Body Building is a sport. It takes time, effort, dedication and a lot of planning. Competition day takes weeks of preparation, good nutrition and focus, In a few poses judges determine the value of weeks, months and years of work. The goal? To stand out among the crowd with the most complete physique. Its not just about size and mass, but about how the pieces of the body fit together into one cohesive whole; whether or not all parts of the body show the same level of training and tireless sculpting. Body building is a beautiful sport, not because of the muscle on display, but because of the time it takes to bring one's body into a unified harmony of strength.
The sport of body building is a science of precision and movement. Judges specifically look for 5 things: mass, definition, proportion, symmetry and stage presence. Some of these seem quite obvious, but lets take a look at the judges vocabulary:
Mass- are the muscles big enough to stand out
Definition- how visible are the muscles
Proportion- have all muscles been strengthened and are they showing good relative size
Symmetry- when comparing the right and the left how even does the body look
Stage presence- how confident is the bodybuilder, how does he look in his poses
It's not enough for a body builder to be large, we need to see definition in the muscles.
It's not enough for a body builder to be well defined, good shape is also required.
It's not enough for a body builder to work favored muscles, the small and weak ones must be worked too.
It's not enough for a body builder to work one side of the body, both sides need to be equal
It's not enough to have a complete physique, we must be moved and impressed by the poise of the builder.
There's something about all the effort it takes to bring these five qualities to life; the juggling of exercises, the tempering of each and every myofibril and the confidence in what has been built that makes for a captivating sport. There's something about body builders that makes all of us wish we could be stronger; they inspire us to achieve in our bodies a part of what they've achieved in theirs.
Body building is impressive. One of the most commonly used words to describe believers in the New Testament is, "the body" as in, "the body of Christ". It was more popular than the word, "church" or Christians. Paul, writer of numerous letters to early groups of believers, referred to them as the body. He taught then to treat each other as members of one body. Implying that each of them was a part of the greater whole. Listen to what he wrote about the body in Corinth, Greece:
"For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body-- Jews or Greeks, slaves or free-- and we were made to drink of one Spirit.
Indeed, the body does not consist of one member, but of many. If the foot would say, 'Because I'm not a hand, I do not belong to the body,' that would not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear would say, 'Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,' that would not make it any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many members, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, 'I have no need of you,' nor again the head to the feet, 'I have no need of you.' On the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and those members of the body that we think less honorable we clothe with greater honor, and our less respectable members are treated with greater respect; whereas our more respectable members do not need this. But God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior member, that there may be no dissension within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice with it."
When I consider what Paul wrote, I think body builders get this; the whole body has to be worked as one. We can't seek to break it down into inferior and superior parts. All parts must work together: the strong with the weak. We cannot discard part of the body because we are frustrated with it. If a part of it is behaving inconsistently, we should train with it and around it to bring it back to stability. And bringing part of the body to a place of stability is a difficult exercise.
What I love most about body building, is the attention to detail; every part of the body is considered, cared for, and brought into supportive harmony. But more so than this, is the consistent drive to sculpt and shape. It's not enough to have built a body, it must continually be worked. Body building requires a lot of dedication. Growing the body as a body builder means consistently stepping outside of our comfort zones. It means finding the line between healthy burns and painful aches, and riding that line each day at the gym.
This sounds overwhelming, and it is. It is not possible to focus on all aspects of the body at one time. The body is too big. It is enough to focus on small little parts, understanding how the tiniest movements create big gains given enough time and dedication.
We are the body. We are the body builders. This is what it means to be a believer. My hope is that a piece of this goes with you into your day, even if its the piece about smiling confidently while you flex :)
Monday, October 7, 2013
Tuesday, October 1, 2013
Body Movement
When exercising for the first time, we do not move our bodies correctly. We may be able to go through proper looking motions, but truly and fully engaging our muscles comes with time and practice. When most people enter a gym for the first time, they assume with a little bit of exercise they will get great results. Within a few weeks they assume their body will look entirely different. They also assume the best way to change their body is by beating it up and breaking it down through overexertion. These assumptions are not entirely accurate: with a little bit of exercise over a long period of time, we can get great results and breaking down our muscles is necessary but we often only break them down one way, and in such a way that our bodies don't get a chance to recover.
Speed. It's the most commonly assumed part of exercise. If it isn't done fast and if I don't get my results quickly, then its not worth doing. Exercise without results is heartbreaking and deeply frustrating, but just because it feels like we're getting nowhere does not mean that we aren't growing. It may mean that we are discovering ways in which our body won't grow. Which means we need to change our methods, or it means that we are focusing on external and easily visible growth. Which means there is such a thing as internal and not readily visible growth.
Flexibility and balance are two examples of internal and almost invisible growth. Looking at two people on the street, we have no idea how flexible they are or how good their balance is. When we think of muscle development, we often overlook these areas, in part because we don't take pictures of balance and flexibility; they aren't considered attractive qualities on Facebook, we'd rather see someone's six pack. Yet balance and flexibility are two key components of stability: the sum total of forces that help us maintain good posture and health. Stability helps us maintain key changes in our body by providing a platform upon which we build everything else. The number one thing we need to build when going to the gym for the first time is stability, not mass or weight loss.
Why? Without stability we will not keep our mass and we will not keep our weight loss. There are plenty of quick options on the market to building mass and losing weight, but these quick and easy options do not last. Building stability is slow at first, but once we obtain it we can grow rapidly. Once our body has learned consistent stability, in various forms, we can then increase the load, frequency and duration of exercise. In short we can grow exponentially.
What happens if we try to grow exponentially and haven't build stability first? Injury and re-occurring injuries. Most injuries in the gym are due to lack of stability. We don't know how to move properly through our existing range of motion to strengthen and improve our range of motion. Too often we think if we push just a little harder and a little faster then we'll get the gains we desire. Once we know what we are capable of, having achieved a stable base, this is a decent way of increasing or decreasing our body size. Without knowing what we are capable of, this is a sure road to injury, frustration and quitting.
Some of us are too stubborn to quit. We know we must keep moving, but at what price? The worse our injuries the more we need to slow down and build stability. Which means we may end up moving at the pace of a snail. The snail, for all its faults and failures, achieves its goal. It successfully moves from point A to point B. My encouragement for those who are struggling and unstable is to slow down and take some more time. Once we figure out how to move as a snail, we can start moving as faster creatures. We all have to start somewhere.
Speed. It's the most commonly assumed part of exercise. If it isn't done fast and if I don't get my results quickly, then its not worth doing. Exercise without results is heartbreaking and deeply frustrating, but just because it feels like we're getting nowhere does not mean that we aren't growing. It may mean that we are discovering ways in which our body won't grow. Which means we need to change our methods, or it means that we are focusing on external and easily visible growth. Which means there is such a thing as internal and not readily visible growth.
Flexibility and balance are two examples of internal and almost invisible growth. Looking at two people on the street, we have no idea how flexible they are or how good their balance is. When we think of muscle development, we often overlook these areas, in part because we don't take pictures of balance and flexibility; they aren't considered attractive qualities on Facebook, we'd rather see someone's six pack. Yet balance and flexibility are two key components of stability: the sum total of forces that help us maintain good posture and health. Stability helps us maintain key changes in our body by providing a platform upon which we build everything else. The number one thing we need to build when going to the gym for the first time is stability, not mass or weight loss.
Why? Without stability we will not keep our mass and we will not keep our weight loss. There are plenty of quick options on the market to building mass and losing weight, but these quick and easy options do not last. Building stability is slow at first, but once we obtain it we can grow rapidly. Once our body has learned consistent stability, in various forms, we can then increase the load, frequency and duration of exercise. In short we can grow exponentially.
What happens if we try to grow exponentially and haven't build stability first? Injury and re-occurring injuries. Most injuries in the gym are due to lack of stability. We don't know how to move properly through our existing range of motion to strengthen and improve our range of motion. Too often we think if we push just a little harder and a little faster then we'll get the gains we desire. Once we know what we are capable of, having achieved a stable base, this is a decent way of increasing or decreasing our body size. Without knowing what we are capable of, this is a sure road to injury, frustration and quitting.
Some of us are too stubborn to quit. We know we must keep moving, but at what price? The worse our injuries the more we need to slow down and build stability. Which means we may end up moving at the pace of a snail. The snail, for all its faults and failures, achieves its goal. It successfully moves from point A to point B. My encouragement for those who are struggling and unstable is to slow down and take some more time. Once we figure out how to move as a snail, we can start moving as faster creatures. We all have to start somewhere.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)