Strength Has a Greater Purpose

Ladies and gentlemen, here is the key point from my speech on the mission of StrongFirst that I gave at our recent leadership meeting.

Pavel Tsatsouline speaking at StrongFirst leadership meeting

Strength Has a Greater Purpose

Our motto is, “Strength has a greater purpose.” There are two ways to interpret it, both correct.

On a higher level, two images come to mind. One is warriors fighting for their God and their country. The other is a scene from the movie Trains, Planes and Automobiles. Steve Martin’s character, a successful executive, invites a man he met on the road, John Candy’s traveling salesman who lost his wife and his home, to join him and his family for a Thanksgiving dinner. Neil helps Dell to carry his monstrous trunk, which contains all of the latter’s worldly possessions. “Strength has a greater purpose.”

Strength has a greater purpose

StrongFirst’s mission goes far beyond teaching people to hinge through their hips or do sets of five. We are to make strength a quality admired and cultivated. Ladies and gentlemen, at 50,000 feet, our mission is the de-sissy-fication of our civilization.

On a 30,000-foot level, our motto—“Strength has a greater purpose”—has a lower key meaning. Unless you are a competitive lifter, strength is not the end all but a foundation upon which greater performance in your sport and a better quality of life will be built.

You can be anything you want. A warrior. An athlete. A hard man or woman ready to handle whatever life throws at you. But you must be strong first.

Strength has a greater purpose

Pavel Tsatsouline
Pavel Tsatsouline is the CEO of StrongFirst, Inc.

23 thoughts on “Strength Has a Greater Purpose

  • Strength training, like the martial arts, is not done to just get “strong”, but to be a strong human being. Strength is the teacher, StrongFirst!!

  • “Strength is .. a foundation upon which … a better quality of life will be built.”

    Yes! When you are strong, you foster a better life not only for yourself but for those you love and, in particular, those who look up to you.

    I choose to be Strong First.

  • Extremely well said. Please keep in mind folks that while that is the mission, to achieve it we must focus on what we want… the strength. Don’t get sucked into the trap of focusing on the sissification and how angry that makes you, or you will only get more of it. What we resist, persists. Instead, focus on strength. In so doing you will achieve it, and the world will be one little step closer to being a truly better place. Enough strength in the world, and there simply won’t be room for sissies. They will be replaced. I guess one could think of it as “slow strength”. We’ll get there, people. We’ll get there.

  • Sissy means weak, not feminine.

    Consider Karen Smith, Delaine Ross, Nikki Shlosser, etc.

    All EXTREMELY feminine, beautiful and STRONG. You know, the opposite of “sissy”.

  • One possible manifestation of the desissyfication will be that grown-ass men will no longer feel compelled to recoil in feigned horror at harmless words like “sissyfication”.

  • A most noble goal. Getting strong, by nature, requires inner focus, discipline, and a willingness to perservere through discomfort; characteristics all but lost in our society. Thanks, Pavel. We’re with you.

  • I can’t subscribe to a mission phrased as “the desissyfication of our civilization.” Our civilization has battled for many years to overcome sexism and using a gendered term like “sissy” to describe someone who is weak doesn’t aid that ongoing cause.

    Any suggestions for an alternative phrase? Unenfeebling maybe?

    • Brad, first, I fail to see anything sexist about the term. Second, I am strongly opposed to political correctness.

    • Ive got admit I find ” Desissyfication” very humourous. Check this video out.

      I would class the term ” Sissy” as a humorous stab at weakness. It may conjure different sterotypes and images to different people. Only if you are ” sissy” enough to allow yourself to be sterotyped.

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