Odyssey Performance

The man who can’t see himself as he is with all of his inadequacies and insufficiencies terminates any possibility for him to be the man he dreams of. The short term release we get from avoiding these things costs us the long-term fulfilment and transformation we long for. In fact, to be open to life is to seek and investigate those very things, which cultivates a particular belief - to be loved as we are. Allowing us to see the intrinsic value of our humanity as individuals and a collective.

What terrifies us most about this introspective investigation is that we may discover something totally unlovable, when you go deep enough, it gets dark and when it gets dark, the worst possible reservations that we hold onto our heart become real, but we must trust that love will triumph and transform all that walk this path.

When you have this kind of openness, you start interacting with the very thing you’ve been running from your entire life, yourself.

There is an aphorism that has floated around growing up that said "Those who know, do and those that cannot do, teach."

The problem I have with that, is that learning from someone who cannot do what you aim to do, will only show the theoretical aspect of it. That's like somebody who understands how bench pressing a certain way can improve your bench to 120kg, that has never benched 120kg shouldn't be teaching someone to bench 120kg.

It's always better learning from the doers. People who demonstrate the ability to complete the things you are looking to learn, so that you too can understand the feelings and insights you would get from implementing what you are taught.

For years, I was the studier, the best ways to get better at anything was learning, however with no implementation is what killed me. Transforming into the doer, has been the catalyst for the many changes in my life.

I have gotten many similar results with training and with business, all because I studied without implementing. It hurt a lot, and it's a lesson I share with you.

The way to truly know, is to do. Whoever is teaching you, must be able to do, no matter how well they understand it.

Get up and do the work you need to do immediately. Waking up in the morning is another opportunity to get closer to your PB.

It may mean getting to the gym early in the morning and crushing your workouts. It may mean getting your first meal of the day spot on when you're rushing to get to your job. It may mean having a proper conversation with someone you love, because it's been a while.

Doing the work first, is always how it's done. You cannot put the cart before the horse. That's how you will get stuck.

Eating is the way that you'll be able to lift heavier weight, there is no way around it.

You can tweak your technique, you can train your nervous system to tolerate heavier loads, your sleep and your recovery is important, however it's nowhere near as important as eating sufficiently. Your input will always determine your output. You eat little, you lift little. You eat loads, you lift loads.

I caveat this to say that "eating whatever the f**k you want" will not get you the results you're after. You may lift the weight, but you'll feel like s**t after. "But Carlo, the objective was to lift the heavier weight." That doesn't mean at the expense of your health and wellbeing.

The "I'm a powerlifter, I can eat what I want" mentality doesn't apply in my coaching. You eat like s**t, you eat like s**t. We're not excusing your s**tty eating habits by lifting more weights. We lift heavier weights by eating loads more, we eat loads better so your body functions and performs better under the stress it'll take when it's lifting heavy ass weight.

There's a huge difference in lifting heavy weight, and heavy weightlifting. The first suggests "I do what I f**king want" approach, the second determines "You lift heavy fricken weight and you mean business"

The second doesn't work by pure chance, it takes work. Especially dialling in and loading on your nutrition.

Showing up and executing every day gives you the best chance of success. By consistently showing up and executing, you get the lessons and insights that you otherwise would not have received if you didn't show up.

When you're working out, by working out every day, you get the ins and outs of what works for you and what doesn't when it comes to exercise selection. You also learn how your mind responds to intensity, to rest, to changes in the program and how your body is adaptable in those circumstances.

By showing up and executing every day, you remind to yourself of your mission, to get off your ass and live every single day rather than just exist, and in that mission, you'll also find and create what you're passionate about.

Doing nothing, creates nothing.

I’ve been travelling around, and if you’re someone that travels around and continues to keep training whilst travelling, here are three things to maximise your results:

1. Anywhere there is an opportunity to drive, walk. Travelling is a good time to get your steps in, especially if you’re someone that prioritises their results and achieving their personal bests.

2. Protein is abundant on the road, however not as abundant as fast food. Your calorie intake is as important as your protein intake. Buy from supermarkets or grocers your healthy meals beforehand so that you’re not indulging on fast food. If fast food is the option you want to take, be mindful of the amount of calories you’re consuming and spare some calories for the excess calories you’ll intake eating.

3. Travel anywhere with gyms or train outdoors. I’m Australia, in various travel spots there are gyms as well as outdoor workout areas. Use them to your advantage. If you’re more of a body weight exerciser, use any space available to you to get a workout in.

Training is a lifestyle that you don’t need to take a holiday from lol, however if you are on holidays, enjoy your holidays and carry yourself as you would following your everyday routine.

Going to the gym daily is like waking up in the morning daily. It's a privilege, it's something we get to do.

Some people didn't wake up this morning, and others didn't go to the gym either. The choices that we make earlier in life often dictate the consequences of those choices later in life.

We can decide to add the gym as a part of our daily routine and daily lives, and then add the positive consequences like having more energy, more focus, more resilience, more power in the muscles as well as more longevity.

Or we can decide not to add it to our daily routines, and then suffer the negative consequences of chronic stress, fatigue, ailments and illnesses because we didn't get our workouts in.

Both of them are hard, and there is always a choice to be made. You get to choose which hard that is going to be.

How to establish a baseline for your lifts when attempting to hit a PB. Set up a weight you're comfortable with, and lift this weight.

Follow that up with lifting weight that is incrementally heavier by 2.5kg or 5kg. Keep lifting this incrementally heavier weight until it's weight you can lift, however it's slightly uncomfortable. This is around the 70% mark of your personal best.

Continue lifting at 70% consistently to establish comfort in lifting and gaining strength, then incrementally increase to 75-90% of PB. This is the build up to when you're hitting your personal best.

When it comes to PB day, you're going to conserve much of your energy by regressing back down to 60-65% of your PB to keep lifts consistent. With dialled in nutrition and sleep, hitting your PB will be a walk in the park.

This entire process will take 6-8 weeks. You need to be patient, consistent and be tracking everything from training to sleeping to calories and your overall stress levels as well as your daily activity.

This is a lot, especially if you have full time responsibilities, like holding down a job and raising a family. Get the load of organising all of your health and fitness off your back and send a message today to see how we at Odyssey Performance implement strategies to help you lift more and be more.

Plateaus in training are one of the most optimal ways to assess where you can make adjustments in your routines and habits.

When you are stuck and weight isn't moving as you think it should be, it gives you an opportunity to have a look over what you're doing and potentially make some changes.

I caveat this by saying that a plateau is a time of eight or more weeks of lifting the same weight, without being able to go slightly heavier due to lack of strength.

If you are attempting to PB every week, this is the fastest way to injury, to burnout and there is no way to measure how you're actually progressing in the gym.

Where if after 8 weeks of following a solid program bears no results, there are two things that need to be questioned. The quality of the program, and the compliance and training intensity of the person completing it.

Hitting a PB is very simple.

You lift a heavy weight that you are comfortable with one week, then for the next 8-12 weeks, you lift weights at a percentage below the weight you began with consistently, then you begin lift that weight you began with for reps. Then you load the weights to lift with more than the original and begin lifting, and repeat the process again.

It's not the PB that's the juggle, it's the consistency in between.

Hitting a PB isn't an every session thing like a lot of people would imagine. You don't need to be going to the gym to lift PBs every week. Not only is it not sustainable on your body, it actually takes 7 full days to recover from deadlifts.

Hitting PBs only happen consistently when you have the right protocols in place, and you are consistent week in, week out. There are likely moments where you're able to lift PBs outside of your program, however, every week, nope.

I help guys who haven't lifted PBs in years, lift them in 12 weeks. If you're stuck on your current PB and want to smash it this summer, send a message, let's see where you are and let's get started.

Boredom that is not taken seriously is the enemy of progress. Here's what I mean.

Often, people eat out of boredom, people binge watch TV out of boredom, people binge on social media, on p**n, on extracurricular activities to limit boredom.

This is a sickness of the "always having to do something" mentality, that when you're bored, that you need to be productive so you don't feel this inherent guilt of not doing anything.

Boredom that is taken seriously, actually helps a lot with creativity. The solutions we can come up with, when we're bored and we're embracing that boredom, amplifies our results.

Here's my suggestion. When you're bored next, figure out where you are on your health and fitness journey and list all of the things you want, and use the boredom to come up with creative solutions. Or the other direction works too, come up with all of the things you don't want and then do exactly the opposite of those things.

Boredom is literally necessary for creativity. You live the same menial existence without it. You live an extraordinary life that get you results when utilised correctly.