MUSCLE CHURCH: Our Father, the Iron

I think that over time we attach meaning to things but don't often ask why something means a lot, we just know that it does. Over the course of my life I'm guilty of not letting myself get attached to things that I should because I've lived by the code that "everything is for sale." However, there are some things that have managed to get into my very exclusive "not for sale" category. I regret that there is a belt out there that was mine for many, many years and I let a friend hold it and he lost it in a move. I can't be too mad-I should've never let him borrow something so sacred anyway. However, one man's sacred is another man's optional-never forget that. What matters the most to you, might not mean anything to someone else and that's okay. We all have our loves and likes and there are times when we have to accept that something is just valuable to you and that's it. Which brings me to the subject of this post. You see this...

The answer is yes. Yes. Yes, you need a goal. You have to have a goal otherwise all this is for nothing, right? If you don't have a specific goal and hit the right percentage of the right poundages from the calculator you got from the website you subscribe to and then forget to post it on Instagram then what's the point? That was me in late 2014...then again in late 2015...and maybe for a smidge in early 2016. I got wrapped up in the question of, "why am I doing this?" Though I was never honest enough to get an answer from myself. From a relatively young ago I always trained for the purpose of sport and later competition so to train for...myself...seemed odd to me and I couldn't wrap my head around it. As result of that I subjected myself to a lot of self-loathing that I could've spared and spent a ton of energy on being negative and most likely set myself back a few years. So what does this mean for you? Well, it really depends on what you want, and her...

Here's a little something for you all to think about as you get ready to do whatever it is that you do. Every single day, you make a choice. Think about that statement. I'll even repeat it for you... Every single day, you make a choice. You wake up. Go to work. Eat your little sorry lunch. Grab an unhealthy ass snack because you didn't meal prep on the weekend. Drag yourself to the gym. Cut corners with your program. Sulk on home and get on Facebook and like a meme that says, "being an adult means you're tired all the time." That's the daily routine for a lot of you out there because at no point in the cycle did you say, "wait a minute, this shit ain't working and I have the power to change it." You see every single day you're blessed enough to wake up, regardless of your circumstances, you make the choice to live you best life. You either decide to do well or at least do better, or you just let the inertia of life take you wh...

So only about, what, 9 months between posts. Not bad, right? Well here I am, back again to underwhelm and disappoint with my tales of woe and injury.  At least, that's what the testosterone fueled, excitable and immature young adult version of myself would say. The mature, injured and somewhat refined man that sits here typing on this ergonomic keyboard feels very different. The truth is that I am injured, pretty badly. I have a minimum of two hernias, at least as of my last MRI/X-Ray which went down about 16 months ago. I also have diastasis, which is essentially a tear in my abdominal wall that probably won't go away. Aside from that, I still battle with problems in my surgically repaired left knee which has very little cartilage left, arthritis in both hands and a little tear in my left Achilles tendon that flares up once I put in too much cardio. Fortunately, the worst of my problems, my stiff, nearly straight neck with precious little space between discs, is the least ...

I can't put it into words most of the time. Sometimes when people give me that look that says, 'why do you put yourself through all that' I just don't have an answer. I just smile back and say 'it is what it is' and the conversation falls away. I even had the idea that I'd create a website to try to tell the world why I do it but the truth is I really couldn't tell you. There are moments that stick out. I can remember workouts from years ago like they were yesterday and I remember how I felt and the moments when I broke through a barrier or in some cases, and perhaps even more rewarding, helping others break barriers. I guess in a way I look back at my lifetime in the gym thus far and I feel like it's a career of sorts and there are times when I realize that my life has been more defined by my time under the weights than anything. I remember the first time I loaded six plates on the military press and how it was so easy and looked so impressive! ...

So I’m on the final lap of contest prep and I’m feeling the strain. In my head I can hear Colin Bryce yelling “take the strain” as he is so famous for doing at World’s Strongest Man. If he was here I could assure him that the strain has been taken, and soon it will be over for a time and I cannot wait. For all intents and purposes, the hard work is done now. With two weeks before contest time, trying to move the needle any further along will probably be counter-productive or cause injury. So there’s a part of me that gets to hit the brakes a bit and look back on the last 12 or so weeks of training and seeing how far I’ve come. I could train all I want in the next two weeks but I’m not going to make myself more ready for this contest. Sure I’m going to have some good workouts and maybe up the cardio a bit, but the time for progression has passed and now it’s time to reap the rewards of my labors. Oh have there been some labors. I present to you the face of fatigue and prog...