Do I workout, or more accurately why do I workout like a mad man?

To stave off the ravages of time?
To prove how fit I am (to who?)?
To look better naked?
To eat or drink whatever I want?
To be healthy(er)?
To compete at the highest level of fitness?
To live an extraordinary life?

All of those things, to some degree, are true. I do want to age well and be able to do what I want when I want no matter how old I am. I am proving how fit I am to myself every day. Looking better naked? We will let that one go! I do eat and drink whatever I want, although what I want isn’t trash or poisonous to my health. Yes, I want to improve my health every day. And the goal is to show up next year at the CrossFit games ready to take on the world.

But as fine as all those reasons are, they aren’t the primary impetus for going as hard as I do. They aren’t enough to put my body, and dangerously, my health on the line. I am writing this with one hand after being surgically repaired 2 weeks ago (tendon). Those reasons are not enough to have me start lifting weight and pushing my body less than 2 weeks out of the operating theatre.

So…Why? What is driving this bus? What is it that has me relentlessly pursuing this thing?
In a nutshell: the pursuit of excellence. The desire to be the best. At the end of the day the ability to look back and say, today I touched excellence and tomorrow I am going to do it again.
In the words of Aristotle:
We are what we do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.

At the end of the work can you say you gave full effort? If so it is a victory…a victory over mediocrity, the defeat of average, of the mundane, of everyday ho hum, hum drum.

Pursue excellence. Live extraordinary.
Join me.

John Mariotti
www.crossfitodyssey.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com
775-338-2412