Tag: Man of Steel

‘Soldier of Steel’ campaign: Gym Jones shows what real men are made of

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Mark Twight Gym Jones

Years ago I met a friend who was heavily influenced by the Gym Jones training philosophy. I had always thought I was a pretty fit guy — and then I met Mike. Those workouts broke me. They were truly a humbling experience, but I wouldn’t trade them for the world. They taught me a lot about myself, as well as just how much more was possible if I was willing to venture deeper into the realm of pain and anguish than I ever had before. Some of our greatest moments of mental, physical and spiritual growth are born out of pain and suffering, and in a bizarre way the person who realizes this truth comes to love and appreciate such feelings in proper doses. And that is why I highly suggest watching the “Solider of Steel” video for the new ‘Man of Steel’ movie by Zack Snyder.

When I was in the military, there was a joke that was made during our morning PT or in the middle of road marches: “Pain is weakness leaving the body!” Gym Jones offers plenty of pain, but there is so much more. It’s the kind of philosophy that turns boys into men.

Mark Twight, Gym Jones trainer, explains:

For me in the mountains, fitness was often the difference between life and death. In a military environment, it can be the same thing — you never  never want to come up short due to a lack of conditioning. When we talk about training one of the most important characteristics I believe, is functional training. And by functional I mean “transferable.” The training that you do in the gym should be transferable to the actual task, which means that if I have to sprint forward to grab a buddy who might be injured and drag him back to a point of cover, then sitting on the a bench wearing a little seat belt doing  quad extensions is not transferable. When you’re training for your military tasks you should be training to develop functional fitness, not the appearance of fitness.

Point number one in our training philosophy in the gym is that the mind is primary. And one of the outcomes of training the mind in the gym is the development of values. Values that are very similar to military values. One of the things for me that is important in the gym is that you always do what you say you’re going to do. You show up every single day. What we practice in here becomes  a habit, and if my habit is always to do less that’s how I’m going to behave in the field. So get in the habit of doing more than you’re asked to do.

Respect starts with self respect. If you respect yourself, you prove to others that you are worthy of their respect. One of the things I like to do is to set up a tag-team type of workout, where one guy has to accomplish a particular task all the while his teammate is suffering. And the faster he does it the less his teammate suffers. These types of workouts really cause a person to digger deeper than they would to save themselves because we will always work harder in the service of someone else.

In the gym context we always know when people are telling the truth and when they are not telling the truth. If you do what you say you’re doing when in comes to diet, then the result is going to be obvious. If you do what you say that you’re doing in terms training, then the result will be obvious. When we make that honor, that honesty, part of our daily life, then it becomes automatic.

A lot of times we assign homework to people outside of the gym because I need to know how they’re going to behave on their own. Does that person have the integrity to do what they said they were going to do? In the training environment, if we practice on a daily basis confronting the things that we’re afraid of and confront our fear — if we get in that habit — then we’ll be to express that in an automatic way once we get outside into the real world.

Wow. Mr. Twight’s passage is a thing of beauty. If all Americans were exposed to this philosophy, let’s just say that the political landscape would change dramatically within a single generation.

Gym Jones is not for everyone. It should be, but it’s not. The reason is because it doesn’t accept excuses, and the modern world is filled with people who live to make excuses for their failures, be it with their diet, love life, personal finances, physical fitness or any number of things.

Regardless, check out the other videos if you get a chance. If you’re interested in taking the first step in transforming you mind, body and spirit they’re a great place to start.

Editor’s note: The image of that guy falling off the rowing machine into a lump on the ground in Episode 3 just gave me a flashback. Sometimes hitting the floor is the best way to motivate someone to reach for the stars.

Here I am doing a workout inspired by Gym Jones, 2009. Pain never felt so good.
Here I am doing a workout inspired by Gym Jones, 2009. Pain never felt so good.

If you see ‘Man of Steel’ and a cop, you’ve really only seen one hero; Just ask Boston

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Superman Man of Steel

The new ‘Man of Steel’ trailer is out, and it looks mighty good. And, truthfully, it couldn’t come at a better time.

Jor El says of his son: “You will give the people an ideal to strive towards. They will race behind you. They will stumble. They will fall. But in time, they will join you in the sun. In time, you will help them accomplish wonders.”

The problem with ideals is that once you establish them, the people who “stumble” will be on full display for all the world to see. The smart stumblers don’t like that. And so, over the years the purveyors of popular culture have sought to do away with ideals, hoping to hide their fallibility in the process.

The easy wrong is always more popular than the hard right, and millions of Americans are seeing that over time too many easy wrongs only lead to heartache and despair. The United States as a whole is culturally lost, and a well-made Superman film just might get a few people to look for ways to right the ship.

Regardless, when trying to make sense of a world where lunatics detonate bombs amongst throngs of innocent civilians watching a marathon, we need not go to the movie theater to find a hero. They’re all around us if we’re willing to look.

Bill Iffrig, 78, lies on the ground as police officers react to a second explosion at the finish line of the Boston Marathon in Boston, Monday, April 15, 2013. Iffrig, of Lake Stevens, Wash., was running his third Boston Marathon and near the finish line when he was knocked down by one of two bomb blasts. (AP Photo/The Boston Globe, John Tlumacki)
Bill Iffrig, 78, lies on the ground as police officers react to a second explosion at the finish line of the Boston Marathon in Boston, Monday, April 15, 2013. Iffrig, of Lake Stevens, Wash., was running his third Boston Marathon and near the finish line when he was knocked down by one of two bomb blasts. (AP Photo/The Boston Globe, John Tlumacki)

On Monday, April 15, The Associated Press’ Jonh Tlumacki responded to the Boston Marathon terror attack not by running for his life, but by freezing; he then captured the men and women who spring into action when disaster strikes. It’s an amazing photo, one that shows just how instinctual it is for some individuals to protect and defend their fellow citizens during a time of crisis.

There are always those who run away from danger — and those who run towards it. Those who run toward the flames aren’t inherently better people than those seeking safety, but at the same time a healthy civil society holds its law enforcement personnel in high esteem.

It’s sad that even in the initial moments of such a gruesome event that there were newscasters who chose to speculate in divisive and sick ways. Only seriously warped minds would watch a bomb blast that left three people dead and scores wounded, only to wonder how the political calculus of it all would play out.

Regardless, if you see a cop, a fireman or and EMS working in the near future you might want to stop them and say “thanks” just like you would a soldier returning home from overseas. Given that modern day terrorism has erased the traditional definition of a battlefield, it’s increasingly likely that local authorities will find themselves caught up in the fog of war. Luckily, we have men like Mr. Tlumacki who are willing to chronicle the heroics.

The Man of Steel’s One Weakness: Political Hacks

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Is Henry Cavill's Superman the kind that fights for "Truth, Justice, and...All That Stuff", or will he fight for the American Way? The intensity in his eyes says director Zack Synder has the Man of Steel back on track.

The first images of Henry Cavill as Superman are up and about. He looks good. Case closed, which frees us up to ask the more important question: Who is the Man of Steel? Underneath all those bulging biceps—deep down inside—what’s really making him tick? What motivates him? Who is he at the center of his being?

Not too long ago moviegoers were asking the same thing about Captain America, and it turned out that despite the director’s best efforts at self-sabotage, it turned out to be a good film.

Because Superman is an American icon, writers and directors worth their salt need to have a firm grasp on America’s core principles. Superman should exude our highest ideals, which is why doing him “right” is extremely difficult. Placed in the hands of a confused writer or pseudo-intellectual, the character will collapse under his own weight. Writer Grant Morrison (who can be brilliant at times) misses the mark when he says:

“Each decade, these characters represent our own best idea of what we’d like to be, our own big idea…Superman started out as a socialist fighter for the oppressed in 1938, but that was the time of the Depression. In the ’80s, he’s a yuppie,” (H/T Four Color Media Monitor).

Wrong. Only bad writers are so lured by a sign of the time that they’d boil a character down to something that can be summed up in pithy pejoratives or political talking points. Only bad writers mistake universal rights for international opinion. Only bad writing essentially creates FDR’s Superman and Reagan’s Superman. Good writing transcends the kind of political sniping Grant Morrison sets the stage for.

So when Henry Cavill says he wants to “[be] as true as I can be to the original character and who the character is,” someone needs to follow up with the soon-to-be Clark Kent. They need to poke and prod his muscles with something deeper than, “How cool is it to put the big ‘S’ on every morning for work?”

I have confidence that Zack Snyder will do Superman proud. In fact, I would argue that his spot-on understanding of Dr. Manhattan (an awesome, yet cynical, take on what Superman would end up like if he existed) has prepared him for the task. He’s ready.

And now, it’s time to watch Rorschach die in all his awesomeness.