Over the past few years Buddhism has become increasingly relevant to my life and how I spend my days. It’s near impossible to sum up such a diverse philosophy with a few words, but there are two traits that are present in all schools of Buddhism: living with deliberation (consciously choosing your path) and maintaining simplicity in everything you do.
Anyways, I was sitting around brainstorming ideas for this blog today and thought, why not apply some Zen Buddhist concepts to strength training? So that’s exactly what I did….
- Do one thing at a time. When you’re lifting weights, lift weights. When you’re eating food, eat food. When you’re resting, rest. All of this sounds obnoxiously simple, but most people rarely do anything without their mind shifting to a million different preoccupations – my mind is doing it right now. Focus intently on whatever you’re doing right now, and be conscious of how your body is reacting to every rep you complete during training or every bite you eat during meal time.
- Train mindfully. Remain aware of the effect training is having on your body and don’t feel any less of a man for having to take an extra day off between training sessions if you’re in pain. Listening to your body and following your intuition is far more valuable than pushing your body that extra mile ever could be. Think about the repercussions of every movement.
- Embrace kaizen. Continuously improve in every area of your approach to strength training (or life in general). Document inefficiencies and forms of mental or emotional resistance that are holding you back, and then pragmatically strive towards solving these shortcomings.
- Be content. Appreciate what you have. Right now. You’re in a vastly beneficial position compared to most of the world and are making the effort to improve your strength and fitness. That is HUGE. Most people don’t try to make the effort. Be grateful that the sum of your life experiences have led you here to this very moment.
- Meditate on roadblocks. You don’t have to sit in the lotus position if you don’t want to, but dedicate at least a few minutes each day to reflect on areas in your strength training that act as bottlenecks to your progress such as your inability to consume enough calories or your impatience to see results. This endless reflection does wonders for your self esteem as you come to terms with your ability to solve problems with little more than your noggin’.
