I was recently nominated by a friend to participate in a 25-day challenge to do 25 pushups each day to draw attention to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). I welcomed the opportunity, though I admit that I was a bit apprehensive as watched my friend nominate person after person before tagging me.
These challenges are difficult as you have to then determine who, in turn, you are going to nominate. I took the route of nominating my old high school wrestling teammates. I chose them, in part, because it was easy to decide who was next, but also because the pushups remind me of conditioning with the team and how much they and the sport have affected me over the years.
I made it through most of the teammates with whom I am connected on Facebook when I saw a post from a friend (not one of my old teammates) who commented that he appreciated the challenges but asked not to be nominated because he didn’t think he could do the pushups. I am sure the same thought went through the minds of countless friends for a variety of reasons. I have been uncomfortable nominating friends. (I was unable to tag a friend/teammate and feared he might have unfriended me. He didn’t, but I haven’t had the nerve to ask if he had changed his settings to block me, specifically, tagging him because of the challenge.) So, I decided to break the chain and stop nominating people. (I am reminded of the old chain letters—pre-email—that threatened bad luck if you didn’t send the letter to a dozen other people.)
I plan to continue the 25-day challenge. I committed to it, after all.
As I considered my friend’s post and the challenge, I thought about my ‘why’. I realized that, while I truly wanted to draw attention to PTSD and it’s affects among our veterans (e.g., and average of 22 suicides per day), I needed to move from “have” to “get” (per my friend, Coach Andy Lausier). I had been feeling that I had to do my pushups and I had to nominate friends. From the start, I determined to do one extra pushups for each day of the challenge (e.g., an extra 11 pushups on day 11). I thought about why I determined to do this. I think I determined to do this because, well, I could. I have to do 25 pushups a day, but I get to do the extra pushups. I get to honor the veterans. I don’t have to nominate my friends.
I hope that my friends will challenge themselves to simply do pushups—for themselves or to increase awareness of PTSD. Moreover, I just hope they find ways to challenge themselves. And, when they challenge themselves, they do it because they get to.
We need to find ways to challenge ourselves daily. We need to grow, because we can. We don’t have to challenge others, they will find challenges for themselves.
Be your best today; be better tomorrow.
Carpe momento!!