I wrote this blog in 2015, but I thought it’d be fun to repost it because it still applies today….
This past weekend I spent quite a few hours trying to teach my daughter Layla how to ride a bike without training wheels.
It was an insanely frustrating endeavor for me. Not because she didn’t get it at first, but because she kept taking her foot off the peddles. I would get her going and she’d peddle while I was pushing her and as soon as I let her go, she’d stop peddling and stick her feet straight out, well of course the bike careened left or right and stopped going. She was getting frustrated and I was getting frustrated trying to teach her. All she needed to do was keep peddling but she kept giving up early.
She kept complaining about how hard it was. There were tears, there were fussing, there was a lot of questions about, ‘Why is this so hard?’ and ‘Why can’t I get this, I’ve been trying forever?’ The funny thing is, she hadn’t been trying forever, she spent maybe 2 hours total trying over two days.
Finally, after hours of trying I got her to keep her feet on the peddles and she was able to ride fairly well, until of course she took her feet off the peddles again. The key was not in whether or not she could do it, but whether or not she kept trying. She needed to be consistent in order to accomplish the physical task.
Most physical tasks and skills that we attempt are not going to be picked up on the first try. Many won’t be learned on the second or third try either. When we are kids, we intuitively know that it takes practice go get something physical right. If we give up to early, we’ll never get it. If we treated walking when we were a baby, like we treat movements at the gym, we’d all be adults crawling on all fours. At CrossFit Bartlett, there will be movements that you pick up really quickly. There will also be movements that will take years to master. You have to try over and over again and celebrate your progress. If it were easy, you wouldn’t need a coach. You’d be in great shape, you’d pick up all the movements, and there’d be no reason to pay for training. The very fact that it is hard is what makes you grow as a person. Personal growth begins when you are challenged with things you can’t quite do, then you practice and master them, and that’s how we grow.
It takes practice and consistency to keep your feet on the peddles. Then eventually, you’ll master the movement.
3-30-17
MetCon:
5K Run
