because what the fuck else am i gonna do?
i started and i like it. i dont like having to go out of my way to get to my gym or any of that shit, but i like how i look and i like being bigger than people. it gives me confidence and it makes me feel like an animal. so no pussy little wolves are going to be coming near me unless they wanna get peed on.
That’s exactly right, Push. I train for when the wolf comes. Both wolves - the one in me and the one outside.
I can never get this across to the other women I know who don’t train in martial arts or weights. They have no concept of either wolf.
I used to train purely for aesthetic purposes back in mid teens, when I first got into training. Then I got all the women I wanted and it just wasn’t my main drive any longer, it definitely plays a part, but there’s more to my training now.
I train to be strong. To look strong. To look intimidating. To BE intimidating. To be a freak, to be bigger than the next guy, stronger than the next guy. To walk up confidently when I need to go head to head with the biggest, baddest mother fucker-to protect myself or my loved ones, shall that moment ever arise. I want to be a force, a willy mammoth of the jungle, a fucking juggernaut.
I want to be ready when the bear comes.
I train because in the gym it’s just me and the iron. I’ve got a clear mind, not a care in the world, my only concern is lifting a little more weight or squeezing out a few more reps. The gym has always been a sort of therapy to me. No matter how angry or how upset I am, a good workout always calms me down and lifts my spirits.
Lookin’ good naked ain’t too bad either.
To be honest? Because I found this site, and because TC’s Atmoic Dog’s literally changed my perception of life in an afternoon.
As well, I’ve always been stereotyped as a strong guy, but I’ve never been strong. This pisses me off to no end.
I was tired of being fat and not getting any girls, but in the short time I’ve been at it, although I joke girls are still the main reason I train, the original problem has been solved and the desire is stronger than ever. Now I train to get bigger, stronger, faster and prove to myself I can do it and I got a long ways to go.
I think TC said it best in one of the first Atomic Dog’s I ever read…
“We probably won’t slay any dragons, but we train just in case.”
There was a news article about a man who was tackled by a grizzly bear running 40 mph, he then stabbed the bear to death with a hunting knife. I lift to be that man. I lift to be able to do extraordinary things in extraordinary circumstances. The bear is my wolf, my dragon it is the same reason many of you lift.
I think many of us wanted to be superheros when we were little, someone special, better than the rest. We wanted to stand out, be all powerful, be respected and feared. Yet since we haven’t come across that opportunity, we are doing what we can to get as close as possible to it ourselves.
I was playing golf up in Angel Fire, NM a few years back. I was lining up my second shot and was on the right side of the fairway while the other 3 guys in my 4-some were on the left.
So I’m about to address the ball when I hear everyone yelling. I look up to see them pointing and waving in my direction, so I turn around to see what they are evidently trying to get me to look at.
Then this bear comes sprinting across the fairway about 20 yards on front of me.
The golf cart is across the fairway, and about 20 yards behind me. I dropped my club and sprinted back over to the cart.
I think I let out a few squeals on the way.
It didn’t make me want to lift. It made me want to get the fuck out of there. I am from the fucking Panhandle of Texas. We don’t do bears. We don’t do wolves. A shit load of coyotes, and a few more than that of rattlesnakes is all we really need to worry about.
Nope - my wolf is in the form of an early death from a sedentary job. If I didn’t train, or make some sort of effort to stay in shape I would die a fat, greasy, miserable person.
Why do I train?
I don’t, usually.
Thats not to say I’m not in the gym, and thats not to say that I don’t put effort into what I’m doing. Its just that, to me, the term “training” requires the word “for”. You’re either “training for ____”, or you’re working out. Or exercising. Or lifting. Or doing some cardio.
The last time I can remember feeling like I was “training” was when me and my friends first started playing tennis and I started doing more core work (suitcase deads, full contact twists, etc).
My original motivation was the fact that I’m going to get old one day; if I’m severely overweight with tons of health problems, I’d look back and say “wow I could have devoted an hour a day to my health. Why didnt I do that?”
So maybe I’m training for old age?
I also do it because it keeps me sane. Because I know that a heavy lifting session is going to trigger a shitload of chemicals in my brain that are going to make me feel good. Because, if I push myself and do what I couldn’t do before, whatever happens that day, whatever. I hit a deadlift max. Fuckoff.
I lift because its spiritual. I have the quote from TC in most of my profiles, about how “the gym is part therapist’s couch, part church, part Indian sweat lodge…”. I lift because, most of the time, whatever song I hear just sounds like a bunch of people touching instruments and saying words in a certain way, but when I hear the right song when I’m at the gym, I could cry.
I lift because it allows me to help people with stuff. Whenever somebody needs help moving, or a car pushed, or a piggyback ride, or a drunk person carried to the car, I feel like lifting makes me a good guy for that kinda stuff.
I have the problem, though, that my motivation comes and goes. Because, like I said before, I dont train. I dont have anything to train for. No competitions, no shows, no big games coming up. So I’ll really tune the diet and exercise in… for a few days. Then I’m back to eating whenever, when I get the time. I’m back to forgetting to take my supps. It just feels like it comes and goes. Three or four days of eating a strict meal plan, then ending up at the diner at 2 AM eating deep fried cheese.
Sorry that I’m getting so off topic here.
I guess, to get back to the main point, the “why do I train” question, or, to be more broad, “why do I do it” question…
I do it because I can’t see myself not doing it.
[quote]Beowolf wrote:
To be honest? Because I found this site, and because TC’s Atmoic Dog’s literally changed my perception of life in an afternoon.
As well, I’ve always been stereotyped as a strong guy, but I’ve never been strong. This pisses me off to no end.[/quote]
Imagine encountering Atomic Dogs when you’re just entering high school…
i actually think i owe him for a lot of who i am today and even getting into college.
[quote]Defekt wrote:
There was a news article about a man who was tackled by a grizzly bear running 40 mph, he then stabbed the bear to death with a hunting knife. I lift to be that man. I lift to be able to do extraordinary things in extraordinary circumstances. The bear is my wolf, my dragon it is the same reason many of you lift.
I think many of us wanted to be superheros when we were little, someone special, better than the rest. We wanted to stand out, be all powerful, be respected and feared. Yet since we haven’t come across that opportunity, we are doing what we can to get as close as possible to it ourselves.[/quote]
Whole-heartedly agree. My sentiment exactly. Growing up I wanted to be Batman. I still want to be Batman. Someone who has a purpose and a goal, and did everything he physically and mentally could to attain that goal.
I also feel the same way about TC and the Atomic Dog. It absolutely changed me faster than anything ever has.
I admit that was a pretty awesome post
I train to put me in the same position I would have been physically were I not in an industrialised, electronically automated world.
I want to be able to have a non-labor job but still be able to look like people who had bodies like that because they would die without it.
Wow, Push, I want to live where you live, it sounds beautiful
What ever your wolf/demon it’s all the same no matter how you look at it. If your demon is you or another person or just getting old it’s a demon! I think we all have our demons.
My main demon is ME. I have always been my worst demon. I lift to defeat myself, by that I mean from getting old, or being fat and out of shape, and being the WEAK LINK. I lift to get past the fact that I hate being 5ft5.
As far as the “wolf” goes, I lift to deal with them also. I encountered a wolf just a week ago, one that thought he was tougher than he was by putting his hands on a women. I handly delt with this wolf with no problems.
Wolf or demon, self-inflicted or not, this is why I lift.
I’ve said it before in a thread like this one and I’ll add it again. My passion is the outdoors and hunting, nothing else comes close in regard to how those two things make me feel.
I want to be physically able to hike five or six miles into the high country kill an elk, quarter it, throw the meat on my back, and hike it out for as many trips out as it takes. I want to be able to do this into my sixties, hell seventies if possible. Then I’ll get a horse to do it (ha, maybe sooner then that, nothing wrong with a little help).
The iron and other good activity will keep this possible. Plus you just feel better no matter what you’re doing!
D
I train for when the cat comes.
[quote]pushharder wrote:
rondastarr wrote:
Wow, Push, I want to live where you live, it sounds beautiful
[/quote]
Wow. Somewhere in Canada?