During an especially grueling circuit workout Monday night, I took note of my threshold for discomfort for the very first time. Or at least, I took note of it more consciously than I ever have before.
It was a repetition-based circuit, meaning we had to complete a certain number of reps of each exercise before we moved on to the next. This is my favorite type of circuit, because the faster you get through the workload, the sooner you’re done. And, it adds a little competitive zing to the class (which, let’s be honest, is the real reason I like it).
There were eight exercises in total; four for the upper body and four for the lower body. Half the class started on the upper body and the other started on the lower body. I started on the upper body, and moved through the exercises pretty steadily, though I took a couple mini-breaks along the way to catch my breath and take a swig of water. In retrospect, I didn’t even think about it — feel a little burn, take a little break.
AS I GOT TO THE FINAL THREE EXERCISES, however, I noticed that a woman in the other group was already on her second-to-last exercise, and I became enraged. Not at her — I’m no Christopher Carter — but at myself. I suddenly realized I’d been backing off automatically whenever I hit a certain subconscious, predetermined point of exertion, and I was lagging behind because of it. Don’t get me wrong: Backing off can be a good thing, if you’re gasping for air and seeing black around the fringes of your vision. But I wasn’t anywhere near that — in fact, upon checking in with myself at that moment, I had to admit I was only mildly uncomfortable.
Why was I holding back? What was I worried was going to happen if I pushed myself harder?
Well … I was just afraid of being more uncomfortable, frankly. And once that truth burbled to the surface, I couldn’t deny that it was an awfully wimpy excuse. So, I decided to find out what would happen if I didn’t ease off, and I got after those final three exercises like nobody’s business.
The verdict: not that scary, after all. Also, I finished first in the class, ahead of the woman who had no idea we were competing. (Yesssssss! A most satisfying victory.)
UPON CONTEMPLATING MY EXPERIENCE LATER, I was reminded of several things I’ve read over the past couple years (and that might have helped me earlier, if I’d have been paying closer attention).
1. ONE OF THOSE THINGS WAS EAT, PRAY, LOVE author Elizabeth Gilbert’s experience meditating among mosquitoes, and her determination to transcend. If you recall, what started as a miserable experience ended with her achieving a whole new level of enlightenment.
2. ANOTHER WAS THE WORK OF BYRON KATIE, who recommends addressing negative self talk with a few questions about what the truth really is. I didn’t realize how very applicable these were until I revisited Helen Cordes’s 2004 article for Experience Life, “Coming to Terms,” which I’ve excerpted below.
When confronted with an uncomfortable situation, Byron recommends asking yourself:
- Is what I’m saying to myself true? (In my situation, the statement to question would be, “I’m too tired to continue exercising at this level.”) Think carefully about the answer and don’t simply accept what you’ve said or been told in the past. She says you may come to realize that it’s your interpretation of the fact that
is causing you the most pain.
- How do I react when I think that thought? What do you feel
emotionally, and what do you feel in your body when you let these
statements inhabit your mind? How do you typically treat yourself when you think each of these thoughts?
Make a list of your resultant attitudes and behaviors. Ask yourself:
How do I live when I believe this thought? Two good follow-up
questions: Can you see a reason to drop the thought? Can you find one
stress-free reason to keep the thought?
- Who or what would I be without that thought? What would you be
like, and how would you feel if you were not hostage to that thought
and the resulting feelings? Imagine that you didn’t have the ability to think the thought as you stand in the presence of that situation.
Byron explains that “often, people discover they are all worked up over judgments they
cannot even be certain are accurate. They discover they don’t like the
feelings they experience when they ruminate and fume about their
reactive versions of reality. They have the insight that they would be
a lot happier, more capable and more hopeful without their ingrained
lines of thought and belief.” Sounds about right, doesn’t it?
3. THE LAST WAS RESEARCH ABOUT THE HIGH-INTENSITY WORKOUTS TABATA AND HIIT. Both are super-effective fat-blasting, endurance-boosting, mitochondria-increasing interval workouts performed at maximal or near-maximal intensity, and I’ve been researching, writing about and even doing both for some time now. (See “The Tabata Tune-Up” in the March 2008 archives, and keep your eye out for an article on HIIT in the December 2008 issue of Experience Life.) Yet while we all understand the definition of “maximal” — giving it everything ya got — it sinks in much more slowly from an operational perspective. How often do we really experience what that feels like physically? In my case, except when I’m playing rugby, it’s more often near-near-maximal. But that’s not going to be good enough anymore.
In the end, I got a great workout and made what I hope will prove to be another breakthrough in my training — although I was rewarded for my efforts with a nasty case of delayed-onset muscle soreness. But hey, no pain, no gain, right?
What do you do to push past self-imposed limits during workouts?
(photo credit: Vlastula)
