This past June I turned thirty, and for the first time in my life I
have found myself spending a lot of time reflecting upon how my life has gone
thus far. A lot has happened in my life
during the past ten years: graduated from college and began my career in the
fitness industry, got married, became a father, job transitions, and family
challenges have all played a role in how I have matured during this time. Major life changing events have taken place
and I found that by looking back at how I have handled these changes,
particularly in the times I screwed up, allows me to better prepare myself for
the future. Over the past ten years I
have found that most problems and challenges in life can be minimized or
avoided completely with a little forethought and planning. Keep these words from Arnold Schwarzenegger
in mind,
“What we face may look insurmountable. But I learned
something from all those years of training and competing. I learned something
from all those sets and reps when I didn’t think I could lift another ounce of
weight. What I learned is that we are always stronger than we know.”
I do not agree with every that Schwarzenegger said or did; I certainly
do not condone steroids as a healthy way to enhance the body. But he is right about this: the journey to
health and fitness is not just about looking good in the mirror or being a
smaller size. It is one of, if not the
best way, to learn a lot of little lessons that add up to one important lesson:
WE ARE ALWAYS STRONGER THAN WE KNOW. So
now I will share with you twenty little lessons that I have learned that build
into that one big lesson. These are not
ranked in any particular order; I do not consider any one lesson to be more
valuable than another because they are all valuable.
1. Mirror Muscles Are not the important
ones, everyone wants to improve what they see in the mirror but it is the
muscles that are hard to see, and more often ignored, that will cause
problems. Emotions or muscles, ignoring
what cannot be easily seen and leaving it untrained is a setup of injury or
problems.
2. Strength is Balance Just as income must
equal or exceed expenses to avoid poverty; so too should the body be balanced:
front to back, left to right, top to bottom, one foot to the other; strength is
about balance the anterior chain muscles (front of the body) must balance in
strength with the posterior chain muscles (back of the body). If not, from top to bottom, the entire body
will be out of alignment resulting debilitating pain. A life out of balance is a life that fall
apart under the stresses of life.
3. Have the courage to train weakness Know
that exercise you really hate doing? You
hate it because you are bad at it. You
are bad at it because those muscles are weak through that particular
motion. That elephant in the room that
your friends and family know about but no one wants to mention? It is getting
bigger because nothing is being done about it.
Avoiding weaknesses does not make them go away; it makes them
worse. Man up, attack the weakness, and
turn it into strength. Cowards cop out,
heroes train.
4. Deadlift Sometimes life gets heavy and
burdens become hard to carry, DEADLIFT.
Nothing builds self-confidence like loading up a bar with heavy weights
and then picking it up off the ground.
If you can deadlift more weight than what you weigh, life’s burdens will
not weigh you down.
5. Foundational Fundamentals The three
greatest strength-training exercises are deadlifts, squats, and pushups. Always be able to drop low to pick up heavy
loads, stand tall under great weights, and pick your body up off the ground. Life will require carrying heavy burdens,
standing under great strain, and getting back up after being knocked down. Don’t just do it, be ready and destroy it.
6. Maintain Mobility It is not lost
because you are getting old; it is lost because you have stopped moving. If your two-year-old can squat his butt to
the ground with perfect form but his grown father cannot, his father is getting
stiff. Quality movement is a natural
skill that does not need to be taught.
Correcting poor movement patterns learned during times of strength
imbalances is time consuming and annoying.
Stay loose to move well. Blessed are the flexible, life may force them
to bend but they will not break.
7. Use it or lose it Agility, speed,
power, strength, endurance and flexibility are lost or improved by how you
train. If something seems harder it is
because it not receiving the attention that it should. Problems arise when attention to detail is
lost. Build a life that trains what
needs improvement not what feels comfortable.
8. Master Technique when in doubt, return
to the fundamentals and seek to improve the basics. If it seems too complicated or requires too
much thinking to be instinctive, back up, return to your roots, and remaster
the fundamentals. Technical and form
mastery will create more positive change in one session than a hundred sessions
of sloppy work. If you do not learn to
do it right the first time, when will you find time to do it over?
9. Work smart not hard A lot of time and
effort get wasted by aimlessly throwing around energy into every single
activity or opportunity that comes along.
Avoid this trap, ask: What is the priority? Identify it.
What is the goal? Name it. What
is the program? Plan it. What is the time commitment? Schedule it. Now, work it.
Any other method is a counter-productive waste of time.
10. Variety prevents plateaus Work a
specific priority for a specific period of time and then focus on a different
goal. The body adapts, so does the
mind. Stimulate but do not annihilate
either one. If the process has become boring or lacks challenge it is time for
a change.
11. Patience Building a healthy life
requires a life time. It is a lifelong
commitment. If that shocks you, pick
your jaw up off the floor. Speaking of
floors; everyone hits one of two floors in their life time. You can hit the gym floor or you can hit the
hospital floor. One you can hit today;
the other you hit in those last few moments of life, hopefully surrounded by
loved ones. Which floor do you want to
be on? Either way it will take a life
time to get there. Good health does not
come to those who wait. It comes to
those who work their butts off. “When it comes to eating right and exercising,
there is no ‘I’ll start tomorrow.’ Tomorrow is disease.”- V.L. Allinear. Be impatient to get started on becoming
healthy but stay patient on the journey.
It is a process, it will take time.
12. Better than Yesterday That is the
primary goal: what have you done today to make yourself better than you were
yesterday. Ask yourself this every day,
and do something about it. If you do,
life will always get easier.
13. Redefine Competition See that person
sitting across the room, yeah, that man or woman who is younger, more
attractive, and in better shape than you? FORGET ABOUT THAT PERSON. Who cares what he or she looks like? That individual is not you, nor your
competition, nothing positive be gained by comparing yourself to that
person. Do you want to get to know the
competition? Step up to a mirror. See that face staring back at you? That is the only person you need to become
better than.
14. Bad genetics is not an excuse High
Blood Pressure, Cholesterol, and Diabetes is in my family history. So should I say that just because I have a
family history of these problems that it is inevitable I will too? Should I just give up and do nothing. NO! Doing
nothing is stupid, all of these problems can be reduced or even eliminated with
a healthy diet and regular exercise. Blaming genetics is denying responsibility
for your own actions.
15. It is impossible to out exercise poor nutrition
Junk food makes a junk body. If you are
wondering why you are putting all this time and effort into exercise and your
body is not changing the answer is simple: Your diet sucks!
16. Food is not a reward Are you a dog to
be rewarded with treats for performing a trick?
Food is fuel. Do you want your
body to run like a Ferrari or a Pinto? I
am not saying you can’t give yourself a treat on a special occasion but if food
is a reward for every good little thing you accomplish, do not expect to
operate like a high performance machine.
No amount of exercise will overcome a crappy diet.
17. Drop it to keep it hot Even a fat loss
of five pounds may drastically improve physical performance. Keep the intensity high in the gym and the
intensity will stay high at home. Trust
me; your spouse will thank you.
18. Become a machine Do not waste time on
them. Everything that can be done on a
cardio or weight machine in the gym is far more effective if done with free
weights, dumb bells, body weights, or outside.
Forget the machines; BE THE MACHINE.
19. Fitness mimics Life I am constantly
reminded of how much fitness mimics real life.
It takes perseverance and dedication to succeed. It takes believing that end goal is worth the
present struggle. A healthy life
requires courage to say no to all of the negative influences around you and
stay true to your hopes and desires.
20. Attitude determines success Every
person will exercise at some point in their life. A person will either do it out of choice or
because of a doctor’s orders. Which
person sounds like he or she has a positive, winning attitude? People who freely choose to do something
about their health will ultimately succeed.
A person chooses to win the moment he or she chooses to accept reality: it is your life, it is your body, and it is
your responsibility. Good or bad you will
live with the consequences of your choice.
It is never too late to choose health.
Choose wisely.
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