Don’t Train When You’re Sick. Tempo Rubato “Play The Pauses”

UPDATE: I HAD THE PLEASURE OF CHATTING WITH SHAWN RAY ON MD RADIO ABOUT THE NATIONALS. CLICK HERE TO LISTEN – I CAME ON AT THE END. – Kevin

“Courage consists in the power of self-recovery.”

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

So I haven’t been able to train for a week due to a bad cold. My only goal has been resting up and getting better. I have accepted down time as a natural – even powerful – part of the champion’s endless transformation.

Sometimes recovery means allowing oneself to step out of rhythm. “Tempo rubato,” is a musical term describing this kind of rhythmic freedom. It’s an expressive technique that happens instinctively among gifted musicians – it’s a way of “playing the pauses,” in a piece of music.

As gifted bodybuilders, we also use tempo rubato. In bodybuilding, the rests are just as important as the lifts. When you’re fighting a flu, cold or infection, our rests actually contribute to our growth and victory.

Rigid, compulsive, machine-like training is the folly of amateurs chasing a feeling of total control. Total control is an illusion. Our training must breathe and live.

Play the pauses in bodybuilding, play the rests your body composes. Rest with patience and artistry, build and gather expressive power and momentum from the silence…soon we resolve in the gym with extraordinary physical, mental and emotional harmony.

Peace

Category: Music