Road To The Myth-Ster Universe One Bodybuilder’s Journey…

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Road To The Myth-Ster Universe

One Bodybuilder’s Journey…

By Wade T. Lightheart

Recently I was asked about what are the psychological components or reasons behind my somewhat unusual journey in bodybuilding. Having qualified for competition at the Mr. Universe in 2003, in Mumbai India I felt ready to share more about how I got to compete at Bodybuilding’s Biggest Event.

My journey was one full of twists, turns, triumphs, and tragedies but most of all it’s about the power of perseverance and about an unseen force that guides all of us whether we are aware of it or not.

As many of my readers know I have chosen to follow a spiritual pathway that now suits me best, plus has affected my choices in life and in sport. Also, whole-heartedly I would acknowledge that my spiritual pursuits have given me a whole lease on life that I readily want share with anyone. But it was not always this way!

In fact my own ignorance to universal principles of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness led me too the brink of oblivion. It was only there, at the point of no return did I fully come to realize how reckless my life had become. What’s even more remarkable is the turnaround that transpired after I hit bottom. But before we get to that let’s go back to see how this all transpired.

Early Life And High Performance Sports

Since bodybuilding is the context here I will use that as a reference point in my shared experiences. I would also like to cite that I have played sport at the high performance level most of my life, majored in exercise physiology at university, and had more than a few classes in sports psychology, coaching, and sociology of sport. Basically, I have been around sport my whole life and tend to look at it from a wide variety of angles.

In the beginning, I started out playing mostly team sports, which I enjoyed greatly. The thrill of improving my own skills and capacities was my primary motivation and secondly came winning. The gratification of training and playing was applied to every practice, game, or training session with an unusual level of intensity, determination, and focus.

My main sport of choice was Hockey and I played for about 12 years at the highest levels. Back then, while I loved the sport of hockey I grew frustrated that I was not able to overcome some individuals’ lack of work ethic or talent that affected the team. In other words I could play my best game and we would lose, or I could play my worst game and we would win.

At that point it became obvious to me that team sport had way too many variables I could not control and so I then began to gravitate to Bodybuilding, which seemed more self-directed. Back then I was smaller than most kids building muscles, but it wasn’t long before my results helped provide a boost for insecurities about my height and weight.

I Am Bitten By The Bodybuilding Bug

Bodybuilding was the perfect match for me. I was definitely bitten by the bodybuilding bug as they say. In fact, I relished the fact that the outcome was based solely on my efforts, which was something that team sports consistently didn't offer.

So, I threw myself into bodybuilding with an even more intense determination then ever before as I began my quest to become Mr. Universe. A lofty ideal for sure, but I was young, naļve, and full of vigor.

Even at the tender age of 15 I realized that it was easiest to motivate myself when I had BIG GOALS and dreams.

Directed by clear vision I would faithfully go out into my barn every night even in -40 C below to train in a snowsuit in a gym that looked something of a cross between Rocky meets the Duke boys.

I had no trouble pushing myself to my absolute physical limits because I had the dream of being like "Arnold".

Despite the crude training conditions and my complete ignorance to any sort of training philosophy, day-by-day I grew bigger and stronger. I savored the satisfaction of building my body so much that when I graduated from High School I enrolled in the University Of New Brunswick to study exercise physiology.

I wanted to learn everything I could about training and nutrition so I could one day write books like my hero Arnold Schwarzenegger. Arnold’s Encyclopedia of Bodybuilding became my bible and I poured of the words and pictures almost daily.

The Naļve Bodybuilder

I was pretty naive at the time and it was about my second year of university when I saw the movie “Pumping Iron’ and I was completely horrified that Arnold was smoking a joint. My girlfriend at the time thought it quite funny as I was sent into shock, denial, and utter disbelief, that Arnold, my idol at the time, used drugs. Up to that point I regularly defended Arnold and naively believed he never used any drugs. Therefore, since it was my first time to have the image of one’s hero is smashed it was sort of traumatic.

Eventually, I recovered but I felt this event planted a future seed that sprouted into the rationalization of my own use of drugs, which ultimately almost cost me my life.

It was about 1 year later when I competed at my first bodybuilding show and I began to realize drugs were a part of the sport. At the same time I also had a professor who was on the Dubin enquiry sharing some eye openers for me about the use of performance enhancing drugs in sport.

Modern Sports Pressure And The Sociology of Sport

I recollect my professor at that time citing a study explaining something like 95 percent of the Olympic athletes polled by the Dubin Inquiry said they would take a drug if it guaranteed them a gold medal despite the fact there would be a high probability that they would die in the next 5 years.

Gradually it became clear to me that many High Performance athletes at the top levels of sport tended to have a more risk taking attitude then the general public. Then, in addition, it became increasingly obvious to me as I studied sports psychology and sociology that many professional athletes are driven by a burning desire for success that has been an inspiration to most of mankind.

With these desires there is an observable pattern of behavior, which in general contributes to a tendency of high performance athletes not to fully appreciate and consider the social, psychological, or physiological costs of performing at the world-class level.

This is evident by the colossal amount of career ending injuries many of which create permanent disabilities in violent sports such as football at both the pro and collegiate ranks. Regardless of the dangers of many sports, extreme sports are increasing in popularity as our society demands, bigger, faster, or more dangerous forms of competitions.

Hero Worship, Attractor Patterns, And The Role Of Media

The media, particular sports casters emphasizes physical sacrifice as some sort of "badge of honor" that invites a widespread effect on the value system pervasive in all sports including bodybuilding. It’s also important that the media depicts athletes as almost mythical heroes not unlike the God’s of a primitive culture. This artificially created hero worship has its consequences on the minds of everyone.

Slowly these heroic depictions, assigned characteristics penetrate and permeate into the thought patterns of anyone exposed to the media environment; which manufactures, creates, and supports these individuals. I too was influenced and still am today because the more one is exposed to these subjective belief systems (given any environment) the more one tends to adopt them as their own conclusions.

Modern Physics Pulls Back the Veils

World renowned psychiatrist, medical doctor, and spiritual teacher Dr. David Hawkins, author of Power vs. Force proves this model better than anyone to date using a terminology in physics called Non-Linear dynamics. This concept originated first in chaos theory, but is now provable by Quantum Mechanics.

The concept of “Attractor patterns” was coined and used to explain how individuals gravitated to certain sociological and lifestyles based on predominate thought patterns programmed by one’s environment. My own insecurity, combined my environment, the media, and the principles of bodybuilding led to the “ideal conditions” for me to begin my bodybuilding journey.

Looking back, it seems I was under the influence of some “Attractor Patterns” that only today some 20 years later I am only fully beginning to understand. In addition, being part of the Media generation made it important for me to explore the extent that the Media has influenced myself and every athlete’s sociological and psychological motivators.

For instance, since the advent of the Internet, satellite communications, and a dizzying array of communication technology mainstream the media has become increasingly more influential on people’s belief system. The old saying of “Caveat Emptor” or buyer beware is becoming increasingly important to the avoidance of becoming ensnared by the all too numerous pitfalls that choice technology presents to athletes as well as all of humanity.

But let's get back to the issue:

The Truth Behind Bodybuilding And Insecurity

My own journey into bodybuilding innocently started out as a way to overcome a common teenage insecurity. This need to be bigger, stronger, and thus “more masculine” was coupled with a new found confidence that I could produce a desirable outcome in my life by progressive weight training.

As a teenager and a young adult seeing changes in my body exerted an influence as powerful as any drug because there was so much in my life I could not control. The gym served a two-fold drive. One to overcome insecurity: and two, to become SELF-DIRECTED.

….But here is where things went awry if you will. It’s a story that is all too common in the bodybuilding world that gets deadlier each and every year.

After my first bodybuilding contest and then after grinding out another 3 more years of intense effort I came to the realization that I would not be able to be "successful" in competitive bodybuilding unless I started to use steroids. Note this is not a commentary on whether steroid is good or bad etc. I am using this to illustrate the "changing psychology" and the rationalizations that sprung up within myself.

Even though I had built an impressive physique from my efforts I was not satisfied. You see, once I started competing, I began comparing myself to others, and it was this comparison that got me into the sport in the first place.

It appears my own insecurity was only masked by a few muscles and had allowed me to succumb to the bombardment of fabricated ideologies propagated in muscle magazines about the value of winning a bodybuilding show, or better yet, reaching the pinnacle of human development and winning the Mr. Universe.

At the time my thoughts were all about starting up and working through the ranks to become like my Idol Arnold, but along the way my mind took finally took the false media bait in front of me and suddenly my "value system had been compromised".

My First Steroid Guru – Bill Phillips

I remember my excitement when I set about "educating" myself about these drugs. I purchased my first copy of the “Underground Steroid Handbook 6th Edition” written by Bill Phillips. Yes, that is the same Bill Phillips that brought us the Body For Life book and EAS, a performance nutritional supplement company.

To Bill’s credit the book was pretty good and certainly helped me understand the need to safely inject myself. It also provided numerous, graphs, charts, theories, and definitions as to what steroids did what, how to use them, side effects, counterfeits, and how to locate legitimate products at reasonable prices.

After hanging around the gym and “getting to know” some of the bigger guys who were competing I enquired about how I might obtain some of these drugs to enhance my own chances of bodybuilding success. It wasn’t long before I made friends with a local bodybuilding champion who took it upon himself to show me the ropes.

After the requisite exchange of cash, and the “duffel bag drop” off in the locker room I was in with the “Big Boys”. I went home in a state of euphoria and nervousness as I took my new found “magic potion” to my apartment. I fumbled with the vials nervously for almost an hour before I figured out how to get the drugs out of the tiny vial.

Before you know it I managed to take my first injection of “Primobolan”, Arnold’s former favorite drug of choice according to our good friend and steroid advisor Bill Phillips. Then, I also ingested a couple of “Dianabol” tablets a day for the next 8 weeks according to the diamond pattern recommended by the Guru.

During this time I gained 25lbs on my first cycle drugs… it all seemed to easy. When I eventually came off the drugs I lost about 15 pounds and had a curious pain in my shoulder. The individual who sold me the drugs assured me this was normal. His reasoning I had just pushed to hard as my strength shot up so fast my tendons couldn’t keep up to my gains.

He advised me to be careful about lifting so heavy when I did my next cycle, which came all too soon.

Drugs And My First Bodybuilding Championships

I took my first two cycles and experienced tremendous results with almost no apparent side effects other than a bit of acne, water retention, and some hardness under my nipples which of course was the dreaded “gynocomastia” commonly called “bitch tits”. Unfortunately, I already had a predisposition to that condition since as I already visited my doctor as a teenager with the budding condition which was common in adolescent males according to my doctor. So, I was assured that I was okay.

Reflecting back, I was gaining size at a rapid rate so it seemed well worth the risk. Besides the magazine writers stated most of the pros simply got the tumors cut out as they advance up the ranks. Plus, some of my newfound bodybuilding friends assured me that it was not big deal and just part of the process of “Getting Huge”. I conceded to the opinions of my friends.

In just a year and a half my efforts were rewarded as I won my first ever Bodybuilding Show, which included the Heavyweight Title and The Overall Provincial Championships. My ego soared; “it was all working out as planned and I was on my way to becoming the next Arnold”. Boy, it’s amazing how delusional a person can become when fueled by the ego gratification of a cheering crowd.

Booze, Bars, And Babes –

Finally I Was Living The Bodybuilding Dream

During this time I worked as a Door Man at a local nightclub as this was one arena that my newfound brawn qualified me for. It was also a great place to vent my increasing testosterone fueled aggression on unruly patrons.

In between bouts with the local drunks I discovered my muscles gave me the confidence to approach even the “hottest girls” in the club who were seemingly impressed or amused as I alternated between throwing out cheesy one liners, and “out of line assholes” from the fine establishment I patrolled like a Spartan Sentinel on red alert.

I felt unstoppable as I experienced the all too familiar rush of testosterone fueled adrenaline coursing through my veins whether I was in the gym, the bar, or out on the town with my latest sexual conquest.

I defended the use of steroids, and would openly discuss them to anyone willing to listen. I merely justified my position and spent time with those who agreed with me. I learned everything I could about drugs, dieting, and carefully saved my dollars diligently as I prepared for my next show.

My whole life revolved around becoming bigger, leaner, and more powerful and bodybuilding became the driving force in my life. What I didn’t realize is how the drugs, the muscles, and the titles only masked the insecurities of the scrawny teenager who first picked up the Weider weight set years before.

So, like so many before me my unsuspecting spiral into the underground steroid subculture had begun and my growing ego began to envision bodybuilding stardom. Realistically, at that time I still only knew a small portion of truth about what I was doing which can happen to most athletes and bodybuilders alike without experienced educated and grounded professional coaches.

Fortunately, for me I discovered and hired the best in the business Scott Abel.

I Meet My Mentor Scott Abel

After attending the 97 Nationals and seeing the athletes that had achieved a greater level of physical conditioning and size than myself, I decided to hire the man reputed to train those I admired. All of Scott Abel’s athletes seemed to have something more and better than all the others on stage.

Even today almost 10 years later I can still recall my first letter from Scott that was hand written as he was in the middle of a move. I won't get into the details, but I will share the lines that had the biggest impact on me:

Scott said, "Your training is amateurish, your diet is not doing your body justice, and your "Drug Stack" is a joke. Good thing you got with me because you’re really spinning your wheels."

I was elated because after 10 years at grasping at straws I had now graduated to the "big leagues".

Ferociously I trained all year always and following Scott's training to the tee, although I could not afford "pharmaceuticals" until the last 14 weeks before the 98 Nationals. In recollection the shorter version of things was that I worked three jobs, alienated my friends, my family, and "sacrificed" everything for the ultimate... a pro card and a trip to fame and fortune... LOL Yep I was pretty naive.

Finally after the long grueling months of dieting, training, and endless posing sessions payoff was achieved when I reached my ideal condition.

I remember specifically one morning exactly 3 days before the show, posing in the basement of the then World's gym on Yonge Street in Toronto, Ontario. Filled with excitement I stared at the rippling muscular body looking back at me in the mirror. I had finally achieved the look I had dreamed of for over 10 years. Secretly I anticipated that I just might be crowned the winner. In that split second I glimpsed at the skinny teenager seeking the approval of others who was still lurking behind the muscular shell I had created, but then he was gone.

The Nationals – NOT What You Might Expect

Scott didn't pull any punches when I went to see him the day before the show. He straight out told me that I might make top five in my class. He was right, I came something like 6th in the light-heavyweight division.

Backstage the show was a circus, and we were herded around like cattle set for slaughter.
Dye stained towels and half opened bottles of posing oil littered the floor along with the assorted bodybuilders lying around dehydrated, dazed and half dead, encased in several tracksuits while they listened to their posing music on headphones.

The smell of sweat, oil, and chocolate bars filled the air as one by one the classes are filed into the “pump room” at the regular and periodic cry of the stage hand stuck with job of organizing the motley crew of walking muscle zombies into some semblance of order.

The “pump room” might well have been a scene out of Gladiator. Bronzed men and women, with sunken cheeks and eyes, glanced nervously at each other while they pumped and flexed their muscles with reckless abandon. Hoping against hope to squeeze every ounce of potential improvement they could in these last seconds before they went onstage.

It was here in the few fleeting moments before their physique would be mercilessly pitted against the lights, their rivals, and most of all the critical eyes of the judges that the insecurities became exposed from beneath the mountains of muscle encasing the souls of the latest crew of “Arnold like Hopefuls”.

Each athlete knew the potential retribution that would be rained upon him from the lips of the audience members who are all too quick to point out the smallest flaw in any competitors’ physique. Competitive anything including bodybuilding can be both cruel and unforgiving at its worst.

The Final Moments Backstage Then… Showtime

The frenzied pumping and posing then changed to an almost serene silence as our class was lined up in the backstage alcove. We waited anxiously in the darkness for the stagehand’s signal that would drive us out under the bright lights to the howls and screams of an unruly crowd desperate to cheer, jeer, or revere the latest crop of bodybuilding hopefuls.

My mind thought back to what it must been like thousands of years before as the Christians were flushed out into the Roman Coliseum for combat, or worse, to be gored and eaten by lions as a blood thirsty crowd howled with glee. It seemed that after nearly 2000 years not a whole lot has changed.

The contest time onstage seemed almost surreal. The depletion of dieting, dehydration, and diuretics, plus the crowd noise combination can confuse athletes onstage especially as the Chief Judge blared out commands and calls for the various mandatory poses on a slightly muffled microphone. Reliving that moment in the present, I still feel the burning muscles reaching almost unbearable levels as my muscles cramped, flexed, and rippled under the blinding glare of the lights.

Time seemingly stood still as I held each pose in a statue like stillness evoking my best efforts to keep from shaking form the intense muscular contractions. My chest heaved between poses as my lungs gasped for air and I tasted my own blood in my already parched mouth. Regardless, with a well-practiced easy smile on my face, I moved from one skin splitting pose to another, making it look as if was taking an enjoyable stroll on a cool spring morning for my morning paper.

Half of the crowd howled with delight while the other half tried to dampen their cheers with a chorus of boos as the judges made selections. The stone-faced judges who were all veteran competitors themselves scanned the line of bodybuilders with only the slightest move of their pencils as they decide the fate of few before them.

When the MC’s voice boomed over the speakers we were ushered off the stage gasping for air, staggering to and fro to find our gym bags where we hastily grabbed the tiniest swallow of water to tease our taste buds with a few measured drops of coolness.

Eventually the last competitors walked off the stage and then the lights went dim. Music dissolved and final the curtain closed. Cycled months of dieting, depletion and drug use were all compressed and crammed into a few fleeting minutes onstage.

The contest for the most part was over and what followed was an ensuing night show that included a hand out parade of trophies, some t-shirts and a few buckets of protein to the newly crowned champions. Victors posed reveling in the attention while the photographers scrambled to get a few shots of each of the class winners. Occasionally one of those winners may be fortunate enough to have a magazine editor provide a scripted short account of the day’s happenings in a 2x2 section usually found in the back pages of their magazine.

Alternatively, the defeated gathered sheepishly with their friends and families nibbling on cookies, candy, and the most treasured “taboo treats” which have been avoided like the plague for the months leading up to the show. There faithful friends are kindly quick to point out how each athlete was robbed, or how the call-outs were unfair. Almost everyone agrees that the show must have been rigged as they all murmur in agreement while suspiciously eyeing the promoters, judges and staff.

Bodybuilding’s Ultimate Irony

The irony for the most part is countless years of training, straining, and untold uncertainty to get to that juncture only to have it skip by almost in the time it takes most people to eat a bag of Doritos.

Athletes with testosterone fueled bodies and minds filled with an unwavering drive to become as big as possible drove forward with an almost insane amount of effort, sacrifice, and discipline to build themselves into the latest version of Hercules can’t beat Father Time as I later observed.

The moment of Glory fades into history like all moments must and the hopes and dreams of most of the competitors are dashed upon the rocks of reality. These few are the lucky ones as often it’s the winners who move forward on the unchanged path supported by the illusionary splendor a temporary victory might bring.

With perspective eventually even the greatest bodybuilders one day will be reduced to mere mortal status again when the grim reaper comes to call back home their soul. Unfortunately it comes sooner and more swiftly for today’s bodybuilding competitors.

The Contest Circus And The Show Within The Show

Outside the auditorium during the breaks between the morning and the night show was "contest scene" at all the booths. The “real bodybuilding competitive world” has a somewhat circus side show filled with a hodge-podge of oxymoron oddities that would flabbergast Mark Twain.

The crowd found in the lobby of the contest arena was what I called “the Contest Circuit”. The circuit circus comes complete with a host of acts, attitudes, and characters that Vince McMahon could barely dream up. Eye-catching characters with the bloated bellies, wildly streaked hair and shaved heads with decorated bodies of completed tattoos, chains, and T-shirts slogans which generally sported words such as: maniac, huge, pain, death, madness, or more should be expected, plus clothing ranges between two extremes of sweats and big shirts to skintight spandex.

I got to watch a few ‘Glazed Eyed Pros” signing autographs at the various supplement booths with crowds of onlookers. Then I contemplated the characters with cartoon like proportions strutting and flexing with lats flared, arms tensed, and chests pushed out to like bullfrogs ready to mate. I found it truly is a sight to behold as everyone struggled to gain the attention of everyone else.

The uninitiated should really consider two important overlapping scenes in the professional body building world. The first is the on stage presence and the other is the off stage presence.

For instance, after the contest, I met up with the overall winner outside the circus who was in a state of depression. As I congratulated him he said to me, "What now? How can I compete against the pros?”

Having trained with this fellow during the last few weeks before the show and understood the prodigious amount of drugs he had used for the last 3 years to "be in the winner circle" I was confounded. Now that he had actually won he realized he didn’t have the heart, the genetics, or the funds to make the jump into the professional bodybuilding ranks.

So, being with him on the sidewalk that night was a powerful experience for me and his words echoed in my head for many months after the contest.

The Razor’s Edge

Even today’s contests can be a dangerous disastrous environment when taken to extreme. Most of the public is unaware how many depleted bodybuilders are backstage on oxygen tanks or in worse cases rushed to emergency rooms because of drug overdoses and diuretic use. I call these practices the Razor’s Edge because at any moment those choices can crossover the threshold to disaster. Decisively some see winning and losing to be determined by how much risk a competitor is willing to gamble and accept.

I was fortunate since I didn’t require medical attention before, during or after the show. However, succeeding the show I unwisely consumed a lot of Coca-cola water, juice, and more in my ultra dehydrated state. The result of those choices were about 2 hours lying on a bench on the boat cruise, trying to calm down my parents, as 'knife-like" pains shot though my kidneys.

In recollection, the optimum was the fact that I managed to facilitate some business out of the show. During the intermission I made a deal to sell supplements for one of the suppliers who needed a west coast representative. Favorably, they were very impressed by my energy and enthusiasm that I landed my first real business contract.

Though I didn’t win the show that was my initial dream, in my new mindset I had a won a bigger prize as I was going West to make my "fame and fortune". So, in less than six weeks I was sitting in Scott Abel’s residence discussing my next move. My blood work was now A Ok and I was able to really start developing.

I Recognize The Futility of Chemical Warfare

Something happened after the National Champion competition. I contemplated using a collage of drugs over the next few years so that I might become Canada's next pro and then thought about what kind of Pro that would make me. Then I decided that I was fighting an uphill battle…. Dorian Yates was ruling the sport at that point and the "Chemical Warfare Era" had begun.

In that moment of clarity as I finally realized that nothing was going to make me Mr. Olympia and I needed to follow a different path than my boyhood Idol Arnold. So, I dropped out of the “Hardcore Bodybuilding Scene” as it’s called and swiftly moved to the west coast where the supplement contract led me to start several successful businesses. Moving forward to my next series of personal lessons, I believed I had overcome the psychological demon of insecurity that drove me daily to pursuit the bodybuilding holy grail. However, again, the "fly in my psychological ointment" led me to throw myself into business at a torrid rate.

I Descend Into A Deeper Darkness

I was a success but my need for approval set me up for an even deeper darkness. As the money began to roll in from my business I got introduced to the underground party scene... the defective psychological weakness that was hidden by my armor of muscles led me into a life of sex, drugs and rock and roll as they say which almost cost me my life, but instead afforded me some very valuable lessons, but that’s another story for another time.

The Miracle And Transformation

In the pit of a personal Hell, when I had nowhere else to turn, I had a profound moment whereby a series of inexplicable events transpired that to this day would baffle and amaze the dourest skeptics.... Luckily, the profound events positively transformed my perspectives and gave birth to a new awareness I had been searching for all along.

I appreciate and am grateful for the "spiritual renaissance" that occurred. My spiritual teacher was a real impact on my life’s path and really struck me as exactly what I needed to positively move forward.

The field of spirit finally obliterated my psychological and sociological pathologies to the extent that I swiftly threw myself into a spiritual routine based around meditation, contemplation, and study of Eastern Philosophy and Spirituality.

Since then my outlook on life, my personality, and just about everything else improved. Despite that some heart wrenching challenges had just occurred, my life had new meaning. Events were merely opportunities for growth, so I regularly enjoyed blissful states for no apparent external reason even during trying personal circumstances.

In a couple of years I decided to compete again, but only as a vegetarian and in drug tested shows. I reconnected with Scott Abel again as a trainer after 5 years of no contact and we went on to win a National Title in just two years. The newly created "light middleweight division" in the Canadian National Championships held in Hamilton, Ontario was also a World Qualifier Event that allowed me to compete in the 2003 Mr. Universe hosted in MUMBAI, INDIA, which coincidently was the home country of my spiritual teacher.

What was even more exciting was that the rigors of competing were now a joy. I was relaxed and took pleasure in the competition process, plus felt at ease during the 11 months on the right diet with only 3 pig-out days for the 2003 Universe. Physically I pushed forward like a real competitor and I had an incredible time at the Universe even though I did not place.

What was even more remarkable was how that experience of competing that year led me to several breakthrough discoveries that I have went on to share with the bodybuilding community through my websites.

The Power Of Spirit

Competing was no longer the “be and end all” for me as it was for many other competitors. In fact it was just something I simply relished doing. Moreover, I believe that I was able to enjoy this process so much because of my new found psychological perspective garnered by my spiritual base and the sociological influence of my "spiritual meditation group". There, simple truths were shared like Dr. David Hawkins acclaimed Power vs. Force quote that “Power is about being rather than doing. It is not something you can control or manipulate”, plus “'Power', on the other hand, motivates us endlessly. If our lives are dedicated to enhancing the welfare of everyone we contact, it can never lose meaning."

After the Universe I competed again, but my heart wasn't in it. My inner path was more gratifying and I lost the "burning desire drive" that every athlete must possess in order to be the best. So, when I lost the following year’s national championship I felt relief instead of disappointment and I have not looked back ever since.

The Torch Is Passed To The Next Generation

Onwards, I went on to pen a book aimed at Natural Bodybuilders as I felt there were many naive young men and women that might be drawn into the same self-destructive path I had been on, which by grace I escaped. Since that time the book has begat a series of courses, audios, videos, and nutritional supplements to improve health and performance.

My life could not be more fulfilling and I firmly believe it's all because of the grace given to me by my spiritual journey. Even today in the throws of business pressures, personal relationships, social requirements, I feel a sense of center and balance that provides a constant state of well-being.

My firm desire is to help positively influence others about the benefits of bodybuilding without using harmful drugs. The feedback and results have been overwhelming and I feel truly grateful to positively affect so many lives. More importantly I hope to help others avoid the slippery slope I was on that leads to Bodybuilding Oblivion.

Too date it my wishes have come true.

A Final Note

When I first began my spiritual journey I was reading a line on the power of spirit as written by my spiritual teacher Paramahansa Yogananda. He said that “If one had a strong desire based in good intentions, even if the item desired did not exist, it would be created by the universe for you.” This sounded almost insane to me at the time since was barely on the road to recovery and competitive bodybuilding was just about the only thing on my mind. Yet as soon as I read the words it kindled the new dream of competing in the Mr. Universe without using performance-enhancing drugs. So in a sense I recreated my original desire that I had when I was 15 years old when did not know drugs existed or that bodybuilders used them. Happily, I had become the best essence of myself again.

Wade T. Lightheart

http://www.wadelightheart.com
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Wade T. Lightheart is a 3-Time Canadian Natural National Bodybuilding Champion and author of "Vital Power" A Dynamic Philosophy for Producing Optimum Health Without Diets, Drugs or Doctors. He helps others achieve Optimum Health by serving as Director of Human Performance at Yaletown Holisitics where he also spends his time formulating high performance training routines, mental technologies and cutting edge healthy supplements to improve the performance of athletes around the world. You can contact Wade by clicking here.