I apologize for the lack of blogging lately, I have been putting my energy into writing the book/guide/manual, whatever you would like to refer to it as.

I am not really sure what to make of the book now that I think about it.  I have so many ideas, it’s like overload.  Maybe I should change this, or maybe I should reword this to read like that.  On and on, around and around it goes.

But I will say this, I think that everyone should attempt to write a book about something that they are passionate about.  You can really learn a lot more about your passion, and also a really tap into who you are as a person.

I have zero ambition of earning money from the book, although I now have a tremendous respect for authors and what they charge for purchases their work.  $12 is a small fee for the amount of time, headaches, research and edits that it takes to put together something that you have no idea if anyone will ever want to read.

That’s putting yourself out there.

But I think that I am finding that writing is giving me a bigger/tougher set of balls (sorry I couldn’t think of any other way to put it).  I am finding that it takes a ton of courage to write something down on paper and hope people will find some value in it.  It’s quite scary actually.  I think that a lot of people would be scared shitless to do it.

I sort of related it to the ever popular “fear of rejection” that sales books so often talk about.  So many people could be great salesman or saleswomen if they could just get a grip on how they handle rejection, and more specifically, the word “no”.

I have often heard people say that they think that everyone should have a job in the service industry at some point before entering the work force… well I think that everyone should have a job in sales, where you have ZERO guarantee of an income and you have to work your ass off day in and day out to earn a living, and you hear the word “no” so much that you develop a thick ass skin.  You start to understand that the word “no” isn’t a no to you (the person), but rather a no to whatever you a presenting or pitching. “No’s” come for all different reasons, so I won’t get into that here.

The second major topic I wanted to discuss is haters.  I recently got into it pretty hard with a big time trainer from Florida who claimed that he is “sick of internet selling crap”.  He was surfing the internet reading fitness articles when he got to the end of one and it was a big plug for the author’s product.

Who gives a shit?  Honestly, everyone is selling something these days, and if you aren’t selling a product, you are selling yourself… daily to your superiors, colleagues or customers.  You are selling your skills, your work ethic, your motivation, your ability to do more than what is asked of you, etc.

This same gentleman went on to say that he hates it when trainers who basically aren’t legends in the fitness industry go on to publish books.

My response to him was the following (copied and pasted):

“Good for John Romaniello. Honestly, good for him. He hustled, networked, chased his dream, achieved it. If people buy his products, so be it. 

Good for Alwyn Cosgrove, he did the same thing. 

There are a lot of un-informed people writing, yes. But that is the internet, and there isn’t a law against writing whatever is on your mind.

I have two filters these days…

1) Poor strength and conditioning advice.
2) Haters.

I respect someone who has the courage to write and put themselves out there like Alwyn and John. Every product gets roasted by someone at some point. 

Nate Green went for it all out and look at his progress in this life with his career. He is achieving what he set out to do, following his dreamers. I am about his age and I remember picking up his book in Border’s bookstore and literally feeling jealous. I hated on his success from the get go, but then realized I felt the way I did because he took action and I didn’t. I wasn’t fulfilled.

I don’t know Kaz… if you have a problem with “internet crap selling”, maybe you should avoid reading articles on the internet. I don’t mean this to be harsh, and I really debated whether or not to say anything at all, but reading through the thread rubbed me the wrong way. 

Alwyn, keep doing what you’re doing, I love it. You only live once, and life is so fragile and short, so you might as well do something incredible, whatever that incredible is.

It’s a gorgeous Fall day in Wisconsin, I am going to go enjoy it…

Cheers.”

I still get fired up reading that, but I think the fact that I feel that kind of emotion is a good thing.  Maybe I am just not willing to go through the motions in life.  I certainly always didn’t have that attitude, as the last couple of years have really been eye-opening for me.

Hey, maybe I will write 3, 4, 5, shit maybe 10 books!  When a writer gets their first work published, I bet they got very little respect from anyone until people started see their work on the bookshelves, maybe even in the New York Times Best Sellers list.  You have to get your start somewhere.  I have a deep respect for that last statement.  I really respect the people who are doing the unpopular activities in order to realize their dreams.  That’s cool to me.

I have always been an open book with passing on my opinion about strength and conditioning, methods that I believe in and methods that I don’t.  If I don’t know something, I network and find out, or I simply redirect that person to someone in my network who knows better than I.

At the end of the day, I think the point of this now 906 word post is that make a decision to do something epic in your life and just go for it.  Who gives a shit?  You are going to die someday, and man it would suck to have a boat load of regret.  Go out and get as many crazy experiences as you can.  Work hard, train hard, get around people who push your limits and make you want to be a better person.

Stay strong…

KG