What divides people who quit from people who never quit? They certainly both go through failures and set-backs. What makes one person give up and another keep going?
Fellow club member Margo took photos at the recent Freezefest 5K. There’s a picture of me after the race. Let’s just say, I wasn’t a happy camper. I had a bad run and afterwards I just wanted to be alone, questioning why I kept trying to do this crazy sport.
The voices of negativity in my head can be pretty loud. It's easy to get down on yourself when you don't get the performance you want and think, "maybe I just can't do it."
I know I have a right to be disappointed. I have a right to feel bad when things don't go the way I wanted, or I feel like I failed. However, I give myself a limit on how long I can feel sorry for myself. After a certain amount of time, I say, "Okay, the pity party is over. What are you going to do to fix this? What are you doing to do to have better results?"
The following is a quote that I have often read in fitness books. "Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat."
It's better to take a risk, to try and to keep trying, then to wonder why you never took a chance.
One of the quotes that has always stuck with me throughout my life is, "I don't regret the things I've done, only the things I haven't done." I've made my share of mistakes and it's easy to say I would have done some things differently. The mistakes you make in life, however, shape who you are as a person. At the end, when you look back at the history of your life, your real regrets will be the things that you didn't do. I don't want to think that I never tried, or that I quit when I should have kept going.
One of the great things I have read is that "there is no failure, only feedback." You don't "fail" you only get results. People who don't quit know that when they try something and it doesn't work, it is not a permanent failure. They say, "I produced a result and it's only temporary." They mentally process what happened as a learning experience and as feedback, not failure.
If you learn from the experience, don't repeat what doesn't work and keep trying, you will eventually find what does work and you will succeed. That can apply to your training and to anything you try to achieve.
As you head into these final weeks before you begin your season, remember that. The obstacles and set-backs are only temporary. They are just a crook in the road until you find the real path you need to take. No failure, only feedback.
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