What Do You Say To Yourself?

"It's what you wear from ear to ear...and not from head to toe....that matters" You may recognize this line from the classic musical, Annie. I used to sing this song ALL the time growing up and it always perked me up! Let's go a step further and declare, it's way you SAY and HEAR from ear to ear that really matters.

It's what you think about.
It's what you think about what you're thinking about.
It's thinking...period.
It's about thinking good thoughts.
About having positive and great expectations for the outcomes of your situations.
It's about building yourself up.
It's about speaking that you are capable. And worthy.
It's about telling yourself YES I CAN.
And...I WILL.
It's all about what you tell yourself.

This topic actually greatly summarizes the purpose and meaning of "the well with all." What you speak about yourself not only to yourself, but to others can greatly affect outcomes and opportunities in your life.

A couple of weeks ago, I was training a friend. We were doing a 1-arm push press with a dumbbell. I handed her a 15 pound dumbbell (which we had never done before) and said, do as many as you can. She did 18 (and really she stopped because she had counted 15). We had both underestimated her capabilities. On the second set, I gave her a 20lb dumbbell with the same instruction. She struggled and couldn't seem to even press one rep. I said, "just get in 6 (reps)." All of a sudden she was superwoman and did it right away, with perfect form. I asked her why? She said, "I thought I had to do 15 again and I didn't think I could do it, but 6 seemed possible." Wow.. how often do we limit ourselves, based on how hard we think something is going to be?

On Saturday, we had workout 12.2 in the CrossFit Open. You did 3 sets of 30 snatches, increasing the weight with each set, and a timecap of 10-minutes. The second set prescribed a weight that I had previously never accomplished with this particular exercise.

Prior to my heat, one of the girls, whom I've seen grow into a suberb and determined athlete over the last couple years, seemed to believe that I would get to the third round. For some reason, I was being compared to these super-strong girls, and placed in a similar category. Now whether they were doing this too encourage me that I could definitely make head on the second set, or if they actually believed I could get to the third, I am not sure.

My brain was saying, "Have you seen me lately. I'm not exactly super-athlete material right. You are seeing something I am not right now."

But it did motivate me and encourage me that I will be better as I continue to get back in gear with my training (I will admit, I am SO much less sore this week than I have been in the past few weeks!)

Got through the first set no problem. 
Got 1 rep at the second weight and was thrilled.
Failed over and over for the next 2-3 minutes.

It was frustrating, because I knew I could do it and I knew my own mind was getting in my way.

Suddenly, I had a revelation and this is literally the conversation I had silently with myself:

"Monica, you said you could get one and that was your goal. So you got 1. You're failing now, because you only set the bar at 1. Other people think you can do 30. You know you can do more than what you are doing. Picture it, get set, go."

Guess what??!!

I hit the next rep.

Amazing, you might say. But truthfully, not really. I just got my mind right.

So my message today is well and simple:

If you are failing and you don't know why, check what you are telling yourself about yourself. Are you speaking victory over your goals, or defeat. Pour the right information into your brain and it will drown out the negative and the nay-say that might try and tell you--you can't.