Let me tell you the story of my adventure race debut.
A few weeks ago two friends and I drove 3 hours north to lovely Dorset for the ‘Wilderness Traverse’. While this may sound like a pleasant day of hiking it went a bit beyond that. The event was a 24 hour race (which means you do not sleep) that if we had finished it (which we did not) would have covered nearly 180 km of trekking, paddling and cycling.
Sounds like your cup of tea?
What if I told you the trekking was 90% off-trail and took us almost 8 hours to cover 18km?
Or the paddle included 9km of portaging during a rain soaked starless night?
Or the ride would wind its way through rutted ATV trails with only your headlamp to guide you?
If it still sounds like your jam let me know, we can be friends.
The point I am trying to make…it was hard!!!
Harder in a very different way than anything I had done before. Which is exactly why I chose to do it. In my opinion, it is fundamentally important to challenge ourselves through new experiences to encourage growth. A novel experience is hard to come by in our socially-distant-disinfectant-covered lives.
I didn’t just want to do this, I needed it.
Cycling 70km would have seemed like a gigantic task had you asked me in July. But on a warm August morning at 3:30am I hopped on my bike eager to ride away hours 18 to 24. In a single day the mental shift of what is possible for my body was incredible. 6 hours of exercise was attainable instead of improbable.
How does this impact our day to day lives? Take chances and try new things!
How does this relate to our Alchemy lives?
This is the power of testing a one rep max.
The magic of learning to handstand.
The potency of developing a new habit.
By introducing your mind and body to a brand new stimulus it resets the limit. We all leave so much untapped potential on the table each day and when we do hard things we take a step a little further towards the best version of ourselves.