“We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.” – Charles R. Swindoll
Jeremy came to Innovative Results back in the Summer of 2013. His consistency, dedication has brought him incredible results, and the IR Family is so thankful and proud to have him here at the IR Facility!
I started training at Innovative Fitness in July of 2013, weighing in at 305 lbs. I started off slowly, coming in two or three times a week, building up my endurance. One of the movements that gave me the most trouble was crawling. (If you have spent anytime training here, then there is no doubt that you have had pleasure of reliving your childhood too. And by childhood I mean trying to remember how it was so easy to crawl around on the floor for extended periods of time.) As I started to lose weight, I began to notice that exercising was getting easier, but my difficulty with crawling continued.
For my one year anniversary, I weighed in at 260lbs, dropping 45 pounds, three inches from my waist and increased my stamina enough to work out five times a week. Even with all of this improvement, I was still struggling with the crawls. Around this same time, I was given the opportunity to interview for a dream job that I had been preparing for over the last several years. The interview process took several weeks to complete, during which I was talking with Corey, Mark and some training buddies about the opportunity. One of the IR challenges at that time was the 10 minute crawl. I remember thinking that it must be some kind of joke, and who in the heck would want to take that on. But one day the following week, I made a bet with Corey, that if I were to get the job I would take the challenge. One of my buddies said he would too and Corey, being the crazy man that he is, said he would crawl for 30 min! As luck or fate would have it, I landed the position but now I had to pay up. I took me about a month before I had the courage to take it on. I had my doubts about being able to complete the 10 minutes, but I gave my word and finally came in one Saturday morning to pay up.
I remember thinking there is no way I can do this. Corey’s famous last words before we started were, “It’s all in your head, man, just keep moving and you will be fine.” As we began, I thought about that for a couple of seconds and decided to buy in. I would be a liar if I said that it was easy or that I was able to crawl the whole ten minutes without my knees touching, but I did get in a good 2 minutes of correct position crawling (which is huge for me) and never stopped moving or took a break. Once the ten minutes was up I stopped and watched Corey and Rob continue to crawl. That’s when the challenge part 2 was issued.
Rob and Corey both encouraged me to join them continue to crawl. So, I did. I lasted another six minutes before total exhaustion and having raw knees from the green turf. A few days later I was thinking about the entire process and a new understanding of Corey’s statement hit me like a ton of bricks. Taking on challenges is 100% mental. People tend to be risk averse and generally don’t like risk because they think they can’t complete the task. This type of thinking defeats the whole purpose of taking on a challenge in the first place. By definition, a challenge is something that is supposed to be difficult to complete. If there is no difficultly or doubt then there is no challenge. By combating this doubt and attempting any challenge, one builds self-confidence and willingness to take on even more difficult tasks. Much like a downward spiral that people often experience in life, one can also experience an upward progression. The difference is, we are 100% in control of the upward and can start it at any time.
I don’t think Corey, has a degree in philosophy or is a motivational speaker but he definitely inspired me think a little bit differently about things lately. Crawling is still a physical challenge but I am getting better and now know that I do have the physical capacity for that kind of challenge. Who knows maybe on my 2 year anniversary, I’ll do the Corey special and go for 30 minutes too.