If you find yourself constantly making excuses to not get things done (like not going to the gym), here’s a quick and easy trick to fix that.

It’s simple and only takes about 5 seconds: during the hours that you’re trying to be productive, click the “Log Out” button of the social media websites you visit most frequently whether it’s on your computer or your smartphone.

Yes, I’m basically calling you out and saying that you spend too much time on sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Because fact of the matter is that we are all guilty of wasting a lot of time lurking on these sites.

Ever find yourself checking your Facebook news feed every 5 minutes even though there’s really nothing new and interesting 99% of the time? And when you do check it do you actually interact with people’s statuses, pictures, etc., or are you just lurking? Because if you’re just scrolling through, then you’re wasting away your life.

The reason why this trick works is simple – people are used to seeing their social media feeds as soon as they open up the sites/apps. By logging out, you will have second thoughts on whether you want to actually spend the extra time typing in your login information. And guess what? Humans are lazy. If we realize that we have to spend more time and effort typing in our username and password, then we are less inclined to care about checking our social media feeds. It’s the reason why a lot of college students deactivate their Facebook accounts during Finals week.

Will this work every single time? No, of course not. We’re humans, not robots. But trust me, you’ll notice a significant difference in your productivity level just by logging out of your social media apps. Try it out and see for yourself.

I’m sure there’s a lot of people out there who can deadlift more than me at this weight, but it’s a feat I’ve been wanting to do for the longest time. It was a goal I wanted to accomplish before the summer of 2013, and I finally reached it.

Click here to view the embedded video.

What makes it even more special (for me at least) is the fact that I did it while in a calorie deficit. Since I’m currently trying to cut some weight, my food intake is slightly lower than usual. In other words, my energy levels have been significantly different.

Why did I want to attempt to set a new PR then? To be honest, I have no idea. My warm-up sets just felt too good to not go for a new record. I actually regret only going for 405 because I think I could have pulled more weight.

Anyway, the reason why I even bother to write about this is to share with you how important it is to be focused on your workouts and to be mentally strong every single time you’re at the gym. The moment I was standing over the 405-lb bar, my mind was racing with the million reasons why I wouldn’t be able to pull it off the ground. But in the back of my mind, none of those reasons would matter. I told myself first of all to shut the hell up, and that I was going to pull THAT weight on THAT day no matter what.

The point of my story: you have to be mentally strong at all times because it vastly affects physical performance, and pretty much every other aspect of your life. Even if you’re physically strong, what matters most is your mental, emotional, and spiritual toughness. And what I learned that day was that every one of those elements have to be in synergy in order to accomplish a feat like that.

If my mind and spirit didn’t think that I would be able to pull that weight off the floor, it would not have happened.

“I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.” – Bruce Lee

When it comes to working out, everyone has no problem going hard on doing upper body exercises. Especially Chest Mondays.

But no, not leg day. It’s a love-hate relationship for most people. Some don’t even train their legs at all.

We’ve all heard every reason why we should never skip leg day, so I’ll spare you all of that. Instead, I have some pictures below that I found on the interwebz that will hopefully motivate you to train your legs.

And for the women out there…

I have a confession to make – I love McDonald’s breakfast. I could eat the Sausage Egg and Cheese McGriddle everyday if I wanted to.

The problem is, I’m not a fan of the yellow eggs that are in their breakfast sandwiches. They’re still real eggs, but just the fact that it’s rubbery and odd-tasting bothers me.

So here’s a little secret that I just recently found out if you ever have to resort to any of McDonald’s breakfast sandwiches that has an egg. Ask for a “round-egg”. That way they’ll replace the fake-looking yellow egg with a poached one, free of charge. They look and taste better than the yellow ones, and makes it feel like the sandwich is a little “healthier” despite the fact that it’s from McDonald’s.

Source: Want Real Eggs at McDonald’s? Just Ask! (Serious Eats)

“It is a shame for a man to grow old without seeing the beauty and strength of which his body is capable.”

And don’t get me wrong, I don’t mean to say that in a degrading way because it’s just a simple fact that over 90% of people who go to commercial gyms are complete beginners (if you’re one of them, start here).

This list I have compiled below is targeted mostly to those that have already been lifting for quite a while, not necessarily those who are new to the weight lifting game. You might be surprised at how some people who have been working out for quite some time still look like newbies when you see them at the gym.

If you find yourself doing any of these, I’m not saying you should change your ways. Do what you want to do. I’m just listing out some things that some people think are ridiculous when they see other people doing them.

You Look Like a Newbie When…

1. You press/curl dumbbells while squatting on a bosu ball.
2. You go to the gym only to work out your chest and biceps.
3. You don’t clean up after yourself.
4. You drink your protein shake while working out.
5. You think you’re strong half-squatting (or quarter-squatting) a heavy weight.

   Click here to view the embedded video.

6. You do bicep curls in the squat rack.
7. You work out in jeans. Better yet, you work out in your clubbing clothes.
8. You do countless ab exercises for a full hour.
9. You don’t train your legs.
10. Your workouts last 2 or more hours.
11. You do some shadow-boxing in-between sets. lol
12. You don’t know the concept of lowering the weight when it’s too heavy for you.

    Click here to view the embedded video.

13. You’re not doing the eccentric part of the exercise properly (in fact the eccentric part is non-existant).
14. And speaking of eccentrics, it’s also non-existant in all the other exercises that you do.
15. When spotting someone on an exercise, you don’t pay any attention to them and check yourself out in the mirror instead.
16. You take up a considerable amount of time on one machine.
17. You spend more time socializing than you do lifting.
18. You spend more time checking out your puny muscles in the mirror than you do lifting.
19. Your rest periods last 5 minutes.
20. You rush to take your post-workout protein drink within 10 seconds of finishing your workout. And when you don’t get the chance to drink it within the 10 seconds, you cry about it and call your workout “a waste”.
21. You do made-up exercises to try and “confuse” the muscles (ex. doing over-under hand grip bicep curls)

    Click here to view the embedded video.

“Mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.”

If you have 4 minutes to spare, just watch what he has to say. Motivation is just a spark, what you really need is discipline and commitment.

Here’s a little workout trick you can do if you “don’t have time” to work out.

It’s nothing new and sounds simple, but I seldom see people doing this. You can literally cut your workout time in half just by doing this, and can be applied with any workout routine.

This is what you do –> superset your exercises and group them according to the type of muscles groups. Here’s an example…

Let’s say you have an upper body workout for today consisting of 8 exercises: one arm dumbbell row, incline dumbbell bench press, dumbbell shoulder press, dumbbell lateral raise, bodyweight push-ups, bodyweight pull-ups, cable bicep curls, and cable tricep pushdowns. Depending on the location of the equipment in your gym, you can superset:

1. Dumbbell rows with dumbbell bench presses
2. Dumbbell shoulder presses with lateral raises
3. Bodyweight pull-ups with bodyweight push-ups
4. Cable bicep curls with tricep pushdowns

As you can see here, the 8 exercises are divided up into 4 supersets where each muscle group is combined with their antagonist muscle. You’ll be taking minimal rest both in between each superset and in between each group. The result? Workout time is cut in half, efficiency is increased, and that feel-good feeling is through the roof.

The only thing is that I would not recommend super-setting max effort lifts. So for example, if you’re going for a 3-rep max for deadlifts, I would NOT superset that with ANYTHING. Super-setting high intensity lifts with any other exercise is just plain dumb and unnecessary.