Take Ownership

Hi, flyte fam! I hope you are all doing well as we continue sheltering in place. 

This has been such a crazy yet growth-promoting time, at least in my perspective! I have been learning a lot about myself and growing in the process.

Last week I was reflecting on how life can change in a minute. COVID19 turned our world and our lives upside down. It reveals to us how much we aren’t in control and how life can be flipped upside down in a moment. This allows us to take one of two perspectives, to let challenges defeat us or to use it to refine us, grow us, sharpen us. 

Honestly, the easier thing is to give up and retreat. Do we want to take the easy way out though? Or do we want to face the challenges, rise and overcome? 

Our sense of control, our structure and routine have been taken away from us. Things that were once easy for us are now out of our control, like our ability to train or get groceries, toilet paper, paper towels. While this isn’t the end of the world, sometimes we can let things crumble our little world. 

Just last week I was having a moment. I was frustrated because it was raining and because it was raining I found myself saying “I can’t work out because it is raining” or another example “I can’t work out because my roommate needs the living room”

Then I had the revelation that it wasn’t that I couldn’t, I wouldn’t. I was choosing not to. I wasn’t taking ownership. I was making an excuse, blaming. Rather than saying “I can’t” it was more like “I won’t” I was letting it defeat me and keeping myself in a fixed mindset. I was telling myself “I won’t find a solution to this problem. I won’t find a way to work around this circumstance” “I won’t find a way or a plan to be able to train today” I didn’t like that. I was like dang, I could have, I could have done something and I chose not to. I wasn’t determined, I was easily defeated. And this gave me a new resolve to be a better problem solver and to be determined to solve. To be determined to find the solution. To be determined to take away. It gave me a new resolve to take ownership. 

I realized that I could work out, I would just need to find a solution to working out, and maybe that was solving HOW CAN I go workout outside. For example, I can say I can’t run or decide I can. I'm just choosing not to, that if I truly want to I am going to run in the rain. Or maybe that means I am going to solve how to bring my dumbbells and kettlebell outside somewhere even if that means it’s a sidewalk. 

What this taught me was a few things 

1. Choice: we CAN choose WHAT we think and we CAN choose to problem solve or quit. 
2. Problem-solving: this is an opportunity to learn how to be a better problem solver, rather than to be stubborn and resolve to be defeated. I can choose to solve for X.
3. Awareness of my mind and thinking patterns: my tendency to get frustrated when things seem to be out of my control, my tendency to give up and be in a fixed mindset, and that I have work to do 
4. How this time where many things are out of my control is a great opportunity for me to grow in my mental and emotional game and become a better problem solver and have a greater growth mindset 
5. Rather than being so concerned about physical training, turn your focus to training your mind. This time can be focused on our mental game and overcoming our mental obstacles. It shows us what we do and don’t have control of, how we currently react or respond and also how we normally approach such obstacles and allows us to learn and grow in how we respond and approach obstacles. Life is easy when it is going our way however when things don’t go as planned are the greatest learning and growth opportunities. 

Funny enough I ended up seeing the quote “change can’t to won’t” on Ben Bergeron's Instagram that weekend which further reinforced the mindset choice and had me thinking about this concept. Naturally, I googled it to dive deeper and also ended up finding a great blog called 413 Fitness that said, “It is time we change the can’t, won't and take ownership of what is possible” talking about this concept. Check out this blog and also check out Ben’s Instagram or Ted Talk or great mindset content. 

Reflection:

Where have you recently said “I can’t X” and how does it feel and change your perspective?

What is something in your life right now where you can better solve for X?  

How are you going to take ownership today? This week? This month? This year? 

Choose to see this as an opportunity for you to be creative and work on problem-solving. Be determined to solve for X. It might not look like how you ideally want to do something but you can still do something. 

The Bible says we are more than conquerors. It says that we are to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. It says that we are to demolish every argument and pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God and to take captive everything thought and make it obedient to Christ. It says we are made in God's image. It says we are fearfully and wonderfully made. It says God has given us a spirit of power, love and sound mind or self-discipline. God has not given us a timid spirit, a defeated spirit, he has given us power. 

What that means is that we are to put down being defeated and timid. We are to stand in the power that God gives us which is being a warrior, a conqueror. 

God made a way and we can too. 

My brain will often take a few days to process through thoughts, emotions, concepts. Over a few days I was scribbling various things in my planner and today I noticed that it was more or less a little mental process and as a flow chart, here is what it ended up being. (See image above)

-Charissa

Charissa is a Performance Coach, Certified Nutrition Coach, Certified Fitness Specialist, Certified Personal Trainer, and holds a B.S. in Kinesiology. She also holds an M.A. in Higher Education Administration. She is a follower of Jesus, passionate about faith, fitness, nutrition, a lifestyle of total health, meditating, learning and growing!