Things You Should Be Doing, But Aren't #2

1. Stretch Your Hip Flexors - Do you enjoy just sitting around and chilling? It's fun and relaxing right? Or maybe you sit for a living at work? Let me give you a scenario... You're just sitting around one day, minding your own business when all of a sudden you see a kitten stuck in a tree outside. You seize the moment and run and save her. Well, since you've been sitting for the last few hours your hip flexors are really tight. You go to stand up and your tight hip flexors, well, stay tight. They pull your pelvic cage down which pulls your low back into hyperextension. But that's ok right? You don't need your back in a good position while you run to save the kitten. Wrong. Your hyperextended spine hates you and decides to pull on your hamstrings in an attempt to hold things together. Now your hamstrings are in a stretched state and since you've been sitting a while they can hardly remember what its like to actually be used. You realize this when you're 3 steps in and your left hammie has had enough and gets strained. It's ok though, you can still hobble to heroism. Boom, there goes your right hamstring as you overcompensate with effort. Now you're out of the game and no one is there to save the kitten. Lesson learned? Stretch your hip flexors, save the kitten.
2. Handstands - You don't have to wait until we tell you to do them at the gym. Yes that's right, you can do them right in your own home. Handstands, and any ground based movement on your hands, will drastically improve your core strength and scapular stability. After a few weeks of routinely adding these movements in, you'll notice a nice improvement in your stability with snatches, jerks, and other overhead movements. You'll also notice your core staying stronger throughout any movement. 
3. Stay Hungry - Stay hungry for food. Stay hungry for learning. Stay hungry for things that are true, lovely, and admirable. Stay hungry for life.

The Grind

Training, what's it all about. For some it's unexplainable. It's that magic elixir of sweat, effort, and PRs. You can't get enough. For others that's not the case. It's a way to feel better, to keep moving, and for some it's the life raft that keep them alive. So in any of these cases there are mountain tops and there are valleys. Mountain tops are very short lived. These are those PRs, those goals you have strived for. Most of you time is spent climbing, grabbing, pulling, grinding. How do we stay motivated, how do we keep grinding when it seems like all we reach are false summits? Well I'm gonna be very honest, some of you aren't, because you just don't have what it takes. With the amount of free information, with a training facility on every corner, with the ability to walk, run, buy the best food on the planet, drink the cleanest water, and be free from disease; some of us will whiling chose the path of least resistance and walk in the shade of the valley, never to experience the glory of the sun.

But for those who have the seed of determination planted in us, for those who have an inkling of fortitude, there is reward unmeasurable if we press on.

(Side rant: we talk these days about self confidence/esteem like it's some sort of mysterious gem that's brought to us by way of how others view us. Bull crap, you want self esteem stop your whining and crying, pull your face out the dirt and grind. Grind till your fingers bleed, grind till you collapse from exhaustion. There you will find your self esteem, there's where you will find your self confidence. It's nothing that can be given to you, its something that you freaking smash the door in and take violently. You think a lil tribal child in the amazon has problems with self esteem, no. Wanna know why? Cause he was born killing cobras. Grab your stick and get to gettin.)

Don't worry you aren't alone there are many more like you. That sound you hear is not the wind pushing you back, it's the sound of all of those grinding by, asking if you will come with them. They aren't strong enough to carry you, you have to do that yourself. But they will go with you, you don't have to go alone.