strong is beautiful: a matter of inches

Victory is won not in miles but in inches. Win a little now, hold your ground, and later, win a little more. Louis L'Amour

we talk A LOT about success. what we consider it to be. how we measure it. what it takes to get there. and like everything else in life we spend time beating ourselves up over it. what does it take to be truly successful?? who knows really? success can be measured in a million different ways. but the one thing that stays consistent is that we try to MEASURE it.

so where do you start? clearly there is the existential "success" - being a good person, raising good children, not killing anyone. you know, the biggies. but on a day to day basis, what do we consider success? most people measure this in either accomplishment or money. since i am not touching the topic of money ANYWHERE near this blog (or anywhere else for that matter), we are gonna focus on ACCOMPLISHMENT, aka kicking ass and taking names :)

“Start by doing what’s necessary, then what’s possible, and suddenly you are doing the impossible.” Francis of Assisi

success in the gym happens daily....which is a big part of why i absolutely love it. i get to watch people accomplish things every single day that they never thought they would be able to do. its motivating and its super EMPOWERING. your body is capable of impressive shit. and i have a front row seat watching the action! interestingly enough, i think one of biggest challenges as a whole, is not giving ourselves enough credit. THAT is what i'm talking about today.

When eating an elephant take one bite at a time. Creighton Abrams

generally, we set big goals for ourselves. you want to lose 20 pounds, run a marathon, do 100 pullups. whatever they are, they take a butt ton of work to accomplish. that's why they are goals, right. if they were easy, then we would already be doing them. duh. but what happens on the way to REACHING those goals? about 1000 other smaller successful moments. that we don't notice or pay attention to. and that is where the real magic is happening. if we can just get better at recognizing the smaller daily or weekly accomplishments, those larger out of reach goals suddenly seem totally manageable. because we are making progress towards them every single day. pretty cool.

so instead of focusing on how far we have left to go, we need to start looking at how far we have come. i know people constantly tell you not to look back - the future lies ahead and all that. but when it comes to success - you HAVE to look back. fitness is a series of milestones. as is weight loss. you cant magically jump from here to there, even though we wish we could. its unrealistic to wish for overnight success. but long-term success is 100% attainable. when we take those small bites.

“Triumphs without difficulties are empty. Indeed, it is difficulties that make the triumph. It is no feat to travel the smooth road.” Unknown

i have witnessed first real pushups, first box jumps & first handstand pushups. i have watched the numbers increase on weight, reps & heights. i have seen people lose weight & gain muscle. I even have watched someone recently figure out how to keep weight ON. its all such good stuff. and it happens all the freaking time. i try to make a point of calling it out when i witness it. but im not always there. we need to start recognizing it ourselves. applauding our own efforts. recognizing personally how much we are getting done. and then feeling really really good about it. that is the part that will keep us motivated to CONTINUE doing super cool stuff.

so today i got my first 30" box jump (since impaling my leg after my first attempt). i wish i could tell you how intimidated i have been about trying it. everyday i watch people jump on that box like its nothing. and i mentally beat myself up over it. i talk down to myself about my inability to do this one freaking thing. its ridiculous. but it weighs on me. and im guessing you all have those same internal conversations. the reason i was able to do this TODAY is because someone else inadvertently handed me something i needed. that neither of us recognized. and it was a compromise. traditional boxes are 20", 24" & 30". and i could not make that 6" leap. wasnt happening physically or mentally. but one of my people brought in a self designed 24", 28" & 36" box. and THAT made all the difference. 4" didnt seem so hard. that 28" box was literally an AHA moment. complete with stars shining down and everything. i could TOTALLY do 28. and from there, 30 didn't seem so hard. its' the same 6 inches. just broken down into smaller, more palatable bites. THAT is how its done.