Bodybuilders are a stubborn bunch… almost as bad as runners! And they tend to follow the “HERD” doing whatever exercises and routines the “pros” are doing…
Now, if your goal is to be as big as possible and you are not at all concerned with your health and fitness, don’t even bother this article… this article is for bodybuilders who ARE concerned about their health and want to be big, strong, powerful, and agile… if that’s you, read on…
The reason so many bodybuilders suffer from so many different injuries is because there are several things the “pros” don’t tell you…
First off, the articles that you see in all the muscle mags aren’t even written by the “pros”… and the workout routines they recommend are always extreme and often not even used by the “pro” who supposedly wrote because their main goal is to sell magazines… not give you the real deal on bodybuilding.
If you are serious about bodybuilding and want to achieve your true peak, you need to stay injury free… and that’s just about impossible if you train they way most bodybuilders do.
There are several key strategies that you can use right now to not only eliminate any aches, pains and injuries you currently have, but also keep from creating more muscle imbalances in the future. For a more detailed article on muscle imbalances go to Aches and Pains Articles Click here to learn Strategy #1 - Target the Weaklings!
Get ready, this is gonna hurt! The exercises most bodybuilders focus on the most, are the ones that cause the most problems… hopefully, you’re different..
But before we share with you what those exercise are, let’s talk real quickly about what bodybuilding is…
The goal of bodybuilding isn’t to get as big as you can, or at least to us it isn’t and shouldn’t be, but to build a balanced body that is as strong as possible in every way. For example, while being freakishly big may get people’s attention, it serves you no purpose at all…
while on the other hand, what if you were not only big, but also extremely strong and powerful, lightning fast, flexible, and agile enough to kick ass if needed?
So many bodybuilders build massive amounts of muscle yet are so unbelievably weak and inflexible… for example, we know a guy who can bench press over 350 lbs but can’t do a measly 50 push-ups!
The point is, the exercises you choose and how you perform them not only determine how big, strong, and flexible you are, but also affect how your body functions and whether or not you suffer from aches, pains, and injuries like back pain and sciatic pain.
Anyone looking to achieve optimal health has to consider nutrition as the single most important ingredient for success. In a perfect world, all of our nutrition should come from the food we eat. Supplementation should not even be an issue.
In the real world, however, most of the foods we eat are riddled with fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides, and hormones - not to mention that they are often hydrated with polluted water. In addition, an ever-growing percentage of our food comes from other countries, which don’t always have the best inspection track record.
And if all that weren’t bad enough, the natural nutrient value of the soil that produces these foods has also been diminishing over the years, a trend that will only continue. This is why it’s necessary for us to take a hard look at our diets and make a decision about whether we may need supplements.
As you can see, proper nutrition nowadays is not that easy; it does take some time to educate yourself. By proper nutrition, I mean eating clean and safe foods that have the nutrients your body requires to get and stay healthy.
Recipe for relief
Your two main purposes for eating a healthy diet and taking supplements are to give your body what it needs to heal itself and to minimize the level of inflammation that is in your body. The inflammation is what is causing your pain.
Why do we call mind-body techniques such as massage, meditation, hypnosis, or acupuncture “alternative” treatments when they’ve been around since the dawn of Man? If these techniques have been around and used for that long, surely there must be something to them.
Truth is, you’re already a bit of an expert in some of these techniques. Let me explain. Say you stub your toe. You know full well you’re going to grab that toe and rub it (massage). Next, your breathing is going to change, you’re going to belt out a few choice words, then you’re going to find a place to sit down and relax for a minute (meditation). And don’t forget your need to show everyone where it hurts by pointing to it and pressing on the most painful spot (acupressure).
I know what you’re thinking right now: How would any of these techniques help heal my herniated disc or Spinal Stenosis or Sciatica? First of all, none of these techniques can change the physical aspect of your condition. But when you examine the goals of each of them, they all make sense. And, if used together, they can deliver better and faster results.
Here’s a quick look at the benefits of a more extensive list of alternative treatments to help you understand how you might incorporate one or all of these techniques into your life. Study this list and then find practitioners to teach you or work with you one-on-one.
Massage: There are literally hundreds of styles of massage. Which one is best for you will depend on your comfort level. I would recommend finding some one skilled in Deep Tissue combined with Trigger Point as well as Myofascial Release the combination offers calming of the muscles and manual removal of inflammation by getting rid of the source of the irritant and pain.
You don’t need to be a scientist to know that chronic back pain can have a negative impact on your life, often bringing with it anxiety and depression. It can affect your ability to work, sleep, and perform other daily activities.
Until recently, it has been assumed that whatever changes occurred in the brain as a result of chronic back pain were only temporary and that the brain would revert to a normal state once the pain stopped.
Recent findings by researchers from Northwestern University have turned this assumption on its head. What they found was that chronic back pain - defined as pain lasting six months or longer - can cause significant and long-lasting damage to the brain, aging it up to 20 times faster than normal.
