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Dan
Dan Sullivan holds a BA in Communications, Psychology, and Business Economics as well as a Masters Degree in Exercise Physiology. He is a certified Crossfit instructor in addition to being a Certified Personal Trainer by the National Academy of Sports Medicine, and has worked in the fitness industry since 1998.
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Crossfit and Mental Toughness

by: Dan Sullivan

CrossFit as an ideology suggests that in life one must be prepared for the unknown as well as the unknowable. About the only thing one can predict with any certainty is that tomorrow morning you will rise to face the day. However, that’s about as far as it goes. From the time you get out of bed until you return the following night you have no idea how your day will actually unfold. Remember that old adage, “the best laid plans of mice and men.” No matter how prepared you are life is full of unexpected twists and turns. You must always be prepared to have a Plan B, Plan C and so on.

It is easy to focus on the physical benefits of working out. After a few weeks you see body composition changes, energy levels increasing and performance gains. The mental aspect of training is often overlooked. After all how many people go to the gym to get mentally tougher? It takes mental effort not only to go the gym in the first place, but to also put yourself through pain and suffering once you get there.

If you stop and listen for just a moment your workout is telling you something each and every time. While it may be telling you that you should quit or give in, it is also telling you that no matter what you may think, you do not yet know your limits. Fitness is about more than what happens during your workout. It is about what happens once you leave the gym and how you are able to incorporate what you’ve done and your new work capacity into your life. Fitness is about what you can accomplish, but this is not limited to what goes on inside the gym. It impacts on activities as varied as avoiding an oncoming car, playing with your kids or surviving on the battlefield.

There is a saying in CrossFit -- “It never gets easier, it just sucks less.” This is true in life as well as training. Certain scenarios will inevitably be pleasant but others will definitely suck. The key to mental fitness is the knowledge that, when you are faced with an otherwise unpleasant situation, you can reflect back on a time that was worse, that sucked even more. Knowing that you have been able to persevere before will allow you to face the unknown with courage, confidence, and competence. With every WOD and every PR we break through our existing comfort zone and subsequently realize that we have yet to fully recognize our limits. In fact, we realize that our limits like our future are both unknown and unknowable.

In the end it is not so important how fast we completed the WOD, but rather that we have overcome our fears – our fear of the WOD, our fear of failure, our fear of the unknown. If we embrace our fears and confront them head-on there is no limit to how much we can grow.





CATEGORY: Training