“18 weeks…”

 

Shared by Breanne Smedley

I posted yesterday on my story about my dead hang PR.

A dead hang is just what it sounds like.

Hang from a bar, don’t let your feet hit the ground.

It’s been a staple in the Thursday GRIT workouts for the past four months.

The goal is to accumulate 4 minutes of hanging.

Of course, if you can do all 4 minutes without stopping (like CJ Thomas), that would be ideal.

But for most of us, our forearms are burning and our palms are sliding down the bar well before that mark.

For every drop, there is a 10 burpee penalty before you get back up on the bar.

The first day I did this, back in October, I dropped five times.

The second time I did it, I dropped three times.

And since then, I couldn’t drop less than three.

Each week, I would come up with a strategy to try to break it up.

Each week, coming closer, but always falling before I reached my mark.

Would I ever be able to drop less than three times? I wondered, often.

Maybe that’s just as good as I can get?

Until yesterday.

18 weeks later, I finally did it.

I held on for 1:45, 1:15, and 1:00.

Two burpee penalties.

It took 18 weeks, 126 days.

Of consistently getting up on that bar.

Of feeling like there was no progress.

Week after week, hanging.

Trying to push that time holding on by 1 more second.

Then, finally, a small victory.

It’s a reminder.

Commit to the process.

Be consistent.

Even when it’s boring.

Most of us, me included, tend to give up on ourselves because we lack the patience needed to for growth.

We want it now.

And if it feels like results aren’t happening quickly enough, we’re over it.

It reminds me of a quote I read last week,

“Look at a stonecutter hammering away at his rock, perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred-and-first blow, it will split in two, and I know it was not the last blow that did it, but all that had gone before.”

Those boring 17 weeks prior where I felt like I was making no progress were just setting me up.

It was a result of the consistent commitment that gave way to the final blow.

A reminder to keep hammering in the other areas of my life that I am trying to make progress.

In my relationships.

In my mindset.

In building a business.

Slow, consistent progress.

But progress, nonetheless.

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