A review of: Warrion Meets Earth-The Birth of Movement Training

By Rita Wilds

Some books are meant to be read for their factual content, others for their ideas and inspiration.  The best books combine facts with ideas and inspire the reader to seek more answers. Warrion vs. Earth: The Birth of Movement Training is such a book.  Not meant to be a quick-reference guide to a flatter tummy, or to provide a list of exercises that target specific muscles, this is a lifestyle book.  The kind you’ll want to read again and again, and find fresh insight and hidden messages with each reading. 

Aaron Guyett of Innovative Results, Inc. and Jaiya Figueras of The Movement Team in Southern California have developed a fitness lifestyle model that is worlds away from that which gyms and trainers have relied on for decades.  Rejecting technology and machines, they use the forces and cycles of nature to build a powerful and healthy body.  In Warrion vs. Earth, their ideas unfold as a story told by two unique characters, Warrion and Earth. Through a continuous dialogue, Warrion and Earth tell us that nature has given us everything we need to stay healthy and fit.  Each character offers deeper insight through their reflections.  The approach is a refreshingly creative invitation to consider a new path to fitness.

Warrion is the warrior whose solitary motive is to do whatever is necessary to complete the mission while providing troop welfare. Earth is the currents, changes and cycles of nature that enable us to survive.  Together they advocate a program that will optimize our experience while we inhabit this planet and celebrate the partnership between humans and their planet. Like the ancient symbols of Yin and Yang, the two complete a circle and offer everything you need to get in sync with the environment, become happier and more youthful.  It is a fitness philosophy that promotes the most natural and effective way possible to make progress.

“Adopt the pace of nature. Her secret is patience.”
                                         --  Ralph Waldo Emerson

            The pace of nature is something that as human beings we cannot rate or measure. At times it appears to stand still –when you are sitting by a lake enjoying a quiet moment, or hiking through a national park acutely aware of the stillness surrounding you.  But, beneath a polished veneer of perfection, giving off the impression of total completeness, is the universe’s most dynamic system.  The Earth is always active.  The planet makes dramatic changes both by the minute and the century.  It never stops spinning and will continue to do so forever. Our bodies are also continuously changing as we absorb and reflect everything that our planet has so perfectly engineered for us.  The human body is the best machine ever designed and does not require machinery and technology to sustain, change and improve.  When developing a program to increase power and improve the body – both aesthetically and functionally – consider a radical idea: that fitness should not be isolated from life. 

“People think that running is hard on the knees until they see a child approaching a busy intersection.  Suddenly, they realize it was laziness that was hard on the body, not running.”     --  Jaiya Figueras

Power is a basic human need like food and shelter.  In fact, in society it is our power that brings us the food and shelter.  Power is a combination of strength, agility, mental attitude and speed. You want to be strong, fast, and agile whether you are a pro athlete or a cubicle queen. Not to mention, the weaker, slower, and more anxious or depressed you are, the faster your body ages.

Guyett and Figueras say there are five critical components to gaining power: Attitude, Recovery, Fuel, Movement and Coaching.  Each one is necessary for success and equally dependent on the other four.  The concepts are explained in the book in a manner as clear and concise as possible, step by step, breaking the philosophy down into major areas. The first in a series of five books, Warrion and Earth present the concepts of Progressive Overload; Periodization; Functional Training; Mental and Spiritual influences.  They do not make the subject unnecessarily complicated. After all, it would be easy to approach this idea from a theoretical perspective, using lengthy and obscure terminology and creating a text which although it may be of interest to exercise physiologists would provide no help whatsoever to the average person who wants to achieve wellness to look and feel better. 

For example, one component to the program is “Functional Training,”   or what Guyett and Figueras call “Movement Training.” This type of training mirrors the physical activities that our ancestors used to survive.  Writing about a fitness training model that is based on movements that come naturally to humans could be challenging even for a Pulitzer Prize winning author.  But Guyett and Figueras accomplish the difficult task by articulating the things that we do everyday, almost intuitively, through their two characters voices, Warrion and Earth.  Both method and motive are clearly understood.  In fact, they make it very simple -- there are five basic movements.  They are up/down, pushing, pulling, twisting and locomotion.  They tell us that with these five basic movements as the foundation of your training, you’ll have at your disposal an infinite opportunity of workout activities and exercises.  Your workouts will always be dynamic, changing and keep you motivated as you advance towards your goal.  

An added benefit to Movement Training is that it helps to prevent common training-related obstacles like plateauing, injury, fatigue, loss of motivation or excitement about physical activity and  injuries that occur from isolation training  – stressing one muscle separately as opposed to using an efficient group of muscles “designed’ to complete the movement.  When executed properly, it’s the only kind of training that the body will absorb without retaliating with injury because all of the movements already exist in nature and were intended by nature to strengthen and improve the human body, not harm it. There is no right or wrong way to do things.  You respond to how your body approaches the task as Warrion would - to complete the mission.

To create Movement Training workout, the only requirement is that the five basic movements are included. There is infinite opportunity to do so and by varying the degree of intensity, even more. For instance, boxing is a good example of a sport that requires proficiency in all five movements, but so is yoga and Tai Chi.  Also, remember that the movement or activity must exist on Earth naturally.  For example, a treadmill is not a good choice because the Earth does not move beneath our feet. Next, get out there and do it – on a mountain trail, a bike, in the ocean or on the beach.  Whatever you like. That’s it. Movement training is surprisingly simple and the most natural path to progress.

Far from being a new idea or the latest fitness fad, the first inhabitants of Earth practiced movement training everyday in order to survive. The program also alludes to the historical training programs that were employed by victorious warriors of centuries long past.  The philosophy is simply an enlightened way to promote change through fitness that, rather than making false promises, offers infinite opportunity.

Jaiya Figueras,’ or “Earth’s,” response to the belief that the only path to health is joining a commercial gym and performing the daily recommended 20 minutes of cardio three times per week is:

“We must always be in search for more knowledge and try to bring ourselves to perfection knowing we will never get there. It is the fastest way to get to your next goal. Don’t get locked into one style of training. Movement Training is only one style of training. There is an infinite number of training methods. Your workout methods should be like water, constantly changing. Your body will only respond to the laws of life.”

Finally, any discussion about Warrion vs. Earth: The Birth of Movement Training would be incomplete without mentioning the artistic value of the book and extraordinary photographs accompanying each section.  Aesthetically, this book rises far above the fitness and training genre, and would be welcomed in the arena of art books.  Read it with an open mind and an open heart and you’ll receive the gift of a new approach to things you do everyday and a new way to achieve your goals.