CHEK PRINCIPLE: Work Hard ~ Rest Hard + more!

Happy Thursday!

I’ve been a bit behind on blogs lately because I’m writing two new one-day workshops I’ll be giving in Sydney, Australia.

I’ll share a little more about them below our feature for today.

Below, I share a link to an important article announcing that the FDA is banning all sales of raw meat in the US!

I’ll also share some of my recent art.

That said, lets get started:

CHEK PRINCIPLE: Work Hard ~ Rest Hard

Today, my vlog explores one of my CHEK Principles: Work Hard ~ Rest Hard. This is a concept that is essential to success with any exercise program.

Unfortunately, we live in a culture that both doesn’t value rest, and is confused at large about how the body responds to exercise.

Most exercisers and athletes, even the most elite of athletes have the confused idea in their heads that you get stronger or fitter when training.

The truth is that you get stronger and fitter while resting between training sessions.

The exercise stimulus induces a catabolic (tissue destructive) influence on the body, which serves as a growth and repair stimulus.

If we don’t have adequate knowledge of how to use rest, and the value of rest as essential to the growth and regeneration (anabolic) phase between training sessions (work-outs), we increase the likelihood of unfavorable responses.

Common examples of unfavorable responses to exercise are:

1. Mental-emotional instability. Mood swings.

2. Loss of motivation.

3. Performance plateaus.

4. Increased bouts of illness.

5. Increased likelihood of injury, and retarded recovery from both training and previous injury.

6. Decreased sexual performance.

7. General hormonal imbalances; typically directly related to adrenal gland fatigue.

8. The need for longer and longer warm-ups to get in the groove.

9. Disrupted digestion and elimination.

10. Accelerated aging.

In my vlog today, I cover the following key topics:

1. I begin by giving a simple explanation of the forces of yin (the feminine) and yang (the masculine).

I give an analogy that helps everyone clearly visualize how these forces work, and explain their functional interplay when on an exercise program.

2. I explain the importance of cycling of energy between the two qualities of yin and yang.

I describe how these energies cycle throughout a day (circadian cycle), and explain how this cycle is the basis for all other training cycles used in periodization (structure or scheduling) of exercise programs.

I highlight the fact that any mistakes made in the circadian cycle repeat and magnify themselves from workout to workout, often leading to poor performance and injury when least wanted, such as in a state, regional, or national championship!

3. REST: My next explanation in this vblog is a basic explanation of the three principle classes of rest:

A. Active Rest: Performing your chosen activity at a significantly reduced intensity.

B. Passive Rest: Performing another activity that does not stress movement patterns (muscles and joints) that are stressed in your primary workouts.

C. Total Rest: Doing nothing, or sleeping.

Though my explanations of these rest types is brief, those that want to learn more about my general approach to rest and the other components of my 4 Doctor self-management model will be richly rewarded by studying my multimedia ebook, The Last 4 Doctors You’ll Ever Need – How To Get Healthy Now!

Additionally, I have a whole chapter on how to create and implement your own exercise program in my book titled, How To Eat, Move and Be Healthy!

4. I explain some of the common symptoms of not applying the Work Hard ~ Rest Hard Principle.

5. We now move to understanding how to assess your readiness to work-out. Here I explain how to apply the 1-3% rule I learned from Charlie Francis (which is also talked about and shared by Charles Poliquin from time to time).

6. Undulating Periodization: I finish my presentation by giving a very basic, but fundamental overview of undulating periodization – alternating periods of higher volume/lower intensity training with periods of lower volume/higher intensity training.

In this section, I outline the commonly used volume/intensity brackets based on the number of repetitions performed per set.

I give an example of undulating periodization in basic form. I encourage each exerciser/athlete to experiment with themselves to determine what their optimal ration of higher volume relative to higher intensity training is.

Knowing how your body responds to training of different types is critical to optimal self-management.

Those that train with teams or groups will probably immediately realize that the optimal ratio for their body is different than what their coach is giving them, which may well be a reason performance is less than optimal…

This vlog presentation is about 16:00 long, and I did my best to synthesize and summarize several key topics, all of which I could easily give a lecture on for a whole day.

There is MUCH more highly practical, immediately applicable information on these topics in:

1. Program Design Correspondence Course (DVDs and manual).

This course gives you the tools to master manipulating acute exercise variables (reps, sets, loads, tempos, and rest periods), which are the basis of effective program design.

2. Advanced Program Design Correspondence Course (DVD’s and manual).

This course is MUCH more advanced than my Program Design course, but doesn’t repeat any of the information in the Program Design course.

It goes into such key issues as bio-motor ability testing, exercise selection, periodization, and writing programs for people of different populations.

In the course, I take you through two case histories and have you design programs for each of them; one is an injured furniture mover, and the other is a professional hockey player.

Enjoy my video and please apply this principle to experience training success!

Additional Resources:

The Last 4 Doctors You’ll Ever Need – multimedia ebook

How To Eat Move and Be Healthy! – book

2 NEW ONE-DAY Workshops Coming Up in Sydney AU May 2014

I’ll be traveling to Australia in May this year, and on May 15 I will offer a new workshop: “How To Empower Change In Your Clients”.

This workshop will follow similar lines of thought as my recent 3-part series titled, Embracing The Change Process, but will naturally be much more comprehensive.

I can only do so much in a few short blogs so if you liked the blogs, imagine what you will learn in a whole day! If you’d like to register for this course, click here:https://www.placeofchi.com/chek-tour-one-day-workshops/

“How To Design Exercise Programs For Unhealthy Clients” will take place May 18th.

In this one-day workshop, I will share my knowledge regarding how to effectively progress people from being unhealthy to healthy.

This is a very important topic today, particularly if you work in the exercise industry, or in any of the rehabilitative professions, such as physical therapy, osteopathic, chiropractic, nursing, athletic training, clinical massage therapy, etc.

My approach is based on a variety of laws and principles that I’ve studied and practiced in my career (now 30 years!).

There are many methods that are NOT common knowledge, but that if used, can make a HUGE difference in your success rate as a trainer, coach, therapist of physician.

This workshop will look at such key issues as how to use a client’s injury history effectively, how to balance autonomic nervous system functions, the influence of breathing and respiration, and much more.

Those attending will leave with a sense of assurance that they know how to increase the likelihood of optimal outcomes while decreasing the likelihood of unwanted re-injury or setbacks.

If you’d like to learn more or register for this course, click here: https://www.placeofchi.com/chek-tour-one-day-workshops/

FDA Announces Ban on American Raw Meat!

Dr. Mercola recently posted the article below on his web site.

I intend to do a blog or series of blogs on this issue, but didn’t want you to have to wait to hear about this very important issue from me.

We all need to work together to let the government(s) know we will not stand for this! I say “government(s)” because it would be unwise of you to think this is only going to take place in the US.

The US government and its associate (Corporations) organizations have, and DO exert tremendous influence over most countries, particularly where they can make money and get more people to play their silly games…

Unfortunately, Uncle Sam is a very good snake-oil salesman…and a very lousy parent, doctor, nurse, teacher, etc.

Uncle Sam seems to have mastered wasting tax payer’s money on a wide variety of very silly, useless issues and projects, like a massive defense budget; the truth is we need our military to protect us from the government!

Feel free to click the link below and it will take you directly to the article on Dr. Mercola’s web site:
FDA Announces: All American Raw Meat to Be Banned in 2015

First they did it to milk. Now in a major push to protect consumers from tainted American meat, only pre-cooked meat will be available from grocers. And forget about getting raw meat directly from farmers as they will be forced to tag all animals with transmitters.

My Recent Art Expressions!

It is my usual practice to draw a mandala (art within a circle) or art piece of some form before I go to bed at night.

I don’t do this because I’m an aspiring artist. I do it because if feels good. Art is a very powerful form of both meditation, and healing.

I find that by expressing the feelings that I have within myself, I’m able to better know and understand myself. I also find my art very helpful as a means of informing me as to what’s coming my way…

By the time I get home from work, do tai-chi, have a sauna in my Healthmate IR sauna, and eat dinner, there’s usually only about half an hour before bed time.

This gives me motivation to not over-think and allow my feelings to come forth.

I don’t like using rulers, compasses, or anything that smells of “perfecting the art”, for that is the very mindset I’m trying to heal.

Here are some of my art pieces from the last week.

My life has been absolutely wonderful lately. Moving here to the Heaven House, making major staffing changes in my business, and hiring a new COO for the CHEK Institute have been magical changes in my life.

This mandala expresses how I feel inside at this time in my life.

I have had the great joy of experiencing my wife, Penny’s joy of flying. She’s been taking classes and flying lessons to get her pilot’s license for several months now.

She really needed a creative outlet after so many years of intense work with the CHEK Institute and now that we have a much better staff and business systems in place, she is getting some much needed play time!

I love seeing Penny’s smile, and feeling her levity when she comes home from flying. Her joy influences me each moment and surely influenced this art.

My wife is truly an amazing woman and has always been an anchoring energy in my life.

I drew this mandala as I was thinking about the experience of Spiritual Union with another human being. There is nothing like losing your ego in the presence of another who’s company and love you enjoy deeply enough to completely let go and be your natural self.

I’m fortunate to have such experiences in my life, and this is what I see when I look into myself entering into Spiritual Union.

I hope you’ve all enjoyed my blog today.

I’ll be busy working on my new workshops for my Australia tour this weekend, but will be enjoying the beauty of my Heaven House.

Last night as I was walking to my car, four beautiful mule deer came out of the brush and onto the driveway right in front of me. They were amazingly beautiful and as they ran up the driveway, they kept looking back at me and it was neat to make eye contact with them.

Today, I saw three more just out the window. There are regular visits here by coyotes and bobcats.

I LOVE the bobcats, particularly the males. They look like miniature lions! If you saw all the muscles on these guys, you’d know you don’t need steroids to get big if you have a healthy diet!

There are loads of amazing birds out lately too. I get to see the hawks performing areal acrobatics regularly.

Believe it or not, the black birds can really put on quite a flying demonstration too.

Today, as I was writing at my desk, a black bird was doing amazing stunts, including multiple complete roll-overs while diving at a fast pace. They are very territorial, and often get into areal battles with hawks, which is funny to watch; they usually get the hell beat out of them, and they are slow to “get it” too.

One day, I watched a hawk literally punch a crow with its wing so hard the crow went temporarily unconscious and started falling to the earth! Fortunately for the crow, it woke up before it hit the dirt! Amazing shows here!

Love and chi,
Paul Chek