The People Who Surround You

I am writing today to talk about something that can impact your physical fitness and health, but it perhaps has a larger impact on your mental and emotional fitness and health.  There will be no science to back me up other than the empirical evidence that I have and my life experience. I have made a lot of decisions in my life, definitely more bad ones than good ones; the best decisions that I have ever made, however, have been the ones that involved the people who have been, and still are now, so influential in my life.

First, I really do need to credit my parents for the person that I was able to become today; I understand that there are a lot of people out there who are not nearly as lucky as I am to have great parents who were great role models –as were my grandparents and my entire family. To those who are still great people in spite of having that monumental obstacle to overcome, I commend you; you are a stronger person than I. My parents were the ones that gave me my work ethic, and although it didn’t kick into high gear until high school, they were patient and kind enough to keep pushing me to be better than I was the day before. Looking back, I began to realize how much my dad worked to give us the life he wanted for us and there is nothing I can do to thank him and my mom enough. He would go months and months of nights with one, two, or –on a really good night– four hours of sleep; nobody has been or will be more inspirational to me than he was because of that. I never feel like I am working too hard because I always have that standard in the back of my head.

The next person in my life that has been incredibly influential in my life has been my little brother. I have been around very few people who are as smart and sharp-witted as he is. He is, again, an incredibly hard worker: a 30 hour a week job, 18 credits as an Economics major, a long-term girlfriend (although I’m still on the fence about her. Haha), and he works out four to six times a week on top of that. His hard work has pushed me to be better all the time. He was also one of the best training partners that I have ever had. He was, and still is so determined whenever he enters to weight room to impose his will on the weights and he worked his butt of to get where he has gotten. The other thing about him that has been probably the biggest thing that he has ever done for me is that he is someone that has never been afraid to challenge physically or mentally and/or question the decisions that I make or am thinking of making. Having someone in your life like this is so crucial to being successful because they will keep you honest, steadfast, and diligent in your work. When you begin to stray, they call you on it. When you begin to doubt, they lift you up. When you get to high on how cool you are, they being you back down to reality. They are the people in your life that keep you on track.

The next person that entered my life when I was fairly young, but became much more influential in high school, was Andy. He and I have known each other since first grade. We even ran away from the school together! To this day I can figure out why we went back, but that was a terrible decision. Haha… In high school he and I began to lift weights together and worked at the same grass seed farm together in the summers. Needless to say, we spent a lot of time together. He is a really smart individual who does a lot of research on things he feels are important. I learned a lot about lifting in the four years that we trained, relentlessly, together. He is also the reason that I was able to power clean as much as I was in high school –he showed me how to use my legs (what a novel idea)! He was the guy that made me want to work harder all of the time, no matter what. He’s the guy that would say, “let’s do another set of this, this, and this…” or “let’s go run these drills after lifting.” This pushed me past where I would have pushed myself. 

My best friend, Britton, entered my life in fifth grade when he moved to Canby. He has been a huge influence in my life because of how intelligent he is, because of how willing he is to have my back even if I have done something stupid, because he is not afraid of confrontation or voicing his opinion, but I think the thing that has influenced me the most has been his generosity and his families. When we were younger, they would give me rides to football every day, even if I didn’t need it that day. They would feed me, even though I had food waiting at home. They would welcome me into their home on any day or night of the week. They were so giving. He was, and still is the same way. Now, years later, he is still the same way and constantly makes sure that I am doing alright; he has even made a trip out to visit me just because! His generosity and fearlessness of confrontation has encouraged me to be less afraid to speak my mind, even if I could be wrong, to stand for what I believe to be correct, and to give freely to those around me.

Jeff has been in my life a while, since my first year of football in third grade actually. Jeff has been another person in my life that is constantly pushing me work on making my mind better, my body better, to work harder for things, and to always work to be as efficient as you can in everything you do. He was my training partner all through college and had a huge influence on the things that I do today. He was a huge part of me playing football for a short stint at Oregon State, he is the person that introduced me to strongman, and he is the person that was always up for a workout –even car pushes at two in to morning because I had to start work at four at the golf course! Not many people or training partners would care that much about helping you become the best version of yourself to wake up that early and still be energized and ready to go. Jeff has always given me a different view on life because he appreciates all aspects of it and works to make the best of his situation. He has a brilliant mind and sees things that others don’t; I have been lucky enough to hear many of the incredibly insightful things he had to say back in college, and still has to say now.

This little person in my life has been great. It has been awesome to talk to her and learn from her because of how she sees life for what it could be, not for what it is. Amy loves people and is constantly trying to make them happy. This is so frustrating to me, but at the same time, I get to see the way that people could be if there wasn’t any bad in the world. She is a person that will genuinely care for you the instant that you say hi to her. That is probably the biggest thing I have learned from her: to never let life get you down and to always stay happy. She knows that hard things happen, but they eventually pass. Life is short, why live it without being happy as often as possible?

The last person in my life that has had more influence than I can even write about is my incredible wife. This woman is the most caring, loving, observant person I have ever been around. I have never been a better person than when I am around her. She is the kind of person that is magnetic, honestly, everyone loves her and wants to be around her. She has that ‘x-factor’ that propels you to be better and do better because you want her to smile and tell you how happy she is for you. She cares so much about people that she feels their joys and their pain. She has made me the man that I have become in the past few years. She taught me how to be more outgoing, more thoughtful, more observant, and just mo’ betta’ in general. She did it secretly though; she has never tried to change me, she has just let me figure things out for myself over time. She has taught me to love whole-heartedly and that there are more important things in life than crossing things off of the to-do lists that I make for myself. She has taught me to live more freely and enjoy the small things in life and showed me that I can still achieve the goals that I have while doing so. She is also a worker that puts me to shame, much as the other people I have mentioned to as well. Her work ethic in one of legend…if they made legends on work ethic. In college, I was in constant awe of her. She was a full-time student, a swimmer for Oregon State, the captain of the team for two years, and worked two or three jobs the whole time! What?! How many hours are in the day again? Yes, as crazy as it sounds, she was able to do all that all while dealing with, dating, and marrying me during those years.

I wrote about each of these people so that you, the reader, would be able to get to know them briefly. There is so much more that I have learned and appreciate from these people than I would be able to write, but I wanted to give you a snapshot to the people that I have surrounded myself with. The theme of each of these writings is that each of these people is better, in my mind, than I am at multiple things. This is important. I surround myself with people that have qualities that I hope to gain a little of just by being around them. They are also people who have truly cared about my success in all areas of life; they have truly pushed me to become better. The other thing, that I do not believe is a coincidence, is that each of these people is very successful and becoming more successful as the years go on.

 Andy is the brain behind this blog (it was his idea to start it). He was also a successful high school athlete, setting our school rushing record in football and making the top five all-time list in hurdles, a successful college athlete, winning conference in the hurdles and has become the manager of an athletic club in his short time working there; he is also a very successful triathlon athlete, winning the state championship in Michigan in his very first competition! Britton was very successful high school athlete, setting our school record in the javelin as well as an incredible collegiate athlete, throwing for University of Oregon for four years. He now works at a prison working his way into law enforcement because he wants to help people. My brother, Josh, is going to graduate from college with a degree in Economics with plans to work as a financial manager for a big company. He was also a pitcher for a year at a community college and a very successful pitcher for all four years of high school; he was also a great football player in high school as well as a great wrestler when we were younger. Jeff was an awesome athlete in high school and set the record for triple jump at our school; in college, he completed a BS and MS in five years (as long as it took me for a BS). He is now a successful strongman competitor making it to nationals last year, a successful engineer at a big company in Portland in his first year working there, a great track athlete still competing unattached, and a great all-around athlete competing in things such as the highland games, warrior dashes, and many other things. Amy is a successful weightlifter that competed at the American Open last year and has only been training and competing for about a year and a half now. And Rachel is a successful person at whatever she chooses to do. She was a great waitress out here and worked her way up the ladder very fast, is a great academic counselor and influence for the athletes she works with, is a great (and strong) lifter, is pursuing her MS, is the student representative for W.I.N of Southern Illinois and is always that person that anyone can lean and count on.

Each of these people in very successful in nearly all aspects of their lives; I have been fortunate enough to learn from them and have bits and pieces of their personalities rub off on me to help make me the person that I am today. I hope to someday be very successful, I have surrounded myself with people that are. Surround yourself with people who work hard, who are ambitious, who know where they are going and don’t lose sight of it, who are genuine in their care, whose character is firm and steadfast, who are don’t wear a mask, who are not afraid to be themselves or do what is right, and who love in a real way. Surround yourself with people who are good at living life. You are a product of those who your surround yourself with.

Chris

P.S. I promise that I will be writing about lifting, training, and fitness as well.