Focus
When I started doing Crossfit, I pushed hard. And then I hurt myself. No surprise there.
ID: Group of people (mostly women) standing together in a gym. They are wearing red shirts, most with the Incredibles’ logo on the front. They are wearing black eye masks that makes them look sneaky. This is my Crossfit Open team from 2019. I’m in there but hard to pick out because red shirts and masks. My head is shaved, and my shirt is plain red.
After a long recuperation period, I came back, and I’ll admit it, I was scared. I was super gentle with myself. I modified every workout, I kept the weights low. And I got pretty comfortable there, in the slow, light lane.
Then I started working with a personal trainer and discovered, hey, I actually am still pretty strong. I felt good and started challenging myself more.
Then the shelter in place happened and all that screeched to a halt.
But the gym kept up with virtual, body weight workouts. I stopped modifying everything because I was worried I was going to lose my progress. But “do everything hard” seemed like a bad plan (see above) so I started choosing just one part of the workout to focus on, like burpees (I’d tilt the camera up so no one could see me floundering there on the floor). Or I’d focus on staying consistent with speed or weight.
ID: Five drawn images of a woman in shorts and tank top that shows how to do a burpee. 1. hands on the floor in front of her feet. 2. Flat out like she’s in the bottom of a pushup (thighs and chest are supposed to touch the floor) 3. Up in the top of push up position 4. Back to position one, hands and feet close togther 5. Arms extended overhead, jumping up. Now that I’ve done this description, I realize it probably doesn’t make sense.
When we come back to the gym (we work out in the parking lot), I found that I could do a lot of the workouts just as they were written! I mean, granted, when we first came back, the coach definitely took into account that many of us had not slung heavy weights in MONTHS, so I think those first workouts were probably already modified, but ANYWAY. I impressed myself!
And guess what? The idea of focusing on one thing? It isn’t a new idea. I remember someone saying to me long ago, “When you run, you can focus on speed or distance, but not both.” I also remember scoffing internally and then suffering through years of “too hard” running. I also remember reading a journal article about the myth of multitasking, that at best people can get better at “serial tasking,” switching from one task to another quickly. It also showed that people generally lose quality whenever they attempt to multitask. Here’s a 7-minute video that tells about some of these studies and if you aren’t interested in that, I encourage you to watch this 2 minute video called The Monkey Business Illusion. It’s worth it, I promise. Even if you’ve already seen it.
Focusing on one thing has helped me get faster and stronger, too. When I remember to carry this simple idea into my workday, it helps me be more efficient and feel better about the work I do. Focusing on one thing allows us the opportunity to find the flow in our work, which increases feelings of satisfaction.
ID: One women in workout clothes sitting on the floor at the gym, me squatting near her, both of us smiling. This is at the Open a year after the picture up top. My favorite thing about the gym are moments like these, sharing that feeling of tired and satisfied.
It’s interesting where life lessons come from, isn’t it? And how you might hear that message in one place at one time in your life, but it doesn’t really sink in until you hear it again? Or maybe even several times? If you’ve heard this idea before, I challenge you to try it out today, see if it works for you. If this is the first time you’ve heard it, I challenge you, too.
Banner Image: A huge group of people in workout clothes at the gym. Everyone is smiling, some people are sitting on the floor, some hanging on the pull up rig in the back.
