Kareem Baassiri I Photography

#HUMANSOFTHEPULSE "I've been at McMaster for seven years now, and I can undoubtedly say that the Pulse has been one of my best on-campus experiences. The atmosphere here is something that I simply can't experience at other gyms. I've seen a lot changes over the past few years for the regulars at the gym, but at the end of the day the feeling of a community hasn't changed. That alone keeps me wanting to come back."

#HUMANSOFTHEPULSE "I used to wrestle with my dad a lot. We would play until one of us would take the other down, and every time my dad would win because of my size at the time. Thanks to the gym, I'm now at the point where I can finally match and beat him. I'm stronger and quicker than him, and I want to prolong that moment as long as I can before I have a kid one day."

Mindful || Sara

#HUMANSOFTHEPULSE "I believe everyone should do some form of sport. It doesn't have to be competitive, but it'll always drive you to get better." Why do you say that?... "To be able to sit down and dedicate countless hours to learning something and finding ways to improve, it's bound to make you feel good. I'm a perfectionist in most things and won't stop until I'm satisfied. You need to be close to perfect, but at the same time aggressive enough to push forward, and that's what drives me."

#HUMANSOFTHEPULSE How do you go about dealing with stress? "Making music and the gym."... How do you go about choosing? "Usually I start out with music. I play the drums, guitar, piano and bass, so there's a lot to work on which definitely makes it a good stress reliever. Obviously there will be times where music won't cut it, and I'll make my way over to the gym and get it done. It works out in the end because I love making music and going to the gym, so I can be flexible with both."

#HUMANSOFTHEPULSE What drives you? "The mindset that everyday is a blank slate. If you look at the past, you're bound to notice a trend in good and bad days at the gym. Everyday, you and your body are different."

#HUMANSOFTHEPULSE "I did a lot of racket sports a few years back, but never bothered with any strength training. When I came to McMaster, my friend told me to get into weight training because I had big legs. So I tried it out and here I am."

#HUMANSOFTHEPULSE "There was a club in my high school that ran a bunch of martial arts. I mainly did Kung fu, boxing, and jiu jitsu, and did body weight exercises to condition for them. I really enjoying the strength that came from it. A few years later, I dabbled around with powerlifting. Slowly but surely, I made my way into weight lifting and loved it since."

#HUMANSOFTHEPULSE When you're working the whole weekend, all you can do is laugh.

#HUMANSOFTHEPULSE "I played around with Karate when I was younger, did rugby and dragon boating in high school, but I was always overweight, and I really wanted to work on that. After a few years of false starts with weight lifting, I finally got started from the Starting Strength programs, and lifting weights was the best way to give me what I wanted. I realized that the excess energy that I don't really use often, I could channel through training. I often wonder what other people do in the time blocks that I spend in the gym."

#HUMANSOFTHEPULSE Can you tell me about a moment when training helped you? "It actually works the opposite for me. The gym to me is a bit of a stressful environment, as I want to improve in so many ways. That's helped me realize that it's sometimes wise to keep each field of your life (school, work, gym) separate. It doesn't help you to come in angry to the gym every time, especially if you come in and see the same people who don't expect that from you."

#HUMANSOFTHEPULSE What does training mean to you? "Betterment of yourself; the mind and the soul. People like to view as exercising or going to the gym as a way to waste time. The way I view it is if you do have the time, why not invest it in yourself through training?"