Be the hardest worker in the room

An affirmation is a powerful force for good and for effecting positive change.

Affirmations aren’t just some hippy mantra BS that you recite in a special voice every morning before completing your six sun salutations and writing in your gratitude journal.

An affirmation can be a positive mantra you repeat and internalize to effect a positive change.  It can be a compliment from someone else or it could be congratulations on a job well done. The dictionary defines “affirmation” as emotional support or encouragement.

I received a compliment from my 22 year old son this week.  This is pretty earth shattering stuff you know, since he specialises in sly, sarcastic humour that is very funny but usually involves a swipe at me.  #mumlife.

We used to train together all the time till I changed to a different training centre.  We’re both highly competitive so it was a lot of fun and good mother/son bonding.  Recently we both signed up for a four week program learning and practicing some skills based movements.

As we drove home after our session last night he commented to me, “you train like The Rock”.  (As in Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.)

Um, what?

“Yeah, The Rock does motivational videos and says you should always work harder than anyone else in the room.  And you just work harder than anyone else.  You add more weight, you push through the AMRAP (Ed. As Many Rounds As Possible workout) and just generally work harder than the others!” He explained.

Wait, The Rock does motivational videos??? Who knew?

Anyway, hand over heart that is one of the best compliments I could hope to receive from anyone, especially one of my children.

If you get a chance to watch one of the Rock’s videos, do it, they’re astonishingly (well, I was surprised) good!

I had two take-aways from that conversation with my son.

One, I loved the compliment.  EVERYONE needs and thrives on affirmation.  No matter how confident and put together people may seem, a compliment or affirmation can be a real gift.  You never know what is going on behind the scenes so don’t hold back.

Two, Dwayne ‘The Rock’ didn’t say be the smartest or be the best in the room – he said “work the hardest”.  Anyone can do that.  Whether you’re naturally good at what you’re doing or just doing it because you love it – work hard at it.  This doesn’t come back to natural talent or how much money you have or how much time you have – it comes back to what you’re prepared to put in.

You can have all the potential in the world but if you’re not prepared to put in the work, you’ll have nothing more than… well, potential.

And three, yeah I added on another one. Because I can, it’s my blog!  This is a biggie.  You NEVER know when someone is watching you.  You could be inspiring someone to better things when you have no idea. Just make sure you’re being a role model for niceness and not for evil.

So whether it's your fitness, your work, your parenting, whatever is important to you,the bottom line is....

Affirm yourself.

Affirm others.

Be the hardest worker in the room.