The events in our past and the views we have taken of those events have led us to become who we are today. The views and expectations that we have for the future also shape who we choose to be today.
Gratitude is thankfulness for what has brought us to where we are now, as well as appreciation for the lessons our past has taught us.
Hope is expecting and desiring for something to happen, as well as believing that good things can happen and that things can improve.
It takes effort, courage, and persistence to cultivate gratitude and hope. It’s often something we have to do over and over, day after day.
When we choose to view the past and future with gratitude and hope, we create soil where beauty can grow.
Cultivate gratitude for the past and hope for the future.
Many people today view crying as a sign of weakness. But is it? Does crying mean that we are weak? No, it doesn’t, and here’s why:
Tears can be the truest expression of deeply painful or deeply joyful emotions. Sometimes when we cannot find the words that explain our emotions to the fullest, we cry and let our tears say what our words cannot express.
Tears can help us express ourselves deeply and fully.
Crying in the presence of a trusted person can heal wounds and mend broken hearts.
There is no need to apologize for your tears. Apologizing for your tears often means apologizing for feeling deeply.
It takes bravery and courage to be willing and able to feel deeply enough to express those feelings through tears. There is strength in your tears.
We all need people who support us. In a boxing match, each person in the fighter’s corner care for the fighter in ways that only he or she can. Each person in the fighter’s corner has a specific purpose for being at the fight.
When we have the right people in our corner, we have the support we need. We can rest in their good care.
We need people who know how to pick us up when we fall. People who know how we work. People we let into our lives, even when things are messy, complicated, and painful.
The stories we tell ourselves are so important. The views we hold about ourselves can be resistant to change, but we can change them. We may have been holding them for so long that we’ve forgotten how heavy they are.
If you view yourself as a hard worker, you are more likely to work hard. If you view yourself as someone who doesn’t quit, you are less likely to quit when things are challenging. If you convince yourself that you do not deserve good things, you will sabotage yourself when good things happen in your life.
Weigh the views you hold about yourself to find out if you are better with them or without them. It might be time to come up with new things to think about yourself.
The views we hold about ourselves can be great sources of strength or major restraints. Craft your views about yourself so that they help you get to where you want to be.
Questions for reflection: What are the stories you tell yourself? Are you someone who overcomes obstacles? Are you the type of person who continues on in the face of difficulty?
“Does it make you ill that someone, somewhere is working harder than you? My point is that your why has to be so immense that you not only do all the hard, painful work, day after day, but you are also willing to make sacrifices on a routine basis.” -Jason Khalipa in his book As Many Reps As Possible.
The people among us who work the hardest are people who have a steadfast reason and motivation, or ‘why’, for what they are doing and working to achieve.
What makes the difference in people who are the hardest working people we know are that they find joy in the journey. They love getting better. They love the feeling of accomplishment at the end of a difficult workout or a long day at work. They know that hard work is part of the process of improvement. You will not become the best version of yourself by staying in your comfort zone.
The truth is that while one person slacks off, his or her competitor is putting in the work to get better. While one person hits the snooze button, someone else is meal prepping. Someone else is reading before they go to work. Someone else is going to the gym before work. While one salesman sits on the couch after work day after day, his competitor is attending night classes for business school. While one counselor indulges in junk food at the end of the day on a normal basis, his or her competitor is reading textbooks on how they can better hone their craft.
Be the hardest working person you know.
Questions for reflection:
What is your definition of hard work?
What are you letting get in your way of working as hard as you can?
What is one specific area of your life where you can work harder?
Becoming the best person you can be does not happen on accident or by chance, just as much as becoming the best counselor, coach, or athlete you can be does not happen on accident or by chance.
Greatness takes place on purpose, and with purpose.
Some people think that going through hardship and experiencing suffering automatically and somehow magically makes the sufferer a better person. This is not true. How many people can you think of right now off the top of your head that are bitter and resentful because of experiences they have been through? Probably a lot.
Now, think of someone who you are inspired by. I am willing to bet that this person has experienced hardship and suffering. But, rather than becoming bitter, they have become better. They have been changed, maybe even transformed. They have become better not in spite of the hardship, but because of it.
The wisest people among us have been forged in the fire of experience. Being resilient is not only an idea to them – it is a fact of their lives. It is a reality to them.
The deepest lessons are often the costliest ones. The deepest wisdom is hard-won. People do not become wise by chance.
Suffering and hardship do not magically make you a better person, but they can be the strongest catalysts to become a deeper thinker, more compassionate, quick to listen and slow to make judgements about people and their situations, and so much more.
Go through your suffering and grow through your suffering.
Make your suffering count. Cry, weep, and hurt all that you need to. It might do more harm than good while you are suffering to try to draw out what you can learn from it. That is absolutely fine. Hurt, weep, and mourn your losses. Feel your pain.
When you process through your suffering and hardship and reflect on your situation, squeeze out every ounce you can, and use it. Use it to learn. Use it to improve. Use it to help others. Use it to become better.
Make your suffering count. Make your hardship count. Make your tears count.
Feel everything that your suffering is, and trust that eventually you will be able to use it.
“But ultimately, beyond a requisite level of intelligence and emotional functioning, the best [counselors] among us are quite simply those who have worked hardest to develop themselves. They are intensely motivated and committed to becoming the best practitioners of their craft – and they are willing to make all kinds of personal sacrifices and devote time and energy in order to make that a reality.” -Jeffrey Kottler in The Secrets of Exceptional Counselors
What makes hard workers work so hard?
Some people’s immediate reaction to this is ‘Oh, it’s simple. They feel inadequate, so their work ethic is to make up for perceived weakness or deficits’. But I think it’s so much deeper than this. People who want to be incredible at what they do are not working from a place of weakness or deficit. They are working from a place of strength and belief in themselves.
People wouldn’t work so hard to become exceptional if they did not already truly believe that they can excel at their craft. Hard workers work so hard because they believe in themselves – they believe in their capacity to become exceptional. They are not satisfied with being average. They are not satisfied with being just like everyone else.
The passion to excel is what gives hard workers the drive to work so hard.
Refuse to be ordinary. Refuse to be ‘just another mental health therapist’ or ‘just another coach, owner, employee, etc.’. Refuse to be disposable.
Find ways to put in the work where others don’t. Put in the hours that other people won’t put in. Most people are working, but few are working at their true, full capacity.
We expand our capacity by pushing past what we are currently capable of. When you’re exhausted at work, put in 10 more minutes before you take a break. When your muscles are on fire near the end of a workout, hold on to the barbell for one more rep.
Show yourself how serious you are about wanting to get better. Show yourself how bad you want it, and I have no doubt that others will soon take notice.
My name is Adam Barfoot. I recently graduated with my Master’s degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. I am also a coach at Whitebelt CrossFit in Chattanooga, TN and CrossFit Freeflow in Franklin, TN. I have been doing CrossFit since December 2015.
I started this blog to write about two of my passions – counseling and functional fitness.
This blog is for anyone who wants to improve themselves and help others. As a mental health therapist, I know that witnessing change in my clients is so, so powerful. Witnessing so much change in such an intimate environment makes me constantly reflect on my own life – Where am I growing? Where do I want to grow? Where am I struggling?
Being a mental health counselor and a coach at two different CrossFit gyms, I have insights from different angles into self-development and self-improvement that can help people.
Who should read this blog? Anyone who wants to grow, reflect, learn, and be challenged to grow, reflect, and learn.
Why should you read this blog? If you let it, it can help you grow. It can help you reflect. It can challenge you. It can teach you.
I will write primarily about counseling and self-development. I will also write about the common factors of counseling and functional fitness, such as courage, resilience, and fear. Self-development is a crucial aspect of functional fitness. We learn how to confront challenges rather than run from them. We embrace the pain of difficult workouts because we know that they can make us better. And in counseling, we learn that healing comes from facing our pain and working through it rather than running from it. We embrace the pain that comes along with healing because we know that finding healing will make us better people, and truly more functional people.
Counseling and Functional Fitness 