If you're not growing, you'r not living. Now some people might read this and think I have turned into a body builder over night but I am speaking about evolving as a person and learning more. Each day I try to progress in a few key areas of my life whether it be my training, my coaching, or my relationship with loved ones. There are core values that I keep but there are still many things that I continue to question so that I don't get bogged down into the same thought patterns. This way I feel like I can continually evolve as a person and continue to help more people along the way.
In my reading this morning I was reading some of Benjamin P. Hardy's work and came across the following. He was talking about how you knew if you have really found your passion and purpose.
"In what ways have you positively changed in the past 12 months to more fully live out this purpose?
“Anyone who isn’t embarrassed of who they were last year probably isn’t learning enough.” — Alain de Botton
If you’re not changing, then you’re not committed to something important. Commitment requires transformation. If you’re not being required to change for something greater than yourself, then you don’t know what loves means. You’re still too focused on yourself.
People who are obsessed with themselves don’t believe they need to change. They think the world should form itself around them.
People who are committed and passionate are intense learners. They serve those who are most important to them, and they use their gifts to transform a specific group of people. They don’t need willpower to get to work. They are being pulled forward and can’t be stopped. They are self-actualized because they have transcended themselves. Their life is so rich with purpose they are often humbled to speechlessness.
If you’re not growing, you’re not living. Humans were designed to evolve and grow. Being stuck in a suppressed cycle of addiction to unhealthy emotions is not what you were designed for. You were designed to expand beyond your pain, to be healed of it, and then to use what you’ve learned to help others."
I think the question is important for us to ask ourselves constantly. Training many people and coaching a rugby league team shows me many examples of both sides of this coin. I see guys who do change positively each year and they continue to progress and still have an impact on winning games but then there are others who don't change and they are falling behind or being overtaken by young hungry guys rapidly.
Its the same with someone who comes in with a goal to improve their health. Some people want to learn and better themselves and they do all the things necessary to achieve their goals. These people grow both physically and mentally as people. They improve their nutrition, they start training, they have more energy, they are more productive, they turn into better people in all areas of their life, and in turn they start to help improve the life of their loved ones.
Ben goes on to say:
"In order to change, you have two choices. You can either act above your current environment and emotions, or you can create an environment far above your current self that forces you to rise up.
Both are necessary.
Continually, you need to be acting, thinking, and living above your current circumstances. Also continually, you need to be proactively surrounding yourself with people, projects, and responsibilities that humble you — forcing you to find something within you that you didn’t know was there."
I think this is very good advice.