Toss 'em out

...like a used tissue.
Good friends will lift you up, like the wind beneath a wing. But bad friends can be like uranium, slowly killing you with radiation (unfortunately not the type that will make you all swole and green).
It's no secret that good friends are hard to come by. I have had my share of good friends and bad ones. Throughout my life I have made allies and enemies, made friends with enemies, and made enemies with allies. Relationships can be fickle. There are a few ways of knowing the difference between a good friend and a bad one. I'll cover the two I believe are most important.

• 50/50 Give and Take

• Is the friendship making you better

 Two way street
Friendship is a two way street. One person can't be putting in all the effort. Yeah I know it sounds like a monogamous relationship, but that's pretty much what a good friendship is (except you get to see other people, so maybe it's more like polygamy). We've all had that friend who mooches off the rest, you stop a local food joint to get a quick bite and Mr. I never have cash is already asking you to buy him something before you even put the car in park. Now I am not discouraging buying your friends food, maybe you buy this time and next time he's covering the bill (give & take). But this guy asks all the time, he has a job but somehow he never has money. You don't want to let him starve, but at the same time you need to eat too, shoot you got bills to pay as well. Good friends will not put you in this conundrum.
Of course it doesn't just pertain to money. Time is just as valuable an asset. Have you ever had that friend that will only hangout on his terms, never comes out when you ask but you always do when the roles are reversed. Inviting them out is a way of showing them they are important to you and you want to make time, well stop. I learned along time ago to give up trying to make time for friends like these. Switch the roles around, stop asking them to hangout, stop wasting time on someone that doesn't want to spend it with you. You have nothing to gain from a friend like this, only time lost.
You're becoming mighty!... at least you should be
 Late middle school early high school I had a group of "friends" who I hung out with regularly, most of my memories I recall from this friendship involve them verbally putting me down. I never truly felt like a part of the group, but that didn't stop 14 year old me from trying (what a dumb ass). I look back and realize I gained nothing from it, sure there were a few good times, but passed all that it was just a waste of time.
It wasn't until I got into fitness that I started surrounding myself with more like minded people who pushed me to better myself, not just in the gym, and I push them back. That is a huge aspect that I love about the fitness community, there is support from fellow gym rats to become a better version of yourself (shout out to Ulysses, Cody, Tony, Paul, oh hell even Manny).
Toss 'em out like a used tissue
If your friends aren't meeting the qualifications, both examples from this article or any of your own, do not hesitate to cut them from your life if/when you see fit. Cut them out like a tumor, or a leech, or like one of those slugs from that movie The Faculty, you know the ones that burrow under people's skin, then take over their minds and control their every move. But I digress, the point you should get from this post is that the people you hangout with really do affect you, negatively and positively. Whether or not your standards of a good friend are the same as mine be willing to remove unnecessary people from your life. Filter out the bad and hold on to the good. Surrounding yourself with good, positive people will take you far, but surrounding yourself with bad, negative people will hold you back.

Birthday Wishes

Sitting there at a local diner, staring at the recently lit candle placed on top of a delicious chocolate chip cake, another year has passed and I have been blessed to see the age of 20. A quick thought popped into my head, an overview of everything I learned or accomplished in the last year. I realized that this last year has been the best of my life. I learned more about myself, opened up to new ideas(thanks Paul), immersed into a life of fitness, and learned to find happiness in myself rather than finding it in others.
I feel as though I progressed further in just one year than in all my high school years combined. Yes being 19 was great.
So as I looked at the burning candle I thought I should wish for this year to be better than the last. But then I realized wishing didn't make my year better, I had to do. I had to go out and make my life better. Sitting and wishing doesn't get you anywhere. So I blew out the candle, wishing for nothing. Instead will take what I have learned last year, as I do every year, and apply it to the next. And make this the best year ever little by little, day by day, until I have passed another 365.

Did I mention the cake was delicious? Because it was.

Old habits are like Bruce Willis...

...They die hard
After living in Wisconsin for one month I have learned one thing, old habits die hard. All of last year I spent trying to better myself not only in physical form by going to the gym, but I was also working on losing my sense of shyness and my lack of "I don't give a fuck" attitude, two of my worst attributes. In the last couple of weeks I have taken steps backwards in reaching my goals. I have reverted to being shy and the "I don't give a fuck" attitude is fading away. Fortunate for me I have realized this issue before it got any worst.

The problem all derives from a lack of comfort. I was comfortable just being me because I knew I had a fall back, one of my closest friends(lets just call him Paul). Paul was somewhat of a self improving coach to me. As long as Paul was around I didn't care if I made a fool of myself, whether or not he was in the same room or even in the same 5mile radius didn't really matter. He understood what I was doing, I was trying to better myself(you'd be surprised how many people look down on that). Along with Paul I had all my other friends and my brother, so the comfort level was pretty high.

Comfort is your worst enemy...
Yes, I did say my problem derives from a lack of comfort, so you're probably thinking "Marco, then why is comfort bad"?
Relying on comfort destroys your goals, if you're comfortable you will never truly achieve anything. I was making real progress, my friends were noticing my increase in confidence. But what happened as soon as I became uncomfortable, I reverted to the old me again(that guy really sucks). So put your self in uncomfortable situations. Strive to improve, and if you fail well keep at it. Don't let the comfort of your average, normal, easy life pull you into its clutches. It will keep you there and you will never improve.

So stay uncomfortable, and go get those gainz....whatever they may be.

Keep Dreamin

After a fun trip to the mall with my sister the car ride back to the apartment became somewhat philosophical, some real talk homie... anyways. She asked me what my biggest goal in life was, the nature of the question threw me off. I have many goals, I wouldn't know how to determine which were more important to me. My dream of owning my own business, my dream of having a studio(separate from another business), the one where I own a small house in the burbs with a few of my all-time favorite cars, or the one where I invest in other peoples businesses, and the list goes on. I couldn't decide because in my mind none of these dreams can exist without another, they are dependent of one another. At least I couldn't decide until I remembered my all time craziest dream.

One day I hope to rent the house where Tony Montana(played by Al Pacino) lived in. I want to rent the famous California mini mansion for one weekend and have a huge nerf gun war (maybe re-enact the ending to Scarface...oh don't snort the pile of flour guys it's just for show). If you can't tell by now, yes, Scarface is one of my favorite movies.
I decided this was my biggest dream because it's the most ridiculous of all of them and it seems the least likely to happen. But that's okay, it's okay to dream big and ridiculously. We need something to chase after, to keep us going. If my biggest dream was for me to live in an apartment, attend a few years of community college, and work a dead end job where I'm just some company's bitch I would have been set a year ago. But that's not what life is about...that's not what the gainz are about. So keep dreaming and keep chasing those dreams, whatever they are. If in forty years I find that I failed at all my dreams, well at least I will have tried while most others would have given up, played it safe, and never accomplished any of theirs as well. We really have nothing to lose from our pursuit for our dreams, because the worst case scenario we end up with what we started.
Till next time, keep dreaming everyone.

Reaching Perfection

If you are reading this I will admit I am very surprised,  most people would read the title of this article and probably think to themselves "damn, Marco is so cocky" or somehow paint me as this narcissistic douche who thinks highly of himself. Rather this post is about quite the opposite.

All my life I have heard the statement "no one is perfect" and I couldn't agree more. The problem with this is people take it as an excuse to continue living under the bar (barbell?... no?, okay let's move on). It's almost as if they just found a loophole that allows for them to be lazy. Reaching perfection is impossible, but that doesn't mean you can't try.

Some people reading this might think to themselves (or out loud, whichever floats your boat) "I don't need to be perfect to please other people, what do I care what other people think". It's not about other people, it's about trying to be the perfect you for you. It's about looking in the mirror and knowing the person standing before you won't settle for anything less than living up to your potential. We owe it, not to our friends, co-workers, neighbors, classmates, or even our parents, but to ourselves.

So no perfection can't be achieved, but there's no harm in trying. In fact nothing but good can come from it, nothing but progress...nothing but gainz.

Who's it for? (Origin Story)

How did it start?
 Talk to any bodybuilder, any gym rat, or fitness fiend why they decided to change their lives and chase the gainz. The response received should sound something like "I was unhappy with the way I was". For most people it stems from a lack of joy in their lives or possibly a tragic incident that ignites a want for change.  Since I've started my pursuit for fitness over a year ago I have met many fellow gain chasers and heard their origin stories. A few stories involved a partner's infidelity, others a non mutual break up, and for some the feeling of physical weakness is enough to push for a change.
Why am I doing this?
I started because I was unhappy with how I looked. My self esteem was low, so low I couldn't land the confidence to ask out, who at the time I thought was, "The girl of my dreams". I felt physically/ mentally weak, I was tired of taking people's shit. At 5'10", weighing 130 pounds, and slouching constantly, I could do very little to assert myself. I had to change, I couldn't keep living in weakness. Above all other reasons, I was tired of being average. Surrounding myself with failure, I felt as if the person I was on the outside did not match the person on the inside, or at least not the person I wanted to be.
Why I keep doing this?
 I could tell you it's because I don't slouch anymore. I could tell you it's because I feel myself becoming stronger, both physically and mentally. Or maybe because I feel more confident than I have ever been. Maybe it's an accumulation of all those things. But individual reasons aside, I was happier in the last 12months than I was the 4years before I decided to start a fitness lifestyle.
Why are you doing this?
You can have a thousand reasons, but as long as your doing it for yourself the reasons don't matter. People will hate you for it, they'll make fun of you. Sometimes the worst comments will come from your closest friends. But don't ever listen to them, because you and you alone know why you have chosen to chase the gainz. You and you alone are putting in the hard work to achieve your goal. It doesn't affect them one bit, so their comments don't mean a damn thing.
So keep your head up, back straight, legs shoulder length apart and
...Just keep chasing the Gainz

What is "The Gainz of Life"

The term "gainz", a spiced up take on the word gains,  is popular amongst the fitness world, used by weight lifters as a reference to muscle building. For the determined gym rat the pursuit for gains is less of a hobby and more of a lifestyle. We eat, sleep, breathe, and live in such a manner that will further assist in sculpting our bodies into the nearly perfect image we work day after day to achieve.

We must not limit the definition of gainz to a simple gain in muscle size and strength. The gainz are all around us. We push our limits at the gym, we try a heavier weight, we go for one more rep, all in hopes that we increase our PR (Personal Record). Gainz aren't just made in the gym, they are made any time we attempt to become better at any single act. I want to read faster, well then I read more. I want to make more money, so I work harder. I want to be smarter, so I study more. Our gainz are our improvements, we work to achieve a goal and we never stop because there is always room for improvement, there is always room for gainz.

I made the decision to become a fitter/ healthier person sometime in the summer of 2013, this proved to be the best decision of my life. I officially joined a gym August 2013. Training with my brother, he himself already having two years of experience with weightlifting proved to be an astounding and capable trainer. Since then I have become noticeably more confident in my self and a much happier person. In other words the gainz have been good to me. Thus I have found it to be my duty to spread the joys of not only the fitness lifestyle, but the Gainz lifestlye as well. The Gainz of Life will include progress with my pursuit for fitness gainz, my pursuit to better myself, along with my take on all things gainz related.

Until next time, remember...There is always room for gainz.