 | | In today's edition, Joe shares: - 7 More Insights for 2024
- A Gripping Workout
- The Value of 'Hard'
| | | BETTER IN 2024, PART 3 | Spartans!
Each year, I take time away for a brutal personal inventory. I ask myself, how did I do professionally and personally, as a business leader, father, husband, and friend?
This exercise could turn into a harsh audit that leads to self-judgment and regret, but I've learned over the years to short-circuit that mindset and instead use what I've learned to get better.
Our Spartan community, I believe, is a lot like me. We are unafraid to search out answers and to find ways to improve our lives and the lives of those around us.
Each week this month in The Hard Way, I will share seven powerful ideas on fitness, mental strength, and performance that surfaced for me, along with actions we can take in 2024:
Here are Nos. 15-21:
15. Aim High: Setting and working toward worthy goals that stretch us and give us the chance to demonstrate our highest values is crucial to success.
This year, commit to something hard that will challenge you while liberating all of your best traits: Consistency, grit, loyalty, focus, and physical and mental toughness.
16. Hydrate and move. Yes, sometimes it's that simple.
This year, start each day with 16 oz. of water and a mile walk outdoors. This act alone will energize you and set you up for a successful day.
17. Go Back to Basics: Going from good to great doesn't always require doing new things. Sometimes all it takes is getting better and more consistent at the basics.
This year, do what you do more often with a deep focus on becoming more efficient and effective. Doing fewer things, but doing them better, can be a catalyst to meaningful change.
18. Lend a Hand: Help someone less fortunate than yourself.
This year, make it a priority to reach out to others. The problem with our "self help" movement is that it's too narrowly focused on the "self." One of the best ways to gain energy and agency is to go beyond yourself to help others.
19. Mood Follows Action: The famous Nike tagline is right: Just Do It!
This year, when you're feeling low or anxious, remember that the best way to feel better is to take action. Tackle that big project, take a small step toward a new career, or even do 50 burpees and take a cold shower to change your mental or physical state. You can't think your way out of a bad mood.
20. Lighten Up: Take the work seriously, but yourself not so much. We are not that special, but we can do special work.
This year, focus less on your title and income, and more about using work as a platform to demonstrate your core values: Patience, kindness, cooperation, focus, and more. It's amazing what can be accomplished when you don't care who gets the credit.
21. Be a Tragic Optimist: Accept the pain and suffering inherent to life, and maintain hope nonetheless.
This year, focus on doing the hard things that paradoxically make us more content. Hard choices, easy life; easy choices, hard life.
Here's to The Hard Way!
Joe | | | They Said It | | "What we think, we become." | | –Buddha | | | GET A GRIP | Grip strength is crucial to being a human and is correlated with overall functionality, reduced risk of injury, and the ability to lift and carry objects not to mention more successfully navigating Spartan obstacles.
Here are four easy ways to get a (stronger) grip.
Farmers Walk: Hold a heavy dumbbell in each hand, stand tall, and walk forward for a set distance or time. Keep your shoulders back, chest up, and engage your core to maximize the benefits for grip strength, forearm, and overall body stability.
Dead Hangs: Find a sturdy horizontal bar, grip it with both hands, and hang with your feet off the ground. Maintain a straight body position and hang for as long as possible. This exercise effectively targets grip strength, forearm endurance, and shoulder stability.
Grip Squeezes with Stress Ball: Hold a stress ball in one hand and squeeze it as hard as you can for 10-15 seconds. Release and repeat for several sets on each hand. This simple yet effective exercise helps improve finger strength and dexterity.
Plate Pinch: Place two weight plates together (smooth sides out) and pinch them between your thumb and fingers. Lift the plates off the ground and hold for as long as possible. Gradually increase the weight as your grip strength improves, making this exercise great for enhancing pinch grip strength and fingertip control. | | | You Ask, Joe Answers | Q: Hi Joe, How do you recommend incorporating mental toughness training into a daily fitness routine for someone looking to enhance both their physical and mental resilience?
–Jackson L., London, U.K.
A: Hey Jackson, Integrating mental toughness into your fitness routine is simple: Do hard things and fight the very human urge to coast or "be normal."
Dial up tough workouts and grind through them, jump in the cold plunge or cold shower for three minutes, get up at 5 am every morning and move, then sit still and meditate for 15 minutes.
Each time you choose something hard, and accomplish it, you wire your brain for handling difficulty. It takes time, but there is no substitute for mental toughness if you want to be the best version of you.
Aroo! | | | | The Hard Way Podcast | | | "We know that alcohol directly attacks our coping mechanisms. So the very thing that you are using to cope, is destroying your ability to cope."
–Ruari Fairbairns | | | | | | Was this email forwarded to you? Sign up here. | | | WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THIS NEWSLETTER? | | | | | |
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