I was listening to a podcast earlier this week -Aubrey Marcus #204- and the guest was a busy CEO explaining how she took up surfing years ago, and even though she has improved, she still sucks.
This reminded me immediately of an old EliteFTS shirt (from the Philosophical School of Dave Tate) - Shit, Suck, Good, Great.
Given her example -
If you can't swim or can't stand up on the board, you're Shit.
If you can paddle out, stand up, and catch a lucky wave, you Suck.
Maybe you catch most of the waves- I guess that's Good, and Great would be a professional surfer, right?
She's been doing this for years and she still sucks (in her words), so why would she continue to do it? She makes some excellent points in the podcast...
By putting yourself in a situation where you suck, you starve your ego and are forced to be VULNERABLE. When you're vulnerable, you can you GROW. When you grow, you can move past FEAR and SELF LIMITING BELIEFS. When you can move past those things, you can do ANYTHING.
The return on investment sounds pretty damn good, just for doing something you suck at.
Put this in context of 'big fish, little pond.' How many lifters do you know of that are scared to leave their little pond and go train with the bigger fish? We all have an ego- it's part of why we love this sport. But if you truly want to be the best you can be, you have to be willing to go from the 'good' lifter to the 'shit' or 'suck' lifter. It forces you to be vulnerable, which will give you the opportunity to grow. It's pretty simple.
In another example, last year I took up yoga. At first it was for stress relief, which was a success. But then I started to realize how it made me feel in my life outside of class- I was present with how much I sucked. I was out of breath. I couldn't get into at least half of the poses. I had to take breaks every ten minutes. But my confidence grew- not in my ability to do yoga- but in my ability to take on whatever came my way outside of yoga. I'm not self-conscious in the 'everyone is looking at me way,' but I was in the sense of 'what would people think if they found out I was taking yoga'? And I realized I didn't care! So continuing to do something I suck at, and may always suck at, is great.
