Never Settle For Less

When I was in high school I did some really stupid things.  At some point during those 4 years I

• Got caught with “unauthorized” females in the house
• Smoke black and milds
• Fought in a weight room full of metal plates and sharp objects (smooth move)
• Chased a school bus 1/4 mile down the street

While all of those things are silly or ridiculous in their own right none of them can come close to my biggest blunder.  At my school shoes and clothes were a status symbol.  If you had the most expensive or exclusive clothes you were seen as coherent and people assumed you could probably spell your name right.  Since I wanted to hold some kind of status I eventually became a sneaker freak.  I was all over just about every new pair of high priced sneakers that hit the market.

Every year the genius squad at Nike would pump out a new pair of must have sneakers (Air Jordans, Air Max, etc).  When I started buying shoes the price tag was only $140. The most expensive pair a bought was $200.  Even though I should have cared, price was no object for me.  I had a job flipping pizzas and nothing else to do with the money. So I did the next best thing…flush it down the toilet.

Things really got out of hand during my senior year.  Cue the almighty air max 95.

One of the executive sales and marketing geniuses at Nike decided to go through their catalog and re-release the all black Air-Max 95 shoe.  It was a pure stroke of genius.  It seemed like EVERYBODY under the age of 30 wanted those shoes.  As soon as they hit the shelf they were gone.  If you weren’t at the store when they were released you could forget about it.  Unfortunately for me my grandmother didn’t see the urgency so I couldn’t get a pair.

At first I didn’t think much of it. After all it was just a pair of shoes.  How big of a deal could it really be?  I found out when I came back to school.  All the cool kids were rocking a pair and I wasn’t. In my little mind that made it a big deal.Since I’m not the type to go down without a fight I launched an FBI style manhunt for the shoes.  I think the FBI has a 98% success rate.  Mine was 0.  Every store I went to was fresh out of size 12 all black Air-Max 95 sneakers.  I was becoming obsessed and depressed at the same time.  All over a pair of shoes.  They were the talk of the town and I was left out.

One day my luck changed.  I walked into Hibbett sports on the hunt.  I asked the salesperson for the size 12 all black Air-Max 95.  She went to the back of the store and returned with a box in her hand. A surge of happiness shot through my body as she approached.  As she got closer that happiness turned to bewilderment.

What’s this??  The size on the box said 14 not when I had requested a 12.  She explained to me that the only size they had was a 14.  Up until then I had been very level headed and rational about my hunt.  Things were about to change. This was the very first time that I’d had a pair within arms reach.

I slipped them on and “walked” around in them.  They were definitely too big. I had room for another adult in there but it really didn’t matter.  I had finally had my shoes within reach!  All rational thought was thrown out of the window as I began to daydream about my new shoes.

“Are you going to buy them?” the sale person broke through my daydream trying to make her sale.  “Ummm…sure I’ll take them.”  I was beaming with joy and pride as I walked to the sales counter.  That was the first and only time in my life that I paid $145 for something that obviously didn’t fit me.

The next day I woke up and prepared for school. My euphoria was broken up by a dose of reality.  I was too caught up in being cool to realize that the shoes were indeed 2 sizes too big.  When I walked tt sounded like my shoes were farting.  I had to fix this and fix it quick.  I took an entire roll of toilet tissue, separated it in half, stuffed it into my shoes, and hit the door for school.

About halfway through the day I noticed that the foot fart had returned.   I looked down to see toilet tissue coming out of my shoes.

GREAT!!  I hustled to the restroom to remove the tissue and create another plan of attack.  Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do accept suck it.  For the rest of the day my shoes flopped around like I had on flip flops.  Actually I did have on flip flops.  They were flip flops disguised as $140 sneakers that happened to be 2 sizes too big .

For a month or two I tried to find ways to make my shoes fit.  Every attempt to look cool only served to make me look silly.  I realized things had gotten out of hand when my cousin asked me when I stole Shaq’s shoes from. After two months of making myself look like a clown I packed the shoes up never to appear again.

Conclusion
I tell this story because its humorous and it packs a powerful point.  I realize today (and I probably did then) that buying $140 shoes that didn’t fit me wasn’t in my best interest.  At the time I was caught up in an emotional storm were fitting in was the only thing that mattered.  I felt so much pressure to fit in that I was willing to do something totally foolish with my time and my money to make it happen.  Ultimately all I did was make myself look like a complete, 100% _______________ (insert your favorite synonym for idiot).

If you’re not careful the same thing will happen to you as an adult. Society has the power to place a tremendous social strain on anyone not strong enough to resist.   I’ve seen some awesome people make some terrible decisions because they want to fit in with the crowd or be “successful”.

Look at the sub-prime mortgage crisis of 2007 and 2008.  Everyone (even the financially unfit) felt the need to buy a home to start building towards the highly subjective “American dream”.  See how great that turned out?  I could go on and on with examples but the picture is already crystal clear.

Analyze your life and start living with your best interest in mind.  Don’t go into the grave living the lift of a person being pushed around and pressured by society.  After all Peer Pressure is 4 da Kidz!

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It’s not too often that I agree with 50 cent on world issues, but this time I have to tip my hat to him.  In a candid interview from inside a car 50 said that he believed Obama would be assassinated if elected President.

That 2 minute interview sent shock waves around the nation.  All the naive little boys and girls came out of the closet to bash 50 cent. Morning radio hosts, TV commentators, and even Bill O’Reilly chimed in.  People all across the nation turned a blind eye to the nation’s history and  threw labels at 50 cent like idiot, “pinhead”, or someone brining “negative energy” to Barack’s campaign.  Are we really that naive or have we forgotten our history?

Remember the guy in that picture.  What’s his name?  Yeah that’s it Martin Luther King Jr.  That guy was a real trouble maker.  Who in their right mind goes around promoting civil rights, equality, love, and economic justice?  At some point his rantings and ravings about spreading love had to be stopped.  Unfortunately, they were when he was assassinated.  The country wasn’t ready for an African-American man with that sort of power.

The power in this country (right, wrong, or indifferent) has always resided with old white men. I don’t know if you’ve noticed it yet.  Maybe you don’t have one of those fancy smancy colored television sets. There’s something peculiar about Barack Hussein Obama.  That name doesn’t fit in very well with George Washington, John Quincy Adams, Rutherford Birchard Hayes, and George Herbert Walker Bush.  If Barack Obama became the president we’d have a little chocolate stain on that 2009 presidential calendar.  All it takes is one person (and believe me that person exists) who doesn’t like that.

The black guy who wanted kids to go to school together was murdered in cold blood.  How could you possibly say the black guy who wants to RUN THE COUNTRY wouldn’t be a target of assassination?

Barack Obama’s campaign is run under the slogan of hope.  So in the spirit of his campaign I’ll close by listing 2 of my personal hopes for him:

1. I HOPE he wins the election
2. I HOPE he doesn’t get seriously injured in the process

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Yesterday the history channel earned my everlasting support.  It takes a lot for me to pledge my support to a channel but after witnessing the single most hilarious program of my life I’m 100% sold.

Around 11 pm on February 13, 2008 my life was changed forever. I witnessed a program about cattle mutilation from Aliens.  The UFO images, dramatic music, and my longing for something to replace the void left in my life by Unsolved Mysteries were enough to keep my attention locked in.  It turns out that my attention (and that of 2 other people) was wisely invested.

From the onset the program felt magical.  The show started out with an explanation of a 50 year old phenomenon.  Cows were being ruthlessly mutilated on farms!  This wasn’t your normal cow mutilation by any stretch of the imagination.  It wasn’t just an ear there or an eye here.  These cows had their tongues and genitals removed with surgical precision (no blood at any of the scenes).

About 5 minutes into the investigation my roomate attempted to change the channel to more "reasonable" TV.  His date and I refused to let him rob us of our joy.  He gave up and let us enjoy a classic piece of American TV.
The show was very educational for me. There are 3 things that I learned that I absolutely have to share.

1 - Aliens are Evil

If there is another type of life form in this galaxy if definitely hates human beings.  They hate human beings so much that they abduct cows (which according to the History channel have a similar makeup to humans) to study so that they can take over the world.  I’m starting to hate aliens

We got some nice pictures of what aliens look like too.  This is the closest picture I could find.

I’m sure that aliens eat humans with the innermost mouth .

2 - Cows have their own CSI Team

Did you know there was a such thing as a professional cow mutilation crime scene expert (CSI watch out).  I’m not really sure where you go to get that degree.  I’m not really sure what drives you to devote your life to the mutilation of cows.  I’m not really sure what makes you poke a cow that has been dead for several months with a pen and then stick that pen behind your ear.

The entire arena of cow mutilation and investigation confuses me.  I am clear on one thing though.  Somebody has to put a stop to this!

3 - Cows have very strong bones

My favorite portion of the show was part unbelievable and hilarious. Halfway through the show we were treated to a visual reenactment  of a real live cow mutilation.  The poor cow was minding his own business just eating some grass in a field.  Out of nowhere a flying white disk of doom flies overhead, scoops up the cow in a beam of light, and takes off into the night. The aliens take all the cow’s hopes and dreams (along with all its inner organs) and then the unthinkable (and hilarious) happens.

The aliens unceremoniously drop our filet mignon friend 10,000 feet from the sky to the same spot they picked him up from.  A fall like that would send any mere mortal in 1000 different directions.  At a minimum the head and a limb or two would come off.

Cows don’t suffer the same fate!

Every cow that has been dropped from the heavens above has suffered about 3 broken bones.  Milk does do a body good .

Conclusion

I went to work today fully expecting to be the only person who could have possibly wasted their time watching a show about cow mutilations.  I was wrong. To my surprise one of my teammates was also equally intrigued and appalled by the whole thing.

Based on the events of last night I do have one tiny suggestion for TV stations.  If you don’t have something useful to show us then just give us the blue screen of death.  The value is the same.

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I was digging through my YouTube favorite’s today when I found this video.  Enjoy!

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Is it just me or is the world becoming too complicated?  When I say complicated I don’t mean in the sense of advancement.  It’s great that we experience growth in technology, education, and other important aspects of life.

My problem lies with the notion that you are somehow "smarter" if you make things sound ridiculously complicated.

Example 1

Case and point.  I was at an all day seminar for small business owners last summer.  Some of it was pure fluff and some of it was quality information.  The first presenter got things going with a semi moving speech about being Super Excellent.  A good number of his principles were spot on and correct.  I agree that in this life you must be persistent, knowledgeable, and slightly crazy if you want to be wildly successful.  Just as I was beginning to enter my Super Excellent zone he said something that snapped me out of my trance.
"If you really want to intrigue your customers say things in a way they won’t understand.  That way they’ll keep coming back!"

What??

I don’t know too many people that will be drawn in by someone who speaks in tongue twisting parables that they don’t understand.  Speaking over people’s heads is wasteful and it never ever gets the message across.  Plain English gets the job done just fine.

Example 2

A former co-worker of mine was the absolute king of the corporate tongue twisters. In 10 short years he’d climbed through the ranks to make the position of Senior Manager.  He wasn’t shy about sharing that information one bit.  He was one of those people that puffed his chest out and flashed his blackberry to prove he was important.  Needless to say he wasn’t well received.

One day we were in a meeting discussing our operation.  The point was raised that some of our facilities shared similar qualities and could work together to create a more efficient operation. In his best big wig voice he puffed out his chest and said "The cross-functional synergies have been running through my mind for some time now".

What??

That’s a very interesting way to say "the two facilities that are across the street from each other should put freight on the same truck".  I don’t really know if that’s a "cross-functional synergenastic" relationship.

Example 3

The fitness industry is terrible about making things more complicated than necessary (probably more so than any other industry).    At any given time there are 25 different diets, 50 different supplements, 75 different workouts, and 100 different people telling you how to get the same result.

Do the math and that’s 25*50*75*100 = 9,375,000 ways to burn fat and build muscle.  No wonder people have a hard time seeing results!  It’s pretty daunting to keep up with 9 million options (at least it would be for me).  I don’t know how things got this way but it needs to stop.

Do we really need 9 million ways to move more and eat less?

Do we?

Conclusion

We’re living in an age where making things sound outlandishly complicated will get you everywhere.  Pretty soon the color crayon yellow will have the number wavelength frequency on the crayon instead of the color.  I bet the kids will love that.

Since I’m having so much fun I’ve decided to throw in my own big word for good measure.  So I’d like to close with my profound word of wisdom "gobbledegookiewoogie".  It means "I’m trying to make this nonsense sound confusing as possible".

Did it work?

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If you’re like me you take your workouts and nutrition very seriously.  By doing that you will inevitably stand out from the crowd.  Those who work out diligently tend to get heckled, teased, or otherwise annoyed by the coach potatoes of the world.  Coach potatoes outnumber us 87 to 1 so we can expect the issue to remain for years to come.  When your results start to show you will be labeled a Fitness "Nut".  All the coach potatoes will point and life in an attempt to make you feel like an outcast.  The purpose of this article is to arm you with 3 simple and effective techniques to shut down the noise.
1 - Explain what you do

The overriding majority of people who harass you have no clue what you are actually doing.  In their eyes it looks weird that you’re scooping tuna out of a can at 10 am (it’s not lunch time yet), it’s strange that you drink a gallon of water a day (don’t you pee a lot?), and you’ll hurt their feelings if you won’t eat their triple refried banana nut cake (c’mon it’s only 800 calories a slice).

They will continue to heckle you unless you explain why you act the way you do.  Explain that you eat tuna at 10 am to feed your ever growing supply of muscle.  Tell them you drink water to LOSE water weight.  Tell them you won’t eat their triple refried banana nut cake because 800 calories is about 45% of the calories you eat in a day.

In all likelihood they won’t understand you.  At least they’ll be confused enough to buzz off and let you continue to see results.

2 - Show Them Your Results

Every gym trainee worth his/her salt has progress pictures.  Progress pictures serve many purposes.  Mine give me a sense of pride.  It feels good to look back and yourself and realize how far you’ve come.  Progress pictures are also a great way to get people off your back.
I recall having a co-worker (who wanted the same results as me) over my back about my lifestyle.  She was laying it on pretty thick (moreso than usual).  From nowhere she began to fire questions at me:
"Why do you workout so much?"

"Are you in love with yourself?"

"Do you ever take a break?"

"Why won’t you eat any pie?"

Her barrage seemed like it was never going to end.  The more she spoke the more annoyed I became.  After about 30 seconds I asked her to follow me back to my computer.

I explained that I could show her visuals to answer her questions.  I logged into my email account and began showing her my before and after photographs.  We flipped through photos of me at 252 lbs, 240 lbs, 230 lbs, 220 lbs, and so on until we got to the final picture.  She was floored. She’d never seen me as an overweight person.  With each picture she became more and more quiet.  When I was done I looked at her at asked "Is that a good enough reason?"

She hasn’t brought it up since.

3 - Ignore Your Hecklers

You may find yourself dealing with a completely irrational, ridiculous, annoying, atrocious heckler at some point.  When all else fails use a technique I learned from a friend.

One of my friends is notorious for his ability to poke fun at people.  If ANYTHING is wrong with you he’ll pull it out and make some jokes.  Oddly enough it seems that no one can make fun of him.  You can try but it just won’t be very effective.  He has a nonchalant way of looking at you like you’re speaking a langauge never before spoken on earth.  Whenever you start in on him he just blanks out.  He won’t smile.  He won’t frown.  He’ll hardly even acknowledge that you’re alive.  When you’re done he’ll continue on with his day like he’s never seen you.

It drove me and my other friends absolutely insane.  Soon we quit trying to make fun of him.  It was incredibly pointless.  It felt like you were literally walking up to a brick wall and trying to make jokes.

Use this tactic when you’re being heckled by someone who just won’t go away. Nobody likes talking to a brick wall.

Nobody does.

Conclusion

There are so many factors that go into working out and being in shape.  You already have to

1. Research exercises
2. Plan your day to make time
3. Eat correctly
4. Chart your growth
5. Stay motivated

The last thing you need is to worry with the heckling of others.  Use these 3 tips to control the pests in your life.  In all likelihood they are jealous of your success.  If they’re jealous then you must be doing something right

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