The Transformation

No, we aren't talking about The Fly from 1986 with Jeff Goldblum.  CrossFit isn't going to stick you in a metal tank and try to transport you to another tank in what was known back in the 80's as "matter transportation".  Today is more like the Monarch Butterfly Life Cycle.  Do you remember that?  It's referenced all the time to show huge changes in life. . .



So, that life cycle that I was just referencing, the Monarch Butterfly Life Cycle.  Another inquisitive look from the audience as they wanna see the connection.  I can make this one pretty easily:

4 Stages
1)  Egg - The adult Monarch Butterfly lays one small egg on a milkweed plant
2)  Larva - From Egg to Adult, the transformation takes roughly one month, Larva grow so fast in fact, that as they consume the majority of the milkweed, they need to shed their skin 5 times before they pupate. That's a lot of change.
3)  Pupa - After much consumption, it's time to cocoon again, and the cocoon changes over time.
4)  Adult - Way to be beautiful, spread your wings and fly and head down to Mexico to migrate.

Today's topic is not the physical transformation that occurs in CrossFit.  That is easily shown on a couple pages right?

The before and after's like:

www.crossfitrelentless.com
http://www.crossfitironwill.com/?p=3152
http://www.shorelinecrossfit.com/2010/04/paleo-challenge-results-revealed/

I want to talk about the mental change.  The maturity, the confidence, and the determination.  Yesterday, many athlete's had the opportunity to perform a chipper WOD.  It was 6 exercises with 50 repetitions of each exercise before moving on to the next one.  They struggled, first jumping on boxes that some thought they could never get on, moving on to kettlebells that they thought they could never swing, to medicine ball cleans that wreaked havoc on the hip flexors, pull-ups that lasted for forever, sit-ups that felt like the someone put the refrigerator on your chest, only to end with Double-Unders - and even if they could only do 1, they did 50 of each, some doing only 1 at a time until they hit 50 (and if it wasn't Double Unders, it was Tuck Jumps)- the definition of a chipper.  Chipping away at a workout till it's complete.

Emotion, thought, and brain structure mutually affect one another, so do the Coach and the client and the client's with the other client's.  I affect your performance, the person next to you affects your performance, you affect your performance.  A positive attitude takes you further than anything else, a negative attitude will weigh you down.  There is no need to over complicate this.  Yesterday I saw some of that, the "This is going to take me forever" which happened to come out more as a groan than anything else, the "Wait, how big is that box I need to jump on?", "Wait, how much weight do I have to use?", and the always hysterical - in the middle of the class - "We all have to pee at the same time. . . "

But self-determination got you through that workout, so take a step back, think about when you were the egg that just started CrossFit.  Even if you are still in the egg stage, what do you have to do to get to the larva stage?  Figure out where you are in relation to the Life Cycle.  We all want to be Adults, but we've got a lot to learn and a long way to go before we get there, and guess what?  Us Coaches will be here the whole time to help you along the way, cause there are only a few elite people I can think of (cough, cough Chris Spealler - Kristan Clever) that get to go down to Mexico to migrate, but they still work like eggs and larva.

-Coach Tony