The reward for work and accomplishments is almost always more work. The reward for meeting and exceeding previously-determined expectations is a new and elevated standard. We’ve never really “arrived” until we retire (regarding sport/business) or die (regarding family and any other personal matters).
Fall in love with the process. Get comfortable with adversity. Keep showing up. Do the work.
Just over a month ago, a client, one whom I specifically am responsible for, dumped a huge project on us with no warning, which I finally completed this week after many long days and weekends of extra effort. Not long after that, I pulled a muscle in my lower back while deadlifting, which caused a couple weeks of agonizing pain and limited mobility. (It was mordantly funny to be reading a book about Stoicism while lying in bed with ice packs underneath me, listening to Seneca airily dismiss pain as anything worth fretting about, but then we already knew that Seneca didn’t even lift.) I’m pleased to say that I made it through the whole double ordeal without my equanimity getting ruffled. I didn’t get stressed, I didn’t get discouraged, I just accepted the challenge and set myself to the necessary tasks of working hard and recuperating. Hey, it only took half a century of practice to finally accomplish.
April 7, 2024 @ 10:40 am
The weight-room has been, for me, the best place to learn this lesson.
Sounds improbable but I once read an interview with Joe Perry, guitarist for Aerosmith, in which he said the major reward for making a good album is you get the opportunity to make another good album.
April 7, 2024 @ 12:46 pm
It’s funny because my trainer likes to say, as praise, “Hard work should be rewarded!” which makes me silently say, Oh, no…