I sit down to write. The cursor blinks on the page.

Nothing is coming to me.

Better make sure nothing life-changing has been posted on Instagram.

Wait I was writing. Back to typing and deleting. Can’t think of anything.

Pretty sure there will be some breaking news on twitter that’s important…

Damn I should be creating something. Back to writing.

OK but nothing has come to me so I should probably check cryptocurrency prices.

Fine I’m back to writing but a whole 15 minutes has gone by and I haven’t been able to come up with something so maybe today isn’t the right day. Maybe I should sit this one out and come back when I feel fresh tomorrow?

The battle with distractions from you doing something hard but worthwhile is never ending. I’m sure Picasso didn’t have Facebook and Netflix but I’d wager he was no less distracted by fair maidens and breaking news telegraphs.

Maybe these distractions stop you from creating something that is trapped in your minds eye, or they pull you away from long term slow endeavours like building a strong body or aesthetic physique. Either way they’re stealing from you.

While there are no true “hacks”, it’s worth experimenting with different systems to interrupt an unproductive pattern. I have tons of friends who have had great luck with and swear by GTD, the Getting Things Done system. Others do something as simple as using the Pomodoro technique when they’re in dedicated work times. I don’t think it matters so much what systems you use, rather that you have something that causes you to examine and focus on your behavior if your automatic habits involve too much distraction.

At the end of the day it comes down to asking yourself the same question often and repeatedly: “Am I creating right now?”

Because in the end that’s what matters. What you create. No one has ever been remembered for what they consumed. Consumption can have a place in creation to be sure, I get some of my greatest inspirations from reading, but that type of consumption can be directly connected to creation.

It’s not clicking yes on “Are you still watching?”

Be patient. Sit with it. Sometimes it takes more than 5 minutes of investing your time before you see the payoff. Sometimes you have to start writing nonsense or drawing doodles or just showing up to the gym to move something before the inspiration really kicks in.

So do whatever you have to do to keep the focus, and go make what you’re capable of.

Let me tell you a quick story, but a sad story, a story about a lifter.

When this lifter was young and new he started out doing bench presses just like any good lifter would do. Also like many others, these bench presses started to hurt his shoulders. But hurt shoulders were macho and cool, and it was a badge of honor not to be able to sleep on his side so he wore his pain proudly.

Luckily our lifter was called to adventure, entered the cave, and returned to the normal world with an evolution of his thinking. This evolution lead to him mostly avoiding bench presses for the next ten years rather than suffering through pain that wasn’t worth it. But without bench presses whatever would our lifter do for upper body development?
Fortunately for our lifter there is the other B-lift: the bent press.

If you are not familiar with the bent press then I am gleeful that it is I who gets to share this special lift with you for the first time.

The bent press is a one-arm lift that involves lifting a weight overhead with little to no pressing movement at all. In fact, calling it a press at all is a bit of a misnomer other than you are in fact putting the weight overhead without using a quick lift motion such as in a snatch or jerk. The actual movement is a bit more like a corkscrew under the weight.

Now what is particularly interesting about the bent press is how much weight can be hoisted with it. In fact, I can have you putting a bigger kettlebell overhead than you ever have before the very first day you learn it.

In lieu of getting too deep into the explanation in text, I think this video will be most helpful:

A major point on this movement not covered in the video: in my experience the best way to train this movement is very heavy, for very few reps, and very infrequently. In fact, the single best way I’ve found is to simply work up to a single max lift, preferably increasing to a new PR each time (using a loadable dumbbell versus kettlebell) and then waiting a week or two before tackling it again. Obviously if you are just learning the movement a few more reps will be helpful, but I do not believe that this is a movement that benefits from lots and lots of reps of lower weight.

Until someone shows me another lift where you can put almost 400lbs overhead with one hand, the bent press will always be king of the upper body lifts.