I’m writing this to the steady drumbeat of the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club iconic Beat the Devil’s Tattoo.
And it’s fuelling my internal desire to move again.
But the most important change to my desire to move, is the fact that I have genuine reasons to improve in the gym.
I’ve realised that the idea of a target when going to the gym is very important. A vague goal like “losing weight” isn’t good enough for me.
There needs to be a purpose behind every exercise I do.
Baseball has now become that purpose.
I’m going to try out for my local baseball team in March for the winter season.
To ensure that I make a good first impression, it’s time to start exercising at the gym to specifically target the exercises that make me a better baseball player.
Sprinting is now key, as well as building up my conditioning so that I don’t gas out by the midpoint of the game. After all, if I’m going to play in the outfield, I need to be agile, with a focus on running hard and fast and moving between the bases.
I’m now also focusing my efforts of getting stronger muscles, so that I can hit the ball harder, as well as focusing on my hips, to ensure that I’m getting good rotational movement. My arms need to be flexible as well, so that when I throw the ball long distances, it moves quickly and accurately.
There are so many things that I am excited to go to the gym about now.
It was like this when I was obsessed with tennis a few years ago. There is something about a bat/racquet and ball sport that fires me up. I love the repetitive nature of it all, how, no matter what you do, every single hit is a tiny bit different to the thousands you’ve done before.
But you keep trying, you keep making tiny adjustments so that one day, it’ll feel natural and smooth and you can control the outcome.
My weekly batting practice has now got me to a level where I know when I hit something, I can predict what it is going to do. I know how I need to arc my arms, when to follow-through and when to toss the bat and run like hell to first.
Even before I got into tennis, I was desperate to start racing professionally. This desire to trim down on all levels so that I was lighter in the car, resulted in one of the most dramatic weight losses I’ve ever undergone.
This is what I need to figure out to lose weight. I needed a specific target, a sole goal that everything leads into.
I’m still the same weight I was so many weeks ago, but this need to be lean and keen for my baseball try-outs is lighting the right kind of obsessive fire in me to succeed.
I’m ready to hit the gym and just give it my all so that I can be the best player and asset to the team I can be.
The last thing I want to hear is that I’ve let the other guys down because I refused to stay in shape.
The worst part of all this, is the constant reprimanding. The inner voice in your head that tells you, that you are hungry. Then the stern voice that tells it to shut up and keep walking past.
It takes so much discipline to stick to a diet.
Worst than that though, is the despair when you realise that nothing has changed. Your weight hasn’t gone, and nothing seems to change.
So what is the harm in buying that TimTam you really crave? It’s a two for seven dollars deal. You can afford it!
What is the harm in just eating one a day? You can control yourself right? Just one a day! Just to keep you sane.
Shut the fuck up.
That’s the new mantra I’m trying to adopt now. Stop wasting money on snacks and stop eating junk food.
Look down at your belly and feel that shame. Then use that shitty shameful feeling to fuel your desire to move more.
It is so tempting to load snacks into my lunch bag and feed my stomach. I can literally feel the urge to eat start to consume my thoughts. But I’m taking the small steps. I can’t reach for that snack until I wait another half hour.
Then another half hour after that. And then …. instead of getting the snack, I’m just going to gulp down more water.
Drown the feeling. Ignore it.
Goddamn is it hard though. I’m struggling almost every day not to indulge. My stomach is tearing itself apart, trying to eat more, but I’m not acknowledging it. Instead I’m trying to make it smaller.
Just like how I felt today in the gym. For some reason, nothing was quite working. My motivation was down, my energy flagging but I pushed through anyway.
I’m already here. Just get on with it.
Some days, your motivation leaves you and suddenly your gym session becomes a test of character. Do you have what it takes to finish your set? Are you going to spend the rest of the time on your phone? Are you really going to justify your mere attendance to a gym is worthy of something?
I stared at the clock. I stared at myself in the mirror.
Then I leaned down and picked up my kettlebell and kept going.
Feeling sorry for myself wasn’t going to drop the number 86 down to 74. It doesn’t matter that you feel like shit today …. just go through the motions. Become a machine and remove the emotion out of this workout. You don’t need a new playlist, a check through Instagram or some motivational speech.
I just have to finish this goddamn set. I just need to lift the 12kg kettlebell above my head and keep it there.
One at a time. One move, one focus, one mission.
Today, I absolutely felt shitty. I didn’t have it in me.
But I finished my set, I finished my exercises and I stayed back another 10 minutes, bouncing balls of the wall, sharpening my reflexes … but due to lack of focus, half of that time was spent dropping them instead of catching them.
We all have days like this. Where motivation isn’t there. But like I told myself earlier …. there’s nothing to do, except get on with it. It doesn’t matter that you feel like crap …. just become a machine.
I really hope that next week’s DA will showcase at least a drop in kilograms. But I doubt it. Change, especially at my age, is slow and a behemoth.
It takes forever to change and an instant to fail to change.
This isn’t a sprint. It’s a marathon. It’s a true test to my character, my focus and my determination.
It’s about discipline.
Remember that Damocles. You need to remember that life is about being disciplined.
To keep your standards high doing the monotonous stuff. Life can’t be flashes of brilliance, because your brilliance only shines once in a comet flyby. So get good at doing the boring stuff.
Keep hitting that gym, no matter the feelings you have inside. Keep ignoring the snack section when you walk through Coles or Woolies. Don’t listen to that tiny annoying tempting voice.
Be firm and let’s see that strength translate back into some kind of athleticism.
You still haven’t found that true motivating factor …. some kind of purpose to tie all this sacrifice and pain for …. but shame will do for now.
Until the next defamatory disciplinary action (DA).
Lately, my motivation for fitness has become solely revolved around combat readiness.
Perhaps it’s the constant geopolitical and “gun-tuber” content that constantly updates itself on my social media feed, but there is a niggling concern in the back of my mind about the state of the world.
As a child of refugees, there is always this small anxiety that lives in the lizard part of my brain. It’s the fear of losing everything due to human conflict.
It happened once to my parents. Why can’t it happen to me too?
In what seems like back to back years, I’ve seen the eruption of warfare in two different regions of the world.
Ukraine & Gaza.
These two conflict zones are indicative of a strong change in the winds of warfare.
Drones rule the battlefield now. Whoever has the ability to command cheap disposable drones and use them to maximum combat effectiveness, now control the area of operations.
From using them in kamikaze attacks, conducting small, immediate searches of dangerous areas, to precise, minute by minute reconnaissance, drones have made the modern battlefield an uglier fight than it already is.
In what seems like a bizarre twist of irony, despite the advances of technology, weapons that were common in World War 1, are now being fielded again to use against drones. Fixed machine guns, rapid shotguns are now being used to take down drones, instead of their ancient counterparts (balloons and biplanes). Those same weapons are also being fielded in the trenches of Ukraine, or the tunnel systems of Gaza.
Warfare it seems has regressed and advanced at the same time. It’s bizarre, fascinating and horrifying to see history repeat itself.
All this knowledge about the state of contemporary warfare has left an undeniable mark on my psyche.
My paranoia about the world has been subtly increased due to all the information I am processing about wars and geopolitical clashes across the world.
This paranoid mindset has created a very dark motivation for me to get fitter and stronger.
For as the man in the photo above is often fond of quoting …. if you don’t get fit, you die.
Being functionally strong isn’t enough though. I need to be able to run long distances, possess good reflexes, sharpen my hand-eye coordination and be able operate my mind in high-stress situations, whilst trusting or overriding my body’s natural reactions.
It is about being as well-rounded a person I can become. Improving everything overall, not just focusing on one element.
That is why I do circuit training. I like to hit everything at once, and really push my limits. I never know when I need to push something, run somewhere, drag an object, climb an obstacle or exceed my mental limits. But the point here, is that I am ready to activate the proper muscles when I need to.
And I push myself even further, because my body weight isn’t enough. Yes, I’m already a heavy individual, but adding on the extra 6kg plate carrier that stimulates the normal weight of plates, is just a small taste of the things I need to do when shit hits the fan (SHTF).
After all, if society does truly collapse, there is no point in me being able to just push myself with nothing on me. No, I need to prepare my body in getting used to extra weight, whether it’d be body armour, the hand of my partner and child, or hauling extra supplies across vast distances.
These are important factors that really stick with me, every time I go out to train now. I’m motivated by a paranoid desire to protect those around me, by being strong enough to take care of myself and them.
To invest in my fitness, is to invest in my survival and future.
Even though, I live in a country that has is far away from anything, a city that is beautifully pristine and a house in a safe neighbourhood, I’m always aware that everything can be stolen from me, because of a bully, a dictator, a psychopath or a truly desperate individual.
And it is those desperate people, that I fear the most, because they are the ones who will do absolutely anything to survive, even if it means walking over my corpse.
Where once I was focused on getting lean and fit for a race-car, the motivation now is about being physically strong with a strong emphasis on stamina.
If there is anything I’ve learned about the men who serve in special forces, is that they all possess a freakish level of endurance and pain tolerance.
They come in all shapes and sizes, tall, short, muscular, skinny, lean or having a bit of survival weight on the belly.
But one thing is true amongst them all … they have an unholy amount of willpower to tough it out in the most extreme conditions. That incredible willpower is boosted by an individual’s operator high level of fitness.
In other words, the fitter, tougher and stronger you are, the more willpower you can put aside for when things get really shit.
It’s a performance booster.
Where once, when you were not the fittest, you could only push to a certain limit, now, at the height of your physical prowess, you can exceed and outpace that previous limitation.
This is why most of my exercise lately have been revolving around circuits. I don’t just do the exercise in isolation anymore. Instead I combine them, so I never quite get a rest.
Jump Rope for 2 minutes
x20 Bench Dips
x20 Incline Push Ups
Dead Hang for 1 minute
x5 Chest Dips
x20 Incline Sit Ups
x20 Squats (Bodyweight)
Run 500 metres.
Rinse and repeat for a total of x5 circuits.
Cardio, strength, core and stamina. They are all targeted ferociously in my workout, and I do my utmost to keep all these exercise within a 10 minute window.
The part I hate the most, is the run. It’s uphill, and never fails to rob me of my breath after all the exercises I’ve done before.
But running is the most crucial skill I need to learn. Running will help me run away from drones, artillery, and anything else I need to face in a modern war. Running will keep me alive to fight another day. Running will let me see my family again.
This is why I always throw it in and the distance will continue to grow in the coming months. Soon, it won’t be 500 metres up a hill once, it will be 1 kilometre up a hill twice.
Because there is no point in staying stagnant. If I want to be fighting fit for a war, I need to destroy my personal limits and reach deep for something truly inhuman inside of me.
That is the only way I can protect my partner, my family and my friends.
This motivation to get fit has never felt so sustaining. It’s such a deeply personal reason, that it marries both the caveman brain inside of me and the rational mind that is living in the 21st century.
And nothing will frighten me more to get fit, than the thought of losing everything I hold dear.
To make the record clear, I’m not doing all of this training to fight a war in another foreign land.
I’ve made peace with the fact that I’m too old to enlist, and the fact that I’ve never felt comfortable fighting people who have never done me wrong personally, on behalf of a government who never really had my best interest at heart.
I will never pick up a gun to get into a fight that isn’t on my home soil. If someone comes here, to my home, then I will fight with everything I have.
But to fight overseas and potentially die there, isn’t and will never be on the cards for me.
I’ve got my own home to protect, as do the supposed foreign enemies of the “state.”
No, I’m getting fit, getting strong, getting tough for my own selfish reasons.
I’m here to protect what I have, and that’s all that matters to me.
Life can be simple when we want it to be, and I’ve decided to cast aside all the useless factors that used to cloud my thinking.
The mantra is simple:
Get fit, to protect yourself and those who you holds dear.
That’s the mission. That’s the motivation.
That’s the endgame.
So let’s get strong for those around us. They’re depending on you to do your part.
Damocles' Journal 