Monday, July 13, 2009

What's extreme fitness and why should you care?

Extreme fitness is another way of saying “get out of your comfort zone” fitness. Set your goal just a little out of reach and go for it! If you never push yourself, you’ll never get better at anything you do, whether it’s trying something new or strengthening your muscles. You should care about extreme fitness because it’s about learning a mindset to help you push your boundaries in whatever you do. Your success in anything you undertake is directly linked with your success at controlling your body. In SEAL Team our number one weapon’s platform is our body, first and foremost. Everything else is secondary.

In your life, your body is your experience platform: how your body performs in large part dictates the experiences you can enjoy, from climbing a mountain* (like I did a few weeks ago) to body surfing a wave to bicycling with your children. Each of us has our own goals for our body and what we want to do with it, but a funny thing happens when you achieve a goal: you set one a little harder than the last one because your confidence is stronger…and there’s no going back! Just ask Lance Armstrong!

It becomes a wonderful addiction that can propel you to living a life that you might have felt was unattainable. It was unattainable because you focused on the end goal, not the first baby step. Would you try to do to a 5.5 mile open ocean swim before completing a 500 yard swim? No! Whether you apply the concepts of extreme fitness to your body or other areas of your life is your business, but one thing is for sure, we’re all going to die, so why not get the most of life while we can? I say Go For It!

CHARLIE MIKE -- ALDEN

* aerial photo of Mt. Whitney courtesy of National Parks Service

2 comments:

Joe G. said...

"Set your goal just a little out of reach and go for it!"

This has worked wonders for me.

For example, if you have never run a 5k or 10k race, pick one that is 2-3 months in the future.

Set a new time goal if you're an experienced runner. If not, just make it your goal to finish.

You'll be surprised how rewarding that day is.

Unknown said...

This is all so true! I am in the process of getting back into top shape, but some mornings I think "man i have sooo far to go, what's the point?" But the point is, that it simply takes one step at a time. You can't bypass putting in those hours of hard work and just skip to the end. Besides, if that were possible, attaining that longer-term goal wouldn't be near as sweet of a reward. In the words of Thomas Paine, "The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph!"