The reasons to quit arrive first

A couple weeks ago I was driving back from lunch on a Friday when something changed.

I started feeling horrible. 

My stomach started churning. I got a fever. I tried to hold back my teeth from chattering because I was so cold during my afternoon meetings.

I had an even bigger problem. 

I had been training all year for my sprint triathlon that was scheduled for 6AM on Saturday morning. 

As soon as my meetings were completed, I got home and I jumped into bed at 4pm with a hoodie and sweatpants in the middle of July.

I set my alarm for 5AM and just braced myself for 13+ hours in bed. 

I was tossing and turning all night. I hardly slept.

The alarm went off as promised at 5AM. I had a choice. Here was my dialogue:

I could turn it off and sleep in on a summer Saturday morning to “get better.” I can reschedule for another race.

Or… I could do the hard thing that I knew would not kill me. 

(The reasons to sleep in were definitely louder that Saturday at 5AM.)

I got out of bed. I put on my swim trunks. I packed my shoes and bike into my car. I drove to the race. I put my bike out. I stood in front of of Lac La Belle (lake in Oconomowoc, WI) until they told me to start swimming. 

I just moved forward with every swim stroke. Then I moved forward with every pedal stroke. Then I moved forward with every step.

Near the end of the bike ride I found myself running on fumes because I had not eaten since lunch the day before. With no fuel, my brain only wanted to focus on what hurts, so I had to hijack the narrative. 

It was 6AM so my kids were not at the race. But I asked myself for the remainder of the race if my kids were watching me “would they be proud of what they saw?”

I made the race bigger than me for the last half of the race. 

I completed the race. 

It wasn’t pretty.

I tried to handle hard the best I could.

It sucked. I learned the reasons to quit arrive first and loudest. (I can’t let the first story that gets in my head to win.)

The sickness I got before the race became my opportunity to handle hard better. 

In family business we’re going to get hit from more angles than any other capital structure. At the dinner table. In the board room. At a shareholder meeting. In operations.

Handle hard better.

Would your kids be proud if they watched a documentary of the way you handled the four rooms of your family business?

Let’s do hard things.

Onward,

Matt

PS - Next up. Hyrox. I’m on the wait list. I’ll let you know if I get in and whether I handle it any better.