Stay Chill, Work Hard

As a former competitive swimmer, I know all about the grindset mentality. In high school we had workouts six days a week, usually twice a day. The longest break from training during that time was maybe three weeks. Thanksgiving Day practice was as much a guarantee as Grandpa falling asleep on the couch, and Christmas Eve practice was as sure as Santa coming. Every day I dreaded the pain packaged in the practice ahead. I was sore all the time, and that was the period of life when my ibuprofen addiction began (that’s a joke, I’m not addicted. Well I am, but it's not a problem. Now I sound like a real addict. Shit). 

Eventually, I gave up swimming as a sport, and I definitely did not keep up my physical shape. Within a couple years of hanging up the speedo (i still try it on sometimes ofc), I gained about 50 pounds. Just recently I actually lost a lot of that weight so I’m not a complete fatass. 

Why did I just tell you how I got fat? To give you an idea of where my head’s at while I’m writing this. Although I used to live the grind, that’s not so much the case in recent years. School and work kept me very busy, but my mindset definitely shifted. I’ve become pretty chill. Occasionally I’m accused of being lazy, but idk I wouldn’t say I’m a lazy guy. Just pretty chill lol. But as I have become chill (not lazy), I’ve come to the conclusion that a certain amount of challenge in life is crucial to health and happiness. To my shock and slight disappointment, some amount of grinding is a good thing. 

Another sort of disclaimer. I hate David Goggins. Well, I don’t believe in hating people. But if I did, I would hate Goggins lol. No birthdays, carrying logs, carrying boats: count me out lol. I’m celebrating my birthday, and I’m putting down the boats to eat pizza.

Challenge is a necessary component of a fulfilled life. I find that the happiest people I know choose to challenge themselves consistently. Whereas people that are unhappy tend to be challenged only by things outside of their control. They rarely choose challenge of their own free will. The more you choose to challenge yourself, the more mentally tough you get. Therefore you are more prepared for whatever life throws at you because you have already trained your challenge muscles.  

Without hard things in life, the easy stuff doesn’t feel as good. One of the things I miss the most from swimming is the warm down after a crazy hard set. After 45 minutes of a nuclear heart rate, there is nothing better than slowly gliding through the water. You can feel the water temp working on lowering your body temp, and you just feel like a jellyfish floating through the pool. The harder the workout was, the more euphoric the warmdown was. To be honest, I don’t miss swimming the sets, but I do miss the warmdowns. Of course, therein lies the dichotomy; challenging yourself is rarely the choice you want to make, but it is the only way to obtain certain rewards and positive emotions.

Another thing about challenging yourself; it's really the only way to get better. Our bodies work like this. If you do 10 pushups, but 10 pushups is easy for you, then you aren’t making progress. You won’t get stronger. But if you can barely do 5 pushups, and you strive to do 10 every set, then you will get stronger. To get stronger you must do something that breaks your muscles down so they can regrow bigger. I’ll take this one a step farther, and say that if you aren’t doing things to get better, then you're getting worse. If you aren’t getting better, you are getting worse in comparison to those around you. This is true in many more aspects of life than just working out or sports.

As a chill guy (obviously I’m chill, I said it in the second paragraph like three times), it can be tricky sorting out when I need to giddy-up. I’ve been in work/school settings where my relaxedness was perceived as a lack of care or effort. Although I’m not that concerned with what people think about me, I also don’t want to burden a group or team with extra work by actually being lazy. I also want to be myself, because you are the greatest asset you can be when you are yourself. But it’s all too easy to fall into a habit of laziness. 

I’m still working this out in my life, but I’ll say this: be open to feedback. If people that you trust say that the way you are handling something is lazy, consider if they are right. Maybe they are wrong, but give the idea a chance in your own mind before sending it to the firing squad. I also think that certain aspects of life require a level of intensity. A chill lifestyle is great, but some moments will call for a different attitude. That’s one reason to find some things in life that you are serious about and want to work for; that hard work will be a training ground for other moments in life when chill is not the way. Of course, chill is usually the way.