Ben Greenfield explains how identity mismatches happen when external standards define what counts as a real athlete. In North America, an Ironman is the triathlete benchmark, but Europe values short-course racing instead. The takeaway: your identity is valid regardless of distance.
Hey, this is Ben Greenfield. I thought you'd like this little clip of my latest podcast.
We have identities. The hats we wear in life as an employee, as a, as a partner, as a, you know, a parent, they're all identities and they each carry the same underlying self schema. And we know that these different identities are all related, right? So if you get a little.
Nudge of one strengthening or maturing one identity, it can have a knock on effect on another. So there's some really good reasons for why we should be sort of self reflective about how we think of ourselves in these different roles. But one of the great examples I like for identity mismatching with athletes, and this is really since we came to North America, would be that if you're a multi, if you're an endurance triathlete and you might be doing it for a year or so and you've done a sprint Olympic, you're not really considered a triathlete until you've done an Ironman.
This is not the same in Europe, the ITU and short course racing is much more popular. But here is the sense that if you sense, oh, I'm a triathlete, have you done an Ironman? And that's the first question. And no wonder that your identity can take a little bit of a blow. So you think, well, I'm not obviously a successful triathlete. I'm not going to be seen until I do an Ironman. So we get all these people doing 70.3 and long distance, they may not actually enjoy it. And there's nothing wrong with sticking with Olympic or sprint distance triathlon. So there's a mismatch between how you think the world values that identity or sees it and how you see it as yourself. So I think that's one in particular.
If you enjoyed this clip, you should check out the whole episode and a host of other topics over@BenGreenfieldFitness.com have an amazing day.
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