Why fitness really is the first step to greatness
Justin Kan (the founder of Twitch) often snaps from the gym with this maxim:
“Fitness is the first step to greatness.”
I’m keen on exercise too, but this maxim flew over my head the first few times as being a bit try-hard. Yet when I think about my own experience, I have to agree that this maxim is true.
No, I’m not great. Yet :) But here’s the five ways in which fitness sent me off on the right path:
1. Changes your state quickly
It goes without saying that exercise puts you in a positive mindset. If you felt blah before, after a run your bad mood will lift and you’ll also feel accomplished. The latter is how exercise puts you in a success state.
2. Builds daily momentum
These ‘accomplishments’, like finishing a run or a workout, build up. If you get your workout in, do you notice how much more accomplished you feel at the end of that day? Even if exercise is the only thing you got done that day?
This sort of feedback snowballs over time. We all know that once you’re in a rhythm of working out, it becomes easier to maintain this rhythm. You feel accomplished and ‘on track’. Success is not a destination, it is the track.
Those small wins (or accomplishments) accrue until they become big wins. Then bam — all of a sudden you’ve achieved a goal that seemed impossible or a stretch at the start of the year.
3. Pushes you out of your comfort zone
Few things are damaging to the ego at the same time as they nourish it. Even as you’re making strides, fitness keeps you humble. As soon as a weight becomes comfortable to wield around, you know you have to increase it. And then you’re back to square one with that particular exercise.
In fitness, feeling comfortable means you’re not progressing. Isn’t it often the same in business & life as well?
4. Teaches the power of consistency
They say that the key to success is showing up. I can’t think of another area where you can see visceral results of showing up other than fitness. As long as you train consistently, you get stronger.
Notice how when you fall of the wagon, you don’t just stop getting stronger but you also get weaker mentally? Exercise creates a positive feedback loop.
5. Boosts confidence
I’ve learned lots since I started training and running obstacle course races a year and a half ago. (Read more about it here.) If I could take away just one lesson from it, it would be the knowledge that I am badass.
Yep. Me. I am badass. Formerly, the person who didn’t think she could run more than 5k in one go. Now the person who rips up her knee halfway into a 12k mud run and still enjoys the hell out of the race.
When times are hard and you need to ‘show up’, what will get you out the door is knowing that you can thrive even while you’re enduring. That’s the kind of grit fitness helps you build.
That’s why, without a doubt, fitness is my first step to greatness.
P.S. Why not challenge yourself and improve your fitness by completing an obstacle course race? If your first reaction is ‘I could never do that’, it’s why you must give it a go.
