fail
“Don’t be discouraged by the lack of result”.
My coach said quietly. I’d literally just written LOL KILL YOURSELF in my training diary next to what was meant to be 2X2 snatches at 90%, and in reality was not that. My coach has this knack of gently making you aware of how ridiculous your thoughts are in a way that pulls you back in off your ledge, without ever having to move from his seat or change the tone of his voice. To me that’s a skill far beyond teaching someone the correct bar path or overhead position. Why is it that in this sport we put so much pressure on the result, when you literally have two outcomes, to make or to miss a lift. The thing I’m trying to come to terms with, which really extends far beyond training, is that regardless of the result, the effort you put in to achieving the outcome is always worth it.
I haven’t always thought that though, frequently writing off entire relationships or periods of my life as being a complete waste of fucking time, just because I didn’t get the result I wanted, whether that was a happily-ever-after (is this even a thing anyway?) or a lasting career, or whatever else. The thing is though, if you write off every ‘failure’ as a waste of time, what are you left with? Chances are you currently have one partner and one job at most, and chances are (sorry) that at least one of those things is not going to see you through to your death bed. So to deem every other experience that didn’t result in lasting success as a waste of time seems really fucking stupid.
Don’t get me wrong, failing feels like shit. Whether it’s missing a lift, breaking up, or realising that the career path you’ve been on for years is no longer congruent with your values or lifestyle…this all blows or sucks or whatever action you feel best resonates with you. But you don’t really learn anything from the successes, if you think about it. What weightlifting has taught me is that ‘failing’, whilst a shit feeling, is more productive in terms of learning than the successes are. Failing teaches me that I did something specifically wrong, my set up was rushed or my pull too slow, my knees shot back or I didn’t extend or shrug enough or maybe I did all those things perfectly and it just wasn’t there in that moment…whatever the reason that’s one (or many) more things I know DON’T work, so I’m one step closer to finding something that does.
Similarly with a relationship or career, you can most likely learn something from the experience if you want to. Not everything doesn’t work out because your ex boss or partner was a giant cunt (this is definitely still a thing though). Quite possibly there’s something you could have done differently. I’m not saying we should all be taking full responsibility for every misstep in our lives, but there is certainly good reason to look at our actions and be honest with ourselves rather than blaming things we have no control over. If there’s a distraction in the training hall and I miss a lift, is it completely the fault of the fuck stick walking behind my platform while I’m setting up, or should I have worked harder to ignore the distraction? (Seriously though, please stop).
How often do we do that? Really think about why we failed? It’s so easy to write off an unsuccessful relationship, friendship, or job as being just a mistake and charging the fuck back onto Seek, Tinder, Grinder, or possibly Gumtree. In relationships, friendships, or careers we literally have two outcomes: it not working out, for whatever reason, or sticking with it until we die. Same as in weightlifting, there’s a fairly high possibility of missing the mark. Literally a 50% chance, because maths. If we are discounting 50% of our life experiences as a waste of time then we are leaving a shit tonne of learning experiences on the table.
There’s that saying ‘win or learn’, and yeah it’s cliche as fuck but it’s true. So you can either take the lessons and use them to aid your future successes, or you can sit there calling yourself a piece of shit and writing emo crap in your training diary. Basically.
