The Only Movement That Matters Is the One You Are Doing Now

If you don’t CrossFit, I’m cool with that. If you CrossFit, I’m even happier. But, there are some folks out there obsessed with hating CrossFit and CrossFitters. That’s really funny when you think about it . . . and pathetic.

I don’t care if you drive a Chevy, a Ford, or a Toyota. I don’t care if you smoke or drink a lot — unless your smoke blows my way or your drunken ass gets in my path. You have the right to make what I might think are dumb decisions.

I don’t care if you have bad teeth, a horrible vocabulary, and you like to wear tin foil on your head and private parts. More power to you. Live your life the way you want, right up to the edges of where it affects mine.

I’m too busy serving to get into the business of undermining. Really, who the fuck has time for that?

So, let me offer a piece of advice (my own tin foil, I guess), whether you want it or not: If you find yourself getting absolutely red in the face, pulse rising, teeth clenched over what someone ELSE is doing, STOP. Think. Redirect yourself.

You cannot control anyone else — really — no matter how hard you try. But you can control yourself. You can direct your own efforts. You can make a difference. And in doing these things, you can better your life and the lives of those you love.

Work on you. Help those who want and need and will accept your help. Fight where you need to fight and where your efforts can yield results. Drive on past the other battles. Ignore the tin foil. Build. Live. Love. Succeed.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

You and I

You and I. That’s what it really comes down. That’s really all we need.

We think we need more. We think we need SO much more. We THINK we need.

But we don’t.

If we have a barbell, great. If we have a room full of other CrossFitters, awesome. If we have a 5000 sf box filled with kettlebells and rowers and medicine balls and bumpers, fantastic.

But if we only have a stretch of dirt and ourselves?

We can still CrossFit.

Throw away the notion of what you think you need, and truly realize your actual needs. Maybe more really is more if you are okay with less . . . and, if not, maybe more is a big old anchor dragging you down.

You and I. 3-2-1-Go.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

 

Beyond Broken

We are all broken. Show me someone who says they are perfectly unharmed and I’m looking at a liar, or someone trying desperately to put up a brave front.

None of us get through life in an inviolate state. There is no one left unscathed; only those who have managed to bounce back quicker or higher.

And yet we find our sanctuaries. Places that help us to heal, to put ourselves back together, to make us stronger, to grow the scars over the wounds. For some of us, that place is the gym, it is CrossFit, it is the WOD.

Some of us come to these places to heal somehow through fire. Like a heat that cauterizes the wound, the new pain takes the old pain away. We go deeper into the darkness in order to escape, to free ourselves. We go through in order to get through, to emerge on the other side into the light, to fall in triumph, and exhaustion, and some kind of gratitude that such light even exists. We don’t want to escape for just right now, we want to go beyond and leave the pain, make it a memory, abandon it like a sandbag after the run, a barbell after the workout, an empty water bottle. We used that pain, and now we can walk away from it.

It makes no sense to the others, the people outside our circle, who don’t understand . . . yet.

It’s hard to understand that the tight cornering and jarring ride of the sports car is somehow preferable to the cushioned, soft travel of the Cadillac. It’s hard to understand that you can feel discomfort without being consumed by it — and that it somehow helps you to find your way.

But we know. And, hopefully, we’re moving beyond broken, with every workout and every day.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

Evolving

Everything changes, or it dies out. Nature is pretty brutal that way. Adapters survive.

People love to reminisce about the early days of anything. That’s human nature. “Remember back when . . .” “It was better when we used to . . .”

And that’s okay. Things always seem simpler and better in retrospect.

Present day is hard.

Challenges are hard.

Changing is hard.

Life is hard.

CrossFit is hard.

Thinking about glories of the past is an easier task. Fun. You’d much rather talk about the first time that you did “Fran” than actually do “Fran”, right?

Good things don’t usually stay small, or quiet, for long. We love to share what we love. And that’s okay too.

Just because something isn’t new anymore doesn’t mean it isn’t still awesome. But awesome isn’t an end state anyhow. You just got to work hard for awesomeness every single day.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

 

 

 

Fight

Fight.

You fight. I’m talking to you. Don’t let this world get the best of you. Don’t let it take you alive. Don’t let this world beat you until you give up. No matter what happens, you keep going. Sure, life is going to pummel you but dammit you better fight back. Kick, scratch, claw, do whatever it takes to keep breathing, keep going, to stay alive.

All you have — all you’ve ever had, really — is heart. A whole lot of fucking heart. Don’t give it up now.

Lots of people have given up on this life, on their loves, on this world. Don’t be one of them. Don’t walk this earth with a life foregone but not yet ended.

Fight.

Simply refuse to be defeated. Refuse to go down. Refuse to be one of the ones who never really made it, who never really got what they wanted, who lived a life less than they could have.

Fight until your last moment, your last thought, your last breath.

Rage on. Don’t just live. Rage.

The light only dies if you let it. Don’t fucking let it. Fight.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

We All Suck

We all suck. That’s the first step. If you can admit you suck at something, then you’ve got a chance — because you’ve got heart.

See, we speak so much of the valiant efforts of the accomplished, the winners, those who distinguish themselves in competition and trial that we often forget that the most heart is unseen. The biggest effort in many gyms often happens before the WOD ever starts, before the “3-2-1-Go!”, before the first warm-up, before the first hello.

The biggest effort is often just walking through the door. Think about it.

People — grown adults — show up in CrossFit gyms to learn, to admit that they don’t know everything, that they’re not accomplished at everything, that they need help, they need to learn, they need to grow. It’s a declaration no one wants to make. Our ego fights against it. We pride ourselves on knowing what to do, what to say, how to be. We are adults, after all. Our bravado masks our fear of the world.

And in the CrossFit gym, we take off those masks and simply lay bare our fear in many, many domains and aspects. And we try. We fail. And we try again. Maybe (hopefully!) we eventually succeed: at this skill, at that movement, in this WOD, in that goal.

But it all starts with the walk though the door, the admittance that you suck at something, at many things.

You suck, so what. We all do. Welcome to the road to success.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

 

 

The Saving Grace of Action

Thought and action: you need both, but sometimes the order will vary.

Thoughts and words build strength like the barbell does: the strength in your mind. If you don’t have your mind right, then whatever amount of muscle and sinew you bring to the workout will never be enough. Whatever speed you have on the barbell will never be enough. Whatever fight you bring to the fight will never be enough.

So get your mind right and get your workout right. But, remember, it’s not a chicken-and-egg thing. One doesn’t always come before the other. Sometimes, you’ll need the right mindset to lift. Sometimes you need to lift to get to the right mindset.

Sitting around on your ass is never the solution. Work your brain, work your body, work your soul.

Get moving . . . and life always improves.

(Image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

 

 

This Bar Is Light

Today’s post is located over on the CrossFit Goal Setting page: This Bar Is Light

(This image courtesy of Nicole Bedard Photography.)

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