Simple NOT Easy

You are lukewarm, and I shall spit you out.

- Revelation 

A couple of weeks ago, I published a post on the "one-lift-per-day" program, but I'm pretty sure that I ended up ranting about how most of the workout-world seems to prefer over-complicated and easy (a two-punch combination that is NEVER going to produce appreciable gains in, well, any-damn-thing) instead of simple but HARD workout programs!  And since the more I think about it, the less annoyed I get, and the more just plain baffled I become, I thought I'd write about some "simple NOT easy" workout tips/tricks/ideas or whatnot that YOU can put to use and achieve some awesome results.

Bill Pearl understood that MASS was built with the basics and heavy-as-hell weights.

You see, I'm baffled more than annoyed at this point because even though results don't come from "easy" programs (there IS an exception to this rule, but it entails VERY frequent workouts and more attention to detail, so we can save the exception-to-the-rule for another post) but great - even spectacular - results can be achieved with VERY simple workout programs.  "Simple" simply (pun intended) means you must work extremely hard.  And that's what baffles me.  This seems as if it's a pretty "great" trade-off.  All you have to apply is the following principle:

Simple workouts + hard work = maximum growth (or maximum strength, looks, performance - you get the picture)

Now, if I was to stop typing this right now, and just told you: "Look, just workout really hard, and keep it simple, and, trust me, results will come in no time,"  I would be telling an utter, absolute truth.  AND you really wouldn't need any advice other than that.  But here's the other thing: If I stopped with that statement, then you can guarantee that within a few weeks, I would receive an email extolling to me how my advice DIDN'T work.  After a little correspondence, it doesn't take long to see the clear problem: the lifter doesn't apparently know what the hell either simple or hard entails.  So let's see if we can prevent any of those emails from coming to my inbox.

Moderation Sucks - Extreme is Good!

It's common these days - especially if you have a fondness as I do of perusing the grocery aisles of your local supermarket for the latest magazines such as "Prevention" and "Psychology Today" and "Woman's Week" (not sure if that last selection is even a "thing") - to read all sorts of advice about how the best way to achieve health, happiness, and apparently a smaller waistline or bigger biceps is through applying moderation in life.  You know: eat a moderate amount of food, exercise a moderate amount so you don't get burned out, watch a moderate amount of television, and so on and so forth... you get the picture now?

But here's another thing (as in the actual truth): MODERATION SUCKS!

I read - as in actually read, not just glance at the magazine headlines on supermarket checkout lanes - quite a bit of "Zen" stuff (not hard to tell based on even a little more than a cursory glance through this blog).  And some of this crap about moderation actually comes FROM the Buddha, or at least what the historical Buddha supposedly said.  And all of these "moderation-sellers" are quick to "sell" you on moderation because the Buddha chose the "middle path" between extreme asceticism and opulent luxury.  And, yes, that's true.  But keep in mind that moderation for the Buddha involved leaving his family to live a mendicant lifestyle, eating only one meal per day (and that meal always before noon), ONLY eating what was given to him when he begged on his morning alms round (no matter the food given), and not to mention walking the length and breadth of the Indian subcontinent for over 40 years, preaching his Dharma.  I don't think that is "moderation" for any modern person.

So, yeah, moderation sucks.  Sorry, but if you want to be great at anything in life, you will achieve greatness only when you devote everything to it, moderation be damned!

(Zen Interlude: To understand how completely NOT moderate Zen can be, the form of meditation that I was introduced to as a young man in my karate dojo was very intense. In his monumental work “The Three Pillars of Zen”, Roshi Philip Kapleau has this to say about Shikantaza (seated Zen meditation): “It is the mind of somebody facing death. Let us imagine that you are engaged in a duel of swordsmanship of the kind that used to take place in ancient Japan. As you face your opponent, you are unceasingly watchful, set, ready. Were you to relax your vigilance even momentarily, you would be cut down instantly… This state cannot be maintained for very long - in fact, you ought not to do shikantaza for more than a half an hour at each sitting… If you are truly doing shikantaza, in half an hour you will be sweating, even in winter in an unheated room, because of the heat generated by the intense concentration… Compared with an unskilled swordsman a master uses his sword effortlessly. But this was not always the case, for there was a time when he had to strain himself to the utmost, owing to his imperfect technique, to preserve his life. It is no different when doing shikantaza.” Now that is the Zazen I knew in my youth; no moderation there!)

Pick Your BIG 5

To achieve the MOST results you possibly can in the shortest amount of time (and this assumes that you are working your ass off in the gym) then you actually MUST keep your workouts simple.

Pick 5 exercises that are "BIG" movements - exercises that you know you will work really hard on.  When I was younger, and the "power" bug first bit me, then my personal Big 5 at that time probably would have looked like this:

1. Squat
2. Bench Press
3. Deadlift
4. Overhead Press
5. Barbell Curl

That's still a pretty good list.  If you want to get incredibly massive, and you can handle all of those exercises (and if you're young, then you can handle them), you can't go wrong with it.  As I got older, and began to experience more injuries, my list probably would have been something such as this:

1. Squats
2. One-Arm Dumbbell Overhead Presses
3. Power Cleans
4. Sandbag Carries
5. Dumbbell Curls

The important thing, as you can tell by looking at both lists, is (1) always squat, and (2) select "big" exercises that work a lot of bodyparts.  (And, I suppose for a #3, we could say you should do most of your lifting on your feet.  Standing exercises are almost always better than exercises where you sit or lie down.)

You can, of course, utilize other exercises, but always keep your Big 5 "on hand" when you need to get back to the basics, or if you just don't know what to do in the gym.  You can do all 5 exercises in one workout, or you can do a lift each day - it doesn't matter.  The main thing is to work the exercises hard!

And the less exercises that you have in your arsenal - in other words, the SIMPLER the workout - the harder you will train.  The more exercises you do, then the more will your energy be dispersed (even just emotional and/or mental energy), which brings us to our next point...

The Power of One Deeply Felt Desire!

In his book The Miracle Club: How Thoughts Become Reality, the well-read "New Thought" author Mitch Horowitz has this to say: "One finely honed, exclusively focused, and passionately felt desire; something that feels to you like breath itself.  Find this, and you will discover a power like none other available to you.  This concept initially reached me through the example of one of the most impactful thinkers of the past century, Bill Wilson, the co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous."

Horowitz goes on to write how Bill "discovered" that sobriety required a spiritual solution through a friend, and fellow alcoholic, by the name of Ebby Thacher.  Thacher introduced Bill to most of what became AA, but here's the thing: Thacher failed to remain sober, while Bill Wilson didn't drink a single drop for the rest of his life on earth.  So what was the difference in the two men?  Bill's wife, Lois, had this to write in her memoir Lois Remembers:

After those first two years... why did Ebby get drunk?  It was he who gave Bill the philosophy that kept him sober.  Why didn't it keep Ebby sober?  He was sincere, I'm sure.  Perhaps it was a difference in the degree of wanting sobriety.  Bill wanted it with his whole soul.  Ebby may have wanted it simply to stay out of trouble.

 Trust me.  If you want 18" arms, a massive chest, a triple-bodyweight squat (or deadlift), or, hell, a Kim Kardashian-esque ass; you will never be able to achieve those goals unless you can be just like Bill.  Bill wanted it with his whole soul.  That pretty much sums it up.