Fit By ___

This weekend I’ve traveled to Cookeville, TN to see about the fit people here. Although this is NOT the place where CrossFit began, it has become one of, if not, THE CrossFit  destinations in the world. People come from all over the world to train here. People pay ridiculous amounts of money to come train with Rich Froning (the undisputed King of CrossFit). People notice that there’s something different here and they want to be apart of it. I’ve heard story after story about people moving to Cookeville, TN to train here full time. It blows my mind. I mean, Cookeville! Yet there’s something different in the air here. Something that causes you to move forward… to push harder… to be better. They call it the Mayhem Mindset and they are currently finishing up a huge project about the Mayhem Mindset, which is set to drop sometime in August (that’s the goal). I can’t wait to check it out!

This leads me to thinking through why mindset and atmosphere are so important. For example… I choose to join CrossFit Trivium. Why? Because their mindset and atmosphere was different than other boxes I checked out. I wanted a box with competitive people who want to be more than just healthy or fit. I wanted to be surrounded by people who push far beyond normal. I wanted to be surrounded by people who come to win, who show up to die, and who show up to go to war with themselves mind body and spirit. A place where fun and work go hand in hand. A place where you are held to proper standards and where judgement happens.

Quick Tangent: Judgment is a good thing. It keep movement standards high and safety as a top priority. Judgement makes you push one more rep when you would have quit. Judgement makes you push beyond what your mind is telling you. Judgement turns around and notices how far you’ve come and has witnessed your progress. When you enter a “judgement free zone”, you are entering a place that says, “I don’t care who you are or what you do”… It says, “come in a slack off because no one cares enough to push you”… It says, “we are going to harshly judge people and kick people out who are working too hard”… It says, “we have zero accountability, zero standards, and zero care for your safety”. I could keep going, but I need to stop. Back to THIS blog…

Mindset and atmosphere are crucial to advancement. We all need people around us to make us better. We need people who are better than us, people who are smarter than us, and people that operate on a completely different level than us. There are key factors to keeping a upper level mindset and atmosphere. It should be intentional, yet organic. It originates from the top (Leadership and Owners) down. It comes out in our actions, our words, and our mentality. If your leadership is not leading by example, then you are faking it and hoping no one notices.

All of that to say that Mayhem is different, unique, and special. They have the similar things that I love about my home box, yet you can tell that their mindset permeates from their people and echoes throughout their business model. Mayhem, as a business, operates just like their community. Consistently pushing, consistently judging for greatness, and consistently wanting to be better today than they were yesterday. It’s been a great experience so far and I can’t wait to learn more.