I have this jar at home that I use to keep spare change in. The silver and bronze crap that’s always rattling in my pocket. I’ve been doing that for years man. A couple of cents here and there. On it’s own you can’t do anything with it. So I started saving it up. After a year I still didn’t have anything worth writing home about. So I stopped collecting. I mean, what’s the point, it’s not like it’s gonna amount to anything. It’s just too little, the denominations just aren’t big enough.
Humans are creatures of habit… Creatures, hmmm, I like the sound of that. So it wasn’t long until I started collecting again. Somedays I’d put up 50 cent in that jar. Other days maybe 5 cent. So this morning I looked at my jar… 4 years later. I had enough in there for a plane ticket to the US! I couldn’t believe it.
Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. Every workout, every rep, every drop of sweat is a cent in the jar. You don’t see the value over a few weeks, hell you might not even a year, but give it enough time… And you’ll become that perfect image in your minds eye. Somedays you’ll have strong workouts, good eating days and drop a 50 cent in the jar. Other days you have to literally drag yourself into gym, force yourself to hold foods down, and then you drop 2 or 3 cent into the jar. The daily grind of a strongman is so monotonous, so ungratifying, so lonely that it’s easy to throw in the towel when you don’t see the change add up.
This is when you need to embrace habit. Embrace monotony. Keep dropping your coins into the jar. One painful cent at a time. Keep pounding away, rep by rep. Plate by plate until you become what you constantly strive for. Until you become that figure that steps out of the shadows, the figure you’ve been saving up for years to become!
Today, like every day, I’ll drop my change in the jar. Not sure how much, but who gives a damn, as long as you keep dropping it in.
By adding little change, be prepared to see big change.
How much will you drop in today?
Strength and Honor
Samuel Frauenstein
