The great thing about learning is that it is not confined to certain times or a specific location. Learning can happen anytime, anywhere.
I like to highlight this fact by, once a month, looking at things we encounter on a daily basis and seeing what important lesson we can from them.
In today’s installment of “Five Things We Can Learn From Everyday Objects” we are going to talk about something that we wish we encountered everyday, but more likely it is every other day…or every week…or every other week…or everyday in the first week in January after we make our New Year’s resolutions…the gym.
5 Things We Can Learn From The Gym
1. We Are All At Different Levels
When I am at the gym and see a huge dude squatting 500 pounds, a few thoughts cross my mind. 1) How do his knees not explode while doing that? 2) Does he have to yell so loud? 3) Does that little belt actually do anything? 4) How many other people in this gym would it take to get that bar back up if this guy fails?
I may stop and wonder these things, but not once do I see a person whose legs are as thick as tree trunks and think, “I should be able to do that.” At the gym, everyone is on a different level. And that is okay. Some people have been working out for 30 years. Some have been working out for 30 days. The man who just started at the gym shouldn’t expect to bench press as much as the woman who has worked out for years.
I wouldn’t expect to be able to squat 500 pounds like the huge dude at the gym, but for some reason that mindset doesn’t carry over into my professional life. When my latest book came out, in the back of my mind, I expected it to hit sales records the likes of which are known to Dr. Seuss. If that was my only goal, you could say I’m failing worse than I would have if I tried to squat 500 pounds.
For some reason I expect my level to be the same as people who are way more advanced in my field. Hopefully I will get there someday. But in the meantime, I need to remember that we are all on different levels. And that is okay.
2. We Won’t Get Anywhere If We Spend The Whole Time Looking In The Mirror
If you’ve been to the gym, I’m sure you’ve seen that guy. The guy who spends 2 hours at the gym and 1.5 of those hours checking himself out in the mirror. He flexes his biceps and looks in the mirror. He flexes his triceps and looks in the mirror. He doesn’t know the names of any other muscle groups, but he is definitely flexing those too. He probably takes a selfie and posts it with #GetSwole. He is usually wearing a tank top that is a size too small, just so others can enjoy the gun show. He may be at the gym for 2 hours, but he is not getting 2 hours worth of work done. The person who comes to the gym and runs on the treadmill at a high speed for 15 minutes gets way more of a workout.
If we expect to get better, eventually we have to get to work. We can’t spend the whole time checking ourselves out in the mirror. I am not sure what the writing equivalent of flexing in the mirror is, but I am sure I’ve done it. There are times when I carve out 2 hours to write, but only get 30 minutes worth of work done. That is an hour and a half wasted. I didn’t get any better at writing and I certainly didn’t #GetSwole.
3. Confusion Isn’t Always A Bad Thing
The popular workout, P90X says that a great way to develop strength is to use “muscle confusion.” Your body gets used to doing the same exercises which cause your workout to become less effective the more you get used to it. They recommend mixing up your workouts frequently to prevent your body from becoming to familiar with an exercise.
The same goes for our minds as well.
Even after limiting distractions and working in spurts, our minds are still likely to wander if they becomes too used to their environment. If you always write sitting in a specific chair in a certain room, after a while you may get too comfortable in that setting.
Switch it up. Maybe move to another room or try typing with a different color font or in a new notebook. Working to maximize your own attention can take hustle. Mix things up and have hustle confusion work in your favor.
4. We Have To Go Consistently
P90X doesn’t work simply because it confuses your muscles. It works because it forces you to work out consistently. You can switch up your workout all you want, but you won’t see any results unless you actually go to the gym. We are successful in changing our bodies when we make our gym habits consistent and frequent.
Same goes for writing ,or podcasting, or cooking or whatever you want to do. Author Malcolm Gladwell talks about the 10,000-Hour Rule, which says that that the key to achieving world class expertise is a matter of practicing for a total of around 10,000 hours. Greatness requires enormous time and the best way to start checking off the hours is to make your habits consistent and frequent.
5. Clean Up Your Mess
This one is pretty straight forward. Clean up your mess. No, that is not a metaphor for, “get your life in order.” I actually mean, clean up your mess. If you drip sweat all over a machine, clean it off so the next person doesn’t have to sit in a pool of your disgusting fluid.
We should need the gym to teach us this. We should have learned that long before we were old enough to go to a gym.
Photo credit: Wikipedia
