I hit one of the goals today. This is something I have officially been working on consistently for about a year (minus the covid break), but really for about 30 years. I squatted three pounds more than my weight. I have been training slowly, steadily, and safely for a year to be able to do this. I am proud of myself something that is pretty hard for me to say). This feels like a very huge accomplishment, maybe bigger than it really is, but for me, it feels pretty darn big and here is why:
If you are of a certain age, a few phrases may give you a nightmarish flashback like....Presidential Fitness Test. It was the fitness testing we did in Junior High in 1988. I can barely remember all the things that happened last week, but oh, I remember every last single detail of that day of the Presidential Fitness Test in 7th grade. I remember my gym teachers name, what the hallway looked like, the color of the walls in the gymnasium, who I was standing next to in line. It was absolutely horrible. The top 15 percent of the kids in the class got a Physical Fitness Award, so....those kids probably didn't mind that day.
The test started off with us all being lined up in the long hallway to the gym, then we were weighed in front of pretty much the entire grade. YES weighed on a scale in front of the entire class. The gym teacher read the number on the scale and then it felt like he shouted it out to his assistant who was writing down all the numbers. Maybe it wasn't a shout but it felt like it to my already insecure 13 year old self and it was definitely audibly heard by all. I barely knew anyone yet in my new school and I was much bigger than most of the girls in my class and was far from athletic. What I weighed that day, at the age of 13, is a number that is burned in my brain. It was beyond awful and I felt so embarrassed. I was one of the heaviest girls in the class. The testing continued to get worse and worse after that. I failed every strength and endurance test, the pull ups, the push ups, the sit ups, every other awful test and came in one of the last in the mile "run" (I had to walk most of it). Ugh... does anyone remember the awful sit and reach test? The sit and reach was the one on that box designed to test your flexibility. As if I wasn't feeling awful enough, at the end of the test a boy (I totally remember his name but keeping it to myself), said "wow, you are big and weak" and laughed with another boy about it.
I have no idea exactly what I was comparing my weight against, or what I understood of fitness and wellness at that age, but I do know I chose to believe those boys and the big F I got on the Presidential Fitness Test.
I just held on to the belief that "I am just not strong" for a very very long time. And unfortunately our self limiting beliefs can get set in our minds as our "truth". This experience also made me dread any type of strength training or heavy weight lifting, because I believed I was bad at it. I now realize that it is important to periodically check in with what you believe about yourself. Pay attention to the self limiting thoughts and sometimes tracing back where those beliefs began can help you see that just because they were "true" or felt real in a past moment doesn't mean it has to be that way for the rest of your life. And then you pivot your thoughts and set a new goal and a new belief begins.
So, today, with a lot of hard work both mentally (overcoming deeply held self limiting beliefs from 1988) and physically, I reached my goal. I did it. I felt strong! The sort of good news is that The Presidential Fitness test was banned in 2012. Why it took so long to stop it, I have no idea. But I am sorry to all of us who were completely embarrassed by that experience and left it not feeling inspired by fitness but instead defeated by it.
Thank you to my trainer, Ellie Anthonys for having my back, literally, and encouraging me to keep challenging myself!
