It’s been over a week since I had the honor of completing another Memorial Day Murph with my Crossfit family. I’ve sat down to write this post a number of times, but it seems like every time I started words just seemed to fail me.
I think it’s because this WOD isn’t just another workout. It isn’t just another day at the box. It isn’t something I want to chronicle so I can compare my time and scaling to last year; it’s something I want to write about because it means something to me every time I find the strength to do it.
The short version is that this year the workout was harder than I remembered. The day was hotter, the box was much more packed, and I finished slower than I did in 2013. I did ring rows instead of kettle bell swings (the scaling we did in 2013), and I did all the pushups starting and finishing on my toes. After 100 that felt like a bad idea. After 200 I couldn’t take my bra off and had to enlist my husband’s help, but I’m glad that I did it.
My Crossfit family is amazing. Around me for the entire workout were fellow members sweating and cheering me on. We were all deep in the suck together, but no one quit. In the end, as one of the very last to finish, I had my own cheering section and even a personal coach who “ran” (if you could call it that) the last mile with me. She had already completed her workout, but pushed me along just the same.
I get a little emotional every time I think about the mental aspect of this workout. Physically, it’s challenging. But mentally, the number of times that I had to push myself to keep going, to talk myself out of just quitting, or of cutting it down a few reps, or any number of other ways I could have “cheated”, was really the biggest challenge for me. It’s amazing how our inner demons, the voices who tell us we’re not strong enough or good enough to do something, really come out when we’re struggling.
Which makes me wonder what our soldiers hear in their heads during their tough times.
In the end, so much of what helped me through was thinking about that. Murph is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done in my life. It’s one of the biggest challenges I will ever face, and one of the toughest things I will ever need to conquer. Talk about a blessing. When doing a hard ass workout, that I PAY a facility to subject me to, surrounded by friends, and fun is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done I KNOW I lead a great life.
I have so many things. So many freedoms. Like everyone I have so many problems, but unlike some of our soldiers, mine are really inconsequential.
While this is a post about a workout, this is really more of my trying to say thank you. To express my gratitude to those who have served and are serving for all they stand for a represent. To remember those who won’t ever come home to us, not that we don’t remember them for at least a moment daily.
So thanks guys.