Embrace the Journey . . .
Embracing the journey . . . Top left (2015), bottom left (2023), right (2024)
Over the next couple weeks, I’ll be seeing my favorite band, Pearl Jam, at four concerts in Los Angeles and Seattle. The band has written the soundtrack to my life; I’ve been to 20 of their concerts so far; and they will no doubt be part of my stories along the way here. I’ll write about the shows I go to, not because I am a fan of the music, but because there are fitness lessons to take from concerts – whether it is Pearl Jam or Taylor Swift. I jump and dance for hours at each show, and I can reach some of my highest strain levels on my WHOOP. There will be more about both Pearl Jam and WHOOP later, but now let’s get to today’s post . . .
Let me start by saying that, no matter what becomes of this blog, I’ve gotten more out of it this week than I ever imagined. I have received so many heartwarming and touching responses that have moved and inspired me. The breadth of the messages made me realize that this is about much more than fitness. My readers have shared their own personal struggles with weight, health, work, and life, explaining the impact my first post had on them in so many different ways. I’m grateful for the inspiring messages that I received. What occurred to me from all of this is something I’ve come to learn over this journey: Many of the steps I’ve taken in this process may be physical, but the journey is a mental one. In order to reach the physical changes that I reached, I had to change my mind first. For me, I had to stop letting failure lead to not trying because not trying is the only true failure. Trying is winning the day.
As I was preparing to launch Legally Fit, I came across this post on Instagram that I have probably thought about every day since I first saw it. Each message in the video struck me so hard, as they encompass all that I have learned about embracing the journey.
“The man who loves walking will walk further than the man who loves the destination.”
When starting a journey, it makes sense to set a destination and to plan how to get there. But think about what we say to someone going on a journey. Rarely do we say, “get there!” We say, “have a great trip,” “safe travels,” or “Bon voyage!” The focus is on the journey, not the destination. Think long and hard on this . . . If you have a great voyage, does it even matter at all whether you reach your planned destination? The voyage is every minute of every day of the journey; the destination is the side effect.
As I think about my journey, one point I want to make clear is that I am not writing this blog about a journey that I was on. It is about a journey that I am on, and I’ve just now invited you all to join me on it. I won’t ever say that I’ve figured this out because the journey never ends. I am here to share what I’ve learned so far and to share what I will learn as this ride goes on.
I’ve reached many destinations so far, encompassing everything from fitness to mental health, and as I reflect on each one, it’s the steps I took each day to get there – not the results that happened along the way – that make up the lessons I learned.
“What does a journey consist of? Sucking at something. Failing. Getting better. Learning. Start a new journey. Start it over. Do it again.”
Hearing other’s stories of their struggles, fears, and failures this past week has made think more about the need to talk about the days we lose rather than the ones we win – better yet, it’s the days we may feel like we lose. You might walk away from a day believing you failed, when the reality is that the win came from trying something hard.
In this blog, many of stories I tell about fitness are metaphors for life. It should be obvious, but it is not always apparent, that things get better. When you start something new, if it’s not easy, you are likely going to suck at it at first. The meaning of “suck” is relative, as we all have different levels of skill, talent, or ability going into something, but watch what happens over the process. One of my favorite lines that I hear from athletes is, “hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”
Early in my training days, even as my trainer inspired me to do more, work harder, and believe in what I was doing, I still felt out of place at a gym among all the other members. I believed I stood out like a sore thumb as I was surrounded by athletes who belonged there. Each session, I would see most of the same people at the gym who were each built like a rock. Then, several months into my training, still feeling way behind everyone else and struggling to work it all into my life, one of the strongest/fittest members at the gym (that’s how I looked at him) came over to me to say, “I just wanted you to know that you are killing it! Keep it up!” The point here is that while I was showing up, I had thought less about myself because I was not in line with others. I felt that I sucked at it and that I would not get to where I wanted to be. It turns out that all along, I was winning the day by sucking at it! The days that I felt like I accomplished nothing because I couldn’t do what I wanted to do, were the days that ultimately led to me eventually doing all of those things. But until I reached those heights, I never realized that those earlier days were really days that I won.
The concept here is true not only for fitness but for everything in life. I am pretty good at my day job, but when I first started, I made many mistakes along the way. There was a lot that I sucked at. I told my boss, “I can’t promise I won’t make a mistake, I can only promise that I won’t make that same mistake twice.” With each mistake, I got better. It’s no wonder that, “embrace the suck” has become such a motivational phrase.
Embracing the suck
“When you love the journey, the goals just happen. You hit milestones as a side effect.”
Over the past 10 years, I’ve reached milestones I never would have imagined reaching. When I thought about where my weight might end up if I kept doing what I was doing, I assumed it would still be obese, but that it may eventually just be less obese. What kept happening along the way, often at a slow pace, was that I reached new levels.
With each new level I reached, it created the opportunity to hit the next one, and then the next one. . . I have long surpassed any expectations, and the result of that has been that I now know anything is possible.
“When you fall in love with the journey, everything else takes care of itself.”
I chose this line for the cover of Legally Fit because the phrase says it all. From the comments I received this week, I now understand that this blog is about much more than physical fitness. Embracing any journey, whether physical, professional, or personal, is a mental process. One reader shared with me that she had been feeling extremely overwhelmed professionally right when she read the blog, and that my message made her realize that everything is going to be ok. She is at a place where I was on my professional journey many years ago, only I’m sure she doesn’t suck at it like I did back in the day. Everything will most definitely be ok when you embrace the journey.
As I look forward to the first Pearl Jam concert in LA tonight, I can’t help but feel that blogging about my journey is like writing a song. I know what the words I write mean to me, and I sing them to you in the voice that expresses my feelings and emotions. But what I see now is that what you get out of it comes from how my song makes you feel. I am touched by all the stories people shared with me in response to my first post and by the support I am receiving in this part of my journey. I am truly inspired by how this speaks to you in ways that I could never have imagined.
Thank you.
Aaron