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Things to Keep, Things to Throw Away

I think back to the "good old days" quite a bit now. At 36 with a knee that is mostly good half of the time, a heart that gets out of rhythm quite often and the ever-looming threat of cellulitis-it's easy to think my best days are behind me. Quite often when I'm visualizing the evening's workout or planning for the week ahead, I will harken back to the old days when I hit the gym any time I wanted, worked out any way that I wanted and the results were, well, basically the same as they are now.

Until you get well north of 30 you don't really get how your body changes and how little, yes how little, training actually matters. As a youth, if you are training consistently at all, you will get in better overall shape. If you do train consistently AND you eat right and rehab, you will get in great shape in the manner you choose. If you do those things AND have a good training plan, well, you will be in heaven. Most of us don't have the discipline to do that as a youth and once we figure out that going to the next level takes more than just blood, sweat and tears, we start finding reasons to not excel. That's why when you see WWE superstars or IFBB pros in their 20's, you are dealing with some seriously dedicated folks who deserve all of the respect in the world.

So where does that leave the common man, if you will?

You have to make a choice, and sometimes you don't realize it until you wake up one morning and the left leg won't bend and both elbows hurt too bad to guide you down the stairs so you just sit there and wait for something to happen...

There are only so many reps on your card before it's all over, so you need to pick and choose what to do. The young cats at the gym haven't learned this yet, but for those who have, they are going to be just fine. We old, rugged, beaten-down warhorses have so few good days within us that every movement we make and decision we entertain is worth quite a bit. In choosing how to train, when to train and at what intensity level, you need to ask yourself one simply question...

"Why am I doing this?"

If you can't immediately answer that out loud, then don't do it. How many of you eat carbs with every meal but say you're trying to cut? How often are you deadlifting your max for one rep but aren't training to compete? Or why are you wearing an oxygen-deprivation mask for five minutes of jogging?

Maybe there's a reason that's valid to you-and that is okay! It's not about convincing me or anyone else of the validity of your lifestyle choices, it's about making sure that you are convinced of the necessity of that action and are aware of the cost. Each time we go to the gym, we are choosing to train over anything else so don't enter that lightly. Don't just "get there" and flounder when you could be spending that time doing something meaningful or enriching yourself in another way that doesn't have anything to do with the weights. Look to the future and see where you want to be and how you want to look when you get there, then ask yourself if the things you are doing now indeed support that vision, or if they are hindering it. Know what things to keep in your life, and know what things to throw away. Just because you are doing something now, doesn't mean you should be doing or that you MUST continue. Be bold and walk away from anything that hinders your dreams and cut loose anything that weighs you down. You got ONE LIFE, just one, and when it's over you won't be able to complain to someone that you didn't get what you wanted because you were too busy making other people happy. When it's over, your legacy will be what you built and what you created so make sure your daily actions are working toward a legacy that YOU are proud of-not anyone else.

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