Momentum Is Everything

(I’m writing something every* day for #100days. This is post 86/100.)

Momentum is everything.

This season of HBO’s Hard Knocks provided a great lesson in momentum.

This season was all about JJ Watt (and Vince Wilfork).

JJ Watt combines the best natural, physical gifts, with the hardest work ethic. He is already an all-time great and NFL.com’s #1 player in the world right now.

On the opposite end of the spectrum is Kourtnei Brown.

Brown was undrafted out of Clemson in 2012. Since then, he’s been cut eight times by eight different teams.

JJ Watt can work 16 hours in a day and not feel tired, because every hour reinforces what it is to be JJ Watt.

Kourtnei Brown can work 4 hours in the same day and be drained and exhausted, because after three long years of rejection, he has to doubt whether every hour is worth it.

JJ gets reward, immediately for every minute. That’s how he keeps going an going.

Everything is self-reinforcing for him.

Kourtnei is banging his head against a wall.

That’s what gets tiring.

Banging your head against a wall with no reward.

Fatigue isn’t hours worked. It’s about lack of output for the input.

Everything is expected of Watt, and little is expected of Brown. But that doesn’t matter. It’s Brown who is tiring right now.

Momentum is everything. It makes getting better easier. And its absence can make getting better impossible.