Kick Your Own Butt

Kick yourself in the ass. Go ahead. You know you need to. You know there is something that you should be doing, and yet you’re not doing it. There may be a whole list of things.

I’m like you — I’ve got a list idling over there on the “Ignore” setting. And a whole list of lame excuses to go with it: too busy, too many commitments, too much blah blah blah.

The real truth (don’t you love that phrase? Real truth? Like there could be fake truth?) is that the list sits undone because we don’t want to do those things. It’s simple. We don’t want to do them, so we don’t do them. And then we sit there, guilty, eating chocolate and watching “House” instead of doing hill sprints or filing all that paperwork. (Oh wait, sorry, that was just me.)

Kick yourself in the ass. The day — and the week — will only get better after you do.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

We Tell Ourselves

We tell ourselves all sorts of things.

“This weight is too heavy for me.” “I’m not a fast runner.” “I’ve never been agile.”

Well, f*** that.

Every time you tell yourself bullshit, you’re limiting yourself. Just because something was, doesn’t mean it has to be.

I’m slow as hell when I run. What’s that mean I should do? Run more. Get better. Get more efficient. Get faster.

You’re weak at the front squat. What should you do? Front squat more. Get better. Get more efficient. Get stronger.

Then work like hell to become that.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

Failing, But Still Fighting

Failure is not getting back up. Failure is staying down. Failure is not grabbing the bar and going again, ever. You can fail, and not be a failure. Huh?

Failure is an end state–a finality, an acceptance of failing. But as long as you’re still trying, you’re not a failure.

Wait. Isn’t that splitting hairs?

No, not if you accept the path to success as a series of failures whereby you try and fail and learn, and try and fail and learn, and then do better and acheive. On that path, failing is a frequent and necessary stop. But failure is not the end destination.

Failures are things, and they’re people who got off the train of improvement. Failures are people who got tired of getting back up. We can understand that. It’s hard to try and fail. Really flippin’ hard. Whether it’s in the gym or in your relationships or in your work — failing sucks. It’s an attack on your mind and your body. It hurts your spirit.

Failure is when you stop doing something. Don’t be one of those people. Know when you have to stop for the day but come back to fight again tomorrow.

Always keep fighting …

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

Church Bells

Black bumpers. White chalk. Shiny steel springs. And a bar with some diamond grooves, sort of a faded silver and gray.

These are the tools of our trade, of our vocation, perhaps of our salvation.

The devout will bray about the superior qualities of this bumper or that bar. “Only in kgs” they will sniff. Their hands reveal an odd kind of exercise stigmata.

The newly converted won’t even notice the difference, too uneducated to care about “whip” or bearings. They are only worried about “How the hell am I going to lift that?” and “I hope I don’t look like an ass.”

And somewhere in the middle stands the good CrossFit coach. Hearing all, seeing all, ministering to all.

One flock is not better than the other. One flock is not more deserving of the coach’s time. Like the Methodists say: “The table is set and all are welcome.”

Sweat drops stain the mat. Chalk particles waft and then descend, like incense vapors swung from a thurible.

3-2-1-Go. The service starts …

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

Hope For Someone To Chase

“Oh good, she’s here.”

How many times have you seen someone enter the class and you’re happy? Not because you know them or you like them (duh) but because you know they’re slower or weaker than you? Because you know you can beat them? Because you know you probably won’t be last in this WOD?

Admit it. You’ve done it. Almost everyone has. (Maybe not saints. Or Rich Froning. I’m pretty much going to bet though that Fitness Lonnie has some kind of victory dance for this moment.)

“Whew. I won’t be last today.”

It’s human nature. Our ego. The need to protect our fragile little psyche.

And it’s kind of wrong. Self-limiting, at best. Mostly, just kind of sad, when you think about it.

Because what would make us better would be a class of people better than us. A bunch of folks we’re chasing. A bunch of folks we’re pretty damn scared will catch us and pass us by. That would make us run faster, lift more, do more, be more.

Not playing big in the kiddie pool. Because you’re a big tough shark if you’re the only fin in the water.

Life’s a little different when you see fins above the surface everywhere.

Don’t just be happy for the competition that you can beat. Be thrilled that someone is going to challenge you today, make you work harder, make you earn every tiny victory. Or maybe defeat you and create the smoldering embers that will keep your fire burning —  a fire that may one day erupt into some greater victory than you ever dreamed of in this small battle today.

Be grateful for your competition, for used properly, they really are the key to your success. And that’s really why you’re here in this CrossFit class anyhow, and not just dancing around in your living room.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

Figuring Out What Not To Do

Figuring out what not to do: that’s a skill too. Something we forget about the importance of focus selection in our rush to do so much. And sometimes, that lesson takes a lifetime to learn.

I remember, soon after college, excitedly telling my sister about some saying like “Life is decided by what you do, not what you don’t.” I expected some big smile and nod of agreement. Instead, she turned to me with that special look — you know the one reserved for wayward puppies, or Grandpa when he has food on on his chin at Sunday dinner. “Lis,” she said, doling out the words like medicine crushed up with applesauce on a spoon, “That’s not you. You will try to do everything. The key to life, for you, is going to be deciding what not to do.”

As much as I hate to admit it, my sister was right. Have to guard against that Pacman attitude daily. Have to figure out what I should not do today, and what I should focus on instead. This is hard because, you see, all the candy in the store looks good. Whether I’m in the gym or the bookstore or at work, everything looks fantastic and I want to try it all, do it all, be it all.

Maybe that’s you too. Everything in the gym looks like fun, everything needs work, and you’re going to get stronger, faster, more agile all in one day. Or you’re the coach and you’re going to fix all 14 things wrong with that squat in 15 minutes.

Whoops. No, you’re not. Refocus. What to do. What not to do.

Stop. Think about it. Pick one thing to improve today. Work on it.

Breathe.

The gym will be there tomorrow. Improvement is a multi-step, multi-day, often multi-year process. And so it will be for your entire life, if you’re lucky.

Decide: What to do. What not to do. At least for today.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

Alone at the Bar

I spend a lot of time alone at the bar.

Not the one with glasses of happy juice and tales of crazy nights, followed by mornings with fuzzy teeth and crumpled-up dollar bills in your pockets.

I mean the iron one, with bearings and whip and faded sheen. The one you can hold in your hands and load with your burdens and hopefully still lift to your chest and then over your head, before you drop it and all falls away from you. Only for you to pick it up. Again … and again. The path to strength lies this way, in these knurls and collars and cold steel and memory — muscle memory, heart memory, life memory.

Both are places of pain, I suppose. With one you pay now, and with the other, you pay later.

Both are places we go to forget. To forget our emptiness, our aloneness, our essentially solitary path through this life, no matter how many people surround us or how much we fill our days. We spend so much time with bars.

But one bar can save. One has saved. While the other continues with her empty promises, her Siren calls, her whispers that never quite become the something more she teases about. She is a beautiful temptress who will break you in ways the other bar never could.

Spending a lot of time alone at the bar can be really good for you, as long as you choose your bar wisely …

The Cost

Bumpers forgive: this is one of the reasons we like them. When shit goes bad and we need to drop the bar, bumpers bounce. There is no permanent mark of our mistake, no forever heralding of our error, no scar that points to what we did wrong. No huge clang of metal plates announcing another failure. No dent in the wooden floor.

But we trick ourselves if we think they are safe.

No act — in the gym or in life — is really safe. All things have their dangers, their costs, their price. The real question posed to us is whether we are willing to pay the price. Whether we can stomach the cost. Whether it — this thing we want — is worth the cost.

No one knows that answer but you.

What in your life is worth the cost? This PR, that new skill, the blossoming of a relationship? What are you willing to pay and how will you pay it?

Everything has a price. Decide what you are willing to pay. Then shut up and pay it.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)