The humility of week one.

In my last post I briefly discussed this new work out routine Martina and I are trying, and now that week one is essentially done (I still have today's leg work out to do), I thought I would reflect back on how hard starting is.

Two years ago when this journey began, EVERYTHING was so hard. I knew that would happen, but what I did not necessarily expect was how humbling it all would be. I have never in my life pretended to be in any sort of shape, but I grew up playing sports and being physical, so I thought I had a good base line. I was wrong. There are so many things my body just was not capable of doing when I started. Most people give up because of that, I would imagine. Why would I put myself through the humiliation of not being able to do a push up? Easy, I just won't. That is my thinking for most of my life. I often faked injuries during the mile run at P.E because I knew I would be last and who needed that humiliation in middle school or high school. Do not even get me started on the President's fitness test twice a year. Are you kidding me? What kind of torture is that for an obese teenager who already had issues with being mocked, now I have to attempt push ups, pull ups and other embarrassing things IN FRONT OF MY WHOLE CLASS? When high school ended, I did away with any thoughts of ever doing push ups again.

Then CrossFit entered my life. I quickly learned the difference between being humiliated by something and being humbled by something. When CrossFit started I could not do a single unmodified push up. I looked around and saw a variety of people in various states of fitness just trying, so that is what I did. I just kept trying. I said, well I cannot do that now, but I will. I will be humbled by my own physical limitations, but I will not quit and I will not be humiliated by them. After all, everyone has to start somewhere, right? As CrossFit went on, I could feel myself getting stronger, and I could do things I never thought possible. I did 5 unmodified push ups before our CrossFit membership ran out. I went from zero to five. I had not done a legit push up since who knows, but when you look at yourself and realize the difference between what you can do at that moment and what you are capable of doing in the future, an entire treasure chest of confidence opens up. Being humbled by my limitations served me very well during CrossFit.

That brings us to last week. I did 2 unmodified push ups. It was the bitterest of pills to realize that in half a year I had lost 3 push ups. I also felt very embarrassed by what I was able to do this last week. I know it is a fraction of what I was doing a mere 6 months ago. I wanted to quit. I wanted to just throw my hands up and say, well it was fun while it lasted, but let's be real about who I am. I am an obese 33 year old, and that is what I am meant to be. I did not give up though. I did my modified push ups, logged what I was able to do, and thought to myself, that is still 2 more push ups than you were doing 2 years ago.

This last week was extremely tough for me in many ways. My students came back to school, and were hit with a doozy of an assignment from me and they have been fighting me all week leaving me just feeling awful about myself. I know that I am still learning the job, and that the constant complaining from students is never going to end, but for some reason it was harder for me to deal with this week. It all felt so personal and combative. Then I would go home and suck hard at my work outs, and it felt like I could not win no matter what I did. At some point though, I realized that I had the chance to decide what these work outs meant to me. I had the opportunity to allow myself to be humbled by what I was doing, instead of being humiliated by them. I am not sure if that is going to make me feel any better about 2 push ups, but I also realize that in a few weeks it will be more than 2 push ups, as long as I keep putting in the work!

Week one of anything is the toughest. Week one is when you are still mentally unsure of what you are doing It is before routine has set in, and you understand exactly what you are doing. Week one is where your insecurities are most vocal. But week one ends, and if you are still moving forward, even at a crawl, then you beat week one. I have beaten many week ones in this journey, this was just another week one to hurdle. Now we attack week 2 with the confidence that it will be better than week one. Let's all be humbled, instead of humiliated.