Powerlifting Made Simple isn't about dumbing down the sport—it's about stripping away the noise to focus on what actually makes you stronger. Hosted by Edward Alicdan Jr, this podcast explores powerlifting as more than just moving heavy weight. It's about developing the kind of strength that builds character, connects communities, and transforms how you approach challenge in every area of life.
Each episode combines practical training wisdom with deeper insights into the mental and emotional aspects of strength development. We'll cover everything from giving yourself permission to fail and breaking through plateaus, to building supportive lifting communities and discovering your authentic training style. Whether you're stepping under the bar for the first time or chasing loftier totals, you'll find tools to make your journey more sustainable, more fulfilling, and ultimately more successful.
This show is for lifters who want to grow stronger without sacrificing their humanity—who understand that true strength isn't just about what you can move, but who you become in the process of moving it. I believe powerlifting can be a practice of self-discovery, a path to building resilience, and a way to inspire others to pursue their own version of strength.
Join me as we explore how kindness, curiosity, and conscious practice can transform your relationship with the barbell—and with yourself.
New episodes every week. Connect with me at www.prometheuspowerlifting.com and on Instagram www.instagram.com/jralicdan
Human First: George Briones III on the Active Soul
In the final act of our trilogy, I interview George Briones III, a man who has journeyed through war, faith, and art to find the true meaning of strength. We explore the challenges of rebuilding identity and discover a new understanding of strength as a way to live with care and purpose. Join us as we uncover the power of aligning body, mind, and spirit to cultivate a strength that honors the whole person.
19 Jan 2026
Prologue: The American Scholar (Emerson)
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. “The American Scholar.” Speech delivered to the Phi Beta Kappa Society, Cambridge, 1837. AmericanLiterature.com. https://americanliterature.com/author/ralph-waldo-emerson/essay/the-american-scholar
12 Jan 2026
Unfolding: On Emerson's Circles
"People wish to be settled; only as far as they are unsettled is there any hope for them" (Emerson, 1841)
5 Jan 2026
New Year Special: Circles (Emerson)
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. “Circles.” Essays: First Series, 1841. Virginia Commonwealth University, English Department Archive.
29 Dec 2025
The Courage to Contradict
Following the interview with Jacob Tsypkin, this episode explores self-reliance through the lens of training, learning, and embodied knowing. Drawing from Emerson, it examines skepticism as responsibility, constraint as invitation, and the courage required to trust your own perception. A bridge from individual sovereignty toward community and meaning.
22 Dec 2025
Learners Learning: Jacob Tsypkin on Learning Beyond Instruction
In this episode, I talk with Jacob Tsypkin about learning without authority, coaching without control, and why skill emerges through perception rather than instruction. We explore autonomy, burnout, systems, and the quiet ways power shows up in sport and society.
15 Dec 2025
Prologue: Self-Reliance (Emerson)
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. “Self-Reliance.” Essays: First Series, 1841.
Virginia Commonwealth University, English Department Archive.
8 Dec 2025
Burnout as Initiation
This episode explores burnout as a modern rite of passage — not a failure, but a dissolution that clears space for the next version of yourself. We trace the arc from ambition to drift, collapse to humility, and return to a deeper, steadier form of strength. A mythic, grounded conversation about transformation, identity, and the fire that shapes us.
1 Dec 2025
Strength; Or, Rewilding in the Woods
A conversation with my first mentor, Keith, who left the strength world, lived in the woods for years, and returned with a new understanding of what strength is for. We talk about identity, burnout, belonging, solitude, and how training can become a gentler, wiser practice when it’s no longer tied to performance. A quiet, human episode about rewilding the barbell — and the self.
24 Nov 2025
What in the Absolute Hell Have We Been Talking About?
A grounded integration of everything so far — translating myth and metaphor back into movement. We connect philosophy to practice, showing how sovereignty, devotion, and belonging live inside every rep, every breath, and every act of meeting what’s real.
17 Nov 2025
The Ember Awaits
When the fire no longer flares but quietly endures, continuity becomes the new strength. We explore how agency takes root through repetition, devotion, and staying — how momentum is not manufactured, but tended, one steady act at a time.
10 Nov 2025
Coming Home Again
After rupture comes the quieter work of return. This episode explores healing not as performance but as presence — the moment you stop bracing against yourself and begin to re-inhabit your own body with trust and tenderness. Strength, here, becomes a homecoming.
3 Nov 2025
Becoming Through Injury
This episode explores injury not as something that breaks you, but as something that reveals you. I share the lessons from two major injuries — one that fractured my identity, and another that I could finally meet as myself — and walk through the 24-hour rule and tiered approach to training through pain. If you’ve ever feared that injury means you’re back at zero, this episode gives you a new map: you’re not starting over — you’re starting deeper.
27 Oct 2025
When the Weight Gets Heavy: Facing Your Dragon
In this pivotal episode of Powerlifting Made Simple, we explore how to face the weights that scare us and emerge transformed. Drawing wisdom from legendary boxing coach Cus D'Amato and poet Rainer Maria Rilke, we learn to befriend fear, harness it as fuel, and lift with beauty and courage. This is a journey of integrating fear and courage, strength and vulnerability - of becoming more fully alive, one rep at a time.
20 Oct 2025
Your First Training Session: Stepping Into The Unknown
Ready to stop theorizing and actually train? This episode walks you step-by-step through your first real powerlifting session—from setting a single intention to recording what you learned. Discover what it means to "win" a training session (hint: it's not about the weight on the bar), how to use position and balance as filters for exploration, and why confusion and uncertainty aren't signs of failure but signs you're beginning the hero's journey.
13 Oct 2025
Letter to a Young Powerlifter: Living the Questions
In this contemplative episode, we explore what it means to train without demanding immediate answers. Drawing on Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet, discover how to form training hypotheses, live with uncertainty, and trust that understanding emerges through practice rather than being given to you. Learn why the courage to sit with not-knowing—rather than grasping at false certainty—is what separates lifters who burn out from those who build something sustainable.
6 Oct 2025
The Gift of Two Simple Ideas: Position and Balance
In this episode, we receive our first "supernatural aid" for the powerlifting journey: two simple filters that cut through all the complexity. Everything you need to understand about squat, bench, and deadlift technique can be organized through position (the structure you create) and balance (how that structure moves through space). Learn to use these filters to develop your own judgment under the bar and become the authority on your own lifting.
29 Sept 2025
The Threshold and The Vessel: Crossing Into Powerlifting Safely
Before you can get stronger, you need to get safe. This episode explores how to cross into powerlifting without sacrificing your autonomy, health, or dignity—building a vessel from self-knowledge, sound principles, and trustworthy community. Drawing on Campbell's hero's journey and Emerson's call for self-reliance, we address the dangers that exist in strength sports culture and provide concrete guidance for recognizing exploitation, finding trustworthy coaches, and building a practice that makes you strong for decades, not just for your next meet.
22 Sept 2025
Permission to Fail: The Foundation of Growth
In this premiere episode of Powerlifting Made Simple, we explore why giving ourselves permission to fail is the foundation of all strength progress. Drawing from years of coaching experience, I reveal how our fear of looking weak—not lack of knowledge or effort—becomes the biggest barrier to breaking through plateaus.
We’ll discover why experienced lifters often struggle more than beginners, how our biology works against us when we’re afraid to fail, and why that fearless curiosity we had as a beginner is actually a skill we can reclaim. I break down the "paradox of success"—how achieving strength goals can ironically limit further growth—and provide three practical strategies for setting up small wins in every training session.
The episode covers the temporary but necessary "awkward phase" that comes with learning new techniques, why our primitive brain treats missed lifts like survival threats, and how to approach challenging training days with curiosity rather than judgment. I emphasize that the strongest lifters aren't those who never fail, but those who fail fast, fail forward, and treat themselves with the same kindness they'd show a friend just starting out.
Key Takeaways:
* Why beginners often progress faster despite knowing less
* Three strategies for guaranteed training wins: Process, Discovery, and Building Block victories
* How to rewire our relationship with "bad" training days
* The biological science behind why realistic expectations lead to better results
Perfect for: New lifters looking to build sustainable habits, experienced lifters stuck in plateaus, and anyone wanting to develop a healthier relationship with strength training that goes beyond just moving heavy weight.
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