POINT BUY IS NO FUN: ROLL A CHARACTER

 

Welcome back nerds to the DnD world, wherein today I will explain why people who use point buy are a bane to all things fun and that rolling dice remains the premier form of entertainment the world over.  To give my uncultured reader a quick crash course here: Dungeons and Dragons has you take on the role of a character (hence a “role playing game”) with basic abilities divided into 6 categories: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution (hardiness/endurance), Wisdom, Intelligence, and Charisma.  When you initially build a character, these scores will range from 3-18 barring modifications, with 3 being almost but not quite completely useless and 18 being the peak of performance before getting into superhuman levels.  Going into a different nerd category here, Captain America would have 18 strength: the greatest a human could ever achieve, while anyone with superhuman strength would have to be 19+, and meanwhile enraged Hulk is probably scratching around a 4 on the intelligence score (but a whopping 30+ on strength, so that’s cool).  Already this intro is long, but DnD players love to talk about this stuff at length, so let’s get down to why it’s 3-18 vs a more satisfying base-10 approach of 0-20: it’s because (traditionally) one rolled 3 six sided dice to determine scores, hence you could roll three 1s and get an awful stat or three 6s and be a god. …and then someone came up with the brilliant idea of point buy.

This is what happens when you take all the points out of DEX and put it into STR

 

What is point buy?  Point buy is a system where, instead of rolling dice, one is told they have a fix amount of “points” to invest toward stats on their character.  Everyone starts at 10 in all stats, with those being what an “average” citizen of the world is like, and from there they can spend points to improve stats OR take away points from stats to have more points to spend.  Points scale: the closer you get to 18, the more points you need to spend.  So much cleaner, so much more “equal”, no element of luck involved at all: everyone gets to have the same chance.

 

How boring!  Already in a game about imagination and wonder you’ve slapped down rules, limitations, by-laws and regulations.  We literally haven’t even played yet and already the Dungeon Master has ruined my fun.  But let’s get to the crux of the issue here: point buy encourages “min/maxing”: the practice of trying to achieve maximal outcome with minimal input.  Also known as “munchkin-ing”, or just plain ol’ “gaming the system”, or god forbid “optimization”, once you implement a system of checks and balances and trading you will inevitably have players with “dump stats”: dudes walking around with a charisma score of 3 so that they could put all of their points into intelligence and become the greatest nose-picking wizard of all time.  In what would be considered a fitting twist of irony, the character that is built tends to be an accurate reflection of the player playing it.

Holy cow, apparently I'm not alone on this

 

Lest we forget: Dungeons and Dragons is a GAME.  The point is fun, NOT winning.  “It’s not whether you win or lose: it’s how you play the game”, was such a simple lesson taught to us, and for those of you chuckleheads who can’t have fun unless you win OR those of you overdramatic blowhards that love comparing a game to warfare: stuff it, no one likes playing with you and your black and white memes on facebook are trite.  In fact, being “built to win” frequently REMOVES the fun from the game, as suddenly the element of challenge is gone, and what should have been a unique and interesting encounter requiring much problem solving and creativity instead turns into a six second suckfest solved with an overinflated fireball from the dude whose character can lob level 8 spells as a level 1 character due to loophole shenanigans but has to have someone carry his spellbook for him because his strength score is effectively in the negative.  Are we having fun yet?

 

When you roll a character, you inevitably end up with a SUB-optimal character.  I know that term “sub-optimal” just sent shivers down the spine of several readers, as we seem to exist in a society where anything less than optimal is considered worthless garbage not even worth taking into consideration, but the reality is that ALL of us are sub-optimal beings living sub-optimal existences…which is what makes us unique, interesting and, dare I say, entertaining and fun!  A character with 18s in all stats is simply not a fun character to play: the solutions are too obvious and there is no need for strategy.  But when you roll a character that’s a bunch of 12s, some 8s and a 16, you suddenly find yourself having to think on your feet, strategize, and maximize the strength YOU have.  And, in turn, victory is ALL the more sweeter.  There is no applause given to the bio-engineered supersoldier that obliterates the cavern of goblins in 1 round: that is the expectation for such a ridiculous specimen.  But when the gnome-ish fighter draws his blade across the throat of an orc that he had absolutely NO business going toe-to-toe with due to his limited strength and constitution, he is a true hero, and a legend among his people. 

If this fight went the other way, no one would care

 

In your training, in your nutrition, in your life: roll a character.  Quit trying to point buy your existence: not everything needs to be optimized, min/maxed and tricked out.  You’re missing out on the “fun” of it all, and you’re spending SO much time tweaking your character sheet that you’re not actually playing the game.  When you roll your stats, you can move on with your life and actually PLAY.  And from there you can wing it as needed: you can adapt your sub-optimal stats to your sub-optimal situation and try to come up with a nearly optimal outcome.  And you get to have your own unique experience among the way, giving you your own stories to tell when you and your fellow adventurers (read: nerds) get together to share.      

PROGRAM REVIEW: BUILDING THE MONOLITH ROUND 2

  

**INTRO**

 

As part of my participation in my own 6 month training block for hypertrophy comprised of 5/3/1 BBB Beefcake, 5/3/1 Building the Monolith and Deep Water Beginner and Intermediate, I found myself once again accomplishing one of the most brutal programs I’d ever run: Building the Monolith.  I’ve done an extensive write up of my experience the first time I ran this, but for summary: it’s the first program that ever made me want to quit.  On day 1 of the first week, after it was all said and done, and I spent about 15 minutes in the shower staring at my feet wondering what I had gotten myself in to.  This time, I came in prepared, having a much better idea of what was in store for me, and, in turn, how I wanted to do things this time around.  I am going to detail the various modifications I’ve made along with my experiences and the outcome.

 

**NUTRITION**

Not as much of this this time around

When I originally ran the program, I did my best to abide by the rules of “a dozen eggs and 1.5lbs of ground beef a day”.  I ended up more along the lines of 8-12 eggs a day and 2-2.5lbs of meat a day (not necessarily ground beef, but sometimes steak, ribs, chops, roast, etc).  Eating that way, I put on 4.5lbs in 6 weeks, didn’t accumulate any noticeable bodyfat, and was well recovered for every workout.  I knew it worked…and, in turn, had no real need to prove it again.  Instead, I stuck with what I had been doing for BBB Beefcake and what I intend to do for Deep Water: my “Deep Mountain” approach to eating.  Effectively using Jon Andersen’s Deep Water as the frame work, but also abiding by John Meadows “Mountain Dog Diet” principles regarding nutrition sources.  In addition, I’d allow myself some things that weren’t Deep Water approved but WERE Mountain Dog approved (specifically organic wild blueberries and dark chocolate). 

 

As a shift worker, my nutrition could get a little wild.  This is what a day of working the early shift looked like the morning that I pushed the prowler for training.

 

* 0315: Wake up, eat 2 whole organic free range eggs/1 egg white (eyeballed) mixed with 2.25oz of grassfed organic New York strip steak, half an avocado, some grassfed butter and grassfed organic sour cream and fat free cheese, along with a keto waffle slathered with a heaping serving of organic sunbutter (no sugar added) and sugar free apricot preserves.  1 cup of cashew milk.

 

* 0330-0430 Training

 

* 0430: 8oz drinkable egg whites mixed with 1 scoop of protein powder and a serving of "amazing grass" greens supplement

 

* 0500: 3/4 cup fat free greek yogurt mixed with a protein scoop of Naked PB powder and 1/3 cup of wild blueberries (sadly, these seem to be tearing up my guts, so I’ll be dropping them soon) with a small amount of fat free whipped cream, cinnamon and salt.

 

* 0600: 1 lite n fit yogurt and 1 oikos triple zero yogurt with an energy drink

 

* 0630: 1 mini reese's dark chocolate peanut butter cup

 

* 0700: 1 quest bar

 

* 0730: 1 lilly's sugar free dark chocolate peanut butter cup

 

* 0800: Organic deli turkey and sliced ham sandwich on keto bread w/lettuce, tomato, pickle, mustard and walden's zero cal mayo

 

* 0900: 5 small mushrooms, 2 mini peppers and a slice of organic deli turkey

 

* 1000: Costco brand "healthy noodles" mixed with organic ground turkey and no sugar added tomato pasta sauce (11oz of total product)

 

* 1100: 110 calorie/26g protein Ahi tuna packet

 

* 1200: 5 small mushrooms, 2 mini peppers and a slice of ham

 

* 1300: 6 walnuts, 6 macadamia nuts, and a square of 92% dark chocolate

 

* 1400: 8.5oz of organic ground turkey breast fajitas w/ 1/4 avocado (no shell, cooked without oil)

 

* 1500: 1 archer country grass-fed mini beef stick

 

* 1530: 1 more of those beef sticks

 

* 1600: 8.5oz of those fajitas w/ 1/4 avocado

 

* 1930 1/3 cup of grassfed organic cottage cheese mixed with 2 organic free range whole eggs, 1.75oz of grassfed beef, 3 celery stalks w/nuts n more spread, a slice of keto bread with organic almond or peanut butter with some more apricot spread, and a keto brownie made with olive oil, along with a cup of cashew milk.

 

This is exhausting just to write out, let alone eat.  I’m effectively eating something every half hour, primarily because training like this makes me hungry as hell and I’m eating to recover from training.  It’s a lot of quality nutrients, and I’m proud of myself for not relying on “dirt” to get me through.  I started allotting myself a weekly cheat meal, typically on Friday nights, but these were not the eating binges I used to engage in, and instead just a time to enjoy a yummy meal with my family.  Frequently it was an 8” keto pizza at a local place along with some curly fries.  I saw pronounced benefits in my physique and performance by including this.

 

**CONDITIONING**

Being in good shape helps make this suck a little less...but only a little

Conditioning is where people tend to screw up BtM.  Primarily because they don’t do it.  Jim says point blank “Conditioning or cardio is mandatory – 3-4 times/week” in the article where BtM originates, but I find many trainees never actually read the article and just opt for spreadsheets, apps, and other lazy approaches.  Laziness begets inferior results, and it’s also why people balk at the diet: yeah, if all you do is lift weights 3x a week, that diet is too much.  If you’re lifting weights 3x a week AND doing conditioning 3-4x a week, you are TRAINING, and you need calories.  Consequently, this was something I discovered about BtM the first time that I subsequently forgot about and re-discovered: you’re pretty much LIVING training for 6 weeks on this program.  You train every single day of the week.  You miss a day?  Now you’re playing catch up.  It can really grind on your mind.

 

All that said, I went hardcore on conditioning this time around.  My rule was to do what Jim recommended as the minimum, and then, after that, I could do what I wanted.  An “eat your vegetables first” approach.  So yes: I DID push the prowler with 90% of my bodyweight on it for 10 trips of 40 yards with 60 seconds rest between sets….and built up to 14 trips with 45 seconds rest.  I DID go on a 2 mile weighted vest walk with 80lbs…and built up to an incline treadmill walk starting at a 9 incline and working up to a 10.5 for 2.5 miles.  I sold my Airdyne before that was cool to do, so instead of that I did my Juarez Valley front squat workout detailed during BBB Beefcake (to review: front squat a weight for 8-10 reps, do 5 six count burpees, then do 1 rep of front squats, 5 burpees, now do 1 fewer front squat rep than the topset, 5 burpees, 2 front squats, 5 burpees, continue the trend until you meet in the middle), as I found it had a similar effect to cycling regarding helping my legs heal.  I’d chase that particular workout with a belt squat stripset.

 

But on top of all of this, I did a lot of WOD style workouts.  I’d always do Crossfit’s “Grace” workout with an axle the day I did Workout 1 for the week, and ended up setting a lifetime PR of 2:46, along with SEVERAL sub-3 minute times while on the program.  I had Fran regularly included in the rotation, using strict chins vs kipping ones, but also found myself researching other crazy WODs that could be done with just a barbell, bodyweight, dumbbells and a kettlebell and just running it.  I did some sort of conditioning EVERY day, and often multiple conditioning workouts a day on top of the lifting.  Once again, COVID has made it that there really isn’t much else for me to do, and I have a solid home gym set-up, so I’m making the most of it.

 

**THE LIFTING**

Did this a WHOLLLLLLE lot

To start with, I used the following equipment.

* On weeks 1, 3, 4 and 6, I pressed with the Ironmind Apollon’s axle for all workouts.  On weeks 2 and 5, I used the Titan 12” log for the third workout of the week.

* On weeks 1, 3, 4 and 6, I used a Texas deadlift bar for deadlifting.  On weeks 2 and 5, I used a Texas Power Bar.

* For all bench workouts, I used the Apollon’s axle.

* For all squatting, I used the Ironmind Buffalo Bar.

* For shrugs, I used the Ironmind Apollon’s axle and set it up against bands

* Used the same axle for curls

* For chins, I used a multi-grip station that attached to my Titan rack, and used an Ironmind belt and loading pin to add weight

 

And I executed the program with the following modifications.

 

* Once again, I made extensive use of giant and supersets to make the workouts faster.  I’m not going to go into the full on details, but big movements were paired with one others (squats, chins and presses, deadlifts and benching, etc).  I was able to knock out everything in week 1 in under an hour again, so I didn’t feel a need to keep timing myself after that.

* I took the widowmaker set on the 3^rd lifting day beyond 20 reps, getting very near failure on many of them.  The initially had me in the 30+ range, and as weight went up, reps went down, but it was still a total ballbuster.  I contemplated turning it into a set of breathing squats instead, but with Deep Water on the horizon, I wanted to train my ability to execute high rep squats.

 

Second week’s widowmaker

 

Final week’s widowmaker

* I took all presses from the floor with only 2 exceptions: the topset of presses on weeks 3 and 6, workout 1 were taken out of the rack.  For the first workout of the week, I’d take the weight off the floor and press away.  For the 3^rd workout of the week, I’d take all REPS off the floor, and use a “touch and go” clean approach to REALLY keep the back under tension.  And on those weeks I used the log, I viper pressed each rep.  The intent on this was the make pressing VERY full body and increase the intensity of the training with the goal of making it even more hypertrophic (holy hell that’s a real word). 

* All deadlifts were touch and go.  I’ve written about this several times, but if your goal is to build muscle, you wanna pull touch and go.   Your body stays under load for MUCH longer that way.

* Curls were done as Poundstone curls (1 single set), with an unloaded axle getting to 160 reps and an axle loaded with 2.5lbs per side taken to 103 reps. 

* I paused benches when possible.  Pretty much any time I could make things harder, I would.

* Shrugs were done against bands.  It’s how I like to do them, because it’s a lot easier than loading up a few million plates.

* After the day 1 workout was done, I’d do a stripset of lateral raises for a total of 80 reps.

* After the day 2 workout was done, on days I had time, I’d do an incline DB bench stripset.

* On top of all of this, I was still doing my daily work of 50 dips, 50 chins, 50 band pull aparts, 40 bodyweight reverse hypers, 30 GHRs, 25 band pull aparts, 20 standing ab wheels, and 11 neck bridges in 4 directions (forward, backward, left and right).  If a workout included any of the daily work, I wouldn’t double up on it, but otherwise I made sure to hit these numbers minimum each day.

 

**MY EXPERIENCE/RESULTS**

Once again, my intent in running this program was to have training that was hard enough to force me to eat to recover, and this did exactly that.  Picking the right TM goes a long way, because week 3 and 6’s numbers are both so daunting that you spend 2 weeks going “Oh f**k” while you eat and train as hard as you can to ensure that you’ll be able to meet the mark when the time comes.

 

What I found interesting about this time around was that BtM felt more like an intensification phase vs an accumulation phase after running BBB Beefcake first.  Beefcake had lots of reps while the intensity was on the lower end, whereas BtM had high intensity sets across and had me moving much heavier loads.  Sure: the assistance work was heartier, but the main/supplemental work stayed heavy while the volume was on the low side.  I actually think this makes the two programs pair VERY well together, and, under the “leader/anchor” construct, I think this is a solid way to about training the two.  Prior to BBB Beefcake, I was running SVR II, and I think that might actually be a sound way to structure some long training blocks, and may even be what I end up doing once this whole phase is over.

 

The modifications really drove home some hypertrophy demands, specifically taking the widowmaker sets far and cleaning each rep on the 10+ sets of cleans.  This put some heavily metabolic demands on my body, and made all that nutrition valuable.  The heavy emphasis on conditioning continued that.

 

Once again, I did not weigh myself throughout this process, but my lifts went up and my body grew as a result of eating the get through the program, and that’s ultimately what matters.  I am primed and ready for Deep Water.

 

Some photos

 

Start of program

 

 

End of program

 

 

 

 

 

BOOK REVIEW: “SCRAWNY TO BRAWNY” BY JOHN BERARDI AND MICHAEL MEJIA

 

Time for another book review.  I stumbled across this book as part of my voracious reading of all things related to eating to gain weight, as, once again, my obsessive tendencies tend to get the best of me (and I fully appreciate the pun of relating reading to voraciousness in a discussion of eating), and seeing Berardi’s name peaked my interest.  I’ve been a fan of the dude ever since I read about his involvement in Dave Tate’s initial transformation from fat and dying to jacked and dying slower, and having been a member of the t-nation forums since 2007 (once again, I have to take a moment to reflect on how goddamn old I am becoming) I’ve already had much exposure to Berardi’s work and found it gelled well with my own perspective (I WAS going to say I found him palatable, but I’ve already done enough dumb puns).  I had no idea who Michael Mejia was, but was willing to take the risk with Berardi’s name attached.

 

WHAT THIS BOOK IS

This is something you woulda found in a Borders...back when that was a thing

The intent of the book is incredibly on the nose: transform the reader from scrawny to brawny.  It’s a book for “hardgainers”, which has ALWAYS held a special place in my heart.  I never considered myself a hardgainer, but the opposite as an endomorph (oh boy I upset a lot of nerds by bringing up the somatypes, but stuff it for a second) in that I seem to put on tissue quite easily, whether it be fat or muscle.  I was a fat kid growing up as a result of my natural bottomless appetite for everything, which is why I tend to gravitate toward lower carb diets, as its far easier to overhead on carbs than on protein and fats in my experience.  All that said, I like hardgainer books because my thought process “growing up” in lifting was: if this works for hardgainers, it must work REALLY well for everyone else.  That, of course, turned out to be kinda sorta true, but my recent forays into insanely stupid high volume training have shown that there are many ways to skin cats.

 

Ok, that intro got away from me, but point being: it’s a book aimed at transforming small, thin and lanky dudes into big and strong ones.  It is broken into 2 sections: one on training and one on nutrition.  Berardi helms the nutrition section, while I infer from the reading that Mejia is who heads up the training portion, but with frequent nod’s to Berardi along the way.

 

WHAT I LIKED

For starters, it is far more nuanced than this

* Despite me talking about the book being for hardgainers, the authors are quick to dismiss that term, which is a great paradigm breaker.  They utilize somatypes, which, again, upsets a certain nerd contingent on the internet, but they also go on to explain how the “science” behind determining somatypes was pretty goofy but that it can STILL be a useful means to describe a trainee: in this case, long of limb and thin of frame.  They even go on to explain how many instances of “fast metabolisms” are a result of poor eating habits along with general propensity to engage in non-exercise activity that burns calories (even something as simple as fidgeting or just being generally more active).   

 

* This is one of those “all in one” books that I really appreciate.  It’s nice to be able to give a trainee ONE product and say “read this and you’ll be good”.  And this one actually delivers.  It contains a 4 phased lifting program AND a very well structured nutrition protocol to support it.  I’ll discuss both in more detail below.

 

* The training protocol goes through an initial phase of structural assessment for the trainee.  It addresses postural issues and muscle imbalances and contains a training protocol to address and correct them.  As much as it upsets me that such a thing would even be necessary for a trainee, it’s a sad fact: most trainees are in too poor of shape to even train in the first place.  I attribute this to a lack of “play” during childhood along with lacking participation in sports growing up.  This should be REALLY helpful in overcoming the millions of “I’ve tried squatting for 4 years and I STILL can’t do it right” complaints that one tends to see in underperforming trainees.  This section ALSO contains information on how a long limbed/lanky trainee can modify big compound movements to better suit their anatomy.  I dig that for sure.  If one doesn’t want to powerlift, they don’t need to do the powerlifts, or do it like a powerlifter. 

Don't get me wrong: you CAN still lift big if you're tall...but still

 

* As I don’t ever tend to speak to a training protocol I haven’t personally tested, I can’t vouch for if what is in the book will work or be of any value, but it at least appears well thought out, intelligently designed, and with a purpose.  It’s not a routine but an actual program, and the authors do their best to guide you through it.  The first phase is fixing postural issues, then it’s about growing muscle, then there is a strength based phase, and then you go from full body training to a split program in the final phase that is supposed to take advantage of that strength phase and really drive home some hypertrophy.

 

* I found the nutrition section to be absolutely superb.  It holds the hand of the trainee, which is exactly what needs to happen in a book like this, telling them exactly what to buy at the grocery store and how to cook it.  It also goes into the details of meal prep regarding how to prepare MULTIPLE means at once, down to the basic logistics (“start the oven, while it warms, chop the veggies, etc etc).  So many underweight trainees are there because they lack very basic cooking and shopping skills, and this gives it to them.  HOWEVER, Berardi also does a great job helping to ween the trainee into self-sufficiency, explaining what food substitutes are acceptable, how macronutrients work, etc etc. 

 

* The nutrition matches the training, which, of course, I am huge on.  As the training phases ramps up, so does the nutrition, and Berardi explains how to make simple additions to previously established meals in order to meet these goals.  It’s simple and effective.  You can also observe elements of basic carb cycling as it relates to what is consumed on training days vs non-training days.

 

 

 

WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE

Aged about as well as this

* Mejia and Berardi are yet another set of cringe inducing authors, along the line of Josh Bryant.  The book was written in the mid-2000s, and it lets you know that with frequent pop-culture references that have aged poorly (“this is like scoring a date with Britney Spears”), which honestly speaks to the idea that there was no intent for this book to “go the distance”.  They also spend a LOT of time hammering “comedic” analogies will past the point of any value to the dialogue.  I can’t tell if they did that with the hopes of padding the book out to be longer, or if they thought the attempt at comedy would make the book more enjoyable, but it lands flat more often than not.  I’ve said it the past few reviews now, but these days, I wanna read from an author who lifts vs a lifter who authors.  Paul Kelso spoiled me that way.

 

* Once again, I caught myself reading passages of the book and having significant déjà vu, only to realize it was because I had read these passages previously as articles on t-nation.  It just leaves a bad taste in my mouth when a “book” is really just taking a bunch of articles and putting it in one spot.  This most likely dates back to when I spent $40 on the Elitefts Basic Training Manual only to get it and find out it was all the articles I had already read on Elitefts put into a spiralbound paperback.  That said, the whole book isn’t previously released articles, and does contain some original content.

 

* I skipped significant sections on the discussion on anatomical structures.  I’m sure that interests some people, but I just plain don’t care.

 

SHOULD YOU BUY IT?

Don't be like these dudes

If you are the intended audience for this book, you absolutely owe it to yourself to pick it up.  It’s going to set you up very well for success.  If you’re already an experienced trainee, there’s nothing in this you don’t already know, but I still enjoyed the nutrition section immensely.  If nothing else, you old souls may just get the entertainment value out of it I did of reading about mistakes trainees have made, nodding, agreeing and smiling thinking about how you made those exact same mistakes. 

ON MASOCHISM

  

I am fairly certain I’ve already written about this before, but that’s what happens when you write 1000 words a week for a year.  That said, maybe this will help clear some stuff up, because I STILL get accused of being a masochist, and it honestly chaps me just like when I get told I have “superior genetics” (I have those special kind of genetics that only kick in after you train really hard for 2 decades that make you look like the dudes that have really good genetics that train hard for 2 years…yeah…).  We’ll take out minds out of the gutters for a little bit here and discuss masochism outside of it’s more wildly known sexual proclivity and just define it as someone that enjoys pain.  Basically, their brains are wired backwards, and the sensations that most people try to avoid are the sensations that a masochist enjoys and, in turn, tends to seek out.  People observe the training brutality I inflict upon myself and inevitably conclude that I must be some sort of masochist: there I am, living through constant pain and suffering, totally different from how other people conduct themselves: I’m clearly a deviant.  Folks: being a masochist would COMPLETELY miss the point: if we want to be bigger and stronger, we need to AVOID masochism.

Although Juggernaut IS rocking that gimp suit...

 

Why is that?  Because the process of getting bigger and stronger is the process of doing things you DON’T enjoy.  This is true on a physical level and on a psychological level as well.  Look at the average human: they live an existence where they ONLY do things they enjoy.  They eat the foods they want to eat, sleep the amount they want to sleep, and engage in the leisure activities that they want to engage in.  The ultimate comedy of this existence is that so many humans are UNHAPPY despite the fact that they are living in a constant state of feeding their Id, but therein lies the rub: doing things you enjoy does NOT make you stronger or better and, in fact, makes you soft, weak, and ultimately “less than”.  This is why children have parents: we as a species are DOOMED when left to our own devices and function much better when a sovereign that understands our true “best interests” can be there to guide us.  A child will eat gummy bears for dinner: their parent forces them to eat some veggies.  This is also why most social contract writers did NOT leave much room for individual personal liberties.

 

Ok, that’s getting super rambly and weird, but my regular readers most likely get where I’m going (similar to how, if you read enough Louie Simmons stuff, you somehow can make sense of it all).  What we understand from that is, when we engage in the things we enjoy, all we end up doing is lighting up the little dopamine centers in our brain and our “reward” is that good feeling.  And like a drug, the dosage has to keep getting upped to keep getting that good feeling, which results in a perpetual cycle of doing the things that make us WORSE so that we can keep feeling better.  To actually BECOME better, rather than simply FEEL better, one must engage on those things they DON’T enjoy.  “Character building”, as it was referred to by Calvin’s father (not of predestination acclaim but of the Bill Waters variety): the process of improving the self through denial and the endurance of misery.  The ascetics (no: NOT “aesthetics”, which is stupid) reached a similar conclusion: self-improvement through self-denial.  The opposite of hedonism: we don’t engage in personal debauchery but instead in denial of the self in order to reach “higher states”.

"And a DIET coke please!"

 

So wouldn’t being a masochist be an advantage here?  Again: no!  That’s the point: a masochist is engaging in things they ENJOY when they experience pain and suffering…which means they’re not “strengthening” themselves at all.  They’re debasing themselves.  They MAY enjoy some physical benefits manifesting as a result of pushing themselves to extremes in training, such as improvement of musculature or perhaps extreme leanness in the light of enjoying the suffering of dieting, but there’s no actual “strengthening” occurring: we’re simply observing a DIFFERENT variant of hedonism.  And where this comes to bear is when the time comes to actually knuckle down and do something challenging: the masochist has only been doing this because it’s fun, and when the fun is over, the willpower isn’t there to carry forward.  Meanwhile, the individual that has NOT been enjoying this process has been going through various repetitions of experiencing misery AS misery, not trying to warp it into pleasure but actually allowing themselves to feel the discomfort and struggle that comes with that sensation, and, in turn, has developed all the necessary tools to be able to carry on, move forward, and drive through.  They actually got “stronger”.

 

In truth, the most advantageous thing one could be in the pursuit of getting bigger and stronger is a HEDONIST: not a masochist.  If one truly enjoys the very basic physical pleasures of life, yummy food and physical leisure, then they were grow IMMENSLEY through regular physical training and solid nutrition.  Every training session is an opportunity to grow stronger IN TOTAL, every single meal is an opportunity to grow physically and otherwise: the hedonist is undergoing constant character building and strengthening with even the most basic of engagement in this approach.  The masochist, meanwhile, is at significant disadvantage: the very things meant to strengthen them, instead, make them weaker IN TOTAL, as it’s simply acting in self-debasement. 

Like this for example

 

Again I say: I am NOT a masochist.  I do NOT enjoy training.  At least once per training session I catch myself saying “I’d rather be anywhere but here right now”, along with a much more abbreviated “f**k me” after a particularly challenging set.  I also catch my mind drifting during heavy conditioning, making promises to myself that I’ll quit soon, which, in turn, forces me to do even MORE work to chase that weakness out of myself.  I have had meltdowns driving by a Taco Bell drivethrough, because my true self desires a nacho-based nutrition protocol and I am SO goddamn sick of eating vegetables.  This is not an enjoyable process, but that’s the whole point: I’m here to enjoy the RESULTS, NOT the process.  Enjoying the process is what results in being average, and the average person, in turn, is NOT enjoying themselves.  They are disappointed with what they are, for they are the outcome of someone who only does what they enjoy.  If you, instead, dedicate yourself to DOING what you don’t enjoy, you will be able to spend time BEING what you do enjoy: someone that is strong.

WHAT ARE THE ODDS?

  

A big pet peeve of mine (which my regular readers will understand that, ultimately, everything I write about is a pet peeve, and with so many pets it’s more like a zoo of peeves…but already I’ve digressed from my own point) is when I see a trainee phrase the following style of question: “I just watched a bunch of videos of guys dropping benches on their chests/rupturing their biceps/tearing hamstrings/passing out while deadlifting/etc etc…HOW DO I PREVENT THIS?!”  This, of course, annoys me on many levels, to the point that the only course of actions I find to be acceptable is to simply not engage, as to otherwise speak to them would result in non-productive dialogue.  One of the biggest issues I have with this is I wonder how these humans manage to simply function on a day-to-day level when they live in such abject and consistent fear of their environment.  You see something dangerous, and now you wonder how you can avoid it…but we see dangerous stuff happen ALL the time.  Have you ever seen a car accident before?  How come you haven’t sworn off driving?  You ever watch the news and see someone get hit by a car?  Why haven’t you sworn off walking?  Listeria outbreak: you aren’t swearing off fruits and veggies (HAH!  Jokes on me: you don’t eat them anyway).  Why is it that you’re only worried about these specific and rare instances of failure?

...ok, but seriously, what are the odds of Randy Johnson obliterating TWO pigeons?

 

But let’s dive even further into this.  You just want to be as safe as possible…but do you REALLY?  Do you have an anti-slip mat in your shower?  Slip and falls in the shower kill scores of people: way more than errant bench presses.  Do you ever go over the speed limit?  Ever talk on the phone, text, or listen to the radio while driving?  Or ever drive when you’re sleepy?  Or not come to a full and complete stop at a stop sign?  Do you realize how many people die from car accidents for failure to follow very basic driving rules and laws?  Ever not chew your food adequately?  People die from choking on food so much it’s downright ridiculous.  And oh my god, if you’re drinking alcohol or taking recreational drugs and wanna talk to me about the safety of using mixed grip on deadlifts I’m gonna have a hearty chuckle here.  I think you have a severely compromised concept of “risk assessment”.  You’ve taken something that has an incredibly low probability of occurring and devoted a high level of energy in preventing it while, in turn, dedicating a very low amount of energy into preventing the maladies that have a HIGH percentage of occurring.

 

But no, let’s go EVEN further.  Why is it that, when you see a video of someone tearing a bicep on a deadlift you go “THAT COULD HAPPEN TO ME!  I need to know what to do to prevent it!”, but if I go and show you a video or share a story with you about a trainee that worked hard and ate well for years and turned into an absolute monster you go “PSH!  Genetics, good luck, unfair advantages: that could NEVER happen to me?”  Why is it that you’re so assured that you are guaranteed the unfortunate aspects of training but have no possibility of achieving the POSITIVE aspects?  I mean…SOMEONE has to receive one or the other…right?

Don't let yourself get beaten by a space lobster

 

Catastrophic failure AND excessive victory are simply opposite sides of the same bell curve of training: most trainees are going to fall in the middle, while some will fall on one side and some on the other.  The odds are, in fact, low that you’ll achieve the extreme ends, but for f**k’s sake: why assume you’ll come out on the bad side if you’re going to assume you’re an outlier?  At LEAST assume that you’re average and that you’ll probably never have to worry about excessive failures or victories, but if you’re going to assume you’re special, assume it in a POSITIVE way, because the power of positive thinking IS real, and it’s the element you’ll find common in those that DO achieve that excessive victory in the end.  Sure, not everyone gets to be elite, but in the same token, not everyone gets to be a massive failure as well, so why not leave the latter to those who want it.  You, instead, choose to want to be on the extreme side of victory.

 

Because guess what the end result of dedicating all of your energy to “not failing” is?  It’s certainly not victory: its mediocrity.  If all you do in dodgeball is dodge, you’re eventually going to get tagged out: at one point you need to actually throw a ball.  So why dedicate your energy toward preventing an incredibly rare instance of catastrophic failure when you could, instead, dedicate that SAME amount of energy toward achieving a ridiculous degree of victory?  The payoff for the latter is SO much greater than the payoff for the former, and it’s the same energy invested.  The time you spend researching prevention is the same amount of time you could spend researching action, the energy you invest in “safe training” is energy you can invest in ridiculous over the top excessive training that gets excessive results.  And if you’re in that middle of the bell curve, neither will matter, but hell, at least you were TRYING to succeed this whole time vs simply not fail.  Because hey, not everyone gets to win the lottery, but the people who DON’T play will NEVER win it, while those that do play at LEAST have a chance.

God I miss the 90s...

 

Strive to be the guy that, when people see you, they don’t ask “how can I keep that from happening”, but, instead “how do I make THAT happen”    

ODE TO THE BARBARIAN

 Anyone that has followed my writing knows that I am a fan of barbarians, the barbarian, and barbarism in general.  I have written on many occasions why the barbarian is the ideal class in Dungeons and Dragons and have annoyed many of my friends with my unwillingness to play other classes.  But I feel it’s time for others to really look deep and understand that they too owe a level of appreciation and, dare I say, gratitude to the noble (or otherwise) barbarian.  Despite what you may believe, there is a fair chance that you have much to thank the barbarian for.

 

CONAN

For those of you that actually read the stories by Rob Howard, you already have much to be thankful for, as Conan served as a fantastic philosopher and role model of physicality, masculinity, and simplicity in manner.  But to be real, we all REALLY have Arnold to thank for his portrayal OF Conan

 

How can this be both timeless AND pure 80s?

 

Though not his film DEBUT, this was unquestionably Arnold’s breakthrough role, and with it he ushered in an era where “excessive” musculature was celebrated and pursued.  Sure, there was some other Hollywood hunks prior to Arnold, but they were few and far between and simply did not have the “gravitas” of the future California governor.  Additionally, this was an era where bodybuilding was still considered a freakshow oddity, and building muscle purely for the sake of having it was vain and taboo.  Oh sure: you could build muscle if you were playing sports, but even then, you weren’t supposed to do it with those nasty weights: it was just supposed to happen organically through the playing of sports and employment of calisthenics.

 

And then Arnold exploded on the screen and the whole world changed…

 

Do you remember where you were when the film flashed forward on the Wheel of Pain and Conan had grown into a man?  Do you remember just how in awe you were?  Do you remember wanting to spend a decade yourself grinding away at the wheel?  And then do you remember learning that Arnold had to LOSE muscle for the role?  Because he was so goddamn big that it would have been comical to have him absolutely dwarfing his adversaries?  Well you weren’t alone, and you’ll find that many MANY successful athletes today accredit that VERY film with inspiring them to pursue getting bigger and stronger.  Every red blooded male at that point wanted to be Conan, and if not him, some other Arnold vehicle, or Rocky, or Rambo, or Van Damme: the dominos had started to fall, and it had become obvious now that the pursuit of size and strength was a reasonable and nobly barbaric pursuit.

 

Thank you Conan.

 

THE BARBARIAN BROTHERS

Once again, overhead pressing is the key

Peter and David Paul don’t get to enjoy the same esteem as Arnold in regards to making muscle awesome again, and, in fact, they were very much the beneficiaries of Arnold’s Conan contribution to the world.  And yes, they also attempted forays in to the “swords and sorcery” world that had exploded as a result of Arnold’s work (hell, even Arnold effectively parodied himself with “Red Sonja”), but it is not the Barbarian Brothers work in cinema for what we owe them thanks, but instead for one quote.  One MAGNIFICANT quote.

 

“There is no overtraining: just undereating”

When in doubt...

 

I love this quote, primarily because, whenever I share it, it upsets a LOT of people and, as a misanthrope, that seems like something that should please me.  However, along with that, I love the quote because of how true it is and the message that it communicates.  So many trainees are so absolutely terrified of overtraining that they suffer the opposite: they UNDERtrain.  And there exists a VERY interesting correlation between a fear of overtraining AND a fear of “getting fat”, resulting in birdlike eating as trainees attempt to operate under the THINNEST of margins for weight gain, in some sort of hope to min/max the gaining process.  Here we are talking DnD terms again, and once again: the noble barbarian rises above all and requires no special build, feats or hacking to hit something really hard until it dies.  If these very trainees would dedicate themselves to training as hard as absolutely possible and then turn right around and dedicate themselves to EATING as absolutely hard as possible, they would witness the type of results that would have people questioning their biology, genetics, and chemistry.  Which is something the “nattyorjuice” crowd just will never be able to grasp: you simply can’t quantify the benefits of hard work both in AND out of the gym.

 

My current training and nutrition is very much exemplifying this: I am training at the LEAST 2 times a day, but very often 3 and sometimes even 4 times a day.  COVID has still wrecked the world, and I have little else to do.  Any time I’m not training, I’m EATING.  I’m at the point where I eat something every half hour at work (packing for work has, in turn, become quite laborious) and I am STILL hungry.  I eat a huge meal before bed and wake up at 0300 from hunger.  When I go to bed, I dream of my breakfast, and after I eat my breakfast I start lifting (often having done a quick fasted conditioning session BEFORE breakfast), and halfway through the workout I’M HUNGRY.  I eat WHILE I’m cooking the next meal.  As long as I am not undereating, I won’t be overtraining, and meanwhile, as long as I’m training THIS goddamn hard and eating THIS goddamn much, the results have been, and will continue to be, absolutely bonkers.

 

THE BARBARIAN

Who needs armor anyway?

And finally, an ode to barbarians themselves, who have existed so long as culture itself has existed.  There have always been those “outside the gates”: the unclean, the uncivilized, the uncultured.  For them we owe thanks, for they were the ones who challenged the status quo enough to force change to occur.  Weather change occurred through the intermingling of cultures, through the self-reflection that occurs when one observes something outside of themselves, or through forceful, sudden and rapid change as a result of the toppling of nations and ending of regimes, the barbarian has served as the necessary “cultural brushfire” that eliminated the excess, brought us back to basics, and forced us to start again.  Sometimes it resulted in the ushering in of dark ages, but in such darkness new light could shine: light that had previously been stifled by old paradigms, “the way things are”, vested authority figures, etc etc.  When the classless hold nothing sacred, when the Vikings pull up on the shores of monasteries and slaughter monks and take gold, when Germanic mercenaries infest the ranks of the legion and hold no loyalty to any king or commander, suddenly all those things we “knew” become immaterial and we are forced to start again and find NEW principles, values, and guiding lights…and often times these prove to be superior.  We simply needed that “push”.

 

Launch your own barbarian invasion: tear down the walls of your own society and let nothing sacred survive.  Rebuild your society from the ashes and find out what was hearty enough to withstand the barbaric hordes.  And perhaps ONLY barbarism is what survives…and you could do far FAR worse than that.