There Is A Method to the Madness
This is a podcast where I will be discussing all aspects of physical fitness. I am an exercise physiologist and personal trainer and owner of Maxwell's Fitness Programs for the last 25 years. My passion is health and fitness and I am excited to share my views, some stories, interviews and much more with you.
There Is A Method to the Madness
Discipline Unlocked
Welcome to there is a Method to the Madness. My name is Rob Maxwell. I'm an exercise physiologist and personal trainer. I'm the owner of Maxwell's Fitness Programs and I've been in business since 1994. The purpose of this podcast is to get to the real deal of what really works and, most importantly, why things work. Hence the name. There is a Method to the Madness. Things work, hence the name. There is a method to the madness. I want to first thank our sponsors, jonathan and Lynn Gildan of the Gildan Group at Realty Pros. They are committed.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about something that people don't like. I don't think they like. I'm assuming they don't like it. Maybe that's just a bad assumption by me, but that thing is discipline. Do you really know what discipline is? We hear all the time people say, oh, it takes discipline, it takes discipline. Well, what is discipline and does it take discipline? Well, discipline is doing something that you know you should do, that you don't want to do. All right, I think that is the best definition of discipline that we can use Doing something that you should do, that you really know you should do, that you do not want to do. That is discipline. And do we need it? Yes, I do believe we need it to progress in the world of our health, our fitness and our wellness.
Speaker 1:Let me tell you a little story About maybe 12 years ago. This incident happened, and it's happened a few times when I've been speaking somewhere. This time, though, it really stood out to me, so that's why I'm going to tell this story. I was speaking at a university on health and wellness, as I like to do, and during the near end of it, during kind of the question and answer phase, a woman in the very front row raised her hand and she goes well, can you help people like me out? Because people like you it's just easy Like huh and I didn't really say huh, like that, but you know that's the reaction you want to make when you're in that situation. Now she went on to explain, as other people have when they've made such silly kind of statements, that what she means is that, you know, I'm just genetically gifted, I'm thin, it's easy for me to get out there or I love to do it. It's kind of all of those assumptions and again, I'm not reading into this, because she did explain a little bit more of it, and I have had clients say kind of similar things to me in the past, so I have heard this before and other fit individuals have heard this before. In fact, we kind of hear it a lot.
Speaker 1:Now, before I go on, I want to make two very important points. Number one I'm not mad at her or others for saying things like this. Like this just comes out of kind of like a justification or a rationalization as to why she and when I say she, it's a collective she and he don't actually want to put in the work. It's a justification. I think everybody knows what they need to do. But it's just easier to swallow, it is easier to handle the guilt if we just kind of say well, some people are special and I'm not one of them, so why do it? It's just easier. I don't think it comes out of an aggressiveness, a, you know, just being totally contrary, a, you know, just being totally contrary. I really believe that it comes out of that human ability to rationalize and justify. I mean, we are so good at it as human beings, you know, we just love to protect our self-esteem, we love to protect our conscience, and so we kind of come up with things, I think on the subconscious level. So that's the first part. The second part is I don't get mad, I don't take it personal Like it's not personal, but what I do want to do, and the only reason why I retort comments like that, is for education, because it is so important to not have that mindset. It is so unhealthy to believe that there is those that have it and those that don't have it. That is just such an important consideration. So what I explained to her is what I've explained to clients and what I'll explain to you now, because that's what's in my plan this morning.
Speaker 1:On Mondays I typically run harder and on Tuesdays I typically do an easier cardio session in the morning, followed by leg training, weight training for the legs a little bit later. That's my Tuesday routine. So I get up somewhere around 5, as usual. A little bit before five, I have a cup of coffee, I do some motivational reading, a little bit of journaling, finish my cup of coffee and I go out on my walk. Now, that's not easy, like I'm, like everybody else. Now, don't get me wrong, it's a lot easier to go for my 45-minute walk than it is my harder run yesterday and followed up by my harder two 5Ks I did on Saturday. Of course a 45-minute walk is easier, but it isn't easy to get up and get out.
Speaker 1:You know, number one I don't like the dark. I've never liked walking or running in the dark. Some people do, I do not. It really messes with my biorhythms. So that's one hurdle I have to get after.
Speaker 1:It was an okay temperature this morning. It was fine, but I'm also kind of a wimp in the cold. I don't like it when it's cold. So that wasn't a factor this morning really, but other mornings this past winter it has been. But I do it anyway. It's never easy. It's just, you know what's harder. What's harder is not doing it and not maximizing what I know about health and fitness. That if I want to have a better quality of life, if I want to feel better all the other hours of the day, if I want to get good checkups when I go in for my yearly physical, if I want to keep my weight where I feel good about it, if I want to have strength, like those are things that I want To have, that I have to do the things that I don't necessarily want to do at the time. And it's so kind of funny in a way when people will say things like that, like, oh, you know, it's just easy for them. It's like, what are you talking about?
Speaker 1:I mean, when I look at some of the schedules of some of the Olympic athletes you know any of them, really any sport and I look at what they have to go through to make the Olympics or whatever. Or the professionals and their diets and their training. I mean a lot of these professional athletes spend more time warming up for a single session than some people spend in aerobic exercise all day, like major league baseball players. People sometimes think of them as not as athletic as other sports, which is really it's just kind of flat out stupid. But that's judging a book by its cover sometimes. But you know, if you like baseball and you like fitness, I ask you to go to a game two and a half hours or so whenever they open the gates early and go out to your seat again when they let you and watch them warm up. You're going to be amazed at how long they warm up. I mean they go through this process of first jogging from foul pole to foul pole and then they do different forms of calisthenics and walking lunges in the outfield. Then they pick up the ball and the glove and they start throwing and then they run again and then they do band exercises, Then they're working with their athletic trainers and their strength coaches. I mean, we're talking a couple hours before they go back under, change into their game uniform and come back out and do a little bit more warmup.
Speaker 1:It is not easy Now. Yes, there's a genetic component to elite athletes and yes, there's a genetic component to, say, a bodybuilder that's up on stage, but genetics only accounts for about 25% of body composition and body weight. That means the other 75% we have to exercise our discipline muscles, and that's a muscle that has to be disciplined. And just thinking that it's easier for people who are in shape is really very entitled, isn't it? And it's not a good world to live in really. I mean, who wants to live in a world where they think and I'm talking about the person that thinks that way, that believes in hopelessness you know that, no matter how hard they try, there's nothing they can do, because some people either have it or they don't, and that is flat out not true. Again, there's a genetic component, but some of the smartest, most acclaimed professionals in the business world maybe did not have well, no, not.
Speaker 1:Maybe fact didn't all have the highest IQs growing up in college. They were just simply the ones that had the grit that kept pushing forward, that kept grinding day in and day out. Maybe know they, maybe they were probably very lucky to not have some of the extra intelligence that other gifted people were, because they learned a work ethic. They learned that they really needed to study three or four hours a day in college to get through and get good grades. I mean that was my story. I mean I don't know what my IQ is. I don't think it's bad and I don't think it's the greatest. I know it's pretty good. I will say that because I did do some testing once.
Speaker 1:But the most important lesson in this is I know I studied my butt off in college and I didn't always want to. It took discipline. I had to exercise my discipline muscles. I remember when I was at UCF in my junior and senior year, some of my classes were getting pretty intense and I really, really wanted to do well. I wanted to graduate magna cum laude or higher and I know to do that I knew to do that I was going to have to crack the book. So every day, whenever my last class got out and I tried to make my schedule between 8 and 12 for my classes, and sometimes I'd have to go back for a night class if it didn't work, but that's how I tried to arrange my schedule.
Speaker 1:Every day, when I finished that 12 o'clock class, the first thing I would do is go over to this little restaurant that was located on at UCF and now it's such a huge campus that there's no way I could find it anymore and they have all these chain restaurants. But anyway, it was just this little restaurant. I go in there. I would get my flatbread sandwich, I remember, and then I would always get this little thing of frozen yogurt, like that was my lunch, because, again, I remember, and then I would always get this little thing of frozen yogurt, like that was my lunch. Because, again, I am disciplined in how I eat too, like I just have rules and I follow the rules because I want to feel better, you know.
Speaker 1:And after I'd have my lunch, I love to work out, but I knew like I liked to work out more than I liked to study, like I liked to work out more than I liked to study. So I would do the studying first, because there's a guy I follow, named Ryan Holiday. On some of the podcasts he always says do the hardest thing first. I didn't know that then it just made sense to me. So after my lunch I would go to the library. I'd have all of my textbooks from the morning. I'd have all of my textbooks from the morning and I would study each class, even if it was the first day of class, like there was nothing to study yet. I would set the habit of literally maybe reading the syllabus the first day. Ok, I know this, I know this. Ok, let me start chapter one in this book, and then I'd set it down. I'd go to the next class, I don't know.
Speaker 1:I probably typically have four classes, five classes a semester, but I would go through every day and you know, I never crammed in college, I never had to pull all-nighters or do any of that, because I did a little bit of discipline every day. And then I most likely knowing me, grabbed a cup of coffee because I'm a caffeine addict, and I would head to what was called the dome, this little crappy workout facility on UCF campus that literally was in a portable and there was no air conditioning. It was a brutal old gym and I'd meet my friend there and we would work out I don't know, hour, hour and a half or something. Then we'd play a little basketball afterwards and then I'd call it a day, because that's what I did. The point is, though, I was disciplined to do all that I knew I had to do and, again, just using school as an example, I have a fine IQ, like. I honestly don't know exactly what it is, I know it's okay. The point I'm trying to make is it's not Einstein level, like it's high enough, but what made me reach my goal of graduating magna cum laude at UCF and graduating as Phi Kappa Phi and Psi Chi, these different kind of honor award systems that I really, really wanted at the time? They meant something to me. Then I was going to have to study, and I did, and I met that goal because I had discipline and I did not miss workouts.
Speaker 1:I was tired after studying. You know, I had a friend that used to bust my chops, and I'd come back to New Smyrna on weekends sometimes and I'd hang out with him, and he was a worker guy. You know, he did very well. His dad owned a company and he was a worker guy. He did very well. His dad owned a company and he worked for his dad. He was a couple of years younger than me but he was doing well. I mean, he drove a Corvette. He was this little we used to call him Richie.
Speaker 1:Rich Never went to college but his dad had this very good company and he worked for his dad. He's making bank and he would work all day doing it, building cabinets and things like that. And he'd say to me how tired can you be studying? And I was looking at him. I say, dude, you have no idea how mentally exhausting it can be. Like I used to feel like it was harder to sit there and do that than to go do manual labor. I don't know if that's true or not, I just know that to me it was hard, so I did it and that's what it takes. It's not easier. Like I'm a good example of somebody who excelled pretty well in college and did it the old-fashioned way through work ethic.
Speaker 1:I really was a hard worker. I was afraid not to be. You know, growing up I had a little chip on my shoulder, never felt like I was good enough, so I always felt like I had to like work from behind. Felt like I was good enough. So I just felt like I had to like work from behind, and so I didn't want to take the chance to rely on any natural level of whatever I had. Same goes with physical too. I don't miss workouts, I mean, unless I absolutely have to or it's the disciplined thing to do, cause sometimes I have to exercise discipline to not work out.
Speaker 1:When I had my hernia surgery 18 months ago, that was one of my. You know, if you know me, I mean that was my first question to my surgeon. I said when can I work out? He says you're going to have to wait a good six weeks. I was like, oh you know, and I tried to get another doctor, a couple of different doctor friends and clients of mine, to soften that for me, because I am a rule follower, and I'd say, hey, don't you think I could get away with this? And they'd look at me and they'd say would you just listen to your surgeon? So I was disciplined. I didn't do it. I did what I was allowed to do, which was walk around the house, and that's basically what I did and I listened.
Speaker 1:So it takes discipline to sometimes take days off as well, just depending on who you are and what you're doing. So it's not easier for the more fit people, it's not harder, it's the same. Now I will say it becomes easier the more you do it, because discipline is like any other muscle the more you strengthen it, the stronger it is going to be. Every time you cave, it's easier to cave the next time. Every time you get up and say this is speaking for me, rob. It's cold, it's dark, the two conditions you don't like you know what. Just skip it and do something later on the treadmill, I have weakened my discipline muscle. It's going to be easier to do that the next day. That is a fact. Every time I get up and I say here we go. 32 degrees dark really can't change the time zone. I get up early, you know, and I go, let's go. You know, no excuses, throw on an extra sweatshirt, whatever. Let's start right now. I'll feel better at mile one, which is always true. Whether I'm walking or running, I'll warm up. Every time I don't cave, I'm strengthening my discipline muscles.
Speaker 1:So I want to leave you with this thought All right, what's hard for you? What's hard for you? I mean, if you want to take this outside of fitness, go for it. I mean, you know this is just, I think, good advice. So what is hard for you Is it getting out and doing your workout and, by the way, it doesn't have to be in the morning, some people are better in the afternoon or evening. But what is hard for you, do it first. Just try it. I promise you that we will feel better about ourselves all of us when we exercise the discipline muscle, do what we know we need to do.
Speaker 1:And I'll leave you with one last example. Pull-ups are really, really good for us and you know what Pull-ups are great for us and pull-ups suck Like. For me, they're one of the hardest exercises there are. So I always like to be able to do a pretty good amount of pull-ups and I hate them because they're hard and you kind of have to do them first because they're a compound movement. So the last thing I want to do after my warm-up is walk over to the pull-up bar and start.
Speaker 1:All right, but I do. That's the first thing I start with. So I take the hardest part of my workout and I do it first because I want to get it over with and I want to start the exercise session off using some discipline. So whatever is hardest for you, knock it out first in the day, get it over with, and then from there you've had a great win and the rest of your day gets easier. Now let us thank Overhead Door of Daytona Beach. They are the area's premier garage door company. There is none better than Overhead Door. Zach Hawk, jeff Hawk own the company. It's a phenomenal company. Please give them a shout at.
