Inspiration

I mean me?

Who knew.

Apparently all my talk about exercising and getting healthy has struck a cord with a few of my family and friends. That's nice. I like that other people are getting in shape. Although I have to admit, I don't feel very inspiring.

I still mostly see where I fall short. I'm certainly not the fastest or strongest at my gym. In fact, I'm often the slowest and weakest. My choice is to scale enough that I can finish with everyone else or potentially be at the gym all night finishing the work out. I'm not too proud to scale. In fact, I often have to just to be able to do the movements. I see that has a short coming. But I'm told others see the fact that I'm out there working my ass off as inspiration.

I'm about to post a video that a friend took. This video makes me cry.

The first time I watched it, I was horrified. All I saw was the big girl on the row machine. I was embarrassed at how my body looked. My hair is stringy and you can see my rolls under my bra straps. I cried.

I made myself watch it again and again. In fact, this video was taken weeks ago. I've watched it a lot. I still cry. But not for the same reasons.

See, what I didn't see the first time? All those guys sitting around me. They are the fastest and strongest. They do the workout Rx (which means they don't have to scale it down to make it through). Some of them had only ever seen me for the first time that day.

They are cheering for me. They are telling me, I can do it. And giving advice about how to make it through.

They didn't care that I'm not among the elite. Or that I had fat rolls showing. Or the fact that my face is probably beet red from exertion. They only care that I'm doing it. Then I cry because I'm touched. (I'm a cryer. I'm just glad I haven't actually done it at the gym. That'd be embarrassing.)

I remember that WOD. It was a 2k row for time. It's not the kind of WOD that's scalable. But, I actually like to row. I'd watched videos earlier that day to learn techniques to be efficient. I knew going in I was probably going to be the last one finished. We rowed in heats. I was in the last heat. I was nervous because I knew that everyone was going to be finished and they'd all be waiting on me. I knew I was going to be in the spotlight. It made me feel very uncomfortable... before I started. But once I was on the row machine. Honestly, all I could think about was finishing the job.  I remember when the guy on the far side of me sat down next to me started talking me through the last few minutes. I don't remember when David finished and started cheering for me. Or when my Coach showed up with his encouragements. And I had no idea about the group that had gathered behind me to cheer me on. I didn't know about them until I saw the video. And obviously, I had no idea my friend was taking video.

All I could think about at the time was how many more pulls on that rope would get me off the machine. It was hard. I never once thought about giving up. There was a moment where I thought about slowing down. That's when people started cheering around me. The last 100m were the fastest I'd rowed the whole time.

And that's how Crossfit works. That's why it's better as a class. Alone, I might have quit before I made the whole 2k. I certainly would have slowed down. I was last, but no one cared. My form was getting sloppy, but no one judged. And when I finished everyone around me erupted in cheers as if I'd just won a  race.

It might not have been as hard for those guys as it was for me. But it was hard, and I did it.

I'm a stay at home mom to three young kids. Just making time to go to the gym is hard.

Apparently just doing something hard is inspiring. Who knew.