Kevin Koskella, of the blog and companion podcast Healthy Mind, Fit Body and I recently met in Austin, Texas (the epicenter of Physical Culture) over an awesome cup of joe at my “office”, the fantastic (and thankfully, just down the street from my studio) Thunderbird Coffee. It’s funny — I’m really a rather reserved, quiet, keep-my-opinions-to-myself kind of person — until, that is, the talk turns to Physical Culture. At that point, and as I am sure Kevin can now tell you, I can’t be made to shut-up 🙂 At any rate, I really enjoyed our coffee and (one sided? Heh, sorry, Kevin) conversation, in part because Kevin is a cool and highly intelligent guy, but too because he is really — as I am — heavy into the psychological aspects of training. Now, in this, the follow-up podcast interview we taped a week or so later, we only touched on the mental side of things (again, I could ramble for hours on this), but just let me reaffirm my opinions here: your psychological leanings, drive, focus and ability to bring intensity into the training theater are everything. There’s a time to be intelligent, questioning and logical, and a time to let it fly. When chalked hands finally grasp the bar, my friends, it’s time to go all-out friggin’ primitive. Make no mistake here: not only are all the commonly assumed training stressors vitally important (load, rep range, tempo, TUL, etc.), but also, too, is the psychological aspect — do we attack the day’s training with a life-or-death intensity, or with lackluster effort? Believe me, the body can sense the difference, and will respond accordingly. Remember, training, to be especially effective, has to be brief, brutal and basic. And if in fact we are true to those dictates, then training can only be intermittent and fractal in nature, lest we become a frazzled train wreck of disparate CNS, muscular and support structure pieces/parts. Think this is merely rah-rah psycho-babble? Think again: the environmental/epigenetic components impart very real, concrete physiological changes (see this piece, for instance) to an organism; this is the stuff of optimized, phenotypical expression.
Quick change of subject here: step back for just a moment and think of all the people you know who agree, in principle at least, that brief, brutal and basic workouts are the way to go, and that a Paleo diet not only makes sense logically, but that the empirical evidence and end results (look, feel and perform) are nothing less than stunning — and yet, these same folks seem mesmerized into believing that they cannot personally make such a change, or that their own physiology is somehow wired different so as to thrive (not just survive, but thrive) on a standard American and/or vegetarian diet. I can’t tell you how many people I speak to swear up and down that whole wheat does their body good, and that long, arduous and slow is the true way to fitness nirvana. Yes, my friend, and the heroin addict feels the same for their beloved black tar. The holiday season is near, and you’ll run across this version of diet-and-health-related cognitive dissonance at an increased frequency. “I am fat, out-of-shape, and desperately want to turn that around; I will not, however, give up my fresh-from-the refrigerator Snickers bar”. Well, I’m not sure what to say, here. Continue on with the tie-off-and-tap-a-vein roller coaster, my friend. When the student is ready, the teacher will appear. Let’s just hope that metabolic derangement is not the impetus that finally opens the student’s eyes.
Check out this motivational montage from a most unlikely source: Will Smith. Hat tip to Messus TTP for the find 🙂
No doubt: whether you think you can, or think you can’t, you are, sir, absolutely right.
And so that’s the mental side of the game. And again, let’s not forget, though, the epigenetic factor. So the question then becomes one of what is a “real” input? Anything that elicits a change at the cellular level must in fact be considered “real”. So do your perceptions, attitudes, drives and desires matter in a real sense? You bet they do.
Two workouts over the past week
Monday, 11/1; a superset of the following:
front squats: 135 x 5; 185 x 5; 225 x 3; 245 x 2; 255 x 2
kneeling DB clean and press: 45 # x 15 for each round
Pogos prior to squats, ballistic push-ups prior to the DB clean and presses, both for a solid CNS prime.
Friday, 11/5; a little Crossfit feel, here — three rounds of the following circuit, completed in 27 minutes.
Pendulum hip press: 400 x 15 (full range of motion)
btn push-press: 185 x 7
RDL: 255 x 7
weighted chins: 70 x 5
Bulgarian split squats: 45# x 10 each leg (below parallel)
Brief, brutal, basic…and intermittent, my friends; this is the way to roll.
In health,
Keith
Theory to Practice 