coaching - Arv' Musings

Your fitness journey as a mass movie

It does require a hero's journey to make it here. You have to conquer your demons. You have to solve your problems and solve them well. You just cannot keep running away from them and hope it will go away. And so, when you step up, you find that you can beat it.

Smoke and drink and live to a 100

The world is full of exceptions. Most things though, tend to follow the norm.

To heck with before-afters

If you are not able to keep off the darned weight, if you lose all the strength you worked hard for, if you are back to square one ... what a waste!

on overnight transformations

The world around us is engineered and filled with climactic moments. But that's fake - like television. From the Olympics to every movie, to cricket and football, the building up, that crescendo, the anticipation, and the glory - that's how it always happens.

find your "me" time

9 times out of 10, you don't go to the gym. You don't do much about your nutrition. You don't get those results. You fail. You get angry with yourself or the gym. Or both. And you give up. You set yourself up for failure from the start.

why kettlebells and the story of Daedalus and Icarus

Everything a dumbbell can do, a kettlebell can do. Plus, there are ballistics with a kettlebell. So, that's simple. Barbells vs KBs is a bit harder. But knowing what we wanted to coach and offer - GPP - meant there was only one clear winner.

what is the game you are playing?

you and your goals and intentions are different. Do what works for today. Tomorrow, as you evolve, ideas that did not make sense will sound different. Sound right.

chit chat during surgery

I couldn't believe it. Here I am, in this serious surgery and YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT LUNCH!?!!?!?! We need some serious people in here with complete focus.

the ever-expanding universe

You realise that some things were scarier in your head than in the real. But now, with more years under the belt, you see better. And when you were bored, you were just not challenged enough.

strength training

3 questions on strength training

Will strength training make you bulky? Will it help with fat loss? Let's find out.

separating the coach from the trainee

But in the early stages of my career, I made one huge mistake. I didn't separate out my lifting from my coaching. I didn't realise how much I squat has little to do with how well I can guide someone on their journey.

why do you ....

Why do you think you being fit/thin/skinny/strong/whatever will make you look better in someone else's eyes?

failing a diet is your comfort zone

Looks like you went on a diet last January as well. Oh, you lost 8 kilos then. Brilliant. And how much did you put on over the year? All of it. And then some. stop repeating the same pattern

thrash your arms about like you just don't care

You jump into the pool and you start to flail your arms and legs in a wild fashion. With frenetic quantities of thrashing, you manage to stay afloat. Or so you thought. You sink to the bottom. Panic ensues. Someone kindly pulls you out of the water where you gasp and cough and hack your lungs out.

just hold your nose and get through it

Instead of hating driving, I can drive. I don't have to love it. Instead of hating your physical activity routine, you can just do it. Armed with the larger theme of you taking care of yourself, you can just do that.

on subbing out rice

We try a shortcut or a flawed method due to multiple reasons. One of them is a flawed mental model. We have the wrong conception about how something works and so when we try to implement that method, we don't get the desired result.

pick one thing to get on the path of Mastery; 4/4

There are no shortcuts. The successful path to mastering anything is to practice for the sake of it, to enjoy it, and enjoy being on a plateau.

a fun night and a sucky morning-after

You wake up. And you start thinking about the weighing scale. Should you? Should you not? After a bit of back and forth, you just cannot take it. Everything you do is distracted by the thought of going and checking your weight. The more you try to push it away, the firmer it comes back.

meet The Hacker 3/4

After sort of getting the hang of a thing, he or she is willing to stay on the plateau indefinitely. He doesn't mind skipping stages essential to the development of mastery if he can just go out and hack around with fellow hackers

on hard and fast rules

You've broken the rule. You are angry. Mostly at yourself. At this repressed way of eating and dieting. You are angry you need to diet. You feel guilty. And somewhere you decide to order a few scoops of ice cream

meet The Obsessive 2/4

The Obsessive starts out by making robust progress. His first spurt is just what he expected. But when he inevitably regresses and finds himself on a plateau, he simply wont accept it. He redoubles his effort. He pushes himself mercilessly.

meet the 4 types of people 1/4

The Dabbler approaches each new sport, career opportunity, or relationship with enormous enthusiasm. He or she loves the rituals involved in getting started, the spiffy equipment, the lingo, the shine of newness.

do we strength train to the exclusion of everything else?

Strength work need not be done to the exclusion of everything else. But done smartly, if you are struggling for bandwidth, it is a good one-stop shop.

a fool-proof system to lose weight

3 meals a day. Nothing between meals. Nothing outside of meals. Nothing before or after meals. If you are eating it, it happens in that thirty minute window that you are eating. Try it out for a week and get back to me. Oh, don't forget to measure yourself today and after one week.

an email from a student on 6 months of progress

You taught me how to eat, instead directing me on what to eat. ... Well that's what [has] allowed me to now maintain a mostly consistent diet for half a year now.