“We must do what we do most often”
Habits: actions and behaviors ingrained upon us which often become automatic responses. Many people divide their habits as “Good” and “Bad” but I believe there are many more shades of gray here besides the obvious black and white.
Many of our habits can be described as rituals–symbolic actions surrounding other actions.
I am curious about your rituals of fitness.
I for example, have several things I do when I exercise that certainly play no direct role to the task at hand, but I feel something is off when I do not do them. The sweat bands I wear when I lift, the music I listen to, chalk on my hands, bare feet on the floor.
I certainly could subtract all of these things and have basically do the same workout–but it wouldn’t be the same.
Are rituals essential to fitness? I don’t know. I have not observed even one person yet who does not have them, even people who are novices to the task at hand. Many people are not aware of their actions, but when you disrupt the pattern you find their entire game is thrown off course.
I note the people who seem to have the hardest time finding themselves in a successful pattern of fitness lack clear understanding of their habits surrounding fitness. I have a friend who tries to wake and run at 5am, but often fails to get out of bed. I asked “Why not run in the evening” and the response was “the morning is the best time to run”
If it is best than why do you often fail to get your ass out of bed and go run?
So I say this, go and explore your habits and your rituals. Does it all fit, does it all make you better? If not, examine how you can alter and change things to make them better. Not perfect, just better. Once piece at a time.
We do not have to change everything, we only have to change one piece, and by doing that we change everything.
-ATG
{ 11 comments }
i to love having my wrist bands for some reason they make me feel stronger in my own mind. Something else i am getting in the habit of is stomach breathing, and really feeling the movements and the body i am trying to make better it has really helped me. working off the feel of my body and trusting it , its all great stuff good shit adam
Last year I quit drinking soft drinks and energy drinks. It was just a habit, I didn’t truly like them too much. Now I don’t have cravings for them at all. I replaced that habit with drinking water.
I always train in the afternoon/evening, on weekdays I do it as soon as I get in from work and on weekends it just does not feel right to train in the morning so I get all the housework out of the way and do it late afternoon usually.
Not sure this is something I want to change as it seems to work well and changing it would be fairly difficult without getting up super early to workout before work!
I much prefer training in bare feet and having the right kind of music playing. But on the same note I’m forced to look at all my fitness “rituals” and am beginning to see where a lot of things look/sound nice but either don’t fit, or I fail to apply them.
This kind of self evaluation seems necessary for evolving as a coach and/or athlete. Eh, I’ve got to clean out the cobwebs as I write, but it’s great to be back on the site and to see that the tribe has grown like wildfire.
I can’t really think of any routines that I have, with the exception of bare feet (always, even when temperatures get below 40 degrees). I have a fairly limited number of basic drills to test: swings, snatches, LCCJ, farmers’ carry, sledge; these might count as routines. These nearly always produce a major ROM increase, however, so their irrelevance remains to be seen.
all of the above- let me give you a few more examples- you watch a major league pitcher, looks at the catcher, looks at the batter, looks at his hand, spits, looks at batter, looks at catcher, throws. ritual all the way. A different pitcher on the same team does a different thing.
recently I witnessed a group of young guys lifting, before each set one of them slaps himself in the face, and proceeds to move small weights looking shitty- not exactly a productive ritual.
I have also witnessed an individual who before every set said “I can do this” which to me was a wonderful step forward.
so not just looking at your big picture habits, but the little things you do when you exercise
I don’t think I really have any exercise rituals or routines, but I think maybe I should GET some.
My schedule for exercise is very haphazard; I’ll test and pick up a KB while I’m walking from the garage to the kitchen after dinner; I’ll wander in the gym at random while at work. So I have no real set up actions.
But that means I also have no consistant frame of mind, no real mental focus. I do all the things I think I should do during the exercise itself, but carrying with me any mental baggage I still have from the last exercise.
I’ve been brainstorming ideas today of what would put me into a state of “impending victory”, that awesome feeling where you feel that your success is not only likely but inevitable. Feeling unstoppable sounds like a good frame of mind to start a session in to me.
I have to have room to walk around. I cannot do a set, then just stand there and chill, and wait to do the next one. I have to walk around, have to pace. I don’t know if it hinders or helps, but I have to move around. Can’t stay still when I’m in a session.
I do the same thing, but it is really just a distraction for me while i await the next starting point
I usually wrap my hands, then unwrap, then wrap my hands up again, before getting to work on the punching bag. Another punching bag thing is putting on music with some kind of swing (haha)to it, whether it be rocksteady, weird cumbias, or calypso, whatever. I listen to metal when lifting weights; there’s just something so right about listening to Pantera or something while doing bench presses. Not much else really.
p.s.
Cool blog.
thanks for dropping in!