MOTIVATION

motivated for Satan.

Today I wanna talk about motivation.  Motivation is a big part of what we do. IMO it’s the biggest. It is essential for every strongman, power lifter, weightlifter, bodybuilder, hard body, and beefcake to have motivation to tackle the day’s lifts. It is what gets us off our firm asses and into the gym after a hard day of work (or a hard night of drinking.) Everyone struggles with motivation. Even the most chiseled hunk with perfect form and technique has days, even weeks, where they are burnt out and not feeling it. This is a totally normal thing and whether you have weird amounts of motivation or none of it it’s ok. Just gotta get our heads back on track and grind it out.

Let’s face it unless you are getting paid to be in top physical shape then you have another life besides getting huge. Don’t fool yourself. That life is important but it is not as important as getting thick, solid, and tight. I wanna break down a typical workday of mine for you.  Much like most of you I work long days with erratic hours and large amounts of time away from home/gym. I am in the Army. More importantly I am in the Infantry. It’s a physically and mentally demanding job that requires a lot of me as a person.  I am the trigger puller. The front lines in the war. Boots on the ground running and gunning. Not everyone in the Army is killing motherfuckers. Quite the opposite, 98% of the Army is just support elements for what I do. They sit behind desks, shuffle papers, make rules, and move things around so that the Infantry can do the best job possible. It by no means an elite job. Any warm body will do but those who work hard and push themselves create a separation and thus a swagger that is usually backed up by a fit appearance.

I wake up at 4:40am and am at work by 5:50am. At 0630 we do PT (physical training) for an hour and a half. So right away I have got a “workout” under my belt by 0800. I do this every day Mon-Friday. It’s not an option. I have to do it. The rest of the work day is filled with random stuff and training that im not going to bore you with but the workday usually ends for me at 1700-1800 (5 to 6pm).Tthen I drive 30 mins. home and still got gotta get my lift in. I’m at the gym by 730pm. I have dinner and am ready to for bed by 10pm.  Repeat that all over again the next day. It sucks but its life. I know many other people with different professions who also work hard, demanding jobs with long hours so this is not exclusively my problem. Like bros working 12 hour days of hard labor and awkward tan lines or nurses and paramedics who work 24hr swing shifts. The struggle is real.

Sometimes my physical training is a 6 mile run (barf) which isn’t really that bad. That’s usually a chill day. Other times it’s fucking rough. Carrying wooden logs on my back in the pouring rain or snow, climbing walls and ropes, doing stair climbs till I barf, thousands of push-ups etc…. That is not an exaggeration.

Check this shit out. Last week we had a PT event for my company. Roughly 80 dudes all doing that same thing in teams trying to race and out-do one another. This was the event….

17 burpees

17 cruches

17 squats

17 lunges each leg

17 push ups

My 8 man team then grabbed two 10 gallons water cans, a giant wooden tree log, and two bags filled with sand. We ran 1.5 miles to an obstacle course and did all of that I listed above plus 17 pull ups, 17 dips, climb a 30 ft. rope, climb over a 10ft. wall, climb a 30 ft. cargo net, and knock out 17 sit-ups. We grabbed all our stuff, ran a mile, and did it again. After that we grabbed our stuff, ran a mile, did it again. Grabbed our stuff, ran a mile, did it again. Grabbed our stuff, ran a mile, did it again. You see what im getting at? It fucking sucked. At 0800 it was over and I was hurting. But that was just the end of PT. I still had to start the workday at 0930.

This is not me bragging or saying “look how tough I am”. This is just the facts. It’s part of my job. Despite that I still had to make time for the gym in the evening in order to stay on track with my Smolov Squat Routine. You may recall my previous post about the end of traditional cardio. Dont mistake my forced running and crossfit like morning routine for weakness in the powerlifting game. This is shit I have to do. Combating the loss of muscle and size is always an uphill battle when every asshole with rank wants to run a 5k every morning. The army is festering with all kinds of "Master Fitness Leaders". Yes that is a real title. 

 

pre-deadlift max ritual.

Now you can see where the motivation comes in. It’s easier to say fuck it, quit, and post up on your futon watching TV or getting trapped into a wormhole on Wikipedia. It’s harder to take a rest, butt chug some pre workout and throw some heavy ass weight around for 90 mins.

I am not some half assed personal trainer fitness guru who is going to tell you it’s easy. Bullshit. It’s not easy and it’s not suppose to be. Whipping your candy ass into Steak Shape takes a lot of work. You gotta want it bad.  Motivation gets you in the door, but action gets you the results.

  

Here are a few tips and tricks to make your balls drop. I use all of these methods. Some of them will work for you one time and not work the next time. That’s why it’s crucial to have an arsenal of motivational tricks at your disposal. You never know which one will create the friction, which lights the spark, and starts the fire.

The obvious one is is Pre-Workout. Canned motivation.  Pre-workout supplements were designed specifically for people who are gassed from work or life and need that substance ass kick to start moving. They fucking work bros but only if used properly. If you spent your whole workday butt chugging 20 oz. Extreme Green Turbo Arctic Blizzard Moonfrost  Monsters
(with electrolytes) then a pre-workout will do nothing but make you shit and give you an anxiety attack. It’s important to avoid large doses of caffeine throughout the day. I have two cups of coffee in the morning and then that is usually my last caffeine intake until my pre workout before my lift. I use Neon Volt Pre- Workout. Tastes good, doesn’t last too long, and is relatively affordable compared to most pre-workouts.

 Nergal drinking the ultimate pre-workout...blood.

Don’t rely to heavy on pre-work outs. Use ‘em for a few months then taper off. Switch to black coffee and almonds. Its very easy for your body to build a tolerance to them. What once got you high with one scoop will soon take four scoops. Get it together cracky. I see too many guys refuse to lift unless they get pre workout. They convince themselves that they cannot lift without the aid of some caffeine infused pixie sticks. Like the goddamn weightlifting equivalent of Trainspotting or Requiem for A Dream. 

this TV will get us two bottles of the old school Jack3d. i know a guy.

YouTube. A gift to all of us in need of a jolt. I watch videos when I’m feeling BLEH. Videos of my favorite wrestlers (The Rock, Stone Cold, Razor Ramone or anyone from the nWo/Degeneration-X era if you must know), Rugby training videos, college football teams in the weight room, videos of Zyzz, the video of some black guy giving a speech about wanting it bad and filling your soul while black and white footage of some Juicehead is throwing up in a bucket after deadlifting a Volvo, soldiers killing mother fuckers in Iraq and Afghanistan (srs), fucking guys with no arms squatting 400 pounds. Videos along those lines will get your head in the right place. I find they make you start thinking about working out when you were originally thinking about why they stopped making 3D Doritos.

Trolling Instagram is pretty helpful for me. Hashtag searching squats, deadlifts, powerlifter will get you lost in a maze of hard bodies. Once you see some dudes puttin’ in that work and posting their results you’ll get angry that those bros are one upping you in the gains department.  You better hustle up or they might be the next dude at the bar/club/pool/concert that everyone is mirin’ instead of you.

Another really amazing thing about IG is that you can connect with all kinds of lifters from all walks and all places of the earth. Ive found an awesome community of lifters who have been not only inspiring but also incredibly generous with information and ideas. Everyone is supportive of each others gains, PR's, and physiques. I have never even personally met most of them and likely never will but that is besides the point. Its great to meet people from all over who have the like minded weight crushing, muscle building mentality I do.

please put this on my tombstone.

 

Looking at yourself in the mirror and realizing that whether you die a healthy 100 year old man or in a freak gasoline fight accident you are one day closer to death. Not trying to get Dr. Phil deep on here but it’s the truth man. No one likes a guy who says “I use to…da dadada” or “I should have done…da dadada”. Fucking boooring. Gimme the guys who are like “I can do….dadada” or “I already did this and now im going to do that”. Make the most of your time because you aint getting any younger buster. Im 30 now and if I knew half of what I know about health and fitness when I was 21 I could probably just retire from weightlifting and coast out the rest of my existence enjoying my gains like a well invested 401k plan.

The last motivation trick is this….stop feeling sorry for yourself. No one cares. Hike up your skirt, quit patting your pussy, and get to work man. Even if it’s just 30 mins. in the gym that’s 30 mins. closer to achieving what  you want. Stronger everyday is the head game you need to have. Push forward, don’t fall back.  

Shut up, Old Man! I ain't goin' nowhere. Why don't you tell all these nice folks why you been duckin' me? Politics, man. This country want to keep me down. Keep everybody weak. They don't want me to have the title because I'm not a puppet like that fool up there.- Clubber Lang.

  

seriously. don't even think about breaking that oath.