Corporeal Morality

Most of the people who read this blog are my clients and potential clients. They tell me they want to get back into shape, maybe lose a few pounds, and just get a little hotter. As you might have noticed from my weekly Q&A posts, I get asked a lot of questions from those readers. But after doing this for a while, I have stopped hearing questions the way the most people hear them. I no longer hear: 

“What muscle does that work?”

“Should I do a juice fast?”

“What should I do for cardio?”

These questions are perfectly valid, and I can answer each one with a single word. But after hearing the same questions for 2 years, I have learned that those words wouldn’t help the person asking the question. That’s because the real questions everyone seems to be asking me is: 

“Is X the move that will finally give me control over my body?”

“Will doing X finally give me control over my body?”

“Can you tell me what will finally give me control over my body?”

It sounds odd to say that I feel I have a moral duty as a coach. On paper, I just make people stronger and less fat. But once you realize that people are coming to you for help and you hear the struggle in people’s hearts about their failure to gain control over their body, you start to understand that there is a moral duty to being a coach. Because a person’s body is all they are and all they are ever going to be.

Most people were not lucky enough to have a comprehensive, scientific physical education starting in elementary school. Instead we are taught that the mind and the body are separate. That the soul is pure, simple and good and the body is dirty, complicated and evil. In fact, “corporeal” which literally means “pertaining to the body” (from the latin corporeus means “body”) also figuratively means “real” or “tangible.” Philosophers since Plato have associated the body with a dichotomy between the real and tangible (and mortal) and the ideal and abstract (and eternal). But the body and mind are not separate. We are our bodies. Even your thoughts, the only thing Descartes thought was real enough to serve as an a priori assumption, are an emergent property of 120 billion neurons sitting next to each other in 3lbs of cholesterol and salt, floating in cerebrospinal fluid that is constantly bombarding it with hormones. If you change any of the conditions of that structure then your mind will change. You will change. In fact, damn near every human quality is mutable and trainable. We can get leaner, stronger, faster, more flexible, more confident, more focused and even more disciplined by fueling the consistent, progressive overload of stress and recovery. There’s no magic movement, diet, or guru. There’s just the laws of consistency, progression, and recovery and they apply to us all.

As a coach, I feel I have a moral duty to help people learn this connection and to give people hope that they can affect the changes they want in their lives. But I’m not the guy telling you that your body is a temple. I’m the guy telling you your body is a tool. You use it to do the things you want to do. Most people associate this with selfish things like sports, daily activities, and maybe some fun in the bedroom. But think about taking it one step further. One of the first modern “corporeal philosophers” was George Hébert. A french physical educator in the early 1900’s who influenced military training in every Western country with his writings, Hébert’s most famous quote is “Être fort pour être utile” or “being strong to be useful.” Who do you need to be strong for? Who are you sharpening this tool for?

Being fit does more than make you look good naked. I have a middle-aged female client who credits deadlifting for her ability to lift her injured mother-in-law off the floor. I have another client who told me that his Dad started eating better and walking more when he saw how much his own son’s attitude and mood had improved. My own marriage was saved not by me losing a bunch of weight, but because as I became fit, I became a better person. I was training not only my strength and endurance, but my patience, discipline, and resiliency. I was a more useful person and husband because I was stronger in every sense of the word.

These are just some examples of why I feel I have a moral duty as a coach and an obligation to heed Dan’s advice and “remember how lucky you are to know these things; pay it forward.” People come to me with potential to be amazing tools. Becoming stronger makes the amazing people I work with more useful to the people they love and the world we live it. I can’t do the work for them, but I can help them sharpen the dull edges and as Hemingway wrote “work the fat off [their] souls.”

You are your body. Everything you will ever do or be, you will do with your body. Sharpen the tool and be stronger for the people you love.

Pretexts of Difficulty

"We excuse our sloth under the pretext of difficulty."-Quintilian

In this ongoing series, I deal with common excuses that I hear every day from clients and potential clients.

I'm too busy. Oh, did you see last night's American Idol results show?

No you're not. Moving more and eating less takes work, let's be honest about that, but it doesn't have to take that much time. The average American watches 6 hours of TV per day. Your body, the sack of meat that is all you are and all you ever will be, is asking for 5 hours of dedicated movement per week. That's 45 minutes per day, or 1 minute more than a re-reun episode of Lost that you've seen 6 times. What you're really saying is that you've got a routine and exercise isn't in it. So stop thininking in blocks on your Outlook Calendar and think about how to accumulate 45 minutes throught the day without adding to your busy schedule of watching crappy TV or drinking bad beer with people you don't like all that much anyway.

Start with a bunch of air squats and push ups when you wake up. That's 2 minutes out of your schuedule, tops. How about you spend $20 on a used iron gym and do a pull up every time you go to the bathroom? That's less than 5 seconds. Maybe you can even do Turkish Get Ups while you watch American Idol? Or turn your walks into training walks? That takes no extra time at all and notice I never mentioned anything about going to a gym.

Training Walks

In case you haven’t noticed from my inconsistent posting last week, Coach Stevo has been a little busy. No this post isn’t going to be a pity party. I know that all my readers and clients are very busy, too this time of year. So rather than complaining, I thought I’d set a good example and tell you about a way that I keep my training progress moving forward when the days get shorter and the crazy ramps up.

Pick a Goal that Will Keep You Sane

Between now and January 2nd, there is very little chance you will be able to do everything that is expected of you and everything that you want to do. But you can still make progress as long as you remember that willpower is finite. If you prioritize what is important for you, you can spend your willpower resources on the things that are going to help you the most. Don’t worry about what you aren’t gonna get done: just stay focused on one thing that is going to help you the most. But think broadly. Willpower is finite and you should be spending it on the goal that is going keep you sane and make you a better person for 6 weeks. As Dan John says in Intervention, “Let’s be honest, it’s great having a 400lb bench; but no one cares.”

Movement Matters

When I take a look at my own life, I know I need to move. Movement matters to me more than training. I can skip training sessions and get other work done. I not swing a bell for a few days and I won't lose my temper. In fact, if I miss a few sprint sessions my 10m time might actually improve. But I need to walk at least an hour a day or my quality of life, and even the quality of my character will be negatively impacted. If I do not walk for a few days but go to the gym, I will lift less. So what do I do? A little trick I learned from all the retired Chinese people that live in my neighborhood: I go for training walks!

Coach Stevo’s Training Walks

Let’s say you’ve been sitting too long. You can’t stay focused; your back hurts; your hips are stiff; you’re cranky; you’re sleepy. It’s time to put on some minimal footwear like Chuck Taylors or New Balance Minimus, grab a hoodie, your iPhone and your headphones. Put on your favorite album or podcast and start walking. No, it doesn’t matter where. Just start walking. But here’s the catch: every time the mood strikes you, do a bodyweight exercise. Not too many, you aren’t looking to work up too much of a sweat. Not too few, you’re wanna get a little training effect here. Just do less than too much, but more than not enough. Here’s a list of what I did on my last walk.

• Handstands on a wall.


• Inverted rows in a railing.


• Step ups on a low wall.


• Squat-stretches at stoplights.


• Assisted pistols on handrails.


• One-handed push-ups on a low wall.


• Cross-Crawls at stoplights.

The retired Chinese people in my neighborhood walk around doing Tai Chi. I bang out handstands. You can do high-knee step ups and cartwheels. It really doesn’t matter. What matters is that you come back by the time that album or podcast is over and feel better than when you set out on your walk. You have a lifetime to get that 400lb bench, and these crazy days will be over in January. I have just as many fitness goals as the next guy, but I’m not sweating the next few weeks. I go for training walks once or twice a day and am a better person for it.

Obligatory Thanksgiving-Fatness-Fear Post

All the blogs I read have done posts about how not to get fat during Thanksgiving. I follow some really great fitness and nutrition experts, so the posts are all very scientific, well reasoned, and long. But many people have asked my advice about how not to get fat during Thanksgiving, so here’s Coach Stevo’s KISS advice:

• Pick up some heavy things prior to eating.
• Relax. It’s just one meal.
• Put down the fork when you’re 80% full and wait a few minutes until dessert.

The key to this whole strategy is eating in your post-workout window, keeping your binge to the one meal, and not to let guilt drive you to excessive cardio (remember that you can't out run a donut). Putting down the fork early and waiting a few minutes until dessert will just lessen that “bloated” feeling which is really all that binging on one meal is. Getting fat takes weeks and months of poor food choices. So relax; you aren’t going to get fat from a single meal.

It Came From the Inbox!

In this ongoing series, I post (with permission) actual questions that have landed in my inbox.

What should I do for cardio?

Whatever you want to be able to do a lot of in a given amount of time. Cardio training is getting your body more effecient at using its fuel systems to produce force over time. But cardio is training and training should always have a goal. If you run, you should run. If you row, you should row. If you need to pass a snatch test, you should snatch. I like to walk, box, and play a little rugby so my cardio is that stuff 3x per week and always try to go a little harder than the week before. What cardio isn't is fat loss training. It may be a little buffer against slip ups, but you can't outrun a donut. Think about what it is you love doing and train for it with your cardio selection.