Musings + a Mini Mental Block
It's been a really wild rollercoaster till here. I wrote this a few months ago and then decided to redo my blog, but felt that this was relevant enough to keep. After Southern Regional Championships in August, I was exhausted. Really and truly exhausted. Normally it takes about a week or week-and-a-half to recover and start getting back into the groove of things, but in this case, I never recovered. It seemed like the problems just seemed to flow one right after another. In the month following, my quads were so tight that I couldn't squat without my knees creaking and cracking. Squatting in my knee sleeves became painful, and I would literally waddle up to the bar to squat and then immediately sit down after sets. I rolled and rolled and cried for w e e k s because of how painful and sensitive my quads were. Every spare moment I had in between classes was consumed with me rolling on a lacrosse ball across our living room table and with my back against a wall. Then, as the pain slowly started to subside, my squats started to tank. 175 has always been a weight that felt relatively comfortable, and, suddenly, I was completely winded trying to do a few reps. My technique was awful, and my coach pointed out that I was starting to lean to one side as I came out of the hold because I was trying to take the pressure off my left knee instead of loading my quads. He had to drastically drop the weight as my traps were just so tight that the bar couldn't sit comfortably on my back. Finally, he took me off-program for a week and stated that he wouldn't give me the next week until I went to the chiropractor. I hadn't realized how much my seeing a chiropractor three times a week in Houston had helped me over the summer or how difficult it would be to find one in College Stations. It took me two weeks to find one who could accommodate my schedule, but she insisted I come in for X-rays first before she could treat me. After that arduous process, the pain and tightness in my back and neck started to subside. And then, the worst problem popped up: I found it impossible to deadlift. Besides the fact that I felt completely exhausted trying to deadlift weight that I used to warm-up (my normal warm-up is 135, 155, 185, 205, 225, and then whatever weight I had after), I was struggling to keep my back tight. The one thing I had always prided myself on was keeping an absolutely tight lower back. Maybe the key word in that sentence is "prided." Even though I'd taken a lot of measures to ensure that I never grew a fat ego, going so far as to keep my training log private so I wouldn't feel pressured to live up to anyone's expectations, I knew I had a huge amount of pride in how high my deadlifts were and how, in just under a year, I'd come to be ranked amongst the best lifters in the U.S., with my deadlift just 40lb under the max recorded lift in the junior 47kg raw class. Lifting the weight became so taxing that I started squatting the weight up and allowing my back to round. Almost every deadlift session left me in tears after and my coach disappointed to the point where he had to lower my deadlift max, truly a low.
Most people think that the most difficult part of powerlifting is lifting the weight, but that's a misconception. We incorporate so much volume into our programs and practice such strict form that when the time comes to peak, we're honestly just eagerly anticipating the chance to demonstrate our training and strength. The difficult part is actually the mental aspect of the sport. When the time comes to step on that platform, every good athlete knows that its our mentality that makes or breaks us. If you step on to that platform with the determination to come out on top, you may miss a command or misjudge an attempt, but you'll always remember that each attempt signifies a fresh start and no lift affects how you'll do on another one (i.e. you essentially have 9 chances to give it your all). However, if you step up on stage with doubt in your heart, you've already lost the meet that day. Every missed attempt just feeds into your insecurities and fears that maybe you weren't born to be an athlete and that you shouldn't be trying to compete at all. I was lucky enough at collegiate nationals that I had a friend on my handling team to literally slap sense into me when I panicked after my second squat attempt because I missed depth. She sternly forced me to shape up and instructed me to learn the lessons from that attempt, apply it to the next one, and move on. And while I thought I had done a fine job of learning that lesson, right then, when I needed it the most, my brain and heart failed me. I convinced myself that my strength was gone and that I had lost my competitive advantage (deadlifts carried my total by almost 100 points). But just as I was ready to give up, I realized that if I did, I would forever be that person who gave up at the first sign of adversity and that if I really wanted to see what I was made of, I was going to have to push through the pain. I told my coach that I was ready to start over...I didn't care what the weight was or how much my ego would be bruised; I would do whatever it took to attain my previous level of strength.
Slowly, I started to rejoice in the small victories: minimization of back rounding, keeping my chest up and lats pulled back, and a stronger grip. Even though the weight was low (no more than 185 or 205 pounds), I fiercely focused on technique and obsessively watched my videos to find even the smallest fluctuation that required fixing. On the other hand, squats and bench were going great. I had dropped all expectations for them, so I was pleasantly surprised to find that bringing in my stance for squat to shoulder-width allowed me to hit depth cleanly and load my quads more efficiently. My rpes for bench were so low that my coach increased my bench max, and I found it easier to use leg drive instead of relying on my chest. But the biggest joy I received was the support of those around me. In my moment of need, it felt like all of closest friends rallied around me and constantly reiterated what a source of inspiration and strength I was for them.
So, why is this important to me? I've felt lost a lot of times because I felt guilty that as an Indian and child to two incredibly intelligent individuals, I couldn't emulate or even remotely come close to being The Perfect Indian Child. You know, the one who takes up classical Indian dance and vocal lessons as a child, gets stellar grades in school, finishes in the top 1%-5% to get into an Ivy League, and then goes on to study either Engineering or Medicine. Instead, what did I do? I took up martial arts and fencing, didn't go to an Ivy League school, almost failed out of Chemical Engineering, changed my major twice, had to transfer schools to escape a somewhat abusive friendship, took up powerlifting, and then started training to become internationally competitive instead of searching for an internship in my own major (I went back to engineering, but alas, almost every other solid engineering major refers to mine as "pretengineering").
I really used to hate myself. I was depressed because I couldn't be that perfect engineer, and then I'd run to my friends to forget about my problems for a while. But all that did was make me codependent on them, especially one of them; hence, why I decided to change schools, so I could learn to love myself for a change. I started reading "Psycho-Cybernetics," and it was life-changing. And while I tried to follow all the edicts and principles to practice, I got caught up in other things, and lost my established schedule. And, then, of course, I became stressed, resented myself, and then had to restart the whole process. I'm on my 5th round now with this book, and it's a process, but one I'm going to keep chugging away at. Because I realized something. You can't be perfect. Nobody was made perfect. The reason our teeny little fragile selves have to set goals and then set out to accomplish them is because that's how we come into ourselves and this vessel God has created for us: He created us with imperfection, so we could strive to be better; and in the process of continually trying to achieve goals that we ourselves have set, we come to be the people we once aspired to be. And yet, we're never supposed to achieve THE state of perfection because just a bicycle only maintains its poise "as long as it's moving forward towards something," the second we stop trying to aspire to a better version of ourselves, the second we stop setting goals and going after them, then we fall into a sense of hopelessness and disarray.
People tell me that I don't know what I want out of life because there's so many things I want to do. But just because they think it's unrealistic, does that mean I shouldn't set out to do them? Somebody once told me I probably couldn't deadlift above 225 because she had been powerlifting longer than I had, and since she couldn't do it, there was a fair chance I couldn't, either. But I knew my own strength, and I knew what those who believed in me thought about my strength. I weighed 15 lb less than she did and was deadlifting around 275 less than a month later. Just because somebody else tells you something can't be done doesn't mean it can't be done. Opinions don't equate to facts, and somebody else's conception of my abilities will never hinder what I know I can achieve. Anyways, I want to become internationally competitive by winning raw nationals at the end of this year because I aspire to compete at worlds. We've got a long ways to go, fam, but I'm keeping this so that when I look back on it ten months from now, I'll remember all the shit I went through and every time I forced myself to pick up the pieces and claw my way back to the top.
Most people think that the most difficult part of powerlifting is lifting the weight, but that's a misconception. We incorporate so much volume into our programs and practice such strict form that when the time comes to peak, we're honestly just eagerly anticipating the chance to demonstrate our training and strength. The difficult part is actually the mental aspect of the sport. When the time comes to step on that platform, every good athlete knows that its our mentality that makes or breaks us. If you step on to that platform with the determination to come out on top, you may miss a command or misjudge an attempt, but you'll always remember that each attempt signifies a fresh start and no lift affects how you'll do on another one (i.e. you essentially have 9 chances to give it your all). However, if you step up on stage with doubt in your heart, you've already lost the meet that day. Every missed attempt just feeds into your insecurities and fears that maybe you weren't born to be an athlete and that you shouldn't be trying to compete at all. I was lucky enough at collegiate nationals that I had a friend on my handling team to literally slap sense into me when I panicked after my second squat attempt because I missed depth. She sternly forced me to shape up and instructed me to learn the lessons from that attempt, apply it to the next one, and move on. And while I thought I had done a fine job of learning that lesson, right then, when I needed it the most, my brain and heart failed me. I convinced myself that my strength was gone and that I had lost my competitive advantage (deadlifts carried my total by almost 100 points). But just as I was ready to give up, I realized that if I did, I would forever be that person who gave up at the first sign of adversity and that if I really wanted to see what I was made of, I was going to have to push through the pain. I told my coach that I was ready to start over...I didn't care what the weight was or how much my ego would be bruised; I would do whatever it took to attain my previous level of strength.
Slowly, I started to rejoice in the small victories: minimization of back rounding, keeping my chest up and lats pulled back, and a stronger grip. Even though the weight was low (no more than 185 or 205 pounds), I fiercely focused on technique and obsessively watched my videos to find even the smallest fluctuation that required fixing. On the other hand, squats and bench were going great. I had dropped all expectations for them, so I was pleasantly surprised to find that bringing in my stance for squat to shoulder-width allowed me to hit depth cleanly and load my quads more efficiently. My rpes for bench were so low that my coach increased my bench max, and I found it easier to use leg drive instead of relying on my chest. But the biggest joy I received was the support of those around me. In my moment of need, it felt like all of closest friends rallied around me and constantly reiterated what a source of inspiration and strength I was for them.
So, why is this important to me? I've felt lost a lot of times because I felt guilty that as an Indian and child to two incredibly intelligent individuals, I couldn't emulate or even remotely come close to being The Perfect Indian Child. You know, the one who takes up classical Indian dance and vocal lessons as a child, gets stellar grades in school, finishes in the top 1%-5% to get into an Ivy League, and then goes on to study either Engineering or Medicine. Instead, what did I do? I took up martial arts and fencing, didn't go to an Ivy League school, almost failed out of Chemical Engineering, changed my major twice, had to transfer schools to escape a somewhat abusive friendship, took up powerlifting, and then started training to become internationally competitive instead of searching for an internship in my own major (I went back to engineering, but alas, almost every other solid engineering major refers to mine as "pretengineering").
I really used to hate myself. I was depressed because I couldn't be that perfect engineer, and then I'd run to my friends to forget about my problems for a while. But all that did was make me codependent on them, especially one of them; hence, why I decided to change schools, so I could learn to love myself for a change. I started reading "Psycho-Cybernetics," and it was life-changing. And while I tried to follow all the edicts and principles to practice, I got caught up in other things, and lost my established schedule. And, then, of course, I became stressed, resented myself, and then had to restart the whole process. I'm on my 5th round now with this book, and it's a process, but one I'm going to keep chugging away at. Because I realized something. You can't be perfect. Nobody was made perfect. The reason our teeny little fragile selves have to set goals and then set out to accomplish them is because that's how we come into ourselves and this vessel God has created for us: He created us with imperfection, so we could strive to be better; and in the process of continually trying to achieve goals that we ourselves have set, we come to be the people we once aspired to be. And yet, we're never supposed to achieve THE state of perfection because just a bicycle only maintains its poise "as long as it's moving forward towards something," the second we stop trying to aspire to a better version of ourselves, the second we stop setting goals and going after them, then we fall into a sense of hopelessness and disarray.
People tell me that I don't know what I want out of life because there's so many things I want to do. But just because they think it's unrealistic, does that mean I shouldn't set out to do them? Somebody once told me I probably couldn't deadlift above 225 because she had been powerlifting longer than I had, and since she couldn't do it, there was a fair chance I couldn't, either. But I knew my own strength, and I knew what those who believed in me thought about my strength. I weighed 15 lb less than she did and was deadlifting around 275 less than a month later. Just because somebody else tells you something can't be done doesn't mean it can't be done. Opinions don't equate to facts, and somebody else's conception of my abilities will never hinder what I know I can achieve. Anyways, I want to become internationally competitive by winning raw nationals at the end of this year because I aspire to compete at worlds. We've got a long ways to go, fam, but I'm keeping this so that when I look back on it ten months from now, I'll remember all the shit I went through and every time I forced myself to pick up the pieces and claw my way back to the top.
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