For the past three weeks my family has been hosting a visitor from Hamburg, Germany. She is the 26 year old daughter of a colleague who has long dreamed of visiting the United States, immersing herself in an English-speaking home, and learning more about American culture. It’s been a three week, fun-filled tour of many things Colorado and a few things Wyoming. All in all a great time. Of course what kind of hostess would I be if I didn’t introduce her to Crossfit?
Her first week with us she saw me coming home most mornings from the box, covered in sweat, exhausted from the day’s WOD. She knew a little about Crossfit, from seeing my Facebook posts, but she had some questions and seemed interested to know what I had done that day at the box. In the second week I was able to get her to come along. The day she came we did back squats and ring dips for strength and skill, and the WOD was 20 minutes of three deadlifts at 185 lbs/ 84 kg (Rx for girls), 20 over the bar jumps, and then as many burpees as you could complete in one minute, with a one minute rest every other minute — so 10 minutes of work and 10 of rest – your score equaled total reps. At Rx, I was completely spent at the end.
She had been nervous about coming, but I reassured her that just trying would be good enough. She did well with strength and skill, but had a little trouble with the WOD – the burpees made her a little dizzy. So she took a bit of rest, and then returned when she was ready. On the way home she expressed that she was embarrassed at her performance and I told her that she did great. The fact that she tried hard was the most important thing. She then said to me, “I have a lot of respect for you doing that!” Her words have really stuck with me since that day.
The next day she was telling me how sore her quads and butt were, and I smiled and commiserated about living in an almost constant state of soreness. Soreness means you’ve done it right, I told her. Soreness is a badge of achievement.
My point in sharing this story, is that when you go to the box day after day, week after week, it’s easy to lose sight of the effort you’re making. It’s easy to cheer on your box-mates and give credit to others for their effort in the box, but I think sometimes we all forget to give ourselves the same recognition. So, pat yourself on the back today, and have a lot of respect for yourself for doing that!
Oh, and lookout Hamburg… I think this young lady will be checking out a box there when she returns.