+1 #583: The Little Things

Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to another Optimize plus one. Jerry Rice was one of the greatest American football players ever. He was a wide receiver known for his astonishing work ethic and commitment to and demonstration of excellence. He once said, today I will do what others won't, so tomorrow I can accomplish what others can't. I might have been thinking about that this morning as I trained my grip and core strength on the setup I installed on my office ceiling. Quick context again. As part of my chasing excellence Spartan training that is serving as my Zen in the art of Spartan training portal into enlightenment. I've identified three things I need to master if I want to compete. Well, number one, aerobic speed, which is a brilliant concept from Phil Maffetone. We'll probably discuss more later. Number two, grip strength. There are a ton of obstacles that require this. And number three, Spartan skills like throwing a spear, climbing a rope, traversing a wall, etc. So Spartan races have rigs that you need to get across. Go. Grip strength. You gotta have great grip strength, right? Whatever. Imagine rings like the ones kids go across at a vocal part. Then intersperse those rings with one, ropes with knots at the end of them and other weird things. And imagine having to do 30 burpees if you can't make it across and ring the bell at the other side. Then imagine me hanging from my office ceiling on a rig like that during one of my 1,000 second breaks. Yes, again, that's like me this morning. I went back and forth. Ring, rope, ring, ring, rope, ring. The ropes with the knots on the end of them are especially awesome. So at the end of each set, I do 11 leg raise, crunch kind of things. And as I did that last part, I happened to be facing my chalkboard that has soul force written on the upper left corner. And I thought to myself, exactly. Each one of these little reps is just another expression of my commitment to harness and and express the soul force laden within me. Awesome. Now, again, as always, this +1 has nothing to do with my obsession with mastering myself via, in part, Spartan training. It's all about you. What comes to mind for you when you reflect on Jerry Rice's wisdom. Today, I will do what others won't, so tomorrow I can accomplish what others can't. Let's remember that the little things aren't that little. Those micro moments of mastery are the foundation of all the big things we want in our lives. And now might also be a good time to recall Jim Rohn's wisdom that there are two easies that determine our destiny. Easy to do and easy not to do. As he tells us, we will all experience one pain or the other. The pain of discipline or the pain of regret. But the difference is that the pain of discipline weighs only ounces, while the pain of regret weighs tons. Today's +1. What's one tiny little, seemingly irrelevant thing you might want to master? Here's to joyfully rocking that as we cultivate our soul force one micro moment at a time.