Sendyka Fit Over 40

How a 1 MIN Asian Squat Heals the Human Body

Pawel Sendyka — Fri, 07 Aug 2026 10:00:24 GMT

Today, we'll be revisiting Asian Squat. And there're some new things I wanna talk about it.😉

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Why Membership is $25 when it Should be $900

Pawel Sendyka — Wed, 05 Aug 2026 01:52:14 GMT

Japanese Print “Mt Fuji after the Snow” by Kawase Hasui (1932).

You’ve been here for a few weeks. By now you know what this Sendyka Fit Over 40 project is all about. If forced to describe it in one line, I would say it is fitness that doesn’t suck, because it has its priorities right. It’s aimed at health and longevity. It uses science and sanity. Does that resonate with you?

If so, I have a request. Consider becoming a member on Buy Me a Coffee. And let me make a quick case why.

Membership is $25 a month. You get the course beta, which gives you the clear, gentle path to fitness I’m advocating. The alpha, which I will sell as a standalone for $900, will be included too. And any course I will make after that will be included also. It’s not a time-limited offer. It’s all part of the membership. You will also become a part of our little community, with direct access (even one-on-ones) and a chat group where we discuss various topics that come to our minds.*

I’m not going to tell you that the membership spots are almost gone. Far from it. Right now, we have about 180 members (100 in The Original 100 cohort and 80 in Tribe Elders). There is room for more. I see our tribe as 1000 strong. Enough to face the undead (algorithms) bravely.** Clearly, there is some way to go. It’s not an opportunity that will disappear overnight. But still, why wait? The body you can still have won’t build itself. Why blunder for years on your own? Plus, you’d be helping me spread the message.

Here is what I am going to tell you. The course contains the most important framework for building and nurturing a body that heals, adapts and stays capable as you get older. Remember the three questions from last week? The course answers them, step by step, with nothing left for you to guess or try to reverse-engineer from free posts. You won’t need any more fitness advice to know what to do. I have spent years figuring it out and learning what works and what doesn’t, sometimes the hard way. It’s $25 a month, but what they call a “value proposition”, is $900. This is still less than I’d charge a private client for this knowledge. That’s it, the whole pitch is the math.***

If it’s for you, it’s for you. Looking forward to seeing you on the other side. If it isn’t, then I’m still glad you’re here, reading the articles. Maybe the time will come. Expect this type of post once in a while.

Below the line

* We use a Japanese chat app Line so that no one has to give up their phone number.

** And since I mentioned them, I am scaling down my social media presence, because what once was a fun place to connect over common interests, has become a domain of doomscrolling governed by the undead. Even my followers no longer see my posts! This newsletter is different. The messages go from me to you, and if you comment or reply, or write me an email. I read it and respond.

*** The knowledge is distilled into a format you can use without me in the room. $900 makes it serious enough that the people who buy it actually do it.

I told my Mum the most Important Rule* About Exercise

Pawel Sendyka — Wed, 29 Jul 2026 01:00:38 GMT

Today, I want to suggest a framework you can use for your personal fitness project.

If you’ve had a feeling that fitness is another thing that was ruined by social media, then you are absolutely right. But the problem runs deeper and has been festering for a while. Like many things, social media just made it worse. [1] This post is about giving you a practical tip - one that will help you to be fit, happy, and injury-free.

Japanese woodcut by Isoda Koryusai, Women Running in a Storm 1770-1775.

Ancient Greeks classified exercise into three categories: legitimate, military, and athletic. [2] If you agree that most people should be pursuing the first, that most of us should be aiming for health and longevity and not for combat readiness, maximum performance, or glory, then this article is for you.

Fortunately, despite the noise and broken social media feeds, there is enough real knowledge and sound science on exercise for us to be able to figure out our own way. It’s not easy, but it’s possible. Especially that we have the ancient Greeks and Bruce Lee to help us.

Bruce Lee? Yes. We’re going to dust off my favourite quote of his, which goes like this: “Reject what is useless, adopt what is useful and add that which is specifically your own”. [3]

First of all, let’s talk about the “legitimate” criterion. Ask yourself, who’s it for? If it has words like “bootcamp” or “race” in it, it’s not going to be for you. Bootcamps are for fresh recruits. Tabata, Crossfit, Hyrox and whatever new intense fitness workout trend is going to show up next, it’s not for you. You can learn from other people’s experiences of heart attacks or rhabdomyolysis and not your own. You’re not going to get where you want to be faster, you’re going to get hurt and take months to recover. [4]

I just told you what’s not legitimate. But what is? The effect that the exercise will have on you depends on both the dose and the intensity. For example, my sprints (which are, by definition, an intense exercise) are super short because I don’t go beyond the effort that’s good for my heart (based on science and personal experience).

On the other end of the spectrum, you can be doing something of really low intensity, like slow jogging, and you might feel like you could go on forever. But you shouldn’t. You’d be surprised how short I cut my sessions.

Whether it is an intense exercise or a low intensity one, the devil is in the dose. And here is how I applied the Bruce Lee wisdom to both of these extremes. I listen to my body. I reject rigid, handed-down rules.

In the case of sprints this means that their number, duration and frequency are up to me, and not a merciless graphic. I adjust all of them downwards for my age, fitness level and how I feel on any given day.

I do this on the other end of the intensity spectrum too. In case of slow jogging, I reject the rules of cadence, speed and whatever other metric the purists might insist on. I adjust it too, depending on how I feel, how hot (and humid!) it is. This sounds like common sense, and it is. But it is surprising how many people lack common sense and deride me for it in the comments section of my videos.

I do it that way because my objective is not to stick to some rules or graphics. Fitness, for me, is about having a capable body and feeling great in it. Rested and powerful. That is why I am the absolute master of my own fitness program. No authority figure gets to lord over my exertion levels. [5]

The framework:

(1) categorise whether the exercise you want to do is legitimate (Ancient Greeks)

(2) reject what’s useless, adopt what’s useful and add what is your own (Bruce Lee)

(3) decide on the dose by listening to your body (my heuristic).

So here is my own heuristic [6] that helps me achieve that. One that I figured out for myself from years of my own experience, one that I told my mum to follow. One I tell to everyone who’s in doubt about how much exercise they should be doing:

It is your body and you have to listen to it. Carefully. If what you’ve done makes you feel great and energised afterwards, then that was the right dose. If it took a lot out of you and you’re feeling wiped out and a bit tired and sluggish for the rest of your day, then you have gone too far. You need to scale it down.

That’s it, that’s the rule. The devil is in its application [5, again].

Below the line (thoughts, context and explanations):

* I really wanted to use the word “heuristic” here, which is more like a “rule of thumb”, but I had a feeling that the algorithm might punish me for it.

[1] Check out The Male Body Lie post.

[2] If this is your first time hearing about it, then you can check my article on the topic here.

[3] You might nitpick about my choice of fitness heroes. After all, Bruce Lee died super young. Sometimes people have a bad reaction to pills and die. It doesn’t invalidate the wise things he said. Same as professor Tanaka dying relatively young does not invalidate his slow jogging research.

[4] I won’t be scaring you with the statistics of people over 50 dying in gyms here, but you can check out Lucy Rice’s harrowing account of rhabdomyolysis following intensive “bootcamp” training (The Guardian, June 2026).

[5] Ego can try lording over you, you have to keep it in check. But that’s a topic of its own.

[6] I was really hoping you would have read the asterix to the title.

I’m an anthropologist who tackled the fitness industry like a research project. Unsurprisingly, turned out it’s mostly nonsense. But buried beneath it all I found enough ancient wisdom and sound science to put together something that works: ten to fifteen minutes a day, most days. Just enough.

You’ll find the free stuff here and on my YouTube channel. The paid work, for people who want clear structure to follow, is on Buy Me a Coffee. The book is in the works.

Why Fitness Youtubers Go Spiritual

Pawel Sendyka — Fri, 24 Jul 2026 10:01:59 GMT

Today, I want to talk about why this series is called the Daily Brainwash, and I’ll also talk about why some fitness Youtubers turn spiritual, and in the end, share a creepy story of a really bad guru…

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Whatever happened to good enough?

Pawel Sendyka — Wed, 22 Jul 2026 01:07:30 GMT

She’s fit enough to carry that big fish.*****

In a nutshell, good enough got wiped out by perfection. Our modern (or maybe I should say post-modern) culture has erased it. I’m sure you’ve noticed. If it isn’t perfect, it just isn’t good enough. And that’s toxic.

Embracing good enough, has so much to offer for life in general, and for fitness in particular.

In life, people go through partners, searching for the perfect fit, instead of trying to make it work with a decent, good enough person. After all, chances are you will not find perfection and will marry the wrong person anyway, so why not spend your energy on working out the problems.*

In fitness, chasing Instagram selfies and the perfection of other people’s bodies** causes us to be unhappy with the anything that’s less than perfect. And then there is a perfection treadmill - you’re never able to actually reach the ideal. Good enough feels like you’re settling, like it’s a failure. And then you’re sliding down an inclined plane: if it’s not possible to reach perfection, if good enough is a failure, then why bother at all?***

Yet, good enough is a fantastic thing. It will not help you to break records at the Olympics, but this is not your job. Your job is your job. And then your other job is to get through your day with enough strength and stamina to carry you till the evening. The good enough fitness gives excellent health benefits, while fitness perfection causes you to dig yourself an early grave.****

My advice is to embrace the good enough. And if you’re looking for a place to start, do Japanese Radio Taiso.

Below the line:

*See Alain de Botton’s essay, Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person.

**These bodies were probably attained using steroids, diuretics and an assortment of PEDs. Their owners can can only hold that particular pose for 5 seconds and need special lighting and digital filters.

***You should bother, and follow the middle path between The Twin Death Valleys of Fitness I wrote about before.

****Don’t be smug if you’re not doing anything - you’re playing with fire too - you’re in as much risk as those chasing the perfection.

*****Japanese woodcut by Shiro Kasamatsu ‘Girls on the Shore, Fukuura’ (1954).

You’ll find the free stuff here and on my YouTube channel. The paid work, for people who want clear structure to follow, is on Buy Me a Coffee. The book is in the works.

How To Start From Absolute Zero After A Year Of Inactivity?

Pawel Sendyka — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 10:02:15 GMT

Now that you know what this Daily Brianwash series is about, do something as you watch this. Asian squats, planks, horse stance, Radio Taiso… Anything.

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Where Most Fitness Advice Goes Wrong

Pawel Sendyka — Fri, 10 Jul 2026 10:01:35 GMT

This is one of the videos from my new series Daily Brainwash. I thought I would use them as a reminder that you should be doing something while watching. So please do some exercise, maybe a horse stance, a plank, or maybe Radio Taiso.The point is not to be the passive consumer.😜

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The Twin Death Valleys of Fitness

Pawel Sendyka — Wed, 08 Jul 2026 05:14:34 GMT

Japanese woodcut by Tsukioka Yoshitoshi from 1864. See why below.**

There are two ways to die in fitness.

The first is obvious to everyone (and maddeningly, most everyone doesn’t do anything about it). They just do nothing. They sit, in their cars, in their offices, on their living room couches. As they get older and no longer have to sit so much, it has become an unstoppable force in their life. They take every opportunity to sit down. They think they are resting, but they’re dying in little installments. They stop going out when it rains, then stop going out at all. Then they fall and can’t get up or break something and get taken away to a home. The obituary will say “natural causes” but there is nothing natural about what they were doing to themselves across decades, it was neglect.

The second is less obvious. They think they’re doing everything right. They train for and run marathons. They lift heavy. If exercise is good for you, surely, a whole lot of is a whole lot better. They push their limits because the industry told them that suffering is virtue and meaning and if you aren’t gasping like it might be your last breath, you’re wasting time. On day they develop A-Fib, that dreaded tell-tale sign of endurance training abuse, or drop dead outright. Friends at the funeral will be shaking their heads. “They were so fit,” they’ll say. They were. In fact, they were super fit. And that’s the problem, because that’s what killed them.

I call these the Twin Death Valleys of Fitness.

Because I like being dramatic. Because it has a nice ring to it. Because I hope you’ll remember. And because the data backs it up.

The Copenhagen Problem

The Copenhagen City Heart Study tracked joggers for years. They found something that should have been front-page news then and also now.

Light joggers had the lowest mortality. Moderate joggers had higher mortality. Strenuous joggers had mortality rates statistically identical to people who didn’t exercise at all.

Pause here to read it again. That’s not a mistake. Let that become something you know, not just something you’ve read.

Those guys, powering past you in the park at 6 AM, dripping sweat, looking like warriors storming a citadel? They’re racing towards an early death. At least couch potatoes know what they are (not) doing is bad for them. The endurance warriors are thinking they’re doing themselves longevity favours. They die in equal numbers, whether in their pajamas, or with Strava chronicling their last move.

Recent research in Japan confirmed the benefits of light exercise. And also showed that it is the light activity that promotes the new neuron formation best. That’s because the positive effects of the exercise are not being eaten away by the stress hormones which get released when you are pushing yourself hard.

The fitness industry doesn’t want to talk about it and rightly so. It would mess with their business model. If light and easy works, who needs the gym? Who needs the trainer? Who needs that latest wearable and its app?

The Ancient Wisdom Nobody Reads

The ancient Greeks had it all neatly figured out and Girolamo Mercuriale figured this out again in 1569 in his De Arte Gymnastica Libri Sex*. He revisited ancient Greek writings on exercise and classified them into three types:

Legitimate exercise: for health and longevity. Light, varied, sustainable. The goal is maintenance and durability.

Military exercise: for war. High intensity, high impact, high risk. The goal is battle readiness. Acceptable when the price of not being ready is death.

Athletic exercise: for competition. Extreme, specialized, inherently dangerous. The goal is the accolades and the glory in the Hellenic world.

The Greeks knew that not all movement is medicine. Some of it is poison.

We forgot.

The industry sells us military and athletic exercise and labels it “legitimate.” Marathons. Spartan Races. HYROX. CrossFit. HIIT. All of it falls squarely into the military or athletic categories. None of it is preventative medicine. It is stress testing. We all know that saying, what does not break you, makes you stronger, but nobody talks about the flip side: what does break you… well… breaks you. And what almost breaks you, makes you weaker.

The Middle Path

Between the two death valleys of fitness there is doing enough with restraint. It is not glamorous. It will not get you on a magazine cover. It will not make your ex jealous. It will not garner likes on social media (quit social media by the way, if you haven’t already).

But it will keep you alive and capable.

This is the way of DSY: Don’t Shit Yourself. Move enough to trigger adaptation. Not enough to trigger destruction.

The amount required to get your body in shape is shockingly small, it is even smaller to keep in shape. You should exercise for your health, not aesthetics. Muscles are important., not as a stuffing for your shirt so that you look big, but because they release myokines, chemical messengers that travel through your bloodstream, reducing inflammation, burning fat, repairing tissue, and whispering to pre-cancer cells to kill themselves. You don’t need to exhaust yourself to trigger this.

10 to 15 minutes a day. Most days.

Don’t tell me you don’t have time. You do. That’s less time than you spend brushing your teeth and sitting on the toilet. Maintaining your body is as important as those two bathroom activities.

The Cost of Each Valley

If you sit in the first valley, the cost is obvious. Weakness. Stiffness. Diabetes. Falls. Dependency. The slow erosion of personal freedom until your world shrinks to a room and a chair.

If you sit in the second valley, the cost is hidden behind a mask of “wellness.” You look great. You tell yourself you feel great (though you feel the accumulated exhaustion in the background, but you don’t let yourself admit it). Then one day, the body you’ve been treating like a horse that must be egged on all the time sends an “I want to rest” signal that cannot be ignored.

Jimmy Fixx wrote the book on running. Died of a heart attack at 52. While running.

Edmund Burke had a PhD in exercise physiology. Trained Olympic cyclists. Died on his bike.

Three physicians at Johns Hopkins. All runners. All dead.

If PhDs in exercise physiology can’t save themselves, what chance do the rest of us have?

The answer is: stop trying so hard. Stop running from the first valley straight into the second. Stop thinking that more is better and suffering is virtue.

DSY

You don’t need to choose between decay and destruction.

You need to walk (or slow jog) that middle path. Move, because your body requires it for maintenance. Know when to stop, so that you have plenty left to go through your day. Repeat.

Not sexy. Not marketable. Not something you can post on Instagram with a flexing emoji.

But it works. And it won’t kill you.

That’s the whole pitch.

Below the line

*Chill, libri sex means 6 books, not free love.

**The Death in Action of Musashi Gorô Sadayo at the Battle of Karashima in the Earlier Taiheiki (Zen Taiheiki Karashima kassen Musashi Gorô Sadayo uchijini no zu). I’m so tired of AI generated images, aren’t you?

You’ll find the free stuff here and on my YouTube channel. The paid work, for people who want clear structure to follow, is on Buy Me a Coffee. The book is in the works.

Not Your Usual Fitness Video (Season 3 Begins)

Pawel Sendyka — Fri, 03 Jul 2026 10:02:09 GMT

This is Season 3. We (you and me) will do things differently...

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Why the Truth about Fitness is Maddeningly Simple

Pawel Sendyka — Tue, 30 Jun 2026 10:34:08 GMT

Fitness was one of those areas of life, which for the longest time went under my radar, until one day I realised it just doesn’t make sense (not unlike Santa). The realisation about the fitness industry came pretty late, around 40 when my body no longer accepted neglect or punishment without consequences. It came as an anthropological reflection that… wait a second, something really weird is going on here. Advertising shows unrealistic bodies, gyms promise delivery, shame follows (unavoidable) failure.

Not from Mercuriale's De Arte Gymnastica. Story below.

The premise of what I do is simple. Before all the advertising, unrealistic body images and guilt, people have been strong, lean and capable in every era throughout history. The ancient Greeks’ thinking on the subject is especially good for cutting through the nonsense of today’s training regimens. They divided the exercise into three categories. The first: gentle movement for everyone. The second: military training for warriors. The third: athletic pursuit for those seeking laurels and admiration. Only the first category was “legitimate” and pro-health while the rest was inherently risky. But the damage was acceptable because there were good reasons to accept it.

Today we get a lot of military and athletic variety trickling down to the unsuspecting public under the label of wellness. That the exercise is good for you, is true, but that more exercise is even better, is only true up to a point.

My own approach lies between the twin death valleys of fitness. One is where you don’t do nearly enough to maintain your body, the other is where you’re tearing it down. Both result in a reduced quality of life, a hastened expiry date, or both.

Yet, the truth about fitness is maddeningly simple. 10-15 minutes a day is all it will take you if you want to get away with the bare minimum. No judgment, that’s how I started too. The point is, I know you have that much time. How? Because it’s less time than you spend each day sitting on the toilet and brushing your teeth. If you’re not doing it, you’re erasing the future in which you’re “living younger” instead of succumbing to many illnesses we associate with age, but are really turbocharged consequences of neglecting your body.

I say that the truth about fitness is maddeningly simple, because on the surface of it, everyone can get it. And yet, hardly anyone does it. Once in a while, I’m able to grab a friend of mine by the hand and explain it to them. And if they listen, it changes their lives. I do this because I worry about my friends: those that don’t do enough and those that do too much. There is a friend I’ve lost because I’ve kept quiet, because I let her get away with the excuses of bad back, bad neck, bad something. We all have bad something. You may even get other people to buy into your excuses, but your body won’t. Our bodies demand action and that action does not need to be heroic. It can be gentle, but it must be consistent.

Radio Taiso (3 minute Japanese stretching routine), Asian squat, animal movements, isometrics, all take a few minutes each and can be incorporated into your day easily. Out of these building blocks, you slowly chunk up and build your routine that lets you “live younger”.

“Gym Culture” and De Arte Gymnastica
Is CrossFit a Legitimate Exercise?
On Ego and Training for the Wrong War

Below the line

You can find more of my thinking on YouTube, my website, and if you’d like to support this work, Buy Me a Coffee members get access to the course beta.

*this is AI-generated, inspired by Mercuriale's work. The real illustrations have already been used in three articles I wrote on the subject:

WATCH THE FIRST EPISODE OF S2 FINALE

The Fitness Industry Won't Like This! feat.⁨@bnsgokugreat⁩

Pawel Sendyka — Fri, 26 Jun 2026 10:02:11 GMT

My first step to Youtube stardom! I got interviewed by ⁨@bnsgokugreat⁩. All your questions about the Sendyka Method answered (maybe...).

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Enshittification Of Fitness Has Got To Stop

Pawel Sendyka — Fri, 19 Jun 2026 10:01:51 GMT

It’s been 2 years that I’ve been on YouTube and something’s got to change...

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The Cultural Logic of Recreational Suffering

Pawel Sendyka — Sat, 06 Jun 2026 01:01:24 GMT

Damn it! Another fitness trend called HYROX is here. Haven’t we just been here with CrossFit?

Yes, I know it’s “different” (a little). The format is standardized. The branding is sleeker. But strip away the veneer and you are looking at the exact same phenomenon: ordinary people paying good money to wear and tear themselves down recreationally... while calling it wellness.

I read Wilson Wong’s piece in The Guardian on HYROX. He seemed simultaneously seduced by it and suspicious of it and I think I know why. I see it too. As an anthropologist, I can’t look away from the cultural logic behind these systems. And what strikes me as (historically) unusual is not the hardship itself, but who is embracing it and why.

Ordinary Civilian’s Search for Meaning

In the ancient world, the athlete accepted damage in pursuit of glory. The soldier accepted it in pursuit of the survival of his community. The suffering had purpose. The pursuit was for something bigger than the self. And it was external.

Today, the “civilian” accepts this damage in pursuit of... what exactly? A number on a screen? A feeling of “I did it”? Instagram likes? By the way, I use the word “accepts” here in the loosest sense here, because most people are not aware of the health price they will have to pay later.

The fitness industry has taken the logic of the battlefield and the stadium and somehow repackaged it as a health pursuit.

“Push harder.” “Give it your all.” “Embrace the suck.” All lies.

Suffering, contrary to the industry’s subtle propaganda, is not a proxy for meaning.

When you train for a war that doesn’t exist, or a race with no stakes, you are only causing yourself pain that serves no purpose.

The Industrialization of Burnout

What HYROX and CrossFit have perfected is the industrialization of burnout.

They take the human desire for structure, community, and measurable progress, and they funnel it into a system that extracts maximum effort for minimum functional return or worse, outright damage. The structure is great because you don’t have to think, the workout is prescribed. The community works because you are surrounded by people doing the same thing, giving you the social proof. And the progress is measurable because you get a time, a rank, and a dopamine hit.

It works. Until it doesn’t. The body, treated as an obstacle to overcome, finally sends a signal that cannot be ignored: the joints are shot, tendons are torn and the heart develops the dreaded A-Fib.

The DSY Alternative

My philosophy is almost the reverse of HYROX. Though I am not anti-effort and anti-performance, I always ask the simple question: “Fit for what?”

If the goal is to run a race, then fine. Train for the race. But please, don’t say it’s for health.

If the goal, on the other hand, is to live a long, capable life where you get to play with your grandkids and tie your shoes without a stool, then the “push harder” mantra is counterproductive.

My core principle is DSY: Don’t Shit Yourself. It may not be polite, but it is clear. It means leaving yourself enough capacity to get through your day, today and the day after that. It means sustainable routine that powers your days and recognizing that less is often more.

The Older (and Smarter) Adult Advantage

Older adults seem to get it faster than the young athletes. When you are 25, you have a recovery buffer. You can do the HIIT, Tabata, power lifts, and bounce back. You feel invincible.

When you are 40, 50, 60, that buffer is gone. The body stops just taking it quietly.

The one who chooses to walk, to stretch, to move gently, is not “lazy.” They are prioritizing longevity over the temporary high of a leaderboard and likes on social media. They are playing the long game.

So, here is the choice we all hold, “sparkling like a star in our hand and melting like a snowflake”: You can continue to pay for the privilege of breaking yourself in a game with no stakes, or you can admit that the “hardship” you’ve been sold is just a very expensive way to get injured and frail.

Red pill, anyone?

Who, what and why?

I am an anthropologist turned fitness YouTuber, and my work focuses on something most of the fitness world gets wrong: how to build strength and flexibility without surrendering your life to the gym, and without breaking yourself in the process.

The course I have built is shaped by long-term thinking about our bodies, minds, and habit formation. It is designed for people who want to stay capable for decades.

Supporters on Buy Me a Coffee get access to the beta version. This is early access to the system while it is still being refined, before it is packaged and priced and released to the world at large. If my way of thinking resonates with you, this is the moment to step inside.

To those who already support my work, thank you. You are backing a model of fitness that refuses to accept frailty as the default. It’s an alternative to the Fitness Dark Ages we’re currently living through.

The Church Of Fitness Is Killing You!

Pawel Sendyka — Fri, 05 Jun 2026 10:09:00 GMT

Today, we take a playful look at five ways that fitness industry is like a church. How it strayed from the path of health and the five theses I'm pinning to its door...

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I Was So Mad At Him!

Pawel Sendyka — Fri, 29 May 2026 10:00:43 GMT

We've all heard that phrase “old and frail”. In English, these two words have fused into a single idea. We say them together, as if one naturally follows the other. And it's wrong...

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Bull***t You Didn't Sign Up For

Pawel Sendyka — Fri, 15 May 2026 10:03:07 GMT

I would have looked all right in the 90s. These days I get derided in the comments section for being skinny or “sarcopenic.” When I was a young boy I saw the Bruce Lee films. His physique looked extraordinary. He was fast, lean, and exceptionally defined but still very much human. By the time I was finishing high school, things started to change…

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What’s the most difficult part of the method to practice?

Pawel Sendyka — Sat, 09 May 2026 01:01:14 GMT

It’s not Radio Taiso, animal movements, isometrics, planks or even horse stance. (Although that one is pretty difficult).

It’s restraint. Because it’s counter-cultural.

Trusting that what feels good is enough and not pushing it.

That’s the DSY principle, written in torn tendons, or in Brad’s, a meniscus.

I’m sharing his comment under one of my posts:

I have had an experience that has really enlightened me as to EXACTLY what you are talking about. I have followed your fitness suggestions for quite some time. I slow jog almost every day… in the winter (in Oregon) I have to do it inside on the treadmill. No problem. I started mixing in some full-out sprints for 20-30 seconds. Really enjoyed it. On the day in question… I thought I could take it a bit farther (and faster). I felt it! My knee suddenly hurt. I stopped and got off the treadmill and went out to the golf course (my biggest passion). Played a few holes… and then I realized my knee was really starting to hurt. I decided to walk in. On my way back to the club house POP!!!! I heard it and felt it!! My knee!! Popped in a bad way. I could barely take steps.

Much better now. Functional… however I have a torn meniscus… and will require surgery.

Lesson learned. I need to be satisfied with where I am and not push to go farther. You are right! Again! Consistency beats intensity! And now I am missing some of the things I really enjoyed.

I’ll report back after my surgery… and back on track.

You. Are. Right. Brad.

We’re all up against the same thing. A culture that tells you to push harder, go further, do more.

If it sets you back, it wasn’t worth it.

If you want the structure behind this, you can find it in the course here.

How to spot when you’re Overdoing it

Pawel Sendyka — Sat, 02 May 2026 01:06:54 GMT

From the Graduation Handbook. This is the kind of thinking that keeps you out of trouble:

Stick to the method because I experimented on myself, so you don’t have to.
Err on the side of caution (it’s always okay to scale down) and remember this critical test: how do you feel at the end?
Energised, or drained? If you feel drained you crossed the invisible line.
Now here’s the tricky part. If you feel great, you’ll be tempted to do more. Just a bit more. Just a bit harder. Just a bit longer.
Don’t.
That feeling of almost dissatisfaction is actually the signal you got the balance right.
You’ve got some oomph left.
Keep it.
Use it for the rest of the day. The rest of the week.

Most people don’t fail here because they don’t know this. They fail because they won’t follow it.

If this resonated, there’s more of this inside. Members get access to the full course. After 3 months, you can also work with me directly.