I think I've realized part of what makes people enjoy life is actually using their brain. Many will claim that they simply want to relax and not have to put much mental energy into things, but honestly, I think that's the exact opposite of what they really want. Now, this is admittedly a bit of an N=1 study, so take it for what it's worth, but many of the people I know who are unhappy with their jobs, and almost by extension, their lives, work in jobs that are almost unskilled labor. Before I go any further, this doesn't mean these people are unskilled or dumb. Quite the opposite, which is why I think it is such an issue for them. The job may require quite a bit of training, possibly even a degree or 2, but in the end, it is a job where the requirements are pretty plainly outlined - they get orders, follow the steps, and spit out the product. They have nowhere to think outside the box, because the box has been very clearly created for them. Do not deviate from the plan. Because of that, while their brain does have to work to remember the steps and what to do, the brain is not having new thoughts. It is simply a re-hashing of old ones. There is no creativity, no place for coming up with something new. Even trying to generate new strategies can be met with resistance, and as such, things continue along, in a "production line" fashion.
Unless they switch careers or find an outlet for this creativity, these people will forever be unhappy. I've never thought of myself as an overly creative person in the classic sense of creating art or writing fiction books. Those things just don't really happen for me, as I tend to be a more science and math-oriented person - I work well off facts, and being creative within that framework. Don't misunderstand - there are others in my field far more creative than myself. And with more understanding will come more creativity, I am sure. But the fact that I even have that leeway, I think, contributes to my overall well-being.
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Training Log
Military press - 135 - 6x3, 1x10
Felt like hot garbage yesterday, through nobody's fault but my own. Slept in later than I wanted, decided I wasn't going to eat before lifting, which wouldn't have been so bad, except by the time I got around to lifting I was starving, so I went and got some breakfast pizza, let that settle, then went at it. Again, it's what I get for being a dipshit.
Onto another rant, though.
Why the fuck do people surround themselves with negativity? Everything they watch, everything they read, the way they talk and act - it's all centered around negativity. And then these same people will decry that the world is out to get them, that nothing good could ever possibly happen to them. And if you present them with an alternate option? A chance to change things? Nope, can't be done. All is shit. The world hates them.
Fuck them. I leave them in my dust. People are sometimes awed by how positive I am about things. I have my moments of negativity, don't get me wrong. But I CHOOSE to surround myself with positivity. The people I read, the things I watch, the things I listen to. Doesn't mean I avoid reality, or anything with an alternate view. But when you really step back, you realize that it really is all about framing. How you choose to view the things that happen to you.
You can accept them as a never-ending current of shit that will constantly be hitting you in the face as you swim up the stream of life, or you can see it for what it is - the inevitable difficulties that will come your way in an otherwise pretty damn good life. Another hurdle with the opportunity for overcoming and growing. Or you can piss and moan some more. Just don't do it around me.
Felt like hot garbage yesterday, through nobody's fault but my own. Slept in later than I wanted, decided I wasn't going to eat before lifting, which wouldn't have been so bad, except by the time I got around to lifting I was starving, so I went and got some breakfast pizza, let that settle, then went at it. Again, it's what I get for being a dipshit.
Onto another rant, though.
Why the fuck do people surround themselves with negativity? Everything they watch, everything they read, the way they talk and act - it's all centered around negativity. And then these same people will decry that the world is out to get them, that nothing good could ever possibly happen to them. And if you present them with an alternate option? A chance to change things? Nope, can't be done. All is shit. The world hates them.
Fuck them. I leave them in my dust. People are sometimes awed by how positive I am about things. I have my moments of negativity, don't get me wrong. But I CHOOSE to surround myself with positivity. The people I read, the things I watch, the things I listen to. Doesn't mean I avoid reality, or anything with an alternate view. But when you really step back, you realize that it really is all about framing. How you choose to view the things that happen to you.
You can accept them as a never-ending current of shit that will constantly be hitting you in the face as you swim up the stream of life, or you can see it for what it is - the inevitable difficulties that will come your way in an otherwise pretty damn good life. Another hurdle with the opportunity for overcoming and growing. Or you can piss and moan some more. Just don't do it around me.
Saturday, July 28, 2012
Training Log
Felt like hot garbage yesterday by the time I finally lifted
Power cleans - 165 - 12x2, 1 min b/w
Deadlift - 315 - 6x3, 1x6
No assistance work.
Yet another reason the US needs to get good at Olympic lifting again - so they put the shit on TV. NBC's coverage of it is pretty much nonexistent, which fucking blows. I can watch it online I'm guessing, but that will also require me to find a really good internet connection at what I'm assuming will be some odd hours.
Power cleans - 165 - 12x2, 1 min b/w
Deadlift - 315 - 6x3, 1x6
No assistance work.
Yet another reason the US needs to get good at Olympic lifting again - so they put the shit on TV. NBC's coverage of it is pretty much nonexistent, which fucking blows. I can watch it online I'm guessing, but that will also require me to find a really good internet connection at what I'm assuming will be some odd hours.
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Training Log
Bench Press yesterday
250 - 6x3, 1x8
Did Yates Rows & Tricep pushdowns - only 2x10 each
Bicep is still pretty fucked up, so between the pain from that and the fact that I was tired as hell, I had no ambition to push hard on, well, anything. Cut the assistance work off and said fuck it. Hopefully continued Graston and ART work will get this fucking thing healed.
Do you know anyone with the "it's just my luck" syndrome? Might be the most annoying Goddamn thing in the world. You know, the people who, whenever something bad happens will be sure to say, without fail, that it's "just their luck." Really? You have a steady job, a family, a house, and yet bad shit just can't help but happen to you? Give me a fucking break. There are plenty of things to get down about in the world - a few shitty things happening to you at work or in your life aren't worthy of it. "Whoa is me, everything isn't going exactly as I had hoped and I'm having to put up with a little bit of shit being flung my way, boo hoo." It's a hell of a lot better than being forced to sit in a latrine. I know and am sure there have been times in my past I've been guilty of this, but one of the beautiful things about getting older is we (hopefully) mature and learn. And one of the things we learn is that things that are relatively shitty are going to happen to us. But we also learn that this doesn't mean that they always happen to us. And that should give you a lot of hope, not pull you down.
Tuesday, July 24, 2012
Training Log
Decided to go right ahead without deloading this week, because I still feel pretty good and want to attack the weights - so I did.
Squat - 250 - 6x3, 1x6
Power snatch - worked up to 195 (PR!)
Single-leg RDL - 35 - 3x6
Kneeling Band Crunches - 3x12
And then, of course, I didn't sleep worth a shit last night, so right back to the issue of little sleep...oh well.
Of course, the big news of yesterday was the Penn State punishment handed down by the NCAA. While it is, overall, a bit of a complex topic, my thoughts are pretty simple. I think Penn State got all it deserved, and the NCAA is doing all it can not to actually punish the current players by allowing them to transfer, penalty free, at any point in the next few years. For those who are mad that it punishes the current players, I disagree, for 2 main reasons:
1. If they chose Penn State due to its academics (I realize this might be, maybe, 1 guy?), nothing changes. They are getting a free education that is at a very good school.
2. If they chose Penn State due to its football program or coaching staff (particularly the old staff), they can leave with no penalty, so they can find another football situation that fits the bill.
If they are worried about going too far from home, there are schools like Pitt, Syracuse, Rutgers, and a few in Ohio that I can't imagine aren't too far away (I'm not real familiar with the geography of that area). It's certainly a sad situation all around, and a friend of my brother's is actually a coach there under the new staff, so I definitely feel for him. But at the end of the day, it's just football, and there are still a lot of people getting paid decent money and a lot of kids who get a free education for playing. None of that changes.
But a lot of the people close to the situation - namely PSU fans - that are decrying this are, in my opinion, simply too close to the situation. They can't grasp the enormity of it. They feel like they already did what they needed to, they are on their own healing path, they've cleared out everyone who was in any way tied to what happened...but it's not enough. It was a culture that was supportive of all of it, and that has to change to a certain extent. As a Iowa fan and UNI graduate and fan, I would really like to think that if something like this came out, I would have the balls to not support them. And to a certain extent, I think that was the case with Iowa basketball and the Pierre Pierce rape case a few years back. But, it's apples and oranges, and a far smaller scale.
In any event, it's a case where there simply are no winners, and Penn State will struggle for a loooong time, unless Bill O'Brien is the right man for the job, in which case he hangs around for a few decades, and gets them back to respectability.
Squat - 250 - 6x3, 1x6
Power snatch - worked up to 195 (PR!)
Single-leg RDL - 35 - 3x6
Kneeling Band Crunches - 3x12
And then, of course, I didn't sleep worth a shit last night, so right back to the issue of little sleep...oh well.
Of course, the big news of yesterday was the Penn State punishment handed down by the NCAA. While it is, overall, a bit of a complex topic, my thoughts are pretty simple. I think Penn State got all it deserved, and the NCAA is doing all it can not to actually punish the current players by allowing them to transfer, penalty free, at any point in the next few years. For those who are mad that it punishes the current players, I disagree, for 2 main reasons:
1. If they chose Penn State due to its academics (I realize this might be, maybe, 1 guy?), nothing changes. They are getting a free education that is at a very good school.
2. If they chose Penn State due to its football program or coaching staff (particularly the old staff), they can leave with no penalty, so they can find another football situation that fits the bill.
If they are worried about going too far from home, there are schools like Pitt, Syracuse, Rutgers, and a few in Ohio that I can't imagine aren't too far away (I'm not real familiar with the geography of that area). It's certainly a sad situation all around, and a friend of my brother's is actually a coach there under the new staff, so I definitely feel for him. But at the end of the day, it's just football, and there are still a lot of people getting paid decent money and a lot of kids who get a free education for playing. None of that changes.
But a lot of the people close to the situation - namely PSU fans - that are decrying this are, in my opinion, simply too close to the situation. They can't grasp the enormity of it. They feel like they already did what they needed to, they are on their own healing path, they've cleared out everyone who was in any way tied to what happened...but it's not enough. It was a culture that was supportive of all of it, and that has to change to a certain extent. As a Iowa fan and UNI graduate and fan, I would really like to think that if something like this came out, I would have the balls to not support them. And to a certain extent, I think that was the case with Iowa basketball and the Pierre Pierce rape case a few years back. But, it's apples and oranges, and a far smaller scale.
In any event, it's a case where there simply are no winners, and Penn State will struggle for a loooong time, unless Bill O'Brien is the right man for the job, in which case he hangs around for a few decades, and gets them back to respectability.
Monday, July 23, 2012
Training Log
Last week to week and a half have been shit for sleep, so I was thinking of taking a week or so off, but the last couple nights I've been diligent about getting to bed early, and I'm feeling good, so I'm going to start up the last 3 week cycle this week to finish strong. I was thinking about waiting until Wednesday or so, but since I'm feeling good, I'll just plow ahead. It's kind of amazing to me to even think that way - probably as recently as a year ago, I don't think I mentally could have gotten past the roadblock of not starting a training week on a Monday. Ah, stupidity.
In any event, did some conditioning on Saturday. I haven't been doing much outside of playing basketball on Tuesday nights and very occasionally running sprints. So I decided to try the Jim Wendler conditioning test - basically, he says he wants to always be "in shape" enough that he can do 10 40-yard prowler pushes, with a 45 on each handle, with 1 minute rest between sprints. Well, it sure as shit wasn't easy, but I did it somehow. I can also honestly say performance didn't decline much, as pretty much every sprint was right around 10 seconds.
It was, honestly, as much a mental exercise as physical. I watched a video Friday that was a speech delivered by a Navy SEAL to the Oakland Raiders from about 8 years ago. In it, he talks about when he was going through the training, they have a saying that goes something to the effect of, "If I have a beat in my heart, I'm not dead, and if I have a thought running through my head, I can't think to quit." I'm sure I butchered that, but he also notes that it was to long to think of during training, so he shortened it to "Not dead, Can't quit." This was, quite literally what was running through my head.
After 7 - wanted to quit, but couldn't
After 8 - same
After 9 - shit, you've made it this far, you better fucking finish
I say none of this to show I'm a badass - I'm sure as shit not. It's much more so to show that your mind is ridiculously powerful. I know that part of the reason I got through it was knowing that I only had 10 of them to do. So my mind did sort of wonder after - what if I had 20? Would I have made it? That may be a challenge for another day.
One last quote that I recall seeing recently went something like, "every day that you do not challenge yourself is a wasted day." Obviously this doesn't have to be physical, but as with everything, pushing our boundaries is where change and growth happen. Find a way to push your limits physically and mentally, and take the opportunity to grow.
In any event, did some conditioning on Saturday. I haven't been doing much outside of playing basketball on Tuesday nights and very occasionally running sprints. So I decided to try the Jim Wendler conditioning test - basically, he says he wants to always be "in shape" enough that he can do 10 40-yard prowler pushes, with a 45 on each handle, with 1 minute rest between sprints. Well, it sure as shit wasn't easy, but I did it somehow. I can also honestly say performance didn't decline much, as pretty much every sprint was right around 10 seconds.
It was, honestly, as much a mental exercise as physical. I watched a video Friday that was a speech delivered by a Navy SEAL to the Oakland Raiders from about 8 years ago. In it, he talks about when he was going through the training, they have a saying that goes something to the effect of, "If I have a beat in my heart, I'm not dead, and if I have a thought running through my head, I can't think to quit." I'm sure I butchered that, but he also notes that it was to long to think of during training, so he shortened it to "Not dead, Can't quit." This was, quite literally what was running through my head.
After 7 - wanted to quit, but couldn't
After 8 - same
After 9 - shit, you've made it this far, you better fucking finish
I say none of this to show I'm a badass - I'm sure as shit not. It's much more so to show that your mind is ridiculously powerful. I know that part of the reason I got through it was knowing that I only had 10 of them to do. So my mind did sort of wonder after - what if I had 20? Would I have made it? That may be a challenge for another day.
One last quote that I recall seeing recently went something like, "every day that you do not challenge yourself is a wasted day." Obviously this doesn't have to be physical, but as with everything, pushing our boundaries is where change and growth happen. Find a way to push your limits physically and mentally, and take the opportunity to grow.
Friday, July 20, 2012
Dark Knight Review
Went to the midnight premier of the Dark Knight Rises - totally worth it. Of course it was, for a few reasons:
A) It's fucking Batman
B) It's a damn good movie
C) It's fucking Batman - he's the best superhero of all time
Now, the argument can be made (and hell, maybe it's already been settled; I love me some Batman, but I'm not a huge comic book nerd) that he's not a superhero due to the fact that he doesn't have a superpower. I can get on board with this. So maybe just the greatest hero ever. I don't know.
In any event, due to my unabashed love of all things Batman, I will readily admit I'm not the most impartial observer. That said, I loved it. Bane was awesome - clearly he wasn't the character the Joker was in the first one, but there's no shame in that. He was creepy in a far different, yet still awesome way. He didn't look massive, but good camera work also made him appear slightly larger than he really is, which added to his mystique. I never thought much of Anne Hathaway before this (she's certainly not ugly, I just was pretty indifferent to her), but she looks damn sexy in this, so that was a plus as well - and light years better than Maggie fucking Gyllenhall. In the end, I highly recommend it if you've got the inclination to go, though at a 2:45 run time, don't plan to do much else for a while.
A) It's fucking Batman
B) It's a damn good movie
C) It's fucking Batman - he's the best superhero of all time
Now, the argument can be made (and hell, maybe it's already been settled; I love me some Batman, but I'm not a huge comic book nerd) that he's not a superhero due to the fact that he doesn't have a superpower. I can get on board with this. So maybe just the greatest hero ever. I don't know.
In any event, due to my unabashed love of all things Batman, I will readily admit I'm not the most impartial observer. That said, I loved it. Bane was awesome - clearly he wasn't the character the Joker was in the first one, but there's no shame in that. He was creepy in a far different, yet still awesome way. He didn't look massive, but good camera work also made him appear slightly larger than he really is, which added to his mystique. I never thought much of Anne Hathaway before this (she's certainly not ugly, I just was pretty indifferent to her), but she looks damn sexy in this, so that was a plus as well - and light years better than Maggie fucking Gyllenhall. In the end, I highly recommend it if you've got the inclination to go, though at a 2:45 run time, don't plan to do much else for a while.
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