Having the courage to continuously work on your fitness.
The creation of this blog happened when I was driving to the gym one day, when I heard a motivational speaker came onto my playlist at a random time. The motivational speaker’s name is TD Jakes. Jakes asks his audience in one his many speeches
“Do you have the courage to act outwardly, on what you see inwardly? Or will you die a dreamer? Will you die on the verge and on the edge in the land of coulda, woulda, and shoulda?”
“I am going to drop something on you. It takes courage to be successful. It is far easier to not be successful. Misery will always have company. Success breeds contempt. If you don’t want to make waves, be mediocre, be normal and fit in.”
“It takes courage to be different, it takes courage to be exceptional…..It takes courage to be successful, it takes courage to win, people don’t talk about people that don’t win, if you win they going to talk about you.”
For some reason this struck a chord with me and with my current fitness training and other referees that I am currently helping guide on their fitness. Referee fitness is something that every referee must possess; however each referee has a different journey. Where they start, what they need to work on, how to improve, what each next level demands out of you.
What I love about his speech is how he puts the responsibility back on his crowd. Almost a dare to do something courageous and be great. When I was in high school and playing sports, I felt that I could always be better than what I was - I wanted to make sure gave 120% and I left everything I had out on the field or court. I didn’t want to think back in 5, 10, 20 plus years and think I could have done more, or I could have given more effort; I wanted to have zero regrets and not live in the land of coulda, woulda, shoulda. In many ways this motivation carried me through to my collegiate sports, refereeing, and now fitness training.
What I love about referee fitness training is its ability to test not only the physical side but also the mental side. It takes a certain amount of courage to push the body and mind to the limit, repeatedly. It also takes someone special who doesn’t want to live in a normal, mediocre, fit-in world. No one is ever gifted with great fitness - it is something that must be continuously worked on all the time. Always challenging and pushing yourself to a higher level, to try to be 100% better everyday. How good do you want to be? How hard can you push yourself?
Quoting a former coach of mine,
“If the world were a perfect place, we could all sit on the couch, watch tv, eat potato chips and be world champions”
Unfortunately, we all know the world is not a perfect place and to achieve what we want in life - it will take hard work; and the courage to continuously keep doing every day. As TD Jakes dared his crowd of listeners to have the courage to be great; I am now daring all my readers and listeners to have the courage to continuously work on your physical/mental fitness and push yourself further then you have been before, with one simple question;
- “HOW COURAGEOUS ARE YOU?”