#79. Push Yourself posted by brian @ Fri, 11 Jan 2008 22:43:10 -0000

brian — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 22:43:10 -0000

"Only those who risk going too far can possibly find out how far they can go."

~ T.S. Elliot

In the words of William James, the 19th century US philosopher and psychologist:

“You have enormous untapped power you'll probably never tap, because most people never run far enough on their first wind to ever find they have a second."

How bout we tap that power? The way to do it? Push yourself a little harder.

Let’s take a quick look at the “Training Effect”—a concept used to build your body—and see how it applies to our lives.

The same principle that applies to building muscles in the gym applies to building excellence in our lives: In order to grow, we must consistently push ourselves just a little bit past our current comfort zone.

In exercise physiology parlance, this is called the Training Effect. The principles involved?

Overload: You must “overload” your body with more stress than it can currently handle. (Not too much as this may lead to injury, but enough so you're out of your current comfort zone.)

Overcompensation: Your body is smart. It doesn’t like to get its butt kicked. So, what does it do? It overcompensates and repairs itself so that next time it's stronger–and capable of withstanding the level of stress you put on it previously.

The training effect explains how muscles grow, how your heart is trained to beat more efficiently, and how your lungs are trained to distribute oxygen more efficiently. It’s also the same principle that dictates growth in other aspects of our lives: from our ability to give presentations at work to our ability to have challenging conversations with our significant other at home.

Go out and "train." Push yourself a little further today...

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#79. Push Yourself posted by brian @ Fri, 11 Jan 2008 22:43:10 -0000