Training With Purpose, Not For Prizes

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Welcome to There is a Method to the Madness. My name is Rob Maxwell, and I'm an exercise physiologist and personal trainer. I am the owner of Maxwell's fitness programs, and I've been in business since 1994. The purpose of this podcast is to get to the real deal of what really works and most importantly why things work. Hence the name, There is a Method to the Madness. Before I get to today's show, I want to thank Jonathan and Lynn Gilden of the Gilden Group at Realty Pros. They are committed to providing the highest level of customer service in home sales. Why don't you give them a shout and figure out what your home is worth? 386-451-2412. It is time to talk about some fitness. I've got some pretty cool stuff to talk about today, I think. At least it is uh cool to me. It's stuff I'm really, really interested in, interested in, which is uh like philosophy and the psychology and things like that. I think I've mentioned before that um I typically get my topics I want to write or talk about when I'm running, training, strength training, it's really like a uh form of meditation for me. Exercise, physical exercise is. I mean, I'm a believer in sitting down and doing some form of meditation as well. I think anytime we can eliminate distractions, it's a good thing. But when I uh run, cycle, when I was swimming, haven't been swimming for a while, still enjoy it, but kind of tough to get to the pool. But anyway, or strength train, I really let uh I focus on the workout. I focus on the sets of strength training that I'm doing, the form, the feel, um, that good stuff. And when I'm cycling, I'll kind of focus on breathing, cadence, my surroundings. When I'm running the same thing, I'll uh focus on kind of my gait, shoulders back, my form, and then my surroundings. But in any event, you know, that's what meditation is. It is uh focused. You know, people sometimes think that it's the opposite, like you're just kind of like drifting off. But the reality is like it's a focus. So when people sit down and meditate, you know, they'll focus on a mantra, whether it be their breath or a word or a symbol or something like that, or some people use visuals, but none of us can do it perfect. We all, you know, get distracted. But the point is we focus on something. So when I do that, I find that uh, you know, good ideas come into my brain. Like that's at least I think they're good, but things I haven't thought about are things I want to explore, and I'll kind of like ruminate on them a little bit, and I'll what I'll typically do is if it really interests me or something I'm gonna look up, I will write it down immediately on a uh little notebook I keep with me for such reasons, and uh then I'll explore and do some research, and then I'll uh either write it up or write it up and talk about it. So that's how I usually get my topic. Sometimes I'll get questions from people, and I really enjoy those, by the way. Um, but anyway, that's how it happens. Or sometimes I just really feel like there's something that needs to get out there because there's some misinformation going on out there. So today's topic is kind of like where do we find the balance? Um, I'm just gonna have to back up and give you a backstory so you know what I'm talking about. Particular podcast I was listening to, and then I started uh thinking about what the quote was. But basically, there's a quote by a guy by the name of Diogenes, and he was from the philosophy of cynicism. And it's not what you think. It's at least, I don't know, maybe you do know what it is, but like before I did some research on it, you know, you think of a cynic as kind of a person that sees the negative side of things all the time, or you know, the glass is half empty, and maybe that's what the definition means to an extent. But what the school of philosophy was with them is that they were really believed in the goal of life was to achieve virtue. They believed that you should live simply and live in agreement with nature. Maybe that's where cynicism came from because they were like, they didn't think like the the stuff at the time that other people thought was valuable, you know, m money of sorts or or wealth or good things. Like, I don't think they put much value on that. Their whole value was on to achieve virtue. Your reputation with others mattered more than like what you thought your achievements were, so to say. So that was what the school of cynicism believed in. And one of them that's the most famous of the cynics was, as I said, Diogenes. Now, he lived, according to research, from 412 BCE to 323 BCE. So that's not a very long life, is it? But anyway, uh he was born in what was then or now Turkey, and he later moved to each ancient Greece, where it seems like all of our great philosophers have come from. He what he came before, I'm sorry, he came after Socrates and before Marcus Aurelius. So Plato was a student of Socrates, and Socrates was maybe what we think of as the first philosopher. So then Diogenes and the Cynics came, and then later the Cynics kind of turned into Stoicism, which is a different belief system from the Cynics. But anyway, this is all going to make sense in a minute. So if I back up again even further, so with Socrates and Plato, they were huge believers in physical fitness. Like they thought that the most important, well, one of the most important things you can do is to reach your potential physically in life. Like Socrates and Plato believed that that was essential. Like one of the whole goals of life was to master your physical body. So they put a high precedence on people that were physically fit. So they thought the at the time, like the wrestlers and the runners and whatever forms of athleticism, plus just your physique, like bodybuilding, you know, I don't doubt they called it that, but they believed the physique meant something. So they were big into that. Not only that, if you've studied Socrates and Plato, you know that they did a or stated and taught a lot of good things, but they were definitely of the physical fitness realm. And I think that is a great thing. I'm obviously a proponent of that. I own a gym. I've been a personal trainer for almost 32 years. I've been exercising and working out myself since the age of 17, uh, with, you know, no gaps in there, you know, a couple injuries here or there, surgeries, but no, I continue to work out. So it's it's a huge, huge, huge part of my life, obviously. But I'm gonna play devil's advocate here just based on what old Diogenes said. So Diogenes came after Plato and Socrates before Marcus Aurelius, and he said this. All right. He said that true champions train to fight against hardships like hunger and cold, and they don't compete for titles. He went on to say that he thought that runners, I guess, was the big sport back then. Real interestingly, by the way, they didn't believe in running around a track back then. This is probably neither here nor there, but I found it really interesting when I studied some of the philosophy of training and sports. They believed that animals should race in a track, but humans should go foot to foot from location to location. Still haven't figured out why that was so important to them, but they never like ran an oval track. You know, eventually, of course, it came, but back then they just believed that, I don't know, maybe we were different, who knows? Um, but anyway, so they were speaking of mostly runners and wrestlers, and Diogenes felt like they basically were wasting their time with titles. He went on to say that athletes who train for prizes such as pine and parsley, I'm quoting him directly, are not a noble man. For the noble man fights day and night to win the virtue of himself, reputation of others, and to find happiness. He went on to say that the real fight is for hardships, to fight against hunger, cold, thirst, and negative social stigma, and that those were the real opponents, not human opponents. He mocked athletes and said that they had a narrow focus. All right. So when I heard those quotes, I mean, yeah, you're you it sounds so negative and so cynical, you know. Funny, right? Being funny. But anyway, you know, and as a as a physical trainer, you know, should I get offended by that? You know, I don't think so, because I kind of get what he's saying. I he he's saying not so much that trying to keep yourself physically healthy and physically fit is a bad thing, but the reason to do it maybe should be different. Now, he didn't necessarily, he wasn't critiquing Plato and Socrates from everything I've read. You know, like I said, he came along a little after, but he was kind of maybe critiquing the athletes of the day. I mean, we can go in and play junior psychologist and say that maybe he was a small nerdy guy and like, you know, he didn't like that. Uh who the heck knows? But from everything I've read, he wasn't saying that taking care of yourself self is a bad thing, that being even elite in your fitness and health is a bad thing. I mean, I mean, who could really say that it is, right? I mean, isn't it great to be physically fit and healthy? I think his point is well taken. It's like, what's your opponent? I found it very funny, you know, that he said against pine and parsley. It's like, who wins pine and parsley? Like, why was that such a big thing? You know, I mean, today I guess it would be, you know, those that win uh plaques and medals, I don't know, uh trophies like I've won in bodybuilding or whatever, right? So he'd say, you know, plaques and medals and trophies, you know, wow, you know, what's that guy doing? You know, what's that gal doing, you know? Um and I think what he was saying was like at the time there was, and there's probably still is, of course there is. There's just not as much in us industrialized nations, but as the hunger, the cold, and the thirst. I mean, obviously we still have a percentage of the population that experiences that, sadly, on a daily basis. But like, it's not a thing that the general population worries about as much. So his point was like, like, that's the opponent. How do we like make sure that we don't become too hungry, too cold, too thirsty? How do we keep our reputation up? So for Diogenes and the Cynics, like that was really important. How do we make sure that we don't have this negative stigma? You know, like maybe it's a wrestling champion, but the guy's just an alley cat, or he's just, you know, no offense, I love cats, but you know, I think you get the reference, but guy's just not exactly the most honorable person in the world, you know, or you know, maybe the female runner was uh an elite runner, but maybe she had this reputation for being a thief or a cheater, you know. Like he was saying that it's those things that matter more. So when I heard that quote, I was really intrigued. And I want and I wanted to read more about it because I do often kind of think that, you know, um, not that like not that bad, but it just seems like sometimes like that's people's only focus, you know? They worry so much about the accolades, you know. The social media has made this so much more prevalent. I don't think it's a new thing. I just think that the uh way we see it is new, you know. Social media isn't that old. So I just think it's like, you know, we see it so much more. But I do think that this has been going on for a long time, you know, and we'll just see people that are so wrapped up into how they place in different races or how they did at their CrossFit competitions or or whatever, you know. I mean, those just seem to be the biggest things I see. I guess they're the most popular sports. I imagine it could happen with tennis titles. And look, don't get me wrong, and I'm probably, you know, probably calling out myself here too. I mean, I've been caught up in that, you know, where it's like this matters, but it's like it really doesn't matter. And I don't think Diogenes is saying, as I said, that it's a bad thing. And I don't think it's a bad thing. I think like if you go somewhere to compete, I've always said that. I believe we should always give our best, you know, like we should always give our best. I don't believe in racing necessarily the guy next to me. It's kind of silly, right? It's it's not a fair race ever, is it? You don't know their surroundings. They may be out there on a casual jog and you might be racing them, you know, or they may be going for a PR that your personal record that they have wanted forever and you don't have the motivation. Like, so to me, being more intrinsically motivated, I think, is very, very important. So I'm not a huge believer in worrying too much about the competition around. Not that it's not natural to think about it a little bit. I think it is, and I think we know through social facilitation that we have a tendency to go a little bit harder when there is somebody out there either watching us or next to us or competing with us, yes. But I think giving too much credence in our head over that, I think, can be a mistake. But I do think in absolutely giving the best and trying to be your best, but I think what he's saying, and I believe this is the happy medium we probably should look for, and that is don't put that above the other things, though. You know, I asked somebody the other day, I said, so, you know, what do you think is, and and to be frank, this is a person I don't think believes this, you know, but I was asking them because I think they need to probably remember this little lesson. And I said, What do you think is the main reason people, you know, should do or you do, or you did originally to do uh, you know, running events or traffons, whatever? And they said, to stay in shape. And I said, absolutely. And again, I don't think they think that. Um, and that's why I was trying to kind of like bring them back to that because that is. I can remember when I was working on my graduate degree, I had done some bodybuilding uh competition, and uh, I did well, and I can just remember feeling kind of empty on the stage, like when I um I ended up getting third in my class, and it was a pretty big show, so I was really happy. I still am, I'm still proud of it, but I can still remember feeling a little empty because there was part of me that was like, oh man, it just seems to me at the time, it it felt just kind of like shallow. It felt like, you know, what what did I really do here? You know, maybe I've always had a tendency to think, you know, overthink things, but I remember thinking that. And so it was right around that time I was in graduate school, and I can remember some of my professors going, oh, you know, you can relax a little bit, do some travel ons with us, you know. We swim, we bike, we run, it says, you know, you know, it made it sound really fun and appealing and a fun way to stay in shape. Now, I never stopped lifting because I think that's a critical part of my fitness, and I love it, you know, intrinsically I love it. But I did start doing that. And I can remember like at the time thinking, yeah, this is like just a pretty chill way to stay in shape. I'm pretty intrinsically motivated, so I don't need or necessarily like a lot of people around the train with, but there was a semblance of a group, and so we would do things together, and that made it easier to do, right? I mean, I talk about that in my book, that like if we um no idea where that slam came from, but you know, it kind of happens. Um, so I talk about in my book, like having that person to meet you is like so, so critical. And you know, that was a way for me and a lot of others to be able to do it. So it was a fun way to stay in shape. I think that people get away from that now, and I think it becomes now more about something else, you know, maybe public praise, pats on the back. The thing is, is those things are gonna leave you empty, just like you know, standing on the stage receiving my trophy when I was 27 made me feel kind of empty. Like the the whole point is to stay in shape and get physically fit. Like wellness is body, mind, and spirit. It's not just one. And, you know, so if we take this out and talk and think about what Diogenes was saying, is that, well, if we're doing this great, but what's the real thing we're trying to get? We're trying to be healthy and fit. I hope. I mean, I think we all should be. But like, for what? You know, I have a client who talks a lot about that she feels the need to stay in shape because she's a caretaker. And if she doesn't, she's worried about somebody she has to take care of who isn't as physically healthy as her. I mean, that's a pretty darn good why, right there, right? I mean, that's a pretty good why. That's a pr, you know, that they say if you know the why, the how becomes easy. So that's a pretty good why. And I think that's what Diogenes was saying. So he's saying, like, so, you know, who kind of deserves more credit? That person who, like, say, you know, wins that award or that medal at a local fitness event, running or race or whatever, and everybody's clapping, that's great. But then, like, that's all they're known for. Or they're known to like not be a very nice person, or they're known to like be a cheater, or they're known for this. I mean, like, what is more important? I mean, ideally, I guess you'd want to have both, right? But let's say if you didn't, maybe it's time to back up and work on those other things. Just maybe, if we want true happiness, which is what wellness is. I'll give you another story. When I was teaching sports medicine, I had a student start up once, and he was a veteran of either the Army or the Marines. I can't remember which one. And uh, he had spent some time in Iraq or Afghanistan. I can't remember where he was. They were kind of both going on at the same time. And um we all kind of uh, well, I should say I had the students talk a little bit if they felt comfortable about why they wanted to get into physical fitness training and sports medicine. And so he said, Well, you know, I've spent time overseas. Uh, as a veteran, I come back, and you know, I now have a young family, you know, that I have to support and take care of now that I'm back. And uh, you know, I have a pretty good benefit package, so it's not about the money, but I feel like I need to stay healthy and well for my, I think he had a son. It was a son or a daughter. I believe he had a young wife and a child. And the child was now, you know, getting a little bit older now that he's back, I don't know, five, six, seven-ish. And he said, you know, I need to be healthy for him and them, and I want to be a good role model because when I grew up, you know, I didn't have necessarily fit parents and it bothered me, and they smoked and they did this and they did that. I don't want to be that. Like now that I'm a dad, I want to be healthy and fit. So I don't really need the money, but I want to learn how to do this so I can keep myself in good shape and then maybe be able to help other people. I mean, you talk about a great why, you know. Think even old cynical Diogenes might go, oh wow, yeah, that's that's that's some pretty good integrity right there. And, you know, it sounds like pretty judgmental. Um, I suppose it is, you know. They always say, you know, oh, don't judge. It's like we all judge. I mean, so yes, but like that that's not the point, though. Like the the point is what works. Like it's not really are you good or bad for your goals and motives. It's really what works. And I can promise you that if the why is really up there, if it's really important, you're gonna stick to it. You know, the person who wants to be the role model for the family isn't gonna quit his fitness if he doesn't play. Place in a 5K, right? The person who knows they have to be the caretaker because they're the healthier version of a family and you know they have people that depend on them, they're not going to quit their fitness training because they don't place in an event. They're going to keep going because they know the big picture is this, right? So I've never met old Diogenes, but I could imagine if I had a conversation, that's how he would say it. He would say, you know, I want people to just think about the big picture and not the small pitcher. And just maybe if their winning isn't leading to greater integrity or reputation, then maybe they should spend a little more time on that aspect of it. All right. As I said, one of my favorite topics is psychology, philosophy, sociology. It's all good stuff. Because again, I can say it and I'm going to say it again. Like, if you know the why, the how is easy. I mean, you can go on Chat GBT and you can easily say, program me a five-day a week or two-day a week or three-day a week exercise program. And it will. I mean, it'll do a damn good job, too. I mean, I don't, I don't feel insecure at all about it. I'm like, whatever, you know, it's like, because that's not the point. It's like people need people. People need other people around. But that program's not going to do you any good if your why doesn't matter. I promise you that. It might work for a week or two. But until you really sit down and go, okay, so why am I doing this? And have a good answer for that. And it better not, I mean, I'm just telling you right now, if it's superficial, it's not going to last. It's not going to last. And it's not going to be fulfilling. So, like, if you know your why, the how comes easy. All right. So let's all be positive about that and thank Diogenes for his cynicism and being funny. All right. See you next time. All right. Thank you everybody for listening to today's show. I really appreciate it. I want to remind you to please hit automatic download. It really helps me and it helps the show. And now I'd like to thank Overhead Door of Daytona Beach, the area's premier garage door company. They have the best product and the best service. I personally vouch for Jeff and Zach Hawk, the owners. They are great. They're going to get you exactly what you need. So if you have any garage door needs, give them a shout at 386-222-3165. And now I'm very excited to add another sponsor. ProCharge Liquid Protein Enhancer has joined the team. And let me tell you, they are a great product. I pop one after a workout. Each container has 40 grams of protein, so that's two servings. I take 20 grams after I work out. 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