You Have A Choice…

​When I was a kid I read somewhere that if you bit your tongue hard enough, you could bite it off and kill yourself from blood loss.

So, whenever I was faced with something I really didn’t want to do (homework, family function, chore) I would tell myself:

“Well, I could just bite my tongue off and die.”

Maybe I was a bit melodramatic.

But, it also gave me a choice.
I could do this thing I didn’t want to do, or not.

Of course, it’s not a real choice. It’s the illusion of choice. And that’s usually enough to get over the “I don’t wanna” hump and just do the thing you don’t want to do.

When I first started doing burpees, I didn’t want to do them. I wanted to get better at them, but practicing the skill was hard. So, I gave myself a choice. I could do the burpees all at once really fast and hate it. Or I could do them slow and color in the meantime. 

Notice how carefully crafted my choice was. My brain and body were on board with the burpee plan, I was going to get them done. But how I got them done was my choice.

That ability to find the choice in the situation and choose WISELY lies freedom and, ultimately, success.