We've all heard the adage, no pain no gain. If you have ever played sports you've heard it for sure. I personally used to think it was bullshit, but the more I thought about it, the more truth there was to it.
I know quite a few people who had the same mentality. We thought you had to go through pain to progress. Then I simply changed my definition of pain. I think the phrase itself doesn't have to mean literal pain. Pain can mean discomfort. We all experience discomfort at some point on some level, whether it's doing something you don't want to do like, speaking in front of an audience, getting pulled up on a dance floor when you clearly have the rhythm of a bamboo stick or being pushed in the gym.
Typically, what happens when we feel discomfort or a forced out of our comfort zone one of two things happens. We either one, say screw this, I don't like this and ignore or make all the excuses in the world to avoid that situation or we say screw this I'm going to give it a go and see what happens.
The former will not help you progress in most cases. By avoiding discomfort, we miss out on some key skills that can give us the life, the body, the relationship, the career that we truly desire. We miss out on failure. Failing is part of progress. When we fail it gives us an opportunity to learn and move forward. We miss out on courage. When we fail to be courageous we miss an opportunity to show our character, that we can face adversity and get through the other side. We miss out on risk. When we don't take risks, we lose the opportunity to have something we've never had. Sometimes you must have blind faith and believe in yourself and others. The sad part is risk is everywhere and we don't realize it. Life is a risk because there's a good chance we will never make it out alive. We miss out on vulnerability. When we miss the chance to be vulnerable we miss the chance to be silly, to show our true feelings, to love as we know we should. By missing these things, we miss out on life.
When we say yes to discomfort, we can instantly become more confident in who we are, even if we do fail, because we gave it a go. We didn't try to do something, we actually did it. We said screw it, what's the worst that can happen, but also ask the question, what's the best that can happen?
When we feel these moments of discomfort, if we don't take action within the first 5 seconds of the initiation of the situation we will ultimately talk ourselves out of it. So, when you feel discomfort or pain, act immediately and have no regrets just because it might make you feel uncomfortable. Push through that barrier of discomfort and see where it takes you. You just might become the phoenix and shed an old version of yourself and become a more confident, courageous, successful and risk-taking version of yourself.
I say all of that to say this. When you are training and you feel yourself running out of breath, muscles aching, feeling exhausted, weights are heavy and the end is nowhere in sight, push through that moment of pain because on the other side is your results. Push through the pain and use that pain drive you, to propel you to the next level where you