You’ve seen it numerous times…head down between the knees, hand on the thighs or cupping the face, struggling for breath, and maybe with tremors running throughout the entire body. Maybe it’s on the knees, face in the hands or seated with the head cradled in the arms of flat on your back gasping for air and rolling around in pain. They all symbolize the same thing…beaten. Beaten down by an opponent whether live and in person or by a work out or something else. Beaten.

When we assume the posture of defeat we are telling our mind, body, and spirit that we have been beaten, that our opponent has gotten the best of us, even if that opponent is just a workout. We often find ourselves in this position by default. It feels good, I will just get a couple of breaths and get back after it but you never come back with quite the zeal you had before. Somewhere in your psyche you have admitted defeat even if you don’t think you have.

And when you next face that opponent or that workout somewhere in the back of your mind will be a nagging doubt, a residual knowledge that this opponent owns you and not the other way around.

Even if the score board says you didn’t win, even if the white board lists you lower you must never assume the posture of defeat. That’s right…Never. You must always stand tall, breathing deeply, eyes forward and posture erect. You must tell your psyche that you win…always. The scoreboard only reflects the outcome of today’s contest, not whether you are a winner or loser. Losers assume the posture of defeat. Winners assume the posture of strength…unbowed, unconquerable, undefeated…every time.

Find your posture of defeat and eliminate it. Cut it out like a cancer…it is costing you points every time you go there. Points your psyche needs to win this time and every time. And thanks to C.J. Martin of Invictus for pointing this out and hammering the point home!

Get out and win. Or at least look like you won. It matters.

John Mariotti
www.crossfit-odyssey.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com
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