I’ve contemplated doing this silently for a while. I’ve started it several times and barely made it a week without missing something on the list… but nobody knew so it was okay.
Bullshit.
I knew.
I knew that I missed a mark and started over day after day. At first, I was proud of myself for starting over and not beating myself up about it, but then I realized that was bullshit too. The fact is, I wasn’t committed. Which is I wasn’t following through. So I stopped re-starting but it’s still been on my mind. Like “when am I going to start again?” had been in the back of my thoughts ever since.
Here’s the thing, follow-through is one of the most important things to me. It’s always been a core belief that was instilled in me, “be a man of your word”. And even more so as I’ve gone deeper and deeper into my study of human behavior and the way things like this affect our self-worth, mindset, and confidence. Knowing how much not doing what you say you’re going to do negatively affects your… well your everything, makes it even more important to me than ever before.
Plus, not doing what I say I’m going to do feels like lying to me. Taking shortcuts feels like lying to me. Not staying strong to my own standards feels like lying to me.
So, this morning I was having a conversation with my biz bff about her adventure with this program I’ve been dancing around and she made it to day 55… Fit in every single thing, every single day (which is insanely massive for her because half of the things on her list are deeply out of her comfort zone) but yesterday she missed one item. Arguably the smallest item on the daily list, but she missed it. So today, she’s starting over at Day 1.
I couldn’t be more proud of her and here’s why; MOST wouldn’t start over. She got the workouts in, she drank the water, she ate the food, she did the things, the hardest things (in most people’s opinions) but that one little item she missed. MOST would look past it and call today Day 56. They would complete the challenge and claim to have finished in 19 days from now. They would post about it and be proud of themselves. Mission accomplished… but internally, whether you realize it or not, that lie would be damaging things you didn’t even know about.
Here’s the thing, it would still be an accomplishment BUT it would also be a lie. The point of this challenge is to build your mental strength more than anything. The point is to push yourself. The point is to stay true to your word and your promise you made to yourself to complete the list, the whole list every day and if you miss one item, one time, you start over. That’s the deal. That’s the deal you make with yourself when you start. So what does it do to your belief in yourself if you lie about fully completing everything? It breaks you down more than you realize. It reinforces something that we all have creeping within us somewhere that “almost counts” or it’s “okay to slide by” or “no one else knows so it doesn’t matter.”
Again, BULLSHIT. It does matter. INTEGRITY MATTERS.
But the majority don’t think this way and instead operate every day sliding by. They don’t take the act of not being truthful with yourself serious and it’s the root of most of our problems.
Look, no one is asking you to be perfect. That’s not the point, the point is to be true. The point is to be in integrity with what you do and the promises you make to yourself, and other people for that matter.
Back to my own back and forth with this challenge… Let’s just clarify that I’m also not a fan of “jumping on the bandwagon” and as lame as that may be that’s also why I didn’t start before. Also, when this first came out I was on a strict regimen that was working super well for me, while also doing some of the deepest darkest emotional healing of my life so I wasn’t interested in changing my routine.
Now, these past few months… I’ve been in need of a change. Of a reset. I’ve been working to recommit to the stellar plans and routines I already have, that I know already work. But in the midst of that, it hit me, What if I was operating at maximum effort every day? If I can get this much accomplished at this level, what if I turned it all up a notch? I’m not saying what I’m doing isn’t enough, because it is but I want more. So here I am, tossing around the idea of how to commit to this challenge because I know it’s time.
During this conversation with my friend this morning I realized, being silent about starting this challenge was actually my way of not committing. (Hello Self-Awareness!)
What I know to be true about me is that anything I say I’m going to do publicly to you all, I follow through on because it’s extremely important to me to walk my talk. So by NOT saying it publicly, I was giving myself an out.
I’m done with that now. I obviously need to recommit to myself, not just you and this challenge is the perfect way to do just that.
Thank you, Universe for the lesson you gave me through my friend this morning. Thank you for shining a light and bringing me full circle with this. My mind needed that. I trust your timing and now it’s time to get after it.
Day 1.