C.S. Sloan's Integral Strength

     If you're looking for a program to pack on the muscle mass and the power, or if you're looking for a program to bust you out of the (dreaded) plateau you have encased yourself within, look no further.  Sometimes, you just have to go back to the basics.      A lot of time when lifters go back to the basics they end up doing some crappy, gutless routine where they train their whole body with something along the lines of 2 to 3 sets of 10 to 12 reps.  They got the full-body routine part right, but the rest of it pretty much blows.  Enter Old-School bodybuilding; the kind of full-body programs that used to be employed by the likes of Anthony Ditillo, Reg Park, and Marvin Eder.  We're talking the real friggin' deal.      Okay, I'm not going to waste your time with any rambling.  Let's get right to what the "real deal" actually looks like.  Here are my "rules" for Old-School Bodybuilding:      1. Use a full-body workout 3 days each week.  The ...

     "Are you on a training program or are you working out?"  These words were uttered by that great immortal of the iron game, the one and only Vince Gironda.  I have always found this quote to be the most important one for training success—and probably the reason why it has been so often uttered by trainers other than just me.      Just "working out" won't cut it.  Never has.  Never friggin' will.  No way.  No how.  You must be on a training program.  Ideally, you must be on a training program that is built around achieving your specific goals.      Which brings us to the title of this post.  What are your training goals?  No doubt they change over the years.  They have definitely changed for me.  When I first started training, I wanted one thing and one thing only: to be as muscularly big as humanly possible.  And, you know what?  I achieved this goal by eating everything in sight (and making sure that I consumed plenty of protein along the way), taking t...

Just Bow Putting my right and left hands together as one, I just bow. Just bow to become one with Buddha and God. Just bow to become one with everything I encounter. Just bow to become one with all the myriad things. Just bow as life becomes life.      Kosho Uchiyama's final poem, completed on the day that he died.      Kosho Uchiyama has long been my favorite of the modern day Zen masters.  Trained in the Soto lineage of Zen (Soto is one of the two main branches of Zen in Japan; the other is the Rinzai tradition), he seemed to "get it" better than any of the other Zen masters of the late 20th century.  Often crude, earthy, and witty, his style was simply more down to earth than others I have read.      My favorite of his books is "Opening the Hand of Thought."  It contains in it one of the most profound explanations of what good religion should look like.  I call this way of approaching religion—and approaching life, for that matter—the 4th way.  By this, I mea...