Listening to your body

is bullshit.
Unless you are constantly crushing boundaries and breaking through plateaus in every single workout you don't have enough experience to say your body knows best.

Waking up sore and creaky is not a reason to stay out of the gym, to the contrary it's a very good reason to get in more often and lift heavy.  (Or get more sleep - but thats another post)
Not eating meat or protein every time you fuel yourself isn't keeping you in shape or the scale in an acceptable range - it's destroying your chances of a PR on lifting anything heavy or completing anything fast (READ - Doing real work).  And it's not letting you retain the strength you could have from a serious strength train.

Your body is conditioned to want the things you have always given it.  Bread, Red bull, cotton candy, cheesecake, mountain dew, doughnuts, gatorade, orange mocha frappachino, skittles, coffee mate creamer....the list is endless.  Your body wants it because it is ADDICTED to it (It = Sugar).  And your brain doesn't have the capacity to be addicted to something and at the same time know that it's addicted to it.

The fact is the only REAL experts on what your body can and can not withstand are people who meet a loose set of requirements.
They, for the most part, fulfill the following:
They have competed in or have experience with and practice and train major lifts.  ie Clean and Jerk, Snatch, Deadlift, Squats.
They have competed in or have experience with and practice and train gymnastic fundamentals.  Pullups, pushups, planches, levers, muscle-ups, parallettes, handstand walking and holds.
They have competed in or have experience in track and/or field events.
They have some sort of Professional certification with regards to Health and Fitness, and continually update their knowledge base.
They have seen lots and lots of athletes perform, have critiqued them physically and mentally, and helped them progress over time through properly scaled and focused training sessions.
They don't need to look up information regarding training questions in a book or youtube video.
They are constantly getting better.

If they have that skill set, and have spent quality time watching you train daily, then they would be the ones to look to for advice on when to go harder and when to back off.  Not your brain.  NOT YOUR BRAIN.

When you look up at your coach and they scream at you to keep going, it's in your best interest.  Whatever your brain says that isn't in line with that, injury aside, is wrong.
When you hear a coach tell you to eat more.  Do it.
Most strength coaches don't waste time or energy -  and they would be doing both if what they said didn't actually matter.

Let your coach help you go further than the deep end.  Go jump in the ocean.

Appreciation.

Important: remember at all times, in every situation, you have a choice.  The power of choice is what makes us free.  Do I or don't I?  Yes, or no.  Simple.

For the members walking through the doors at CrossFit Farmland, they have chosen to trust our knowledge, experience, and ability to raise them safely into the ranks of "Firebreather"(or at least nearly to their genetic potential). 

The problem with choice is that there are so many choices we take for granted things that once were an all consuming decision...

The story goes as follows,

First workout is FREE!   "I guess I'll go what can I lose?"

First day of Build-Up class "Am I the most out of shape person here?  I'll stick it out for the month but I can always quit after that."

First Day of Group class "Holy smokes this is tough, I'm fine not doing all of it as RX'd"

First day after completing RX of anything "It's about time!"

and so on..
until the day comes where the value of the effort is outweighed by the numbers on the whiteboard.  Which, unfortunately, is happening a lot.
We measure in CrossFit.  Standards for movements ensure that when we put a couplet to the clock of kettlebell swings and burpees the time we get when finished is a measurement of our work capacity on that given day.  It does not measure your character, your rationale, your reason. It doesn't make you smarter, or appear sexier, or make your manhood hang any lower.  It is a tool that when used correctly, under proper perception, can illuminate exactly what CrossFit is so good at doing... making you better across broad time, modal, and age domains.
A single pound added to your deadlift, or a single second off of your FRAN time indicates to the athlete that they are getting better.  That is the reward.  The ability to do more with less.  The transfer of that ability to life is universal in the sense that we are all going to die, we are only here for a limited time-span, and in this time we want the most out of it as we can possibly squeeze.  The effort, however, is not the person.  And forgetting that we chose this path will sooner or later become a toxin in the athletes mind.
Whether you write RX next to your name or not, almost as important as our ability to choose to pursue this lifestyle of ever-increasing capacities, it is important to remember why we chose to take the first step at all.  To be more, to be better, faster, stronger - in the gym and life.  But is it the end-all?  Nah.

You can leave the path at any time and never again have to be disappointed with an effort.

If you are not happy here and now, you never will be.  ~Taisen Deshimaru

Take aim

If you were in a room with no windows, no lights, and no one watching how would you perform your WOD?
Chest to deck on burpees?
Squat your hips below your knees?
Chest to bar?

The real question here is why are you working so hard?  If you haven't answered it for yourself yet it might be time to go stare into the mirror.
Going through the motions without having an internal pulse, or driving purpose, leaves the athlete stagnant and unsatisfied with their efforts.
If you are driven purely by aesthetics, you will be sorely disappointed at how long it takes to reap rewards.
If, contrarily, you are in it for the purpose of facing headlong that thing which you most loathe, then you will be delighted in the fact that every day you spend in the pursuit of something that you fear there is an equal remuneration for those efforts that manifests as confidence, and the ability to persevere in and out of the gym.  There's no price for earned pride.
Find your real target (health, quality of life, confidence to pursue a career or lifestyle) and the target will take focus.
Even in a room with no windows, no lights, and no one watching.

Commit.

There is only one way to Clean, Snatch, Jerk, etc as heavy as possible.  And it has nothing to do with thinking.  In fact, it has everything to do with trusting.  You've done the work.  You know to keep a tight midline with weight overhead, your weight back on the heels in the dip of a heavy jerk, to finish the 3rd pull of your snatch, to pull your ass to grass fast as shit on heavy cleans.  You know all of this.  Now forget it.  Trust yourself.  So slide on that extra 10 pounds, step up to the iron until your shins dig into the knurling, dig those heels in, set that grip deep into the first fold of knuckles and empty your head.  Then explode.

You have chosen...

...to do the hard thing.
...to face something that scares you and not blink.
...to work for something over and over until you finally achieve it.
...to get knocked down, bloodied, buried, crying, and shaking - but to rise up through it.
...to eat how others don't, so you can lift what other's can't.
...to be picky about what words you let ring between your ears, knowing self-talk is the number one tool in achieving what you're perceiving.
...to take blow after blow until you reach that point that you never thought you'd reach - a limit on your abilities. (and it pissed you off that you have one)
...to stare determined at the thing which you most dread and say "FUCK OFF, I WILL BEAT YOU!"
...to chalk up those 7 open blisters and wrap your hands on the bar for one last round of "Murph"
...to stand  up, dazed, confused, covered in vomit with a personal record now on the whiteboard.
...to be proud of things you work hard to achieve.

...CrossFit.

Served daily in Waunakee, WI at CrossFit Farmland.