Book 73 - A Year of Magical Learning

Reflection Title - The Conscious Quitter - Fatigue is just as much mental as physical

Book - Endure: Mind, Body, and the Curiously Elastic Limits of Human Performance by Alex Hutchinson

Book Description: The capacity to endure is the key trait that underlies great performance in virtually every field. But what if we all can go farther, push harder, and achieve more than we think we’re capable of? Blending cutting-edge science and gripping storytelling in the spirit of Malcolm Gladwell, Alex Hutchinson reveals that a wave of paradigm-altering research over the past decade suggests the seemingly physical barriers you encounter as set as much by your brain as by your body. This means the mind is the new frontier of endurance—and that the horizons of performance are much more elastic than we once thought.

Reflection:

Humans are remarkable. If there is anything that I've learned over the past 18+ months of my life and this journey that I've been on, it is this. I never really took the time to appreciate just how truly special we are until I was smacked in the face with it by my daughter and watching her fight for a chance at life after being born at 22 weeks old.

First off, the fact that she was even able to make it into this world and have a chance at life is a testament to humanity's ability to endure as a whole and all the advances we've made in the field of medicine. Modern Medicine, while remarkable, is only one step of the equation. The human mind and our will to endure is the other. For that, I'm proud to say that I got to see first hand the most courageous endurance athlete that I'll ever witness in my life in my daughter.

Watching my daughter's journey as she overcame so many set backs to keep pushing forward demonstrated to me the true power and seemingly limitless potential of humanities ability to endure, fight, and never give up no matter what we are faced with in life. After we lost her, I couldn't helped but to be propelled forward every single minute by the memory of the power that she showed me that we all posses deep down in our ability to endure. Her blueprint and example she set is what ultimately led me to adding the value of enduring to be placed on my personal core values list as something I hold near and dear to my heart and will until the day I day. I don't rank my core values, but if I did, enduring would be number 1.

Naturally, with the importance of this concept on my mind every day after we lost her, I wanted to explore it further. I literally googled "books about endurance" and Alex's book came up as one of the top results. I wasn't a serious "runner" or an endurance athlete, but I thought it sounded like I would learn a lot about the mind and body and I decided to give it a try. I'm so glad I did.

I learned so much from this book. The biggest lesson I took from it was the concept of "conscious quitter" which dove into how fatigue is almost as much mental as it is physical. We can push so much further than many of us can imagine, but we let our mind's tell us to stop and most of us listen. A part of that is evolutionary and to protect us from ourselves. However, after watching my daughter's battle, I now KNOW how much more we are capable of from witnessing her fight. It has given me a different perspective on how I view endurance in my life.

We truly can tap into so much more than most of us let ourselves think we are capable of if we want to. It made me think about all those times in my life when I've been in a personal "marathon", whether it be athletically, at work, dealing with frustrating relationships, in the NICU, etc, and my mindset when things were at there worst. I remembered how miserable I felt, how frustrated I was, and how much I complained and wanted to quit in the moment. When I reflect back on those same moments far removed, I don't feel that way anymore. Strangely, I feel accomplished for making it through and now think, that wasn't so bad.

These days, I look forward to endurance tests and challenging myself to do more constantly in all that I do. I welcome the pain and I'm not afraid of it. After all, life is one really just one big endurance test. We are going to suffer, struggle, and have tests that push us to our limits. I'd rather learn about it, recognize it, and embrace it to push past my conscious quitter and see what I'm really capable of in this life. I owe it to my daughter to do that!

Question: How are you going to push yourself further than you are comfortable today?

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Links:

What is The Year of Magical Learning? An Introduction

YOML Podcast Discussion - Endure

YOML Bookstore - Endure: Mind, Body, and the Curiously Elastic Limits of Human Performance by Alex Hutchinson