What motivates me to train? These days my motivation comes in the form of fighting off softness. In the past I was motivated by training to improve the release speed of the shot put.
When in college, I lifted 2 to 3 times per week, squatting once, benching once or twice, and then spending the rest of my time working at other aspects of my sport, speed and stuff. Maybe I overlooked the Oly’s, and maybe I came up short of my potential because of that, and technique flaws, etc.
I now lift more days per week and my workouts are much longer than they were when I was 22 years old. I am consistently more achy now than I ever was then. It could be age or it could be that for some reason I think I need more training now than when I was a practicing athlete. Maybe I’m motivated by boredom.
What motivates you?
[quote]OooahhhCANTONA wrote:
A dream.[/quote]
I imagine that your dream will take you further than my boredom will take me.
And the dream is?
I just like it.
And I’ve always wanted to be able to pick up full grown people over my head.
[quote]Airtruth wrote:
To bust yo ass[/quote]
Just busting yo ass is motivation enough? That’s lucky.
Training for the sake of busting my ass hasn’t done it for me for a long, long time.
For a few years if I broke a sweat while lifting I was pissed. (no oly’s) Call it what you will but the long rest periods and easy paced workouts made me strong. I gave that style up long ago???
I’ve found that having an underlying purpose or motivating factor outside of being huge or getting stronger have spurred me on to greater strength gains. But it is always nice to have micro-motivators to get me in the right mind set during a particular workout. When I lift in a gym typically I will pick someone out that looks like “the man” and mentally attack this person through my training session taking out my “rage” on the weights.
At one gym I used to frequent I did this quite often focusing my energy against this one bodybuilder that was there. He eventually asked me why I was staring him down while I paced in between sets. After explaining to him what I was doing he tried to counter my mental attacks with his own flurry of mental attacks against me and the weights he was lifting.
After conferring we both decided it was kind of dumb and no longer did that. It only seems to work if the only person playing is me. However, this crazy mind fighting doesn’t seem to work as well as real micro-motivators.
Get real motivation, real motivation and your abilities will increase more rapidly than if you train out of, in my case, purposelessness.
Skidmark - I love your avatar.
I enjoy being strong so that’s my motivation to train. I also have an upcoming powerlifting meet which I’m trying not to embarrass myself too much for. (already have to wear a singlet)
I hear ya on the singlet.
I put that thing on and I feel like bad gay porn.
What motivates me?
When I’m lifting I’m away from it all, I’m in the moment. To me it’s a battle, me or the iron who’s gonna win? I’ve gotten my butt handed to me a few times but I’ll keep coming back. Was tired of being weak and small. Even better, people told me I couldn’t. They still say I can’t. I like it that way. Stay at home and play your beer league softball, I have nothing against it. I’d rather hold 500lbs in my hand, or 700 on my back and do something with it. I hate mediocrity, spent most of my life that way because the world convinced me I wasn’t good enough.
Who’s laughing now???
Keep eating your fries.
Keep drinking your soda.
Keep asking me to give you a ride while I pull the sled.
Last time I checked I’m the one you ask for help when you need some stupid task done b/c you’re either too weak yourself or you’ll stroke out walking up the stairs. So I’ll give you a ride on the sled, I’m down for more work.
I don’t want people to look at me differently, I don’t want their praise. I lift because I can, and I want to see how far I can really push myself.
And wearing singlets sucks but not as bad as when I was in high school and wrestled and had to wear a singlet and shower in a gangbanger with a bunch of other guys. That sucks, but so does ringworm…
i hope to compete on WSM man some day in the future 
long way to go but ive got the genetics for it (tall, heavy, strong for age)
[quote]scubasteve2105 wrote:
What motivates me?
When I’m lifting I’m away from it all, I’m in the moment. To me it’s a battle, me or the iron who’s gonna win? I’ve gotten my butt handed to me a few times but I’ll keep coming back. Was tired of being weak and small. Even better, people told me I couldn’t. They still say I can’t. I like it that way. Stay at home and play your beer league softball, I have nothing against it. I’d rather hold 500lbs in my hand, or 700 on my back and do something with it. I hate mediocrity, spent most of my life that way because the world convinced me I wasn’t good enough.
Who’s laughing now???
Keep eating your fries.
Keep drinking your soda.
Keep asking me to give you a ride while I pull the sled.
Last time I checked I’m the one you ask for help when you need some stupid task done b/c you’re either too weak yourself or you’ll stroke out walking up the stairs. So I’ll give you a ride on the sled, I’m down for more work.
I don’t want people to look at me differently, I don’t want their praise. I lift because I can, and I want to see how far I can really push myself.
And wearing singlets sucks but not as bad as when I was in high school and wrestled and had to wear a singlet and shower in a gangbanger with a bunch of other guys. That sucks, but so does ringworm…[/quote]
Nice. That’s inspirational, really.
Bignate, joburnet, one of you guys change your avatar, it gets confusing hahaha
Alright, so I train to get stronger, more powerful and more explosive for american football and rugby.
Also, I was tired of being a fat kid, then a skinny kid, and decided to turn into a jacked kid!
I just love being able to look back three months ago and see how weak I was and how much bigger I’ve gotten.
I love it when people tell me I can’t do this, I can’t do that, I’ll fail, whatever. I just smile and say to them “we’ll see.” And when I turn I put on a scowl and get down to work in the weight room. When I accomplish the challenge these haters said I’d never do, it’s just so satisfactory, and I want more.
I love it when they just shut their hating mouths after that.
I love it when girls touch my chest and arms.
I love it when guys joke about me being on steroids because of my huge gains.
I love it when some punk talks trash to me and I can just walk up to him and scare the crap out of him, without saying a word.
I love blasting my Ipod, lifting heavy things and thinking about aspects of life.
I love latching onto something I hate and mentally kicking the crap out of it.
I love unleashing anger by battling the iron.
I love the determination before big football games, on a cool, crisp autumn friday, with the crowd of thousands cheering my team on, and I know I’m gonna wreck the enemy because of all the hard, bloody, sweaty hours I put into the weight room.
I love it.
What’s with all these gay Animal Pak-aping “inspirational” posts?
I dunno. Doesn’t everybody just want to be stronger? Seems pretty simple to me. You like it or you don’t. You want to lift more weight or you don’t.
The perks are great, no downside so far as I can see. That’s enough for me.
Oh - and picking full grown people up above my head. I like that too, still.
[quote]skidmark wrote:
I dunno. Doesn’t everybody just want to be stronger? Seems pretty simple to me. You like it or you don’t. You want to lift more weight or you don’t.
The perks are great, no downside so far as I can see. That’s enough for me.
[/quote]
It takes sacrifice and hard work, the end of the road for many. Downside?..eh. Necessary aspect? You bet.
[quote]Ryan P. McCarter wrote:
What’s with all these gay Animal Pak-aping “inspirational” posts?[/quote]
I can do unispired posting.
For me it was prepping to compete in the NFL combine at age 32 this year. I proved to the High School boys I worked with what can be done with hard work.
I put on 17lbs of muscle, lost 6lbs of fat and went from a 205 max bench to a 305max at my peak in that 6 months (Lifted 225x7 at comp with 225x10 my best in training). I went from a 305 squat max to 405.
I got down to a 4.8 second 40 (not bad for not running for years) and a 36inch vertical.
Now that the competition has passed and I look the way I look and felt the way I feel I keep pressing on. I may end up trying to do a powerlifting competition just to do it. I was never ‘strong’ in High Sc/College just fast. Its nice moving from a medium shirt to large then xl because my arms/shoulders are to big.
For me my biggest reason to keep lifting is to stay in shape to play with my 2 boys (and 3rd one on the way). I don’t fatigue and can enjoy life with them. Something they enjoy alot when I run around with them tackling, wrestling, racing, etc.
[quote]bluejay wrote:
What motivates you?[/quote]
Getting ready for my next bench press competition motivates me a lot.
[b]TRAIN HARD
“BIG WILLIE” J.T. HALL[/b]
I love sitting on the toilet and now I will be able to get up easly.
hey MR Hall or BIG WILLIE w/e one you go by my goal is to be able to bench 500 before my deployment which last 6 months and i leave in 3 months i should have my bench at 450 by then. I bench raw and from the you tube i watched so do you or least some. I cant find any legit work out to get me from mids to 500. do you post your training any were online