SURROUNDED BY SHARKS? BECOME ONE

There is a Japanese story about how fishermen had a problem to get fresh fish. Each time, they had to sail farther away in order to fulfill the market demands, but some fish arrived dead and most of them did not have that fresh taste that Japanese clients wanted. Fishermen noticed that fish were bored of swimming in a small space with no purpose, so they decided to put the fish in bigger tanks and with small sharks, and IT WORKED! Fish arrived more alive than ever, they did not stop swimming, they were worried for their lives; and of course, sharks ate some of them, but this was a great fix.

This is what I see in every Crossfit box I have visited. The most competitive athletes know that if they want to improve they have to be measured against the best. These people know that they have to train at a certain time so they can be with people that push them, or they get together to increase their motivation. I remember one clear example of this: a top elite athlete, Stacie Tovar, visited Peru and decided to participate in an international competition held at a local Crossfit box. The best female Latin-American athlete in the heat was head to head with Stacie, she gave it all, we all could see that she was pushing hard, and she came very close to beat her. I’m pretty sure this event made her a better athlete, that competition made her stronger even though she didn’t win.

I believe it is wise to surround ourselves with sharks, people who inspire us to be faster, stronger and more resourceful. Being close to them makes us feel alive, and when we least expect it, we’ll become a shark for someone else.

Emotional Injuries

We work on our strength every day, work on our resistance and skills, but do we work on our mind? We know we need a strong mind if we want to become better athletes. Sometimes people let their mental wellness be just a beneficial outcome of working out and taking care of their body.

What if we are not in a working out mood, if we feel frustrated practicing a difficult skill or if we feel stressed about something that happened at work or just having a bad day? We feel bad about ourselves and think that we are not good in something. What are we supposed to do then? We have a life outside the gym and it affects our training, so everything has to stay balanced.

An option is to wait for the problem to go away, but that is like doing nothing about the “injury” up there in our minds. Doing nothing to confront those feelings will make our mind trick us in the future. Another day will come when our mind will tell us, during a difficult workout, that we cannot do it, that it is too hard, and soon we will stop trying to overcome those obstacles. It will be so easy to convince ourselves that is how things are and it will be hard to get out of that mindset.

We have to STOP that thinking process as soon as we become aware of it. Let’s practice a new habit: thinking or listing all the positive things that are good in life. Try to think about how far you’ve come, think about all the times you were STRONG and used your mind to focus on what you are GOOD at, all the things that made you learn new ways to get out of difficult situations. Be kind to yourself, do not repeat to yourself all the things you cannot do right now, do the exact opposite and take action. Can you imagine all the things you could do if your mind trusted everything your body is able to do?

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