Originally posted by plouffe
Yeah alot of people I know move weight just to move weight. Until you're able to isolate that muscle group and learn to squeeze it - You aren't going to get the gains your looking for.

Originally posted by ponyboy
Good post Dante - this is probably the biggest hurdle with new clients, getting them to really feel the muscles they are supposed to be firing. Sometimes even just using touch you can cue their body to reat properly.

Originally posted by Flex
right on bro

i try to preach that to everyone i know that BB's, but they don't wanna hear it. its "their way" or the "highway". and they wonder why i have such a better physique.......

I am constantly amazed and dismayed when I see a personal trainer having a conversation with a client while the client is moving a weight. Dat client don't be feeling nuthin'! Don't even know which muscle SHOULD be workin'

Originally posted by Dante B.
I posted this on another board, in response to 'what music do you lift to,' but it works in quite well here, as well.



To briefly touch upon several points:

The trick isn't knowing where to look for inspiration--speaking in general, and specifically for this discussion as well---but rather, knowing how to create it through filters and channels.

When I lift, I listen to the shit for music that's slapping my ears through the gym speakers. Actually, I don't listen to it, and that's the key. Music should serve as a guide, rather than a replacement for thought and inspiration. So you have to choose your weapons wisely, and if you learn to control your body and your mind---especially for lifting purposes---music should allow you to silently slip into another state of consciousness.

And when you're forced to listen to something you'd rather not listen to, or be around and hear people you'd rather not be around while lending an ear to their prattle, you have to learn to filter and channel it.

Note that I didn't say merely to drown it out. You have to create an active state of channeling whereby all outside influences become a new source of energy. More important than creating a conditioned response, is creating a general process of thought that lends itself to adaptability.

For example, if a certain work of music has always allowed you to lift with greater intensity, but in an instant is taken away, then you have to learn how to adapt by manipulating the output into visualized desired input.

In my (AL) journal, someone stated how it was "gay" to use the visualization techniques that I do; for he, had an 'intimate relationship with the weights.'

For anyone who thinks or lifts along these lines, where you allow too many outside influences to act upon you, instead of allowing them to impact you in accordance to your will:

There's no doubt that you're having an 'intimate relationship,' as you're doing nothing more than fucking around.


After I complete the article I'm working on, perhaps I'll do a training article along these lines. I thought of calling it----Jacked Magic: Incantations and Construction Rituals

Originally posted by Dante B.
In my (AL) journal, someone stated how it was "gay" to use the visualization techniques that I do; for he, had an 'intimate relationship with the weights.'

Originally posted by Mudge
but I suppose it depends what you actually think of as being "magik," where it comes from and what its purpose is.