The story goes like this:

A former gang member trying to leave the gang life was assigned, among other activities, to a meditation group. Two weeks into the class, the instructor called his supervisor and complained.

“He doesn’t want to be here,” the teacher said.

“Where is he right now?” asked the supervisor.

“Here.”

Um…..

The student was in the class four months before he put his phone down and began to actively participate. I was struck, as I listed to the story, at how often that kind of situation occurs at the gym. People come through the doors for a lot of reasons, and in a lot of different situations. Some people are prodded to come to us by a spouse who already goes to the gym, or to avoid medication, or by a friend.

So people show up.

Sometimes, that’s all they can do. They don’t love being at the gym. They don’t love the workouts. Some of them don’t even feel better at the end of the workout. They’re just glad to be done.

Some people fall in love with working out right away, but many folks don’t. I can think of one client who came to the gym for a full year and “tolerated” every minute of it. She openly hated working out.

But she kept showing up. She didn’t want to be here. But she got here.

Then something amazing happened. She missed a week when she got sick - and when she came back she realized how much better working out made her feel.

Our team t-shirts say “you showed up - we’ll take it from here.”

We mean that.

Maybe you’re showing up to the gym because a friend dragged you. Maybe you show up, do half of a warm up, and shuffle through the workout. You know you "should" do more, but you don't have it in you.

I believe that if you keep showing up - if you keep putting in the effort - that one day you will realize that you don’t have to measure up to some abstract unattainable idea of who you should be.

Keep showing up.

And good things will happen.