Month: September 2024

A Tale Of Losing Muscle (Theoretical) :
I sit here just after midnight sipping on both a glass of milk, and one of orange juice…

A moment prior I had done the day before’s pushups, and as I got down on the floor I had the idea of what to write ;

How To Fail At Losing Muscle :

Now firstly my “post workout” macros are surely off, of which that I am certain.
~16oz orange juice, and the same of milk.
I have drank mostly carbs, and committed the heinous act of mixing fat into s “meal” which containeth carbs.

I’m not concerned.

If anything getting something quick into me, and just before sleep is anabolic as can be.

But that’s not the main point here…

So long as I do daily pushups it would be hard for me to lose muscle mass on my upper body.

With a decade and a half of experience, essentially daily and unbroken with pushups this entire time I get much out of them, even if the total on the day is some silly low count like 30 total.

I can put them into just about any muscle group, I can fly through them with zero range of motion and too I can do them very strict, very mentally focused, using perfect form, and a high level of mind-muscle connection for the ever gainful squeeze.

One simple exercise has become abundance, unlimited ability with just the one thing.

A few pushups backed by so much training history so as to never…it’s hard to define…

Need more.
Backslide.

& More…

…..

I can’t rightly say I identify as an advanced trainee.

I tend to look at myself as “a very strong normal man”, with the emphasis in my eyes on the latter, on being the normal, or at least what should be.

For a handful of years now I’ve identified my own goal in mind as to be “the best nobody I can be/the strongest nobody around”.

I don’t see myself as ever going to medal in weightlifting or win a world’s strongest man/arnold’s competition.

But I place high value on strength, have had so much adversity (it seems – all is perception) in my own training journey that I’ve simply adapted.

In any environment I’ll find a way to strength train, even if it’s simply “revert to pushups” which I can, and have done in the past.

I don’t view genetics as being all that important to 99.9999 or 99.99999%.

Maybe it matters to the one in a million or the one in ten million outlier “genetic freak”. To the rest, the “everyman nobody” whenever they may be, those NOT in the spotlight on the world stages of nfl sunday, or in the olympic games, the latter of which I haven’t watched since 2012, the former…the last, a single game in maybe 2018…

Just train.

Without an addiction to being a spectator, which is most in society you’ll end up pretty impressive in the real world, in your own life, in…the place that matters.

Real World

One moment, I’m pouring another glass of orange juice. I’ve been drinking mucho as of late, around carton a day honestly – it’s a kick.

Often I eat like that, on kicks…

…..

Okay, I’m back, with another tall glass of oj to sip.

Maybe the writer’s stereotype was an alcoholic alone in his madness, maybe now it’s the yuppie in a coffee shop with laptop.

Here I am flow writing, at the kitchen table, smart phone plugged in charging as I type. Between midnight and 1am.

Initially my point was going to be how hard it’d be to lose muscle.

That so long as I train some, it’d be pretty hard to even starve off on me.

I feel for all that it is more truly this way.

It’s a cultural psyop, supplement companies or something selling you on the belief that you have to not only struggle to build, but struggle to maintain muscle.

Maintaining muscle is the easiest thing.

Like many (including my mother) say “oatmeal sticks to your ribs”, that’s the case with muscle.

Once muscle has been built it sticks to ya.
The built muscle ain’t going anywhere.

Believe THAT

It’s now 1230am, I’ve finished sipping the second glass of oj, and I’m off to bed.
Have a good night, or a good day, and a good life.

Be strong, and best to ya,
Persistence & Tenacity

crossposted from youtube community posts in full, and instagram in part with

Jimmy Soul – If You Wanna Be Happy
as the choice of music

If you hit 200g of protein a day, likely for anything shy of marching siberia in winter whilst wearing rags that’s more than plenty to feed your muscles.

To remain anabolic.

(the picture just ain’t uploading)

Even 150g is probably plenty, though it’s not going to hurt to be the type who eats more meat.

Ribs being most preferable, but messier to cook or more expensive to buy.

It’s real easy to get to 150g.

A pound of chicken breast is 100 to 110g.

Six Eggs = 36g
Nine Eggs = 54g
A Dozen Eggs = 72g

So easily, and realistically you can cut up some chicken breast, pan fry it, crack some eggs over your now fully cooked chicken, fry that up (now together), pour a glass or two (or more) of milk, and hit all of your necessary nutrition in one meal of chicken, eggs, and milk.

Playing 1800s Farm Diet
roll film

Now, maybe as a beginner it helps to have some pretty rigid and structured guidelines for eating and training, but do so long enough and it all mostly become minutia.

The part that matters is progress.

If you’re making progress it’s working.
You could put the pedal to the metal, but too it’s okay (and only recently have I started accepting this) to simply keep doing what I’m doing
SINCE IT’S WORKING!

Right now I want the scale to move downwards, a laissez faire cut (rather unstructured, not too many guidelines in effect) with a hands off approach to “I know my pullup reps will increase with dropped weight and continued kettlebell workouts”.

That’s it.

Now, what works for me is eating infrequently.

I just don’t like having to digest outside of the evening/night generally.

So one meal a day is a guideline, but if I’m still hungry my nutrition was already covered by the meal, and my calories are pretty low overall…I’ll have a snack or two if I instinctively feel it’d be better to eat.

And I’m not a snob about this.
As I type it’s a couple extra glasses of milk, a few cookies, and a pack of top ramen.

The calories aren’t wild, and there is now some more protein to add to the day’s count.

See, whenever I eat really, my go to is dairy.
There’s going to be some protein every time (rare exceptions) I take in calories as most every time I do is drinking a glass of milk or eating a little cheese (often with some honey roasted peanuts – these being the most affordable and always convenient nutritious thing to eat known to man).

Spend $2.50/lb, buy three to five jars, and throw one in your car, in your backpack, etc.

Might not be a particularly low calorie option, but it’s good enough nutrition – very low dollar cost and with perfect travel logistics.

At home lately I’ll just drink a couple glasses more milk, and have a pack of ramen.

THAT might not be the best source of protein, being wheat, and even still that’s another eight or ten grams to add to the day’s total.

In a way, in the strength game, the picky mouth starves, stagnates, doesn’t grow.

The not picky eater, the human garbage disposal, this type puts on muscle much faster, and as I’m now finding…

My lack of discernment has made cutting not terribly complicated.

I actually like chicken breast sans even salt and pepper, a little butter in the pan, the raw meat chopped into little pieces, then fried up on all sides to a nice golden brown.

Like that.
Boom. Delicious.

Crack the day’s eggs over that.
Cook two or three pounds of chicken (in batches) back to back, have a couple or a few days of meat ready to go.

The rest fills in around that pretty easily.

…..

Even if I never hit any of those barbell goals I had in the past…

I’m getting pretty strong on the kettlebells.
As I type there’s a nice, light soreness in my traps from doing a decent looking swing-snatch with double 32kgs.

With a little more violence of pull/extend I can make it a better rep, but what I did earlier…it would count (video up in about a week), and snatching double 32kgs seems to me that it’d be something to the kettlebell community.

And too I have double 40kgs. There’s no doubt in my eyes that I’ll get there, from here – eventually, over time.

That’s what’s cool about the kettlebells.
To a degree, just train with what you’ve got.
Occasionally try out a harder movement.
You may have it.

What’s the worst case?
You stick to c&p, add reps to ∞ with a moderate weight…something real real world useable via a handful of kettlebells used for…half hour a week.

Easy.

Just don’t stop at only the sig klein challenge.

Aim for more reps. Aim for heavier bells.
Aim for both. Mix the sig klein challenge with the grace wod, train their bastardized child…

30 reps clean and press with as heavy a pair of bells as you can (kb or db – either is fine).

Dang, now I just typed up the point of a talking “podcast” that’s not yet live.
Haha!

Persistence & Tenacity

don’t stop thinking about tomorrow