It Wasn’t Real Until…
I was sitting with Kaci when she called me out.
“Yeadon! Why aren’t you sharing your journey?”
Um…
This was not the time for anyting but the unvarnished truth.
“Because I’m afraid.”
The words popped out and I couldn’t take them back.
I only had 73 days left until I was planning to participate in a huge endurance athletic event.
A full distance Ironman triathlon.
2.4 mile swim…112 mile bike…26.2 mile run
I had been training(ish) solo for a few months, getting long rides in where I could, but mostly ginving myself waaay too much leeway on actually training for the event.
A few people knew I was registered for the race, but I hadn’t really shared the journey so far.
Because I knew if I kept it to myself, there was less risk.
Less risk of embarrassment, less risk of feeling like a failure, less risk or falling short.
I knew the mental game I was playing.
I was playing to avoid loss…instead of playing to win.
Playing it safe so that I wasn’t accountable to anyone but myself for my progress and results.
Playing small.
And Kaci called me out on it.
In that moment, I had a choice.
I could stick with my secret plan to train on my own and just hope for the best…or I could lean in and share my journey and play to win.
So many times, I had argued with myself to just train on my own and not publicly proclaim what I was doing.
Because the truth was that I didn’t really want accountability!
I didn’t want the pressure of having to get up at 2am on a Saturday to ride a bike for 5 hours while the neighborhood streets were empty.
I wanted the option to sleep in!
“Because sleep is super important for recovery!” I would tell myself…
But if you’re not actually training…then it’s just sleep…not actual recovery…
And there I was, sitting at the table, processing the question from Kaci…
“Why haven’t you shared this with more people?”
Door number one…make up some excuse and go home after the conference and continue my half-assed training regimen and hope for enough juice to finish the Ironman at the end of the summer…
Door number two…honestly share the fear and lean into the journey and accept the accountability that comes with it…
We’ve all been there at various times in life.
Fighting back the fear voice shouting in my head, I committed.
“This next Saturday, when I get home, I’ll go live before my ride so you know it happens…”
You would think that the fear would subside…but it actually doubled down!
The next week, Friday afternoon, I knew I had to follow through. So I prepped my bike gear and made sure it was ready to go for the midnight hour start.
And in the dark, with terrible lighting from the streetlights…I started the livestream…
No turning back now.
The crazy part is that my fear was actually a huge part of what was holding me back from making progress!
Statistically…keeping my goal to myself was a losing proposition.
Check out these numbers from The American Society of Training and Development (ASTD)…
Chances of achieving a goal:
10% — If you have an idea or a goal actually.
25% — If you consciously decide you will do it.
40% — If you decide when you will do it.
50% — If you plan how you will do it.
65% — If you commit to someone, you will do it.
95% — If you have a specific accountability appointment with a person you’ve committed to.
I really only had a 40% chance of success with the plan I was working on!
By committing to someone and having a specific appointment to check in, the odds jump to 95%!
I knew that by committing to Kaci with a specific time for checking in, there was NO WAY I was going to back out of the next early morning ride.
And it worked.
And it kept working.
Each week, I would share my journey, share my progress toward my goal.
I couldn’t fall back on old excuses…because the pressure that I had for sharing each week was stronger. It kept me on track.
Whether you’re training for an Ironman, or a 5k, or starting a new business, or whatever the goal is…the numbers are the same…
Are you keeping it to yourself? So that there is little or no risk of external “failure”? Playing to not lose?
Or are you playing to WIN? Setting up the systems in place to keep the motivation high to accomplish the steps that will move you across the goal line?
The safe route is solo.
The winning route is with a community surrounding you that can hold you to it.
Finding the right community is key. Surrounding yourself with those who can hold you to your commitment to yourself for action.
Set your goal.
Make the commitment to yourself.
AND THEN…the key…
Get in the right community to share that goal.
Get in the rhythm of scheduled checkins on the way toward the goal.
You’ve been practising long enough…time to start playing to win.
p.s. I finished the Ironman triathlon. 15 minutes faster than I thought I could…
