Today, we're diving into the wild world of tackling challenges and how facing adversity can be your secret weapon for setting new goals. As I watched folks crush it during the CrossFit Open, it hit me just how pivotal those tough moments are for sparking motivation. You see, when athletes like Sophie and Ciara hit a wall during their workouts, it doesn’t just stop them in their tracks—it fuels their fire to improve, especially when it comes to mastering those pesky pull-ups! We all have our comfy little routines and maybe even some skills we’d rather avoid, but guess what? Growth lives just outside that comfort zone. So, let’s embrace those awkward moments, learn from our struggles, and turn them into stepping stones for future success. Ready to get real about our weaknesses? Let’s do this!

Takeaways:

• Facing challenges, like the CrossFit Open, helps us identify and set new goals.
• Embracing weaknesses can be a powerful tool for personal growth and improvement.
• Consistency in training is key; nothing happens overnight, but hard work pays off.
• Don't shy away from discomfort in workouts; it's where the real growth happens.

Hey, everyone.

Welcome back to the Wicklow Strength and Fitness Podcast.

I'm Limo Tool, and today we're going to dive into something that was kind of fresh on my mind after this weekend, which is the concept of facing challenges, facing adversity, and how that can ultimately help us set and create new goals.

I suppose we've spoken a lot previously on the podcast about goal setting.

You know, how to make smart goals, how to stick with them, what to do when you start falling off course, but I guess we never really touched on things that can help us highlight what should be a goal.

And this weekend we are in the middle of the CrossFit Open, and I guess I just seen so many instances of people taking on a challenge, facing adversity, pushing to either maybe get past that or else find a limiting factor that they can now work on.

And I guess there was a really cool, I guess, contrast of where the idea hit me for this podcast was when I was judging Sophie in the, in the workout.

And I'm sure she won't mind me saying she did amazing.

She flew through the first two parts and then we got to the pull ups and that ended up being the limitation.

And, you know, afterwards I was speaking with herself and Kira, who was in the same heat, who had pretty much the same scenario where she breezed through the first kind of two portions of the workout and then got to that limiter of the pull ups and wasn't able to progress beyond it.

And what was great to see was that the desire that, that lit up under them to, you know, get into the gym and get training to develop pull ups so that if they were to do something in future, whether it's the CrossFit Open or, you know, any form of competition that we do, that pull ups pop up, you know, they've done the work and they'll be able to achieve it in a year.

And, you know, we had a really good chat about it and I could even just see the motivation, you know, in their eyes, having the conversation.

And I love that because I suppose when you're in that environment where people are, you know, doing these incredible things and, you know, there was such a cool contrast between people doing the Orex, the inter, the scaled, you know, all these workouts were challenges at the end, there was always these separators, but it was cool to see people working within their capacity and I guess for people to see what is possible if you stick with it, you know.

So for those two girls was chatting to at the end, you know, they have that Goal.

Now they can come into training this week and, you know, when the pull up work is on or when they're doing a goal review or anything like that, that can now be a focus point and it can be something that we try to build towards because I suppose the opposite to that was a previous heat.

I was judging Lauren and she managed to get three of the five pull ups, which was not something we were necessarily expecting.

We knew we were going to get there and we knew we were going to give it a really good, really good go.

But, you know, when she got her chin over the bar three times, I think we celebrated each one as if it was a, a new PB because, you know, it was something that we weren't sure if it was going to happen when we got there and when it did, it was, you know, joyous.

Right?

And I guess that's a cool part of this story too, because Lauren was in the position that Kira and Sophie were in in previous years, in previous Opens and kind of had that goal coming out of it to be able to go and work on these kind of limiting factors and now has got to a point where was able to get a few of them and hopefully by the time they come around again, it'll be, you know, able to do more of them and able to do more of them and start advancing.

Right?

It's by tackling that challenge and seeing, you know, facing that adversity and maybe not having the best time in the workout when they show up the first time when you can't do them, but then going away and doing the work that ultimately allows us to focus our training and ultimately grow, right?

So it allows us to embrace the weaknesses because they're just tools that we can use to highlight where we need to push.

And there's so many ways we can do this, right.

Like I've Talked about the CrossFit Open so far, but it can even be, you know, anything from, you know, a test week in the gym, any event that we do, you know, the Open, a Hyrox event.

Putting yourself in these situations that can highlight your weak points can be incredibly valuable as long as you take the right lessons away.

Because the lesson should be that you need to come in and tackle these challenges head on.

So when we're talking about challenging ourselves in fitness, we're often talking about pushing past our comfort zone.

And the thing is, it's not just about lifting heavier weights, you know, or running faster times, rowing faster times.

It's about finding areas where we're weak and we can address that.

There's a lot of us that are used to going to the gym, doing our routines, but to a degree, sometimes we can stick with what feels comfortable.

You know, like maybe it's that, oh, I don't want to do the progression, I'm just going to do my ring rows instead.

I don't want to try and do the negatives.

Maybe it's that the 12.5kg dumbbell has become comfortable.

I like using the 12.5kg dumbbell.

I'm not going to go to the 15 because I know I'll be slower.

Maybe it's that I know I can do 25 kg power cleans no problem.

I know if I go to 30, this workout is going to take me a bit longer and I might be stuck working on my own a little bit at the end.

Right.

We've probably all had these moments in our mind, right?

We've always had these opportunities to maybe push ourselves, but we decide, I want to be comfortable today and that's okay.

We can't always be pushing the boat out, we can't always be seeking more.

Sometimes we're just there to tick the box.

We're there to get the exercise in for that day because we've already had enough.

But if we're always doing that, if we constantly stick to what we're good at, we're never really going to grow.

Because in the scenarios I just said, you know, at least you're still showing up, at least you're still doing the work.

Worst case scenario is you see something like double unders, or you see something like snatches or cleans or whatever it is that's on the program for the day and you just decide, oh, I don't like that.

I really don't enjoy that.

I, I'm bad at that.

When you tell yourself you're bad at it, you're just going to constantly believe it.

So you just don't go.

And then you'll end up stagnating.

So you can't really grow because you're not showing up to face this thing that you find challenging.

And, you know, I suppose there's, there's different areas where we can focus because, you know, it might feel good to keep hitting the PRs and improving things that we're naturally good at.

But if we're not challenging ourselves in the areas that we're weak in, we can be missing an opportunity that can make us a true all rounder.

And I do think that's where things like a test week or even Events like Hyrox and the CrossFit Open or a CrossFit competition around the country, or even just our in house ones can really like highlight things for you.

It highlights where we need to work and it can give us the opportunity to focus on improving these areas.

And the, the beauty of these events is that they create a measurable standard.

You know, you can see exactly where you stand and you can identify the weaknesses so that you can tackle them head on in training.

So, you know, when you embrace them instead of avoiding them, you know, it can be very tempting to avoid the things we struggle at.

You know, you don't like the movements, you hate running.

And I spent, you know, all morning on the 3rd, on the Friday working on bar muscle ups.

And then I came in and did the Friday Night Lights events and I managed to get a few and I was elated because I'd worked hard on it for that day.

I'd been working on like doing gymnastic stuff like with upper body pulling for weeks and weeks and weeks leading up to this.

So it was, it was a real moment of joy.

But then that was severely contrasted by 16.4 the following week, which featured handstand push ups.

And I did not like handstand push ups.

As a matter of fact, I really hated going upside down at the time and I dreaded it.

So whenever they would kind of appear in class at the time, I would kind of maybe just do my wall climbs or even worse, maybe I just didn't go.

And when they showed up in 16.4, what inevitably happened was I couldn't do them.

They were at the end of the workout, I was tired.

I think I got like two right, if even.

I don't even remember, but I do remember at the end feeling like I've really let myself down here in a way because I'd worked so hard training for this CrossFit open.

I had really pushed myself, but I just neglected this one thing and that one thing came up.

So obviously what I did coming out of that was I spent at least one day a week doing handstand push up work and handstand development.

That was just something that I had to do.

And by the time they came up again, which Happened to be in a local competition.

A few months later I was able to do them and I was able to complete the workout and I was buzzing with myself.

Right.

So that's just a personal anecdote.

But again, I can see it.

I know I've done it.

I know we all do it at times where there's something that we don't necessarily enjoy doing.

We maybe have this internal perception that we suck at it.

So we don't want to do it.

It's like, oh, I don't want to try and do a pull up in case people see me fail.

But the reality is everybody's just focusing on what they're doing, right?

So on occasion, I'm not saying you need to do it every time.

We just need to get out of being, you know, that pattern of comfort.

Right.

It's okay to go in and do things that you're comfortable with some of the time, but we need to allow that.

Some sessions we are pushing ourselves beyond.

Right?

Because magic happens just outside that comfort zone.

It's something that we know we're probably going to be able to do, but it's going to be challenging.

We're not talking about if you can't do a pull up going in to try do muscle ups.

That's not what we're talking about.

We're saying that we want to go just a little bit beyond what we know we're capable of.

Because then we're confronting weaknesses and we're giving ourselves the opportunity to improve, to see just how capable you really are.

And look, failure is part of the process.

You'll often hear me say that.

I'm a firm believer that small wins are more powerful than failure.

And that is 100% true.

If you can constantly get little successes along the way, that sets you up for long term gains.

But the reality is there is going to be some failures along the way.

Now, we don't want them to be, you know, huge dramatic failures like it is in a movie or something like that.

But there is going to be times where maybe you do try to use the 15kg dumbbell instead of the 12.5 or you try to use the 20 instead of the 15, whatever it is, and maybe it doesn't go so well.

Maybe you have a really tough time, maybe you have to take the weight down and that's okay.

But you tried it, you can work and then come back and try it again.

We all have weaknesses.

No one is perfect.

But we shouldn't fear failure and we shouldn't fear feeling frustrated.

When we're working on a particular skill, not that we need to ultimately welcome it, but we need to accept that it is an opportunity to learn and progress.

Like if I'm working on my double unders and halfway through the workout I just switch back to singles because I can feel like it's getting tough.

That defeats me, that only defeats my goals.

Right.

So yeah, I kind of look at, you know, whether it's test weeks, CrossFit competitions, hy roxes or even just what's been put into your program.

Like if you're doing an ID session and it's put in that you have to use a 50kg barbell, but you decide, oh, I'm just going to use 40 and I'll just tick the box.

Right.

It's a self defeating circle.

So I suppose once you know what your weaknesses are, like how are you going to use the information?

How do we use it to f fuel our growth?

Well, I've already mentioned that we can somewhat look at these failures.

It is part of success, right.

When you do struggle with something, we can take it as an opportunity to learn and improve.

Book in your goal review, have a chat with one of the coaches, get some progressions and start working at it.

Use it as motivation to keep pushing forward like Sophie and Kira.

I know we're going to do after the weekend you can make a plan.

You know, you identify these weaknesses, you feel more focused, you can improve them.

I guess what's important is, you know, it's not going to happen overnight.

You know, Lauren got three pull ups at the weekend.

That work has taken a heck of a long time.

Right.

But it was the consistency that got there.

You know, we have to identify what we need to work on.

We then need to measure our progress as we go by, you know, tracking our weights and things like that, like we are always saying to do, but then keeping at it.

You know, whether it's developing a skill or trying to get stronger, there's only one thing that we know to be should be true and that is that consistency is going to be key when it comes to overcoming any of this.

Nothing's going to happen overnight, but with regular focus and effort, you'll undoubtedly see growth.

If you keep working at it week after week after week, there is nothing that can stop you.

So I guess just to wrap up today's episode, remember challenging yourself is key to growth.

We as coaches will be there to help challenge you, but we need you to have that mindset, to tackle it head on.

We need you to not shy away from the things that feel somewhat hard, that feel somewhat outside your comfort zone, because these are the areas where you're going to see so much improvement in a CrossFit event, a hierarchy, you know, whatever these challenges are, even if it's just showing up to do a team wad because you're afraid of doing things in that group setting, you know, putting yourself in these scenarios, these challenges will give you so much valuable insight into what you need to work on and will ultimately help push ourselves to be better.

And if we only keep focusing on what we're good at, we'll never reach our true potential.

So instead, embrace weaknesses, embrace challenges, find the things we need to work on and use them as your fuel for growth.

So thank you for tuning in today, and I hope I'll see you in the next episode.

Just remember, keep pushing, keep growing, and I hope I'll see you all at our open wrap party and spring social next weekend once we've wrapped up the open.

Thanks, guys.

Have a wonderful week.