Weightlifting
I've lived in many places over my life, but I've also had several "second homes," most notably Helen Newman Hall, Noyes Recreation Center, and (briefly) Teagle Hall at Cornell, but also the YMCA back in Hillsborough and the fitness center in the community where I live now. In fact, I'm proud to say that I've been a regular at the gym since I was a freshman in college, determined to finally shake off the dis-fitness I had gathered all my life up to that point.
You might be wondering how I could be so motivated to go to the gym so consistently over the years, and I actually have a specific answer for that. I've had the opportunity to meet many other dedicated weightlifters in my tenure at the various fitness centers I list above, and the one thing I've learned is that few serious weightlifters are lifting because of a superficial reason like trying to look good in front of girls at the beach. You can always tell who these serious lifters are because they're the ones that are still around when beach season is over, or when exam season is at its peak. What drives and motivates these lifters goes much, much deeper. I have my own reasons, but they are probably best saved for a personal conversation.
The first time I used a weightroom was freshman year in high school when we had a marking period of weight training in PE. I had always been overweight as a child and later improved to being just un-athletic until right before college started, so I took the lessons in this class to heart. However, I was young and undisciplined, so I wasted a lot of time trying to compete with my friends and brag about lifts I couldn't actually do right--as young freshman boys are wont to do. I didn't see any results out of the class (obviously, since I wasn't doing it right), but the idea stayed with me. For the rest of high school, I couldn't drive, but more importantly, hadn't gotten addicted to going the gym yet, so I didn't lift at all.
The story changed when I got to college, when one of the first things I did was to visit Helen Newman Hall and sign up for a year-long gym membership. I started out slow, only going three days a week. I also didn't have any plan--I was lifting the same way I had been taught freshman year in high school. If I remember correctly, I would mix up some muscle groups and just do whatever, as long as I was sore the next day. I also hadn't fixed my diet at this point (see here for some history), so I wasn't getting results very fast. I was also mentally discouraged by the fact that I was pretty small and everyone around me seemed to be huge. One of my fondest memories was going to the gym and seeing these huge Asian guys putting up the 100lb dumbbells on incline press. Later on, I would see other huge Asian guys at the gym and it would crush my confidence. It turns out though, that it was just a freak coincidence for the class of 2009--later classes turned out to be much more normal-sized. Naturally, I ended up befriending all of the Asian lifters over time and have a lot of respect for them (that's why the memory was fond and not traumatizing). I doubt they'll ever count me among their ranks, but I'm past the point now where the presence of big guys at the gym affects me in any way. If anything, it motivates me rather than deflating me.
In any case, I continued this unfocused pattern of lifting until about the end of sophomore year, when I finally had the brilliant idea to just read about it. Later on, I would even think about it--what an amazing discovery, right?. Well, you'd be surprised, because it still looks to me like the vast majority of gym-goers haven't reached this point. I don't blame them either, because it's so easy to see lifting as some kind of elusive ritual where only the big guys at the gym know what's up, and you have to learn it from them should you even be lucky enough to get to talk to one. Well let me tell you right now that--like anything else in life--you're allowed to think about it and draw your own conclusions.
Due to sleep-deprivation, I don't remember freshman and sophomore years too well, so I'm not sure exactly how things happened, but eventually, I do remember that I started reading more and more, both about lifting and nutrition, and it got to a point where I started making my own judgments and trusting my own intuitions. I've written a lot about it in the past, especially during junior year (look back in my thoughts). As a junior in college, I needed the weightroom more than ever before, as the CS program was really starting to push my limits. I've always thought of lifting as my "counter-nerd" activity, and so far it's been a great balance. In fact, it's become my "counter-bs" activity, as just about anything that bothers me gets sorted out during some quality time at the gym. By this time, I was lifting five days a week, and only missed two scheduled days the entire year, and that was because I had a fever of some sort and just couldn't gather the energy. Even throughout breaks and vacations, I stayed true to my fitness goals.
My big breakthrough came in senior year, when I discovered something called MaxOT. That workout philosophy (it's more than just a plan) put me on the fast track to putting on muscle. Unfortunately, it also put me on the fast track to structural damage. The biggest plaintiff in that case is my right wrist, which is still not--and probably won't ever be--100%. I sprained it badly in March of 09 while making my final push to compete in the Teagle bench press competition. That dream was unfortunately crushed by an accident I had while lifting, and the ensuing month or so was really the first break I've taken from lifting since I started some four years ago. I tried a couple of times to get back into it, but the pain was often too great, so I had to stop for an extended period of time, leading all the way from post-graduation to the time I moved to Austin.
Over the years though, I've come to believe that how you lift really tells the world a lot about what kind of person you are. This is surely a controversial viewpoint that I maintain, but it works well enough for me so I'm happy with it. For example, the guys that only come in the week before spring break--what does it tell you about them? Or the guys that lift more than they obviously can handle--what does it tell you about them? Or how about the guys that will only come with friends? Or the guys that are afraid to ask you how many sets you have left on a bench? Or the guys that don't put their weights back? Or the guys that get mad when you point out that what they're doing is not safe? Or the guys that thank you when you do that? Or the guys that don't want to share a machine with you when you ask? I don't know about you, but I feel like I've seen a lot of different personalities go through the gym, and that I've inferred something about them just from the way they lift or behave in the gym.
To me, weightlifting is more than just some hobby; over the years, it's become a way of life and a way to deal with it when things are out of balance.
