Humility
How fast can you stand back up?
Humility is an interesting feeling. Humility generally comes when you are at the top of your game, when you strut gets longer, your shoulders get taller, and your head gets bigger…then you fall.
Get Comfortable at being Uncomfortable…
In Crossfit you don’t ever know what your WOD is going to be. In life you don’t always know what your day is going to bring. You MUST be well rounded to be fully prepared; you must become good across varied times and with different exercises. (Crossfit says train at High Intensity across broad times and modal domains.)
The end of that sentence above is…because that is the only way you will continue to improve. CrossFit is about constantly varying functional movements. If you are strong and comfortable with clean and jerks your going to want to do that exercise all the time because you know your good at it, and your Grace time is probably going to be pretty stellar. How much are you going to get from that? When you train what your good or harder with what you good at you improve less overall than when you train what your bad at. Work what your bad at, less comfortable with, and get better as a whole crossfitter; as a person in life. Are you comfortable?
Humility knocked me on my ass…
I was humbled by my good friend Brian Kunitzer. BK took the Level II test last night and was focused, practiced, prepared and encouraging all the while. There is absolutely no way Brian could have passed this test three months ago…he couldn’t do pull-ups and he certainly couldn’t do 50 of them in 4 minutes after a 14 minute two mile run. You can watch him working his ass off in every class he participates in, and it showed. He couldn’t do pull-ups, so he trained to get better at them, all the while improving in every aspect of his workouts.
I was humbled by Matt Blanton who not long ago broke his foot and still came to the Level II, rowed 3200 meters, did all 50 pull-ups, completed the overhead squats and clean and jerks and when he knew he wouldn’t pass, did all 50 burpees side by side with BK. Congrats Matt, hell of an effort and great example.
I was humbled by the test, I was humbled by overhead squats and clean and jerks, and I my overconfidence was humbled by my failure. The day I failed Level II was when I stopped trying to make myself better each and every day and it showed at game time.
The next challenge…
When an athlete becomes complacent in what they are doing they will most surely lose. When a person becomes complacent in life they will most surely fail. Be satisfied with what you have accomplished and celebrate your achievement. Then work to better you performance and yourself everyday. That is MY December Crossfit Scottsdale challenge, and I challenge YOU to join.
Congratulations to Brian Kunitzer, the only Level II student. I am truly proud of you and your Level II achievement last night and I am thankful for your friendship. I continue to learn from you each day and hopefully for many years to come.
Jon Kaufman
December 10th, 2009 at 6:57 pm
Great story Jon. I hope you use this as a small stepping stone on the way to the 2010 CrossFit Games.
December 11th, 2009 at 12:26 am
Thanks for the kind words Jon. We can certainly help each other reach our desired goals.