Try to imagine being beaten so badly at something that you could never even think of coming back. Never in a million years would you again subject yourself to such pain, such humiliation, such personal debasement. The beating was so bad that each thought associated with the defeat creates nightmares. The nightmares give way to being haunted by temptations to end it all.
We have all been here. That last bodybuilding show when we were handed our heads on a platter. Our egos were crushed and all we could hear in our heads was the drum beat of criticism and taunts. It is here that all of us who eventually won and became more than we ever imagined started…..at the bottom. Like somebody once said, “When you are the deep end and our knees hit the bottom, it is here that we gather ourselves and push hard off the bottom to the surface.” This is our reality in bodybuilding and life. There will be things that will crush our very spirits if we let it happen.
It’s easy to ride high on success. It’s easy to be a fair weather hero. It’s easy to pump our fist in the air in victory when it’s happening. But! In order to get to the top AND STAY THERE we have to endure the worst of times. We have to overcome the worst of times. We have to literally, turn the night into day when we have been written off and often when we have written ourselves off.
There is no magic formula….Like Muhamad Ali Said, “Your will has to exceed your skill!” We have to have a gigantic store house of “WANT TO” and ‘SELF MASTERY” or all the skill and talent in the world will be useless to be our best. The greatest question we must face in my estimation is, “WHEN DARKNESS COMES WHAT WILL YOU DO?” Being our best will be determined by our ability to handle the worst. Every bodybuilder I know who has had any degree of success knows this to be true.
Bottom Line: Experiencing the worst is the beginning of being the best.
Six Pack and Senior 