Bruce

Image courtesy of nypress.com

Self Made® Book Store

Peter Ames Carlin's Bruce is the life story of Bruce Springsteen, from his earliest years through his struggles to find acceptance as a kid to the first music days all the way through to his most recent tour.

I didn't know much about Bruce Springsteen outside of his Greatest Hits album.  Growing up, my dad would often listen to that album when we were in the car together.  I enjoyed the songs, and while I was initially too young to understand the lyrics, there was something electric about the music, something that made me feel really great inside.

When I went to Williams, there was a social psychology course offered during the month of January that was all about Bruce Springsteen.  While I never took this course, it put it on my radar that he was a guy whose influence extended far beyond my dad's car.  So when I was roaming through Barnes & Noble one day and saw this book for sale, I was hoping it would turn out to be the type of book I was looking for.

I enjoy books on influential, charismatic people; people who have changed the world and part of history; people who have accomplished or created exceptionally great things.  I like studying their life, particularly their come-up, and finding similarities and drawing parallels between the lives of different people.  Bruce's story did not disappoint.

Bruce was somewhat of a social outcast in his early years through college, never fully finding his place to fit in, keeping to himself, but staying true to what he believed through it all.  He wasn't about social norms.  He was about doing what felt right to him, and that's what he did.

Bruce describes the initial curiosity of music, the excitement of getting his first guitar, and the early frustrations of being part of high school bands.  Throughout this entire course and for the remainder of his career, three things remained constant:

1) Being true to himself

2) Having the vision of how big he could be, especially early in his career before the Born to Run album

3) The hours and hours and hours of work

While there was some raw talent initially, Bruce put in hours of time with his craft, honing his skill while developing a charismatic presence.  Combining this with his lyrics describing real-world issues, he drew people in and connected with them in a way that rock and roll hadn't experienced before.  Through it all he set an extremely high bar for the quality and feel of the music produced by his band, doing take after take of songs when nobody else could not hear the flaws in the first few versions, staying true to what he believed (and being incredibly unpleasant when forced to do otherwise).

And in the end, he became legendary.

I recommend this book to any Bruce Springsteen fan and anybody who wants an inside look at the life of somebody who was phenomenal at their craft.

Your body.  Your training.

Enjoy this review?  Get a copy of Bruce in the Self Made® Book Store!

Want to use this article in your blog, newsletter, or other platform?  You may, but be sure to include all of the biographical information found in the yellow box below!

Synovial Joints

Image courtesy of pages.uoregon.edu

Over the past week I've posted two posts (Post 1, Post 2) on the feet that mention synovial joints, so I wanted to take the time to dig a little deeper into what a synovial joint is.

First, there appears to be three different types or classes of joints in the human body--synovial joints, fibrous joints, and cartilaginous joints (p 25-26)*.  Synovial joints are of particular interest to me because that is the classification of joint of nearly all of the limbs and the one that is used for locomotion (p 26)*.

So these synovial joints have some pretty cool distinguishing features about them.  There is this joint capsule that brings the joint together and is made up of fibrous layer which has a synovial membrane lining it (p 25)*.  This synovial membrane does three things:  1) it secretes synovial fluid, which lubricates the joint; 2) it closes off the joint cavity, which contains a small space for the synovial fluid to go once it is secreted by the synovial membrane; and 3) it covers all of the internal surfaces of the joint except for where the two bones articulate with one another.  Those areas are covered with articular cartilage (p 25)*.

There are also these periosteum and perichondrium tissues that surround the bones (periosteum) and the cartilage (perichondrium) of the joint, serving to provide nutrients for these areas as well as serve as areas for new formation of bone and cartilage (p 25)*.  Additionally, synovial joints usually appear to have some type of ligamentous material reinforcing them, which are either completely separate tissues (called extrinsic accessory ligaments) or are where part of the joint capsule thickens (called intrinsic accessory ligaments) (p 26)*.

Of the many synovial joints in the human body, Clinically Oriented Anatomy groups them into six classifications based off of how they articulate and the type of movement allowed.  The first type is a plane joint such as the acromioclavicular joint.  The second type is called a hinge joint such as the elbow joint.  The third classification of synovial joints is called a saddle joint and the fourth is called a condyloid joint.  The carpometacarpal joint is an example of the former and the metacarpophalangeal joints are an example of the latter.  The fifth classification is more easily recognizable with it being a ball and socket joint such as the hip, while the sixth is a little more obscure being a pivot joint such as the median atlantoaxial joint (p 27-28)*.

Interestingly, Clinically Oriented Anatomy does not mention hyaline cartilage in reference to synovial joints at all, instead referring to articular cartilage but highlighting hyaline cartilage by name as a characteristic of primary cartilaginous joints, an example of which is given as the hip or coxyfemoral joint (p 26)*.  So, according to this source, joints can fall in multiple categories.

Finally, just a few words on the nerve and blood supply of synovial joints.  It appears that the joint capsule, specifically the synovial membrane, is both highly innervated and highly vascularized, containing articular nerves and articular veins (p 28)*.

Your body.  Your training.

Want to use this arti­cle in your blog, newslet­ter, or other plat­form? You may, but be sure to include all of the bio­graph­i­cal infor­ma­tion found in the yellow box below!

*Moore, Keith L; Dalley, Arthur F; Agur, Anne M. R. Clinically Oriented Anatomy Sixth Edition.  Wolters Kluwer; Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. 2010.

MAT™ and Healthy Feet: Orthotics

Image courtesy of thephiladelphiapodiatrist.com

Last week I described how participating in the Muscle Activation Techniques™ process can provide the opportunity for the muscles of your lower legs and feet to contract better, potentially allowing for more motion to occur around the different joints of your feet and more force to be appropriately applied through these joints.  I then discussed how these joints in fact need a certain amount of motion and force through them to be healthy.  This means that if the muscles are not contracting efficiently and motion and appropriate force application is subsequently limited around and through these joints, the health of these joints is at risk.  The irony of all of this is much of today's society is doing something to intentionally limit the motion of the joints of their feet:  wearing orthotics.

Let me first start by saying what this post is not doing:

1) This post is not saying orthotics are bad.  There may be a specific reason why you or somebody else has no other choice but to wear them.

2) This post is not telling you to immediately get rid of your orthotics.  That could cause a lot of discomfort if your body is not ready for it.

3) This post is not telling you to completely disregard everything that the person who put you in orthotics has told you.

What this post is trying to do is to present some information that you may not be aware of regarding what may be happening to your feet by wearing orthotics.

So why do people commonly wear orthotics?  One of the biggest reasons I hear of people wearing orthotics is because of plantar fasciitis.  Plantar fasciitis may develop when pronation continually occurs during the propulsive phase of gait, causing the plantar fascia to become inflamed.  When you wear orthotics, the amount your foot is able to pronate is typically limited, which prevents those tissues from getting beat up any further.  Subsequently, relief may be felt.

Here are a couple of the issues:  First, while the orthotics provide the stability that is needed by the foot so as to not pronate during the propulsive phase of gait, they are not addressing why the foot was pronating during that phase of gait in the first place.  They are metaphorically solving the issue of repeatedly breaking your arm by permanently casting it instead of teaching you how to not run into walls (or parked cars, street light posts, or barn doors, depending who/where you are).  A permanent casting may work just fine, unless it limits your ability to perform a motion how you would normally perform it.  This would cause you to figure out other, possibly less efficient, ways to move, which may begin to have their own negative consequences.

Second, and what is relevant to the topic of this post, is by limiting the ability of the foot to pronate at all--not just during the propulsive phase of gait--the motion that is supposed to occur at specific joints is no longer occurring.  Consider this akin to the muscles of your feet not contracting as well and thereby limiting the motion at specific joints in your feet.

And then we are back at last week's post.

Instead of introducing this "all pronation limiting" device, Muscle Activation Techniques™ can potentially improve how the muscles of the lower leg and feet contract, allowing the joints of your feet to be controlled better.  This means that your feet could pronate when they are supposed to and not pronate when they are not supposed to, which may allow for both appropriate motion and force to be involved with the joints of your feet.

Specific joints need specific amounts of motion in order to stay healthy.  Specific joints need specific amounts of force through them in order to stay healthy.  Limiting either in any way limits the health of the joints.

Have you experienced how Muscle Activation Techniques™ can help you reinstate the health of your feet?

Inter­ested in find­ing out more? Check out the “Mus­cle Acti­va­tion Tech­niques™” page.

Inter­ested in set­ting up an assess­ment time or dis­cussing this sub­ject fur­ther? E-mail Char­lie at charlie@selfmadefitness.com.

Your body. Your training.

Want to use this arti­cle in your blog, newslet­ter, or other plat­form? You may, but be sure to include all of the bio­graph­i­cal infor­ma­tion found in the yellow box below!

Passion

Image courtesy of adminsecret.monster.com

**Originally published in "The Source", November 2012.

Over the course of the last few weeks I have tried multiple times to write this month's feature article, and each time I have failed miserably. Some times my head wasn't in it due to illness or fatigue; other times the words just refused to flow. I knew the topic I wanted to discuss, but I was having difficultly telling a story about it. So I decided to stop trying to tell a story and instead just say what is on my mind.
There is a lack of passion in our world. People may be content. They may even be happy. But true passion is rare. It is clear when someone has it for something, and equally as obvious when they don't. Having it does not come from the compensation, notoriety, or status that accompanies what you do, but rather from an unwavering confidence that you are doing exactly what you are supposed to be doing.

You may not have a clear idea where your path will lead you, or even where you want it to, but that is almost irrelevant to you because right here, in this moment, things are exactly how they are supposed to be, so you have to believe that moment by moment, things will be as they are supposed to be, as well.

Let me stop right here and say I am a bit of a passion junkie. I'm attracted to it. I feed off of it. It fuels most of my waking hours. I'm attracted to others who have it. If you get hype off something, I'm hype for you.

I am by no means an expert on passion or anything even remotely close to that, but people ask me about it a lot because they can see how excited I get when I talk about what I do and where I envision my path leading. And a lot of people are struggling to find something in their own lives that they can get excited about. And not just excited in this moment, but have that excitement carry on from moment to moment to moment on and on and on. So if this is you, these are my thoughts.

I was going to write that you should do what makes you happiest. I had to erase that. I was going to write that you should surround yourself with passionate people both in person and through various forms of media. I had to erase that as well. With both ideas I was skipping steps and key points.

Happiness is far too fleeting to lead to passion, and while you may be inspired by the energy of other passionate people, it is not a skill you can acquire. If anything, it is a state of being. A mindset. A complete confidence that you will accomplish what you set out to do, not because the road ahead is without difficulties, but because you cannot fathom things working out differently. You live in every moment with that confidence, and you love it. And you love each moment. And there really isn't any other option in your mind.

So here is where my difficulty lies in writing this piece. I don't know that I have any sound advice to give on how to develop this. But to be honest, I think you have already developed it. Each of you. You just need to find what brings it out. And I think that's where you can start to do what makes you happiest and spend your time with people who are passionate about what makes you happiest because while neither will lead to the development of passion, both may provide an opportunity where the passion you already have can show itself.

It seems like a lot of people I talk to are scared to do what makes them happiest for fear of running into financial difficulty. To speak on this, I will default to Gary Vaynerchuck. If you haven't already, watch the YouTube video of Gary's presentation at Web Expo 2.0 NY. Additionally, check out his book, Crush It, which can be found in the Book Store. In both the book and presentation, Gary does a great job laying out different ideas on how to turn your passion into a viable business.

I don't know how to help you find your passion. I really don't. And it took me a while to realize that. But I don't think you need me to find it. I think it is within you and it is up to you to provide the opportunities for it to come out.

What makes you happiest? Do that. Who in your immediate circle has an expressed passion for something? Spend more time with them and let their energy bring out yours.

If there isn't anybody in your immediate circle, expand your circle. Find videos online, books, blogs, music, podcasts or any other form of media that allows you to experience others sharing their passion and connect with them.

Be great.

Want to receive articles like this every month?  Sign up for the Self Made® mail list by filling out your info in the purple box in the sidebar or by clicking here.

Want to use this arti­cle in your blog, newslet­ter, or other plat­form? You may, but be sure to include all of the bio­graph­i­cal infor­ma­tion found in the yellow box below!

No Impact Doesn't Mean No Issues

Image courtesy of wisegeek.com

A lot of times I will hear people say that they used to run frequently for their exercise but then their joints started giving them issues so now they choose to do "low impact" or "no impact" forms of exercise like riding a bike or using the elliptical thinking that these choices are without consequences for their structure.  While not having to catch some multiple of their body weight with every step should be less likely to cause joint discomfort, what they often fail to realize is there can still be tremendous joint forces created while participating in these no impact exercises.  Furthermore, depending on how they are using the piece of equipment, different force scenarios may be presented, which may exceed the set point of certain tissues and lead to other issues not previously present.

Things that need to be taken into consideration are:

1) The position(s) you are in while using the piece of equipment.

• Is the elliptical pushing you into more hip flexion that you can actively get to?

• Are you being shoved into excessive radial or ulnar deviation while using the handles on the Arc Trainer?

• Are you in too great of hip/spinal flexion for too great of time while using the bike?

• Is the incline while walking on the treadmill forcing you into more dorsiflexion than you currently have?

2) How exactly you are using the piece of equipment and the specific joint forces that are being created.

• Are you pushing down on the StepMill steps when the machine is pushing them backwards?

• Are you pushing back on the pedals of the Arc Trainer at a point when the machine wants them to go down?

• How are you pushing into the pedals on the bike?

• Are you standing up or sitting down on the bike?

• What is the path of motion of the machine as created by its axis/axes and how are you using the machine relative to that path?  Moreover, what are the effects of your choice to use it in this manner?

3) Where is your focus while you use the machine and are you trying to use it in a way that exceeds the set point of the involved tissues?

• Are you pulling up on the pedals of the bike or pushing down?

• Are you using your arms, your legs, or both while on the elliptical or Arc Trainer?  In what manner are you using them?

• How much are you holding yourself up with the side bars while on the StepMill?

Not taking these things into consideration may lead to further joint and neuromuscular issues if what you are doing isn't a good fit for your body at that moment.

One way to improve the likelihood that you will be able to handle using these pieces of equipment without the potential negative consequences is to, first, receive a neuromuscular assessment via Muscle Activation Techniques™ to figure out what tissues are contracting efficiently and then to meet with a Resistance Training Specialist™ so they can guide you on what equipment to use and how to properly use it for your individual situation.

While many pieces of exercise equipment seem like they are self-explanatory, the reality is that each one presents an array of specific scenarios in which it is used most favorably.  If one of these scenarios does not match what is tolerable for your body at this point in time, you may be causing just as many, if not more, issues than you were with your running, regardless of the impact on your joints while using them.

Is your exercise right for your body?

Inter­ested in find­ing out more? Check out the “Mus­cle Acti­va­tion Tech­niques™” page.

Inter­ested in set­ting up an assess­ment time or dis­cussing this sub­ject fur­ther? E-mail Char­lie at charlie@selfmadefitness.com.

Your body. Your training.

Want to use this arti­cle in your blog, newslet­ter, or other plat­form? You may, but be sure to include all of the bio­graph­i­cal infor­ma­tion found in the yellow box below!

MAT™ and Healthy Feet

Image courtesy of devonfeet.com

Your feet are comprised of 26 bones each (28 if you count the tibia and fibula due to their articulation with the talus)*, which create eight groupings of joints in each respective foot**.  The majority of these joints are considered to be synovial joints** and as such have certain requirements regarding motion and force that need to be met in order to remain healthy.

As I have written many times before, Muscle Activation Techniques™ is an assessment process to analyze what muscles are not contracting efficiently and a means by which to give those muscles the opportunity to contract better.  At the most basic level of understanding, a muscle does one thing:  generate tension in order to control the distance between its two endpoints of where it attaches into bone.  Subsequently, controlling the distance between these points also means muscles control how bones move on each other and, more specifically, how the contact surfaces of the bones articulate.

Going back to the feet, these synovial joints*** are comprised of many features, one of which is hyaline cartilage and another is synovial fluid.  Hyaline cartilage provides a low-friction, shock-absorbing surface for joints and survives by receiving its nutrients via a process called imbibition where the cartilage is squished, releasing its fluid, and then as it becomes "un-squished" it soaks up the nutrient-rich fluid around it.  Think of it kind of like a sponge.  Synovial fluid is released by the synovial membrane at the onset of joint motion, serving to keep the articulating joint surfaces lubricated.   The important take away from all of this is there are parts of your feet that need motion and force in order for the joints to remain healthy.

One way to help ensure that motion continues to occur in your feet and forces continue to be applied as they should is to make sure the muscles of your lower legs and feet are contracting as they should.  This is where MAT™ comes in.  By providing an opportunity for muscles to contract more efficiently, not only may you experience improved joint motion and force application in your feet and rest of your body as a result of the MAT™ process, but the health of those joints may also improve due to their need for motion and force in order to stay healthy.

By wearing shoes all day or doing activities where you are constantly on your feet (examples such as running and playing sports), the muscles of your feet may lose their contractile efficiency.  On the one hand with shoes, the requirements of your foot muscles may be very little, causing them to become deconditioned, similar to if you were to not exercise for an extended period of time.  On the other hand, asking the muscles of your feet to do too much based on their current set point may reduce their contractile efficiency, as well.  This is in part why it may be initially difficult for you to go from wearing shoes for years to not wearing shoes while you exercise--you haven't progressed to train the muscles of your feet to handle the forces of barefoot training but yet all of a sudden expect them to.

If this contractile efficiency is lost, the opportunity for efficient joint motion and force application to the joints may be lost as well, which will be detrimental to the health of those joints.

So, to recap and highlight the important parts:

1. Your feet are comprised of many bones and many joints.
2. These joints need motion and appropriate force application in order to be healthy.
3. Muscles create and control motion of the joints as well as apply forces to the bones which then get transferred through the joints.
4. If the muscles are not contracting efficiently, joint motion and appropriate force application may be limited.
5. Muscle Activation Techniques™ is a means by which to provide an opportunity for muscles to contract more efficiently.
6. Muscles contracting more efficiently = joints potentially moving better & forces potentially appropriately applied = healthier joints.

How well are the muscles of your feet contracting?  Schedule an MAT™ assessment to find out!

Inter­ested in find­ing out more? Check out the “Mus­cle Acti­va­tion Tech­niques™” page.

Inter­ested in set­ting up an assess­ment time or dis­cussing this sub­ject fur­ther? E-mail Char­lie at charlie@selfmadefitness.com.

Your body.  Your training.

Want to use this arti­cle in your blog, newslet­ter, or other plat­form? You may, but be sure to include all of the bio­graph­i­cal infor­ma­tion found in the yellow box below!

*Moore, Keith L.; Dalley, Arthur F.; Agur, Anne M.R..  Clinically Oriented Anatomy, Sixth Edition.  p 522.

**Moore, Keith L.; Dalley, Arthur F.; Agur, Anne M.R..  Clinically Oriented Anatomy, Sixth Edition.  p 652.

***While the information on synovial joints in this post can be found in many textbooks and online, it was first presented to me in the RTS™ courses.

Greater Than You

Image courtesy of empowernetwork.com

"Why they are the hero is to become the ultimate servant to something larger than themselves." -- Tony Robbins

The first feature article that I wrote for Self Made®'s monthly newsletter, The Source, described the importance I put on finding a cause larger than yourself.  To paraphrase, I said that to truly live, you need to have something in your life that you would die for.  Something that you are willing to put all of your time, energy, and focus towards in an attempt to ensure its success.  That to not have something in your life that stimulated you to such an extreme would be to do yourself the incredible injustice of not allowing yourself to truly experience what it means to be alive.

This morning I saw a Tony Robbins video where he described what it truly meant to be a leader or hero.  At its root, hero means slave.  He goes on to say that a hero is the ultimate servant to a cause that is larger than themselves.  Subsequently, in order to truly lead, you must fully commit to the service of others, specifically to their needs of growing and giving.

See the video below:

Watching this video, I could connect with his message.  I was reminded of what I wrote over three years ago, of the message I tried to convey then and how I have been trying to live with this in mind every day since and for years before that time, as well.

What motivates you to wake up every morning?  Why do you do the things you do?  Who or what is it that you are trying to lead, and are you making the necessary sacrifices to become the ultimate servant to your cause?

What do you have in your daily life that is greater than you?

Be great.

Want to use this arti­cle in your blog, newslet­ter, or other plat­form? You may, but be sure to include all of the bio­graph­i­cal infor­ma­tion found in the yellow box below!

Precision and Quality

 

Image courtesy of medxpf.com

"The outcome of an exercise will only be as good as the precision with which the motion/position is performed and the exact way it is challenged.  It all boils down to the quality of each individual rep!"  (Purvis, Tom.  Resistance Training Specialist™ RTSm Science 1 Manual.  4:7.  2012.)

Above is one of my favorite excerpts found in the RTS™ course manuals.  These two sentences, for me, involve a huge portion of the process of exercise.

When I read this excerpt so many concepts come to mind--structure, progression, immediate/short-term/long-term goals, exercise mechanics, the exercise equation, satellite vs. zoom, communication, cuing, current status, current abilities, fatigue, length-tension, equipment selection--all things that should be taken into consideration when designing exercises and applying forces to the body.

How precise are you with your force application?

How precise are you with what you are moving and what you are holding still?

If you had to justify how you went about doing things with mechanics, physics, or physiological principles when you exercised or trained somebody, could you?

Image courtesy of ibbl.lu

If you had somebody watching over you taking notes and then questioning you afterwards, could you justify the earlier choices  you made?

What are the effects of your choice of exercise equipment on your ability to maintain the chosen position while performing the chosen motion?  Did those effects play into your choices?

If the concepts mentioned above do in fact determine the outcome of an exercise, what kind of outcome are you creating by either not considering all of the details or, if you are, not having the discipline to see to it that the details are maintained for the duration of the exercise?

If the positions, motions, or presented challenge are randomly chosen, can you expect the outcome of the exercise performed to be anything but?

I am by no means perfect at any of this, but I think it is something good to think about and remind myself of and question myself on on a frequent basis to try to ensure that I am providing the best exercise experience and process for my client and myself that I can.

What level of precision and quality do you expect and require of yourself?

Want to learn more?  Take RTS™.

Looking for a place to study some of these concepts in greater detail?  Join the Precision Human Performance study groups!

Your body.  Your training.

Want to use this arti­cle in your blog, newslet­ter, or other plat­form? You may, but be sure to include all of the bio­graph­i­cal infor­ma­tion found in the yellow box below!