Bridging or Deadlifting

The back bridge and deadlift are two exercises which compete for training time in the routines of athletes.  Both movements accomplish largely the same goals, yet there are important reasons to prioritize bridging over deadlifting.

*The neck bridge gives back more than it takes.  The deadlift requires such a massive investment of tension that its specific benefits are overshadowed by the full body fatigue it creates.  It is a known paradox of weightlifting that some of the heaviest deadlifting is accomplished by those who frequently train less fatiguing auxiliary movements and rarely deadlift in practice.  

*Bridging requires no more equipment than an open space of floor, padded according to preference.  The deadlift requires solid ground, a long bar, expensive weights, and a space to store equipment.

*The bridge provides a safer opportunity to practice tension over a longer period of time in an optimal position for building strength and flexibility.  A typical set of bridges lasts 1-3 minutes with the neck, spine, and hips at full extension.  A typical set of deadlifts lasts 30 seconds and works the muscles at only partial extension.

*The grip is a weak link for the deadlift which can potentially reduce load on the spinal muscles.  The bridge requires only the posterior chain muscles to activate and is not limited by grip strength.

*The bridge builds proportional strength through the entire back of the body.  The neck, back, legs, and calves share the weight of the body equally.  As a result, strength and muscle gain is uniform across all these regions.  By contrast, the deadlift stresses the lower spine to a greater degree, resulting in muscle imbalances between the upper and lower spine as a result of different leverages across vertebrae.

*Bridging applies static force to closed spinal discs which reduces the likelihood of acute injury.  Deadlifting applies dynamic force to open spinal discs, which can result in slipped discs during forced reps.

*In this author's experience, greater muscle is gained from deep nasal breathing in a neck bridge for only 3 minutes once per week than from deadlifting 285 pounds 25 times twice per week.  A bridge held long past the point of muscle burn acts as a potent stimulus for human growth hormone.  The arms, legs, hips, back, neck, and shoulders grow thicker for days after a bridge workout.  By contrast, the deadlift more easily elicits cortisol production as a result of overtraining due to excessive weights, resulting in only localized muscle gain overshadowed by full body stress and fatigue.  In other words, the bridge can build more muscle mass with less effort and less training time.

*The bridge with deep breathing increases metabolic endurance by pairing  slow oxygen intake with high oxygen expenditure.  The stretched rib cage simultaneously makes breathing more difficult which builds the strength of the respiratory muscles while stretching lung capacity.  Discipline is increased as a result of controlling pain and panic to breathe deeply at a set cadence.

*The bridge can make a trainee taller with age.  The deadlift compresses the spine to progressively reduce height.

*The bridge can convert into combat specific ground drills for grapplers and build a thick neck for better knockout resistance in stand up fighters.

*The bridge, when trained hard, results in the feeling of "walking like an old man."  This means that the exercise fatigues and strengthens those muscles which regulate posture and walking.  As such, training with the bridge can prolong one's mobility into old age by progressively strengthening those areas which atrophy to produce geriatric weakness and abnormality of gait.

*The neck bridge alone can prevent and cure cricks in the neck, sprains of the small muscles of the neck, back aches, pulled muscles in the back, and knee pain.  All joints benefit from bridging.

*The direct structural integrity of the spine built through bridging prevents injury more effectively than the "bracing strength" built through weightlifting which requires attention and focus to increase intra-abdominal pressure and brace the spine.  Acute spinal injury is unexpected by default, so bracing should not be used as an injury prevention tool.  Structural integrity built through bridging is a better insurance policy.

*The benefits of bridging are general, holistic, and greater than the sum of training investment (the spinal muscles only support bodyweight for 3 minutes, once per week, yet muscle mass is disproportionately increased).  The benefits of deadlifting are specific, isolated, and less than the sum of training investment (the spinal muscles support hundreds of pounds, multiple times per week, yet muscle takes a long time to grow).  As such, bridging constitutes a practice with far reaching benefits, while deadlifting constitutes an exercise with narrow, strength based applications.

Fear Breeds Evil

A schneevie does not sprout into a scumbag through hatred alone.  First, he or she must fear.  

Fear begins with personal weakness.  One's perceived helplessness, real or imagined, drives them to cast aside basic virtues of empathy, justice, loyalty, and honesty in a fraudulent social contract.  In such a trade, weaklings pledge allegiance to killers to avoid being targeted.  The falseness in the schneevie's compromise stems from a complete lack of loyalty among scumbags.  If scumbags had any loyalty they would not terrorize their own.  

Still, the schneevie, clinging to a life without honor, reduced to base savagery, renounces more and more civilized virtues until they have become the same scumbags they feared through successive approximations.  

To pity these accessories to evil would be a profound mistake.  Their socialized mobilization toward violence and fraud begins through personal weakness, avoidance of responsibility, and fear.  They deserve every pain they sought to escape through appeasement of evil.  

The true warrior of civilized principles cannot defeat genocide or organized witchhunts.  They can choose only two options: escape or die.  However, in so dying they have a choice of death.  Scumbags seek to get their power for free.  It is the place of the warrior to raise the price of evil.  This can be done either through illumination of evil through the manner of one's death or the delivery of overwhelming and targeted violence against agents of death, preferably toward the decision makers.

One must decide what values they will serve in life and death.  One can be a scared soldier rounding up innocents for the firing line, a scared innocent willfully blindfolded and made to kneel, or an unafraid warrior who kills the commander, snatches his gun and goes down in a hail of bullets.  My choice is no choice at all, but a matter of duty to the greater good.  Fuck collaborators, fuck the scared.  If no one feared scumbags, the price of their evil would be too high.  Never compromise with evil or you will join its ranks.  And watch out.  Some of us don't fear you and will fight to an honorable death bathed in your tepid blood.

Teaching and Learning

Western culture in its infinite naivete, has all but abolished the fundamental character traits of civilized institutions.  Respect, patience, humility, and gratitude constitute foundational attributes which enable proper teaching and learning to occur.  In the absence of these traits, no teacher can lead a student, and no student will be led.

In the absence of these character traits, teachers teach because they possess some power or domination over students, who are students precisely because they are dominated.  The classroom, dojo, or gym thereby becomes a wrestling match of egos and wills where teachers unwilling to punish students cannot possibly succeed.  In this kind of culture, true teachers and visionaries simply vacate, as no obstinately defiant student is worth attempting to teach.

The classical martial arts present a different view of a teacher.  A teacher knows.  A student does not.
And a teacher only becomes a teacher by first being an exceptional student.  In this way there is no stratification on the basis of domination, but on the basis of what is known and mastered by each.  It is possible for a teacher to be a student in one area, yet still possess superior knowledge in another.  This author was once enrolled in a dojo which practiced mostly pushups and crunches while this author had trained in all bodyweight calisthenics across a vast set of progressions over approximately 3 years in addition to weight training and knew many superior ways of building full body strength and muscle.  This author was a student of the sensei's stance, fighting, and technique knowledge, and the sensei was a student of this author's calisthenics experience.  As a result, the sensei incorporated many formerly unknown techniques into his training which benefited the training of all students of the dojo.  Meanwhile, this author incorporated the philosophy and technique of the dojo to improve general movement and outlook.

An example of a bad learner was when this author trained in "practical self defense" with a self appointed expert who knew less than this author about nonviolent self defense techniques.  Instead of learning from this author, or at least admitting disinterest, the instructor ignored the validity of the alternative techniques and criticized them on the basis that they were nonviolent.  He then suggested that nonviolent redirection is for victims.

A more explicit example was when this author formerly free sparred once per week with a close friend.  In exchange for learning self defense and conflict assessment from this teacher of combat, this author taught proper form for bodyweight movements in addition to teaching basic kettlebell lifting and the concepts of mindfulness or presence, and amused mastery as exclusive traits of victors.  Both this author and his friend functioned as both learner and teacher.  As iron whets iron, strong people sharpen one another, but only when the principles of respect, patience, humility, and gratitude prevail.

Some telltale signs of students include superficial understanding of a deep subject matter, strong beliefs based on little evidence, impulsiveness, lack of empathy for others' positions, and a general inability to tie knowledge together coherently, such as failing to see the connection between calisthenics and self defense, or political conditions and opposition to another US war.  Signs of a teacher include superior performance with minimal explanation, the quiet appreciation and understanding of another's position, nonjudgmental correction of weak techniques for the primary benefit of the student, and preferring to avoid conflict rather than argue, thereby allowing the superiority of one's way to become evident through demonstration.

The reader is encouraged to meditate on becoming a better learner before teaching anything.  The role of teacher emerges without effort only after a long time being a learner.  Lastly, the reader should consider how to discriminate whether they are in the presence of a teacher or a student.  Here's a hint: a true teacher does not need to force their views on anyone, ever.  They lead by example in all things.  By striving to be a student of life, the reader will become a teacher of wisdom in time.

Martial Conditioning: Bridging

Intro: Bridging encompasses a variety of movements, all of which share the common elements of extending the head backwards behind the feet, contracting the muscles on the back of the body, and stretching the muscles along the front of the body.  Bridging is a comprehensive enough practice that each variation provides different benefits.

Muscles Worked: Literally every muscle along the back of the body and many in front coordinate to complete a bridge.  The calves, hamstrings, glutes, lower back, lats, and traps primarily maintain the bridge position while the deep abdominal muscles, shoulder muscles, and quadriceps stabilize the position, acting like the struts above and below a suspension bridge.

Why Bridge?  The benefits of the bridge are wide reaching.  Few exercises can approximate the holistic benefits to all muscular, skeletal, and organ systems.  Proper bridging can prevent and rehabilitate back injuries, increase spinal flexibility, improve digestion, stretch the abdomen, chest, and hip flexors, extend the hips, and even increase the libido.  The bridge is a fundamental power exercise.

The Matt Furey Bridge: What I call the Matt Furey bridge consists of touching, or attempting to touch, one's nose to the ground in a bridge hold for time while deep breathing.  Furey refers to this form of bridging practice as the king of bodyweight exercises.  The incorporation of deep nasal breathing in this position, also known as bridging chi kung, leads to better flexibility, pain tolerance, focus, and relaxation under physical/mental stress.  A trainee should strive for 32 slow breaths (2 second inhale, 2 second exhale) in the bridge position, with nose touching the ground.  One can use hands for assistance depending on strength.  In order to extract maximum benefit from the hold, the trainee must strive to stretch as fully as possible and extend the hips and back by actively tensing the glutes and pushing out the chest.  It is also critically important to hold the pose long past the point of discomfort to the point where pain subsides to numbness, then relax in that state.  A proper workout with this hold results in shaky legs, sore glutes, and a feeling of depletion throughout the spine and neck.
 

The Convict Conditioning Bridge:  The bridge taught in Convict Conditioning, also known as the gymnastic bridge, consists of dynamically pushing up into the bridge position on the hands and feet from the ground.  For numerous reasons, this method is not recommended by this author, as dynamic bridging requires less tension and therefore confers less strength benefits.  The one exception to this rule regards wall walking and falling backwards into an arms extended bridge.  This variation greatly conditions the strength and flexibility of the back and shoulders.  For those who want to train this movement, try it as a finisher for the Matt Furey bridge for a couple sets of 10-15 slow reps.



Advanced Variations:  The one armed, one legged, and one arm/one leg bridges constitute the pinnacle of bridging strength.  From a combat perspective they serve little use, but may help to break the monotony of training.

 

Likely Results of Bridging:  The benefits of bridging are less physically apparent than those of other exercises.  A variety of body types can practice and benefit from the bridge.  One can conceive of bridging as a body type amplifier.  Smaller individuals are likely to be made more compact, limber, and flexible by the bridge.  Larger individuals are likely to grow more muscular and powerful from the bridge.  One's absolute body mass will determine which results are likely.  Unlike many bodyweight exercises, heavier individuals are not disadvantaged in the bridge and may actually gain more absolute strength than relative strength through its practice.  Lighter individuals will gain proportionally less absolute strength benefit, but will nevertheless increase relative strength and flexibility.

Bridging will thicken the muscles along the upper back and spine, resulting in a more durable, injury resistant back and neck.  Strengthening the spine also removes an important weak link in full body strength allowing for greater strength in all bodyweight and weighted movements.

Signs of Healthy Masculinity

Our culture suffers from an underestimation of masculinity, both in its present state and in its potential.  The following are some situations indicating that one has achieved a balanced masculine presence.

*When insulted, one's first impulse is to laugh, joke, or artfully reverse the insult with the offender.

This situation shows that one's ego has not grown to dangerous levels.  Attackers will often attempt to unbalance opponents with insults, particularly if they cannot hope to physically defeat them.  No insult, no matter how grievous, warrants physical attack.  All insults are indicative of weakness and insecurity.  This admonition does not apply to threats, which may be parried with a joke, but must always be treated seriously.

*One can urinate readily and easily in a crowded public bathroom without anxiety.

Every man is born with a reflexive aversion to urination in front of others due to its evolutionary associations with territoriality.  If this aversion is missing from a man, he is confident in his territory and does not accept the claims of others over his physical space.  The reader should note that civilization has all but eliminated the necessity of physical territorial contests.  Only in war and savagery is territoriality an important trait.

*One has fought/wrestled with bare fists to the point of injury without fear.

This sort of contest is increasingly rare in modern civilization.  As good men have abandoned the study of combat, evil men have grown more emboldened in the use of violence as a tool of control and amusement.  Therefore, good men have a civilizational responsibility to train in combat.

*One is immune to shame.

Shamelessness is an important prerequisite for opposing arbitrary social control.  A man with no shame has no master.

*One tends toward silence rather than complaint when angered, disappointed, or depressed.

This trait indicates a disavowal of social relationships based on common complaint.  One's pain cannot ever be shared and has no worth in directing one's decisions.

*One does not apologize to anyone, for any reason.

Apology is a submissive act which communicates one's inability to solve a problem.  A healthy man skips the apology and fixes the problem.

*One does not pine for women or require their approval to find happiness.

This trait enables a man to sidestep sexual manipulation and judge people of all sexes by their character.

*One can easily meet all his financial, nutritional, shelter, and mobility needs autonomously, if necessary.

A man who can care for himself entirely alone is less susceptible to manipulation and more able to respond to the actual limitations of his environment in place of the artificial limitations imposed by acquaintances.

*One can say anything worth saying in a single sentence.

Laconic, unhurried speech indicates one's control of a situation.  Very little speech is necessary for a man to communicate effectively.

Will Power Training: Crafting the 'Human Weapon'

The goals of a martial enterprise influence its training methods.  In studios which place a premium on will power, training is likely to revolve around pushing limits and increasing one's force of will.

In this way, will power training treats martial techniques like weapons.  Punches, kicks, grabs, locks, and throws are treated in the same manner as gunshots.  In fact, training in this setting can feel like visiting a gun range to throw some lead.  The trainee is primarily concerned about power, speed, and accuracy, but may overlook application, precision, and discretion.

Still, will power training makes good sense for soldiers, police officers, and others who will use their bodies as weapons.  The capacity to weather austerity and remain motivated has great application to the martial way.

Due to the necessarily physical stresses encountered in the course of will power development, the trainee's body will develop muscle, tendon, and bone durability to greater degrees than in softer arts.  Weightlifting and calisthenics, which are merely supplementary in the soft arts, become obligatory to sustain progress and prevent injury during will power training.

Conceptually, the weaponry metaphor is complicated by the necessity of building the weapons of students (power of techniques) concurrently with learning when to use them (tactics).  While an artist well trained in awareness and technique would criticize such a method as useless when the student does not know under what conditions to use techniques, the will power martial artist would counter that a student needs powerful enough weapons to make tactics relevant.  Weak blows delivered halfheartedly with perfect technique and flawless tactics are still weak, unmotivated blows.  This dilemma was present in the Pacific Campaign of WWII where Japanese with superior tactics and martial spirit were outgunned by sheer American firepower, however begrudgingly.

Misplaced Assumptions: Sex, Brinksmanship, and the Male Martial Artist

 The Root of Female Violence

Too often, those involved in self defense do not completely consider their philosophical reasons for engaging in martial training in the first place.  For example, I have seen a martial arts instructor advocate training to use a knife stab to the neck to address a grab from behind.  The disparity of force represented here is enormous.  It is this author's belief that the instructor was only allowed to advocate such a measure unchallenged because she is a woman.  The reason she was not questioned is because most martial artists in this culture do not consider the reality of women's violence or their capacity to wield it.  Even worse, most male martial artists do not consider the passive, more sexual ways women hurt men every day in this culture, nor do they plan to defend against those tactics.  Therefore, it remains typical for women in western culture to advocate for exaggerated acts of incomprehensible violence in response to minor altercations (#killallmen is one example) and to use sexuality as an indirect form of violence (google Brigadier General Sinclair, an exemplary soldier, stripped of rank, humiliated, and disgraced by a single vindictive sex partner who demonstrably lied in court).  Such behavior is now NORMAL to western women.

The majority of women do not believe they need martial training, nor do they typically need to physically protect themselves.  That's because most violence is not used against, nor by, women.  Criminal statistics bear this out too often to reiterate here.  The primal power of women lies in sexuality, not physical aggression.  With civilization stripped away, women survive through their sexuality, not their muscles.  Countless conflicts throughout history demonstrate how powerful victors in war are rewarded by the women of the conquered men, often with the tacit acceptance of those women.  Contemporary culture, as it decivilizes, has shown how women reward thugs and other violent men.

With respect to sexuality as a tool of violence, this author does not refer to broken hearts, cheating, and other forms of emotional wreckage.  This author refers to literal VIOLENCE that is perpetrated through women's sexuality.  Examples include women who encourage vengeance killings (among the poor), use the police state as a weapon against men they wish to victimize (among the middle class), advocate legislation which harms others (among the elite), and use lies and distortions to put a social bulls-eye on people they wish to harm (among all women).  This author is continually shocked by those male martial artists who do not explicitly acknowledge or prepare for the violence of women, or speak out against it when it occurs.  Considering what's at stake, men should learn to better resist passive female aggression.

When people picture a predatory criminal singling out a man for extortion of his money, most people mistakenly picture a male criminal, hunched over, with a weapon, who intends to commit violence unless that money is forcibly transferred.  But what of the female predator who uses her vagina to accomplish the exact same outcome?  A woman who will likely receive social, even political support for her robbery?  This woman is every bit as dangerous and far more common than the male mugger.  So how should a man protect himself from this enemy?

Fundamental Tactics to Resist Female Seduction/Aggression

Brinksmanship

Much like martial training teaches a man to absorb, redirect, and oppose increasing levels of physical force by an assailant, Venusian arts training, otherwise known as 'Game,' can help men absorb, redirect, and oppose increasing levels of seductive force by women.  Though most game theorists use game for its practical outcome of scoring pussy, men can also learn to protect themselves from sexual predation through seduction resistance.  The single most powerful training tool for male self defense against women is sexual brinksmanship.

Just as one can learn to effectively resist a man who uses violence to influence one's decisions, one can learn to effectively resist a woman who uses sexuality to influence one's decisions.  Luckily, men in this culture have one of the most effective training tools imaginable: pornography.  What is pornography but a collection of the sexiest possible women engaging in the sexiest possible behaviors to manipulate men into giving them money?  By training to resist the seduction of women who are 10's, a man can theoretically resist the seductive advances of any woman he meets.

The method is simple.

1.  Limit yourself to one orgasm per day.  When you have this orgasm, it can be accomplished through fantasy or sex only.  No pornographic pictures or videos allowed.  The rest of the day, when tempted by pornography, watch freely, but spend no money, and do not orgasm.  Masturbate to the point of 'throbbing' 4 times, then stop watching.  Go do something productive.  Repeat this process as necessary, then manually orgasm only 1 time or have sex before bed, without visual aid.

2.  Visualize denying porn actresses your sperm.  You are regaining control of your sperm back from women.  When this becomes easy, visualize denying the women around you your sperm unless they have earned it.  This will increase your confidence and reinforce a healthier attitude toward sex that values your fundamental worth as a person.  You will begin to have better standards for female behavior, make better choices in relationships, and set firmer boundaries.  You will also become more selective and demanding in the bedroom, an attribute psychologically healthy women will appreciate.

3.  For best results in brinksmanship, use a time when your work for the day is done, or as a brief break.

4.  At first, use a highly sexually charged, flirtacious softcore type of pornography which closely simulates natural female seduction.  Videos of twerking, dirty talk, bodily display, and other suggestive videos are best.  Masturbating to videos of penetrative sex are actually counterproductive as they encourage a man to take the subconscious role of cuckold.  Eventually, you will be able to practice without visual aids using fantasy alone.  At this point, you will reach a state of 'masculine presence' where attractive women stimulate you, but do not modify your behavior.  If you feel inclined to ask whether you're there yet, you aren't.

At this point in your development, women you know will begin to separate into two categories: 1. Good women who sense your control, respect you, and want to earn your sperm by winning your favor, and 2. Evil women who feel entitled to your lust and will attack you for your autonomy.  By increasing your sexual power in this way, you will simultaneously draw in good women and enrage evil women.  Use brinksmanship to further steel yourself against manipulation by both.  Both types of women will attempt to overcome your resistance in two different ways.  A good woman will attempt to win your sperm and your exclusivity while an evil woman will attempt to manipulate you into giving favors and masturbatory tributes whilst simultaneously rejecting your advances and denying you access to any better women.  Both types of women want your exclusive attention, but only one type will pleasure you on command and follow your lead.

Other benefits of brinksmanship include: a more satisfying and autonomous sex life, greater comfort while interacting with attractive women, a more balanced appreciation for attractive women without the predatory feelings which accompany unrestrained lust, greater feelings of bliss and peace due to a calm stream of endorphins which do not crash in the calamitous wave of orgasm, greater amounts of sperm per orgasm, harder erections, and less symptoms of erectile dysfunction in healthy men.

Distance, Preemptive Recording, and Legal Representation

When you suspect a woman has singled you out or might single you out as a social target for violence, you must react quickly using three tactics: distance, preemptive recording, and legal representation.  Your financial security will influence which tactics are available to you.

If you suspect lower class violence of the vigilante sort due to false claims of rape, violated honor, etc., make any sort of distance you can from that woman.  Do not answer calls, do not stay in the same city, get away.  Your brinksmanship training will make this easier.  Your life is in possible danger and you must react accordingly.  A man does not ever fight a single woman.  He fights both her and the mob of men who will do violence for her approval.  No one ever asks the lynching victim for their side of the story.  Simply get away.  Time may disperse the mob, but they will always remember you as a social target for violence.  Count your losses and leave town if you are singled out for mob violence.

If you suspect the more middle class, civilized variant of this mobbing, begin recording every interaction you have with this woman.  Continue to avoid calls and interactions, but also be ready to record any attempt she makes to reinitiate contact.  She will try to contact you as a means of creating conflict so she can make you seem hostile to others.  Remain calm and record everything.  This will help you later when she inevitably calls the police to take you away.  Do not speak to the police or the woman, though you can show the police recordings as long as they do not seem likely to destroy or confiscate them.  Just record everything and save it all for the courtroom.

If you suspect character assassination as a successful man, you must, whenever possible, enlist the services of an attorney.  Be ready at all times to preemptively sue women who seem likely to attack your character.  Make distance, record everything, and additionally hire legal counsel to financially attack predatory women who wish to harm you.  At the elite level, everyone will be recording YOU as well.  Make sure you enjoy your vices over secure internet connections, be discrete in your sex life, and keep your dirty laundry locked away from everyone (even friends and family).  If necessary, hire a therapist to vent your secrets.

Wrapping Up

No one, man or woman, has the right to initiate violence on another.  In equal measure, everyone has the right to self defense.  Hopefully, these methods will help round out the martial philosophy of those who anticipate conflict with women.