Belief

“What the mind believes, the body achieves.”

This was written on the back of the Hayward girl’s basketball team summer t-shirts in middle school. Over the past 30 years that saying has popped into my head more than I care to admit. It usually is seen as a positive statement.

But recently I have wrestled with what if what you believe is wrong… I’m not talking on some political or ethical front here, I’m talking about a belief you have for yourself that guides a daily choice. For example, I believed when I was training for my marathon that I could eat trail mix whenever I wanted and there would be no consequence. I believed I “earned” the right to eat pizza after long runs. With this belief, I achieved weight gain while training for marathon. Son-of-a… that was devastating.

On the other hand, placebo effect is a real thing in medicine. You can believe so hard in a capsule or tablet that it fixes things that are physically impossible.

Belief is not truth…

Damn that stings.

If your Whoop watch tells you that your workout was shitty, and you also see you didn’t sleep well… You might miss the fact that you had 4 glasses of wine with dinner; and all the noise-making, light-blocking machines and melatonin in the world won’t help your problem.

Believe you can do it… But be truthful enough to know what “it” is…