Hard lessons learned

As a business owner, I spend time watching other businesses, not just our competitors. I watch many different types of businesses.

I find it absolutely fascinating to watch what they post on social media and to read their newsletters.

Over the years, I can tell when a business is struggling and when they are successful just by what they post.

Even more interesting than that, I can see the mentality of the owners change as well (particularly when they have some success). More often than not, I see the ego start to blow up. Power starts to go to their heads.

That's really sad to me; because although the owners of the company were the drivers of success, they could not have done it without their employees or contractors or....most importantly: customers. It's always a team effort.

I can speak from experience on this one. Until we started added significant staff, we were small potatoes. We wouldn't be where we are today without our team; we struggle as a team, and we experience success as a team.

Not all business owners can handle success. They are so focused on empire building that they forget how they got where they are. This attitude becomes evident in their social media posts and email newsletters. Instead of talking to or trying to engage customers about how the business owner's service or products can benefit the customer.....all the posts become about the owner/company. Instead of educating customers, the newsletters (in particular) become shoving their greatness down the customer's throat. I see it all the time.

As the owner becomes successful, they become more and more greedy. I've said this before. When your focus becomes money, you lose focus on everything that is truly important.

So, I watch. I watch the story unfold.

I know how easy it could be to just sit back and let revenue roll in, but that's the wrong perspective.

When business starts growing, business owners need to fight even harder for every dollar. Because when they start to focus on how GREAT they are....there are smaller competitors sneaking up on them.....taking away the customers that the Power hungry business owner has forgotten how to take care of.

Those can be some of the hardest lessons to learn.

You could do it, you know

"You could qualify for Kona"

"What?" I looked up from my book and stared at him.

"YOU.could.qualify.for.Kona." He said the words slowly.

"What are you talking about? Do you know how hard that is? Do you KNOW how fast those women are?"

"YOU are one of those fast women. You could qualify."

"Wait. I'm doing my first 70.3 in SIX years this year. I don't even know how it's going to go. And the training. You know what type of training it takes to do Ironman."

Just then J-Man popped in with, "Yeah, remember....I'm going out for a ride. I'll see you IN SEVEN HOURS."

Me laughing: "Yeah. That."

"All I'm saying is that J-Man is leaving. You have time to train. You're fast. Why not?"

"Maybe next year, I'll do a couple of 70.3's"

"Maybe next year, you should do a 70.3 and an Ironman. You have time to train. I'm just saying, Pick a non Ironman race. Those don't fill up very fast. Do it and see how it goes."


I couldn't respond to that. Ironman really hasn't been on my radar. Even with the boys moving out, I was waiting. We're going to have a lot of free time, and I didn't want to fill "our" time with training. But was that just an excuse? I have the flexibility to do long training days when Mr. Tea is at work.

I had a friend that I was planning to do Ironman with. We were going to do the same race, but that's no longer an option. It was going to give me someone to train with....but that person is gone now.

Could I do it on my own? Could I enlist people to ride with me for portions of a long ride?

We do have Ironman Boulder now. I'm sure I could find training groups or group rides to keep me entertained.

The one thing that was holding me back the entire time was having support from Mr. Tea.

Now, I have that?

Quietly training in the background

Ain't no secret, I've been training with a chip on my shoulder.


Last year, I was told that I wasn't ready to do a 70.3.

Last year, I just missed 1st place at a few races.

Last year, when I shared my goals with someone, I was told, "That's a little ambitious".

Last year, every day I woke up tired, thinking, "I can't do this".



THIS year, I am ready to RACE a 70.3.

THIS year, I'm not missing 1st place.

THIS year, when I shared my goals, I was told, "You can do even better than that. I want you to beat MY time".

THIS year, every day I wake up thinking

Karma

I just don't have the capacity to hate a person.

I can be really mad. I can get really sad, but I can't hate another person.

I've been watching (from a distance) a situation. This person did some things (to me) awhile ago that were really not cool. Now, karma is coming back to this person.

Instead of being happy that this person is finally getting what they deserve. I just feel really sad for them.

Inspiration

I'm one of those people who are rarely inspired by other people. I have a lot of internal motivation and don't usually get all geeked up about racing because of what other people accomplish.

BUT this morning, I woke up to find out that a friend came in first in her AG in Ironman Melbourne; while her husband came in 4th.

Reading her Facebook wall, the comments, really got to me. I was tearing up as I was reading them and looking at the pictures. She is one of the nicest people.

Training for Ironman can't be put into words. If you haven't done one, you'll be given advice. You'll be told, "It's like having a second job." Sure your eyes might light up with excitement when you see 15, 16, 20 hours of training on your plan in ONE week.....but you can't even understand what it is like until you are doing it.

When we triathletes track our friends at these races, it's about more than the finish. It is about all the days that you don't want to get up to get your swim done. It's about all the dirty laundry piling up. It's about leaving in the morning for a long ride/run and not returning until late in the afternoon. It's about your spouse/partner.....and their willingness to cover more chores than normal. It's about mood swings. It's about never seeming to have enough food in the house. It's about lack of confidence. It's about GREAT training days and really really bad training days.

Training for and racing an Ironman is not something that just affects you, it affects your family.

It seems like we are a tightly knit community. We are because we have to be.

We are competitive with each other because that makes us push ourselves even harder. We will openly talk about how we want to beat other. Yet, we're also going to be the first ones to give out hugs when a race doesn't go right for a friend because some times there just aren't the right words.

That's why watching my friend was so amazing. It's everything that went into just getting to the start line.

For those of you sitting there, deciding if you might want to try this triathlon thing....or for those of you getting ready to do your 6th or even 7th Ironman.......get ready for one helluva trip.

Don't be afraid of your power

WAY back in January, when I started working with my Coach, I had made some fitness gains very quickly.

For those of you who haven't worked with a Coach, this is normal. When you move to a structured program based on your own abilities, a Coach will work with your abilities and weaknesses. It's almost like MAGIC. The gains happen THAT quickly.

BUT.....my mind had not caught up to where my body was. My mind was thinking, "Ok, THIS effort means I'm going hard, so I need to feel tired."

That wasn't true anymore. Although I was racing faster, in training there were a couple of sessions where I found myself plugging along at old paces.

HABIT.

One day, I opened my email. There was a note from my Coach. All it said was:

Tea,

Don't be afraid of your newly found fitness and speed.

Hugsies,

Coach.

This quickly became a mantra: Don't be afraid of your power.

Recently, Thursdays have become a tough day. It's the day where I am starting to feel the fatigue of the week; most importantly, it's two days after the hardest day of the week: Tuesday: a long hard effort workout.

I was running yesterday, and it was so hard. I have moved beyond the "wanting to stop" phase when I'm tired. Under no circumstances am I going to stop. I will keep moving even if it means running at a 12:00 pace. (I'm pleased to say, I wasn't even close to a 12:00 pace BUT I wouldn't care if I was).

Those types of days force me to focus. If I don't focus, I swear I would end up walking. 

I AM NOT GOING TO WALK. Hell, I'm STILL technically running. 

THIS IS WHERE CHAMPIONS ARE MADE. 

The people who want it bad enough will push. Everyone else will give up.

You might think this little bit of motivation got me all jazzed up to go. But, that's not always how it goes. Sometimes, it just saves me from walking.

When I was on the return, I started thinking that THIS RIGHT HERE is my weakness: Being willing to push even harder when I am tired. Being willing to push when my legs were screaming at me to stop. "Please stop. We'll buy you ice cream. You can finish the chocolate bunny. The whole thing....not just the ears....and the Peeps. Take them all. Just maybe a break? Please. Think of us. HAVE SOME SYMPATHY WOMAN."

Oh they hurt.....bad.

I started thinking: Don't be afraid of your power.

If you quit now, you give yourself the permission to quit every time. Don't make that time today. Don't do it. If you slow down now, you are giving yourself permission to quit in a race.

Even when it hurts like this, if you DON'T STOP, and IF YOU SPEED UP, you are teaching yourself just the opposite.

PUSH HARDER when things are hard. Don't back off. It hurts, but it hurts everyone equally. Don't be THAT athlete that you see walking at the end of a race.

MAKE A NEW HABIT.

I managed to pick up the pace toward the end, dropping :30 per mile. That alone shows I have more inside. I can go deeper into the pain.

Acknowledge it. Accept it. Push harder.

I can do this.

I will do this.

Showing John how it's done: Wordless Wednesday