BEING CONSISTENT WITH GRACE: BE GENTLE NOW & FIERCE LATER ⋆ FINDING FINISH LINES

As athletes, we prize consistency. In this season, let’s celebrate being consistent with our grace.

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Athletes Value Being Consistent

One thing that endurance athletes and coaches talk about pretty much all the time is the value of consistency.

We hear messages constantly like:

A consistent athlete is a resilient athlete.

How you show up for yourself in training is how you show up everywhere in life.

If you want to be taken seriously, be consistent.

Or from Tony Robbins, “It’s not what we do once it a while, it’s what we do consistenly.”

And there is so much value there.

Phsyical science and behavior science both tell us that we making our training a habit, a part of our regular lives, will make us stronger.

And that is wonderful.

Life is a little different right now

I promise to get back to this messaging with you later, when life transitions to a new normal.

For now, dear atheletes, there is only one practice that I am begging you to find consistency with:

Grace.

The incredible pouring out of grace for yourself and everyone around you, as much as you possibly can.

Hear me out:

We have all been thrust into this strange time together, but we aren’t experiencing it the same way.

I’m in my mid 30s with two kids, a huband, a business I run from home, and 6 animals under one roof…always.

My benchmarks for thriving are in far different places than those of you that are 19 and returned home from your first year away in college, or 24 and trying to launch a carreer, or 70 and managing in an odd, virtual society.

Rocking the social distancing looks very different for a family in an apartment in the city than it does for a crew on a farm in middle america.

Things change radically for families who have a loved one we are now trained to call vulnerable.

You do you

We might all experience a whole range of emotions every single day.

Anything from gratitude to anxiety to lonlieness to productivity to rested to bored to feelings I don’t even have words for.

So here is what I am coming to learn in this time: it’s absolutely not helpful for me to nag you to add to your to-do list. That’s not for me.

I’m actually going to gently encourage you to release yourself from the to-do list that has been handed to you in the messages from top to bottom:

You are welcome to spend your time relaxing if that is what your body needs

You are welcome to get a little messy if thats what your body needs.

You are welcome to sit (safely at home) in the sun if that is what your body needs

no, thank you

You might have heard a certain actress with a lifestyle brand to sell you all kinds of things to (put your fingers in the air and lets hit some air quote together) “SOOOLLLVE” all kinds of deficiencies you didn’t even know were in your life, tell you that if you aren’t learning a new skill in this time, then you have wasted it.

And all I have to say about that is, “Huuhh…”.

You might have friends that have told you, with very good intentions, that this IS the time you have been waiting for to get into the very best shape of your whole lives.

And all I have to say about that is, “Huuhh…”

Maybe you have received the message loud and clear that you have to get rip roaring drunk at 3pm or you aren’t a cool mom right now.

And all I have to say about that is, “Huuhh…”

Are you recieving the foods message? It could be either way, either allllll the women are eating junk and getting fat or maybe alllllll the women in your bubble are ordering in prime ingredients from an exotic untouched forest in south america and trying all the new, luxuouis foods and you should too.

And all I have to say about that is, “Huuhh…”.

I’ll try my own way

Becuase, much like I am right now, we are all just wandering around looking for the way through this.

Good for all of you for trying things on for size. My size isn’t necessarily yours, though.

So if everyone is sharing their messaging, here is mine: Why dont we just decide, before our feet hit the ground in the morning for the first time, until our heads hit the pillow, that we are just going to swim in grace

GRACE FOR EVERYONE

Grace for everyone in leadership, just trying to figure out what is right and what is wrong in a new area with very few real answers and very VERY many conflicting theories. This grace is available whether we believe these people are up to the challenge or not. The truth is, this is their burden. Ours is to not make it harder.

Grace for yourself when you fall WAY short of who you believed you would be today.

Grace for the loud voices around you that might be sloppy in the way that they offer their help.

This one has taken some real work from me and I’m not perfect, but grace for the people around you who have just declared themselves epidemiologists and now have all kids of suggestions for you.

Grace for the VERY loud small people running around our homes asking for snacks and entertainment and love and security when you are all out of it all to give for the day.

For now, dear athletes, let’s commit that the practice that we are being consistent with right now is making it rain grace.

How does this apply to those of us in training right now?

Where is the consistency?

Well, I’d be willing to bet that you have gone either ALL IN or ALL OUT lately.

Either you are rocking the two-a-days or you can’t remember the last time your shoes slipped into your favorite runners.

Maybe you have had a few solid streaks of two or three days of workouts strung together followed by five where you couldn’t bring yourself to get it.

Here is what I know about our kind: if you are in the group that has the less consistent efforts, you are probably holding some guilt about it that feels like a kick in the belly the three or four times per day when the thought crosses your mind, yeah?

Friend, it’s ok.

Your race was cancelled. Your responsiblity list just started looking like a cartoon scroll that goes on and on endlessly.

You took action to sign up for that race. You never asked for any of this extra responsibility. The grief of that exchange is real.

Being consistent will come.

This is not the time to hit yourself with messages of discipline. This isn’t the place for the, “Go hard or go home” philosophy.

This is a season for one question: What can I do to be most gentle to myself and those around me today?

Sometimes, probably pretty often, just asking yourself this question will give you exercise as an answer.

Maybe the combination of sun and wind and the soundtrack of songbirds over your repeated footfalls on the pavement will shake out the tension you have been holding.

Maybe climbing 10% grade on your bike as the sweat and tears mix on your face to wash away the fear is exactly what grace looks like today.

Blonde mother teachers her daughter the value of being consistent as they ride bikes indoors in a basement — Climbing it out

And maybe it’s just plain old not.

It could be a gentle walk with your kids to look for new flowers blossoming up in this strange mix of a beautiful and horrible spring.

(Older mom tip: kids are less likely to ask you for the 442266th snack while exploring.)

And yall, maybe its just the workout of schlepping your weighted blanket out to the couch to watch Too Hot to Handle for an embarassingly long time.

via GIPHY

This doesn’t make you less of an athlete. It doesn’t mean that you are weak because you cant hit the bar of six – a – week workouts.

Because you are hitting seven-a-weeks days of self care.

And that’s all that this training is in our lives.

So Congratulations! You can find yourself practicing being consistent, a mark of an athlete, a survior, a fighter, a thriver…even without a green week on TrainingPeaks.