TOO MANY EXCUSES AND NO REASONS!

Although I pretty much covered this in the post; ’No Pain No Gain, Is That The Attitude?’ I feel the need to repeat myself because I see it consistently, week in week out. Not just in the classes, but in life in general. It is the single biggest cause of failure that I have seen. 

 

People are full of excuses for why they missed training. Why they can’t stick to an exercise programme, diet or goals. The real reason, I believe, is that they don’t have a big enough ‘Why?’ The saying goes, ‘If you have a big enough ‘Why?’ you’ll find the ‘How?’

Why are you training in a particular art? Why do you want to go to the gym? Why do you work where you do? Does your ‘Why?’ fire you up? If not, then you need to re-evaluate your choices. We all have choices, no matter how dire your situation may seem.

Paul.

 

 

Nowt Queer as Folk!

A lot of people nowadays are over medicated and undernourished. They are overly obsessed with how they look and undervalue how they feel. They go for the symptomatic remedy,immediate, though short term, relief but ignore the underlying problem that got them there in the first place.

“Any day we wish we can discipline ourselves to change it all. We can also do nothing. If the idea of change makes us uncomfortable we can remain as we are. We can choose entertainment over education and delusion over truth. The choices are ours to make. But while we curse the effect, we continue to nourish the cause. We have created our circumstances by our past choices.Those who are in search of the goodlife do not need more answers or more time to think things over to reach better conclusions. They need the truth. They need the whole truth. And they need nothing but the truth.”  – Jim Rohn

You’ve heard the saying; “The truth hurts.” How true is that? Mostly it’s the stuff you don’t want to hear, but you know it’s right. You know what you have to do; do it!!

“Forget past mistakes. Forget failures. Forget everything except what you’re doing now and do it.” – William Durant

Never quit. Your turn will come.

Paul

Musashi Speaks

Japan’s most famous and revered Samurai, Myamoto Musashi, once asked his young disciple, Jotaro, what his goal in life was. Without hesitation, the teenager replied, “To be like you!”

“Your goal is too small”. Musashi scolded him. He went on to admonish his student to be like Mt. Fuji. With such a broad and solid foundation that the strongest earthquake cannot move you, and so tall that the greatest enterprises of common men seem insignificant from your lofty perspective. “With your mind as high as Mt. Fuji”, he explained, “you can see all things clearly. And you can see all the forces that shape events, not just the things happening near you”.

(From the book: Karate Do. My way of life. By Gichin Funakoshi)

How do you see yourself?

Paul.

Plateau? Rest/Pause!

One of the best training methods that I’ve come across for overcoming any ‘sticking points’ in your weight-training or callisthenics programme is the rest/pause. This technique has been used by body-building legend Dorian Yates. It is also, in my opinion, the best technique to use if you don’t have a training partner or someone to ‘spot’ you on big lifts to help you squeeze out that last all important rep. And it’s great if you are pushed for time.

Rest /pause, I suppose, is really a weight-training technique but I’ve used it with Hindu press ups and in my ab workouts.

The rest/pause works like this. I’ll use the bench press exercise as an example. You are on your last set, you don’t have anyone to spot you. You reach rep number 8 and you know number 9 isn’t going to happen. Rack the bar. Count to ten. Lift the bar and perform as many reps as it’s safe to do. This is usually only one or two at the most. If you feel that there is more in you rack the bar again and count to ten. Then go for glory. Don’t do anymore than two rest pause sets per exercise. If it’s done correctly, no skiving, it puts a tremendous stress on the muscle worked, any more than two rest/pause sets could lead to over-training or possible injury. I personally only use it on compound exercises; squats, bench press, deadlift, standing barbell curl, shoulder press and a tricep exercise of my choice.

Without weights you can use the same principle. For example; Hindu press ups. Do as many as you can without stopping. After collapsing, count to ten. Do as many more as you can. Collapse. Count to ten. Go again. Same with crunches.

Try adding the rest/pause into your routine once or twice a month and I guarantee that you’ll be impressed with the results.

Train hard or go home. But, train safe.

Paul.

Don’t let them down.

All sports people require some of the same attributes: speed, power, balance, agility, co-ordination. Some need additional things like higher levels of fitness and endurance. The key ingredients are the first five.

There are many ways to develop these attributes and sports science has come along way with their research. Telling us which exercises are best for which movement. This is all useful stuff but where I think a lot of sports coaches fall down is that they don’t know how to put it all together properly. There are some coaches out there that are still living in the dark ages; boxing in particular. These guys believe that weight-training slows you down. Nonsense! A lot of basketball players and even some golfers have realised the benefits of using weight-training as part of their competition preparation.

How do you put it all together properly? Drills. You need to analyse the particular sports movement / technique that you wish to improve and, with a bit of creativity, devise a drill or set of drills that will ‘naturalise’ your movement / technique. I’ve watched some football (soccer) and rugby training sessions in the past and most of their training just looks like a circuit class that you would find in any local sports centre. I think that one of the main reasons for this is because a lot of the coaches and trainers are just ex-football or rugby players. Nothing wrong with this if they posses an ever learning open mind. But, most of these guys are only training the team in the same way that they were trained. A case of the blind leading the blind. One of the main problems with this type of training / coaching is that only the very talented will shine and get the most benefit from it. There will be very little possibility of developing any new talent. Anyone can learn anything if it is taught to them in the right way. Some people may need different drills from others. Or the drills adapted for them. The coach must have an open mind. He must, obviously, have the sports person’s main goal as a priority focus. But he must be intelligently flexible in his approach to achieving that goal. For some it’s still a case of; “Well this is what worked for me”. It is now gospel and they won’t budge on it. They only see failure to do something as failure instead of feedback. Feedback is the breakfast of champions. There is no such thing as failure. Only feedback. If the recipe sucks, it doesn’t matter how good a cook you are. At this point what I’ve noticed that works best is not all the; “We’ll have to get you hooked up to the sports science computer, check your form”. So called ‘modern’ way of doing things. It needs the personal touch. As a coach if I can’t see for myself where you are going wrong then I shouldn’t be there. Why should I need a computer to tell me what I should be able to see for myself? Thing is, how does it feel to you? What do you think? Boredom could be the enemy, not some abstract ‘failure’.

As we are now being told; it’s mental as well as physical. It’s a mind game. Sports psychologists and some hypnotherapists are cashing in on this gap in most coaches arsenal. But it’s not new. It’s always been a mind game. It’s the attitude that’s developed through proper preparation to prevent piss poor performance, as they used to tell us in the army. If your training isn’t on par, then neither is your mind. I’ve noticed this myself in the past. This is where good drills can make all the difference. With drills you can break stuff down into more manageable chunks.

Some of you might have been thinking; “But what if my mind isn’t on the training session? “I might have problems at home to deal with”. “I might be feeling less than good about myself,…..for whatever reason”. I know. I have deliberately left this for now. That’s a whole article of it’s own. Suffice to say that I just don’t understand why ant serious trainer or coach hasn’t bothered to take the time to go on courses for EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) or even some form of sports psychology or hypnotherapy course in order to ‘be there’ for all of his / her people. And all blocks in their training. Whether mental or physical I believe that if you are going to work in this type of area you should be a ‘Jack of all trades’ and pretty damn good at all of them as well. Your students and clients trust and rely on you. Don’t let them down.

Paul Smith.

 

 

No Pain No Gain! Is That The Attitude?

You can only cruise your way to victory if you haven’t been cruising your way through your training.

I’ve lost count the number of times people have said to me; “How come you’re good at….?, “How come you can do….? or “I’ve been practicing, doing, trying….for years and I can’t…” The simple answer is: you haven’t been working hard enough! That means you haven’t been approaching your ‘task’ with the right attitude. If you put mediocre effort into something you don’t get mediocre results. You get poor results. Put poor effort in and you get no results. If you put exceptional effort in you get great results. This is where most sports people, artists etc. stop. If you can go that extra mile it is only then you become one of the greats like Ali, Bruce Lee, Einstein, Edison, Branson. You become part of the 1% of the population. As the saying goes; “Go the extra mile, the road is quiet.” That extra mile could be just one more rep in your weight-training, another lap of the track or pool, another round on the bag.

Most people quit at the first sign of discomfort. Arnold Schwarzenegger said in the body-building documentary ‘Pumping Iron’ “The people who can go through the pain barrier may get to become a champion. But the people who don’t, forget it!”

You must approach your training with the correct attitude. Don’t fool yourself. You’re wasting time. Remember ‘Time’? One of the best ways to do this is to ask yourself two questions. And, of course, answer them honestly. Number one; “What is it that I really want?” Number two; “Why do I want it?”

If the answer to number one is ‘I want to be world champion.’ And the answer to number two doesn’t get your motor running, then you need to review question one again.

If you have a big enough ‘Why?’ You will find the ‘How?’

This is one of, if not the, best formulas for success in every area of your life.

When you answer the question, ‘Why do I want….?’ The answers you give are your values. What things are most important in your life. The things that give your life a sense of meaning. If you only used achieving goals as a measure of success in your life, you’re going to spend a helluva long time feeling like a failure. Whereas if you focus solely on living your values every day you are more likely to achieve your goals as well as enjoy your life at the same time.

If, for example, you wanted to be a rockstar and you have values like; security, peace of mind etc. There’s definitely going to be a clash somewhere. Do you think you’d be happy, even if you got a number one hit? Would you, then, be a success?

Maybe one of the reasons you aren’t enjoying your training or life is that you aren’t satisfying your values. Change your art, sport, career. Or, find a better ‘Why?’

There’s a saying; “Attitude determines altitude.”If you are pursuing your values you will attack your training and your life with the correct attitude.

Paul Smith.

 

TIME

 

Too much time on our hands, not enough time, time flys, time drags. No matter how we perceive it, we’ve got to moan about it. If you want to moan about something moan about this: waste time and it’s lost forever. Time doesn’t care how rich you are. How famous you are. How talented or educated you are. We all have no control over time. It ticks by at the same rate for everyone. What we all have control over is how we utilise our time.

My biggest pet hate is people telling me that they don’t have enough time to exercise or practise they’re skills in whatever discipline they are involved in. As Mark Twain said, “People have a thousand excuses for every failure but never a good reason.” There’s 168 hours in a week. Are you trying to tell me that you can’t find at least 3 hours to look after the body that’s meant to carry you through life?

I worked 15 hours a day, 6 days a week. I slept in my truck 5 nights a week. But I still managed to exercise everyday. Every morning I started the day with 3 sets of crunches combined with leg raises. All sets done slowly and to failure. On the last set I did 2 rest pause sets. Next I did 2 sets of Hindu press ups to failure. Every second day I did Hindu squats to failure. Only one set. I felt that was enough. My legs have a great way of letting me know this; they buckle. Every night I did resistance band exercises. One night I did biceps. Next night I did side and rear delts. My front delts get worked with the Hindu press ups. I doubled the bands up so that I got more strength work rather than loads of reps. When I got parked up in a suitable place I went for a run. When I was back at the weekend I went for a run. If I had space in my truck trailer I’d skip. It wasn’t ideal as I didn’t get any real back work done, but it was better than sitting on my ass complaining about what I didn’t have.

Remember this; If you love life don’t waste time because time is what life is made up of. And tomorrow isn’t promised to any of us.

Paul Smith.

 

 

What is Physical Intelligence?

Physical Intelligence is what enables Paul Smith to quickly enhance the ability and performance of almost any athlete.

Whether is is in martial arts or any other sport, Paul’s ability to see what an individual is doing, analyse it and then interpret it in such a way that improvements can be made, is Paul’s unique gift.

It is this gift that has enabled him to master such a variety of complex physical arts so quickly.

Great sports people instinctively do the right things. But they could rarely explain to anyone what it is they do that makes them special. Paul not only can communicate what he is doing but he can communicate what other sports people are doing, enabling them to understand their physical movement as they have never done before and improve it.