told is safe, acceptable, aspirational. It’s not wrong. It’s just… disconnected.
And maybe that’s what we’re actually here to do:
To help people come back to their own language.
To get clear on what they really want, even if it’s messy.
To say: “Hey, it’s okay to want to look good. But let’s also figure out what else you might be longing for underneath that.”
Because when I dig a little deeper, that’s what I’m trying to do in my own training too.
To look good, sure — but to feel like I’m in alignment. Like I’m not chasing something I didn’t choose.
I haven’t fully figured it out. I still walk that line.
But maybe that’s the real work — not pretending we’re above the mess,
but staying in it long enough to make something honest out of it.