What are you looking for?

What are you looking for?

Let's face it, most people come to a fitness program for aesthetic reasons.  People want to shed a few pounds, they want to fit into that outfit from high school or college, they want to look good in a swim suit for the summer time...basically people want to look better naked.  That is the reason I began my fitness journey.  I was in my mid thirties and had the typical American male physique...I had the spare tire, the gut, and the man boobs.  When I first walked in to a CrossFit gym I told the head coach that I would do anything he told me to do if he could guarantee to get that fat off of me.  In about 60 days most of the fat was gone and my life had been completely transformed.

This picture is not a fake, these are the kinds of results a person can get with a clean diet (paleo/primal) and good physical training.  The methods work and it is actually quite easy.  But there is so much that is not shown in this picture.

Getting into a fitness program not only transformed my body it also transformed my spirit.  I began to rediscover what it really means to be a human being, to be alive.  When you let your health decline, when you follow the sick consensus reality of what passes for being alive in our modern western culture, you lose touch with the fundamental joy of being a human being.  There is joy in movement. There is joy in adventure.  There is joy in hard, physical activity and sweat.  There is joy in climbing, running, swimming, lifting, throwing and jumping.  There is joy in rolling in the grass.  We all knew this back when we were little children, when we were still wild, and undomesticated.  Erwan Le Corre http://movnat.com/ describes most modern people as "zoo humans".  I take this to mean that most of us are like wild animals who have been locked in cages.  We are no longer in touch with our natural instincts, desires, way of moving, or diet.  We are in the zoo of modern life and we are growing fat, lazy, sick and dull.

But hope is not lost, far from it.  Right outside of your front door is a whole world just waiting for you to explore and rediscover your true human nature.

My fitness adventure began as a way to lose weight, and look better naked.  My fitness adventure has transformed into a completely new way of looking at and living life.  I no longer think of a "beach ready" body in terms of how a person looks in a bathing suit.. Now I am interested in the ability to swim, to dive, to hold my breath, and the ability to help if someone gets in trouble in the water.  I no longer concern myself with the amount of weight I can squat or bench press.  Now I am interested in my ability to use that strength to seek out new adventures, have fun, and be helpful to friends, family, and strangers.  I no longer walk or run on tread mills, use weight machines or cardio theaters.  Now my training involves lifting actual objects, from dumbells, to kettlebells, to rocks.  I run on trails that have obstacles and beautiful scenery that requires awareness and engages my mind.  I climb trees, rocks, and ropes.  I seek adventure.

What are you looking for in your fitness training program?  It is a wonderful goal to lose weight and look good naked.  This is a goal that you can easily achieve through a paleo/primal diet and a constantly varied, high intensity training program.  But explore the possibilities beyond that initial goal.  What might your life be like if you could reawaken that beautifully wild, undomesticated being that is the original core of who and what you are?  What kind of life might there be outside of the confines of the zoo?