There are so many talented writers out there creating CrossFit blogs, and every time I come across a post that leaves me speechless, I’m going to share it with you guys. While some posts make more sense to people who are active CrossFitter, others just resonate on a very deep level to just about anyone. This is one of those posts.
The latest blog that I came across is “The CrossFit Gamer; the thoughts, musings and opinions of Alec Hanson”. The title of this post is “Why you matter enough to face the pain”. I’ll paste the entire post here below, but feel free to click the title below to get pointed directly to his site. It’s a really good read.
...pain is weakness leaving the body...
“You matter. Period. Somewhere along the lines of our lives we believe we don’t, at least not “that” much anyway.
Some of us have parents who tell us we matter, some are not so lucky. But shortly, we learn we are only as valuable as what we can accomplish. School tells us we matter if we get the best grades. Sports tell us we matter if we can beat the other guy. Our friends and peers tell us we matter if we can somehow be cooler than everyone else.
And we always fall short, don’t we? There is always someone smarter, someone more athletic, and someone just cooler than all of us. And in this wild ride of becoming who we are today, we forget that we matter. We try our best to recreate our own importance; through our efforts and tribulations we strive to hear from others the validation that we have worth, that we are valuable and important, that we matter.
We stack rank ourselves against everyone on a hierarchical ladder we make up based on a value system of intrinsic worth that we piecemeal together from various life experiences, of which we define through other paradigms and life experiences, many of which we simply witness and somehow believe to be God’s given truth.
Basically, it’s all made up shit we’ve come to believe, accept, and allow to run our lives. It’s a worldview we live our lives by, controlled absolutely by paradigms we don’t even know are controlling us.
Well, in all that bleakness and confusion surrounding our “real” selves, there is a ray of hope. There is a way to begin to unearth and behold your intrinsic value. It will take work, but it will be worth it.
During your next CrossFit workout, I want you to go deep. I want you to pour out yourself and take your mind and body to the point where the only sound is the thumping of your rapid heartbeat and the roar of your burning lungs. That place where the voices of doubt, self-loathing and fear, begin to get stripped back and drowned out and that small whisper of your true self can be heard. I want you to go there and find your self again.
And in that moment, in that space of pain and exhaustion, you will find that you are worth the pain. You will see that you are worth going through that pain and that on the other side, you are worthy and capable of achieving amazing things. You may even PR the workout, or not. It doesn’t really matter. What matters is that through that blackness you get to rediscover that you are worth it. You are worth the pain to become the person you are destined to be. You get to remember that you have a burning sun inside your body and mind, an unlimited power built inside you screaming for release.
You are worth more than a mediocre life with mediocre results. You are worth more than a paycheck, a balance sheet, or someone else’s opinion. You are worth the pain.
It’s my hope for you that you will have the chance to meet that person the next time you CrossFit. The “real” you. The “you” that is filled with an indomitable will and ability, the “you” that can take on anything, and the “you” that is worth all the success, all the passion, and all the love this life has to offer.
It’s all yours and it’s all possible with just one little dive into the heart of pain.”
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