Do you know that feeling of battling against the current, exhausted, wondering what you did wrong to end up here? I recently found myself struggling to reach progress using old methods, until a scene of local nature taught me why this never works.
An exhausted Tuesday morning. A slow endurance run at three alternating paces, but I feel weak at all three. Even though the weekend out with friends was already two nights ago, I’m still feeling the effects of the beers and late nights. I usually enjoy every run, but today is a rare exception. I’m trying to train like a pro athlete, but the aftermath of this weekend prevents it. I look around, searching for anything to provide some hope. Grey, dreary autumn skies all around. I wonder what went wrong and just put my head down to grind out the last 5 km.
Today is one of the first runs that require warmer clothes to protect against the cold autumn winds. It’s usually in this month that the running gloves get dug up from the closet. I look at my gloved fingers: a sign that the seasons are changing. Through my fingers I see a brown pile of decayed plant material on the road, that I have to sidestep on this small path while running. The nature at the local canals is kept in check by removing the tall brown reeds from their banks every October. Just like our wardrobe changes, so is the change of seasons visible in nature.
A little annoyed I zigzag to circumvent the familiar piles of dead plants. But then my eyes spot something I’ve never paid attention to before. Between the leftover stubs of the reed I see tiny new plants poke their heads up. A fresh green color like you only see in young plants, cutely grasping their chance at new life. The old plants had to be removed first for these new shoots to claim their place. And suddenly it dawns that nature is holding up a mirror here.
Sometimes we want to change, but old patterns prevent our new lifestyle from emerging. Just like the brown reeds, the old habits must be pulled out to make room for the new. If we want to eat healthier, those processed foods need to leave the kitchen cabinets to make space for healthy alternatives. If we want to spend more time reading or developing ourselves, we need space to focus by eliminating distractions like doomscrolling and netflixing. Once we create a new environment that fits our desired change, the chances of succeeding increase. It’s clear now that this is exactly what I did wrong: I tried to reach a completely new outcome by barely changing the old patterns. I skipped a few beers here and there, exchanged some unhealthy snacks during poker night for a banana, and was the first to be in bed. But what remained was late nights, a diet of coffee and fried eggs, and a weekend with calorie-loaded but nutritionally poor snacks along with some beers. This simply doesn’t suit the lifestyle of an athlete who wants to start the week energized.
…the old ones had to go out first
Whenever our desires or goals change, we need to rethink whether our current lifestyle is supportive. A quote that accurately reflects this is: what got you here, won’t get you there. This doesn’t mean we have to completely overhaul our lives, it can mean something as simple as exchanging the crisps in our home for fruits, or not taking our phones to bed with us. Small changes are the most sustainable. Just because certain habits have served us in the past, doesn’t mean they are helpful for the rest of our lives. And sometimes you just need two days of exhaustion and a bunch of rotting plants to point this out.
If you’re smarter than me you won’t need to learn this lesson the hard way, but instead see it coming up front. Are there any old habits you feel are holding you back? What’s something that got you here, but won’t get you there? Or, perhaps a bit more scary: is there any communal habit you share with your friends that you would like to rediscuss with them?
References:
–What got you here, won’t get you there. It’s actually the title of a book by Marshall Goldsmith.
Or, as an uncle of mine uses to say in dutch: als je doet wat je deed, krijg je wat je kreeg.
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