Crippling the Army

As the saying goes, don’t ask your team to do something that it can’t realistically accomplish because all you’re doing is taking resources away from productive objectives that are achievable. You’ve mistakenly set your troops up to swallow failure rather than taste success and you’ve net crippled your team’s confidence and capability to do its job.

In the gym, I believe similar dynamics are at play with our goal setting when we ask ourselves to do something that too far exceeds above our established reach.

Did you know that not all of us can do the same things?

This will come off as negative to some, and I accept that. I willingly admit that my viewpoints tend to fall towards pragmatism versus blind belief in something. Pragmatic is simply an honest assessment of yourself, your willingness to work, and what you decide is best for you. It doesn’t mean that you short change yourself, it doesn’t mean that you don’t challenge yourself or set lofty goals, it just means you don’t act like Brick Tamland and point at things and say you want them. Do you really want a 450# deadlift or are you just pointing at things in the room and saying that you want them?

Let me tell you that back in my prime I was a terrible deadlifter. I have only deadlifted over 400 pounds twice in my life and both times I felt absolutely dreadful for about a week. Yet, here it was a point of achievement in our gym so how could I not pursue getting better at it? I tried and I tried, and still after over a year of work I was still God awful at it for someone of my fitness experience.

There are some things we just aren’t good at it and there isn’t always a great explanation. There are people out there who will never have a 500# deadlift. In fact, most won’t. There are women who will never do 10 pull-ups. In fact, most won’t. That is perfectly okay. It doesn’t mean that we can’t have a noble endeavor in the gym, life changing transformations, or goals that on a relative scale are equal to 10 pull-ups and fit who we are, uniquely.

However, I would certainly argue that if you get too caught up in what’s not attainable that you will miss all of the things that are. What the hell kind of way to go about fitness is that?

I don’t think there’s anything cool at all about being the gym or the coach that lets people cripple their army for fear of coming off as naysaying. Pragmatic doesn’t have to be come with a negative undertone. In fact, it should be freeing. If your body isn’t built for heavy back squatting, would you not want to know and accept that so you can apply your strength goals elsewhere and set yourself up to be strong and fit, not weak and broken?

You should say yes to that question. I promise you.

Ultimately, pragmatic thinking ensures that all of your army’s resources are working towards success, not detracting what it can achieve by pursuing foolish missions. You set and demand too many unrealistic goals of yourself, and sooner or later you’re goal setting calibration will become totally disoriented.

That’s when you quit.

Positivity and attainability do not have to be mutually exclusive. You just have to find the point where those two paths cross and chart a course.

-Dave