Ante Up

“His place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.” That is the real shit right there. Words spoken by President Theodore Roosevelt almost a century ago. The man Teddy was speaking of is the kind of guy we all need to be... A gladiator in the arena of life. The risk taker, the warrior, the one willing to go all out and put it all on the line in pursuit of his dream. The man who takes control of his destiny, antes up and puts it all on the table, knowing that it is better to dare greatly and fail, than to play it safe and never try at all. Fuck that. Life is too short and there ain't no reset button on this game... There ain't no return flight on this trip, so it is about time we step up to the plate and go for ours today, because tomorrow may never come.

There are steps to be taken to illuminate the path of success. We always need to conceive a master plan to be executed and carried out, forever progressing towards a goal just over the horizon. Laying a foundation for the house of our dreams starts with just one brick. Once you start pulling those new bricks from the pile and laying them in place, the wall grows pretty quickly. Visualize your goals; pile up those bricks, and use these tools to lay them in place. Before you know it, you'll be living large in a mansion fit for a king.

Conceive to Achieve

Before we get ahead of ourselves lets clear one thing up, you've first gotta know what in fact it is that you want out of life. Who are you really? What makes you happy? What makes you proud? What motivates you? What is your ideal life? You need the answers to these questions or you are going nowhere fast. You need to identify your goals clearly and in detail before you can set out to achieve anything. The more you know about yourself and what you want out of life, the easier it is to map out a game plan to get there.

First Things First

Prioritize, my friend. If you want to be a bodybuilder more than anything else in the world, then bodybuilding has to come first-before everything else. Ok, maybe I'm overstating the need for tunnel vision, but one must be consumed by and preoccupied with their goals in order to reach them... you gotta do your homework. You get out what you put in, believe that. You have to find time to train, to prepare your food, to eat and to take your supplements, to be about the business of being a bodybuilder. Yeah, you need to be a little obsessive, but that is what it takes to be the best at anything. If that is asking too much, then get used to being an “also ran.” Don't worry; you won't be lonely-that isn't an exclusive club.

Tiny + Small + Little = One Big Motherfucker

If your goal is to gain 20 quality pounds in the next year, know that it ain't going to happen overnight. That isn't how this game works. Not to mention the fact that running to the scale everyday with your 20-pound goal in mind is going to make the incremental daily progress seem minute to the point of being inconsequential. Break your goals down into their simplest terms. Twenty pounds in one year works out to 5 lb. every three months, which is less than 2 lb. a month, less than half a pound a week. When stripped down to its bare essence the final goal seems far less daunting and each tiny target needed to get there seems all the more attainable. Set up each little challenge and knock it down, then move on to the next. Sometimes all it takes is some finely tuned perspective to put us over the top.

Be That Guy

You see him in your head, in your mind's eye. He is as clear as the image in your bathroom mirror--the perfect you. The best friend, the perfect husband or father, the ideal businessman, the best bodybuilder who ever lived… In your mind, in the depths of your being, “he” is “you.” That vision can be your greatest ally on the road to success. When faced with a particular situation--punking out on a training session, calling out of work, cheating on your diet or your girlfriend--stop and ask yourself, “What would the perfect me do in this spot?” Answering that question honestly makes giving anything less than your best effort nearly impossible. The more often you behave in keeping with how your ideal vision of yourself would act, the closer you are to bringing him to fruition. One day he might wink back at you in your reflection.

The status quo is a motherfucker, Animal. It hangs around our necks every day of our lives. Society calls us to be less. It demands that we be average, cuz the less we make of ourselves, the less the rest of the world has to live up to. Who the fuck cares what the next man expects of you if it doesn't jive with your dreams? Free yourselves of the tiny, narrow-minded expectations imposed upon you and go for yours. Criticize no man but yourself. Do what it is you feel you were put on Earth to do and fuck everything else. Our time here is short, so don't waste a second of it being anything less than your best, anybody other than yourself. Do “you” until the fuckin' wheels come off...