I went for a run the other morning. It was cool outside, but the sun had started to warm up, and about half a mile in, my mind started doing what it sometimes does:
It’s too warm.
Your legs feel tight.
Why are you putting yourself through this?
This isn’t fun.
You could just stop.
That voice shows up enough times that I recognize it. It tries to negotiate, bargain, and pull me back toward comfort.
But here’s something I learned a long time ago: your mind wants to quit long before your body actually needs to.
We crave comfort. We look for the easy road. But the easy road never takes you where you want to go.
Once I push through that initial resistance, everything changes. It becomes:
This is what I’m doing right now.
No debate. No negotiation. And when I finish, I never regret it.
This isn’t just about running. It shows up everywhere in my life: I don’t want to get out of bed on cold mornings. I don’t want to leave the house in the evening. I don’t want to start the thing I know I need to do.
But this is where discipline wins. This is where it overrides feelings.
Because I always feel worse when I don’t do the things I know I should do. And sometimes—it’s supposed to be hard.
If it were easy, everyone would do it. But not everyone does.
Don’t let excuses stop you from doing the work. Doing what needs to be done—especially when you don’t want to—is what separates the disciplined from everyone else.
And last: if you want to be exceptional, you have to be the exception. Do what everyone does, and you’ll get what everyone gets. Do what others won’t, and you’ll live a life others never will.