When I was young, I had no sense of my true self. All I was, was a product of all the fear and humiliation I had suffered. The fear of my parents. The humiliation from the teachers calling me “garbage can” and telling me I’d end up mowing lawns for a living. And the deep-rooted fear of some of my classmates. See, because of my skin color and my size, I was constantly threatened and beaten up at the local school.
As I was skinny and clumsy, I wouldn’t go home crying and wondering why other people teased me; it just kind of made sense that I happened to be bullied.
The idea that I was there to be antagonized had sunk in. In sports, I was laughed at. A spaz. I was pretty good at boxing but only because the rage that filled my every waking moment made me turn wild and unpredictable. I fought with some strange fury. The other boys merely thought I was crazy.
As stupid as it seems now, I so much wanted to fit in: to talk like them, dress like them, behave myself freely and casually, without fear of getting pounded in the hallway between classes. Years passed and I had learned how to keep it all inside. I only talked to a few boys in my grade. Other “losers”. Some of them are, to this day, the greatest people I have ever known. Hang out with a guy who has had his head flushed down a toilet a few times, treat him with respect, and you’ll find a faithful friend forever.
However, even with friends, school sucked. Teachers gave me a hard time. I didn’t think much of them either…
Then came Mr. Pepperman, my advisor. He was a powerfully built Vietnam veteran, and he was scary. No one ever talked out of turn in his class. Once, one student did and Mr. P. lifted him off the ground and pinned him to the blackboard. He could see that I was in a bad shape and, one Friday in October, he asked me if I had ever worked out with weights. I told him I had never.
So, he suggested that I should take some of the money I had saved so far and buy a hundred-pound set of weights at Sears. As I left his office, I started thinking of what I would say to him the next Monday, when he would ask me about the weights that I had no intention to buy. Still, deep down, it made me feel special. My father never really got that close to caring. Eventually, on Saturday, I bought the weights… but I couldn’t even drag them to my mom’s car. An attendant laughed at me as he put them on a dolly.
Monday came and I was called into Mr. P.’s office after school. He said that he was going to show me how to work out. He was going to put me on a program and start hitting me in the solar plexus in the hallway when I wasn’t looking. When I could take the punch, we would know that we were getting somewhere. Never was I to look at myself in the mirror, or tell anyone at school what I was doing.
In the gym, he showed me ten basic exercises. I paid more attention than I ever did in any of my classes. I didn’t want to screw it all up. I went home that night and started right in.
Weeks passed, and every once in a while Mr. P. would give me a shot and drop me in the hallway, sending my books flying. The other students didn’t know what to think. More weeks passed, and I was steadily adding new weights to the bar. I could sense the power growing inside my body. I could feel it.
Right before the Christmas holidays, I was walking to class when Mr. Pepperman appeared out of nowhere and gave me a hit in the chest. I just laughed and kept going my way. He said that I was now able to look after myself. I got home, ran to the bathroom and pulled off my shirt.
I saw a body, not just the shell that protected my stomach and my heart. My biceps bulged. My chest had a definition. I felt strong. This was the first time I remember having a sense of myself. I had succeeded in achieving something and no one could ever take it away from me.
It took me years to fully appreciate the value of the lessons I have learned from the Iron. I used to think that it was my opponent, that I was trying to lift that which does not want to be lifted. I was wrong. When the Iron doesn’t want to come off the mat, it’s the kindest thing it can do for you. If it flew up and went through the ceiling, then it wouldn’t teach you anything. That’s the way the Iron talks to you. It tells you that the material you work with is what you will eventually turn into. That what you work against will always work back against you.
It wasn’t until my late twenties that I learned I had given myself a great gift by working out. I learned that nothing good comes without work and a certain amount of pain. When I finish a set that leaves me shaking, I know more about myself. When something gets bad, I know it can’t be as bad as that workout.
I used to fight the pain but, recently, this became clear to me: pain is not my enemy. It is my call to greatness. But when dealing with the Iron, one must be careful to understand the pain correctly. Most injuries involving the Iron come from the ego. I once spent a few weeks lifting a weight that my body wasn’t ready for, thus spent a few months not picking up anything heavier than a fork. Try to lift what you’re not prepared to and the Iron will teach you a little lesson in restraint and self-control.
I have never met a truly strong person who didn’t have self-respect.
I think a lot of inwardly and outwardly directed contempt passes itself off as self-respect: the idea of raising yourself by stepping on someone’s shoulders instead of doing it yourself. When I see guys working out for cosmetic reasons, I see vanity exposing them in the worst way, as cartoon characters, billboards for imbalance and insecurity. Strength reveals itself through character. It is the difference between bouncers who get off strong-arming people and Mr.Pepperman.
Muscle mass does not always equal strength.
Strength is kindness and sensitivity. Strength is understanding that your power is both physical and emotional. That it comes from the body and the mind. And the heart.
The author isn’t afraid to get dirty. Neither should you.
Yukio Mishima, a Japanese writer, said that he could not stand the idea of romance if he was not strong. Romance is such a strong and overwhelming passion that a weakened body cannot endure it for too long. I have some of my most romantic thoughts when I am with the Iron. Once, I was in love with a woman. The pain from a workout would race through my body when I was thinking about her the most.
Everything in me wanted her. So much that sex was only a fraction of my full desire. It was the single most intense love I have ever felt. Unfortunately, she was living far away so I couldn’t see her very often. Working out was a healthy way of dealing with the loneliness. To this day, when I work out, I usually listen to ballads.
I prefer to work out alone.
It enables me to concentrate on the lessons that the Iron has for me. Learning about what you’re made of is always time well spent, and I have found no better teacher. The Iron had taught me how to live. Life is capable of driving you out of your mind. The way everything falls down these days makes it some kind of a miracle if you’ve not turned out insane. People have somehow become separated from their bodies. They are no longer whole.
I see them walk out from their offices to their cars, and commute to their suburb homes. They’re are constantly stressed out, they lose sleep and eat badly (their cortisol levels must be rocketing…). And, unfortunately, they behave badly. Their egos run wild; they get motivated by what will eventually give them a massive stroke. They need the Iron Mindset.
Through the years, I have combined meditation, action, and the Iron into a single strength. I believe that when the body is strong, so is the mindset. And the reverse holds true. Time spent away from the Iron makes my mind degenerate. I wallow in a thick depression. My body shuts down my mind.
The Iron is the best antidepressant I have ever found. There is no better way to fight weakness than with strength. Once the mind and body have been awakened to their true potential, it’s impossible to turn back.
“The Iron never lies to you. You can walk outside and listen to all kinds of talk, get told that you’re a god or a total bastard. The Iron will always kick you the real deal. The Iron is the great reference point, the all-knowing perspective giver. Always there like a beacon in the pitch black. I have found the Iron to be my greatest friend. It never freaks out on me, never runs. Friends may come and go. But two hundred pounds is always two hundred pounds.“
My fellow lad, if you too are down for a powerful anger catalyst and for a combined physical/mental/emotional improvement, click here.
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