As a kid, I always had a difficult time in school. I was often not paying attention in class. I would daydream about summer, playing video games and how to take over the world (you know, typical childhood thoughts)! As a result, I often failed a good amount of the classes I took. I remember one day when I received a report card and I received all "D's"! Both my parents and I were so elated with this report card because I didn't fail anything!
Eventually, I did get my act together and started putting as much attention into school as I did playing video games and I did a lot better in school. However, going through that and many other trying experiences in life has allowed me to realize that failure is what helps me move forward in life and not hold me back like I thought it would.
This is one of the aspects of training that really separates the champions from everyone else. Failure during a workout is what the goal is! Becoming familiar with how you feel when your body completely fails on you can help you propel your conditioning from mediocre to extraordinary!
The concern I often get with training to failure is: "Won't I get hurt?" The truth is: if you do it right, most likely not. If your form is as good as it can be until the last few repetitions, then you shouldn't worry too much. However, if you have sloppy form throughout the entire set, then you might get injured. This is why having a spotter or a trainer help you during these sets can help make sure you are doing it right. When done correctly, training to failure can bring results significantly faster than any other type of training, period!
I often train to failure in most of my basic exercises. I always try to get a spotter to help me with these sets. I try to get as many repetitions with a challenging weight until I think I can't do anymore and then I ask myself "can I do just one more?" and then I try. Most of the time, I find that I can do one more. Then I ask again "can I do one more?" again and again until I absolutely can't!
Training this way can completely blow away your expectations for how strong or fast you think you are! For example, if you think a challenging weight for you when bench pressing is 35lbs with dumbbells and then you try to do this exercise with 30lbs and you find you are able to do 25 reps....that will prove you can go heavier!
Training to failure can really take your own self-limiting beliefs off of your workouts!
Failure can often lead to great success in life! As God tells us: when one door closes, another one opens. Also, everything works together for the good for those who believe in Christ Jesus!
To me, the best part of our family trip to Hershey, Pennsylvania was hearing about the life of Milton Hershey! To help illustrate how not fearing failure can make a big impact on your life, read about his story:
Milton was born in the mid 1800's. He barely had any formal education. He became an apprentice to a candy-maker in Pennsylvania when he was a teenager and soon thereafter tried to start his own candy business but failed! He then moved onto New York city to try again and failed again! He moved to New Orleans to try again and failed again! By this point he had gone bankrupt and needed someone else to help him finance another venture if he was going to follow his passion.He then went back to Pennsylvania and convinced his aunt to remortgage her house so he could try yet another business. Just 2 days before the bank was going to foreclose on his aunt's home, Milton received an order from England that more than completely covered all of his debts and Hershey Chocolate took off!
What's even better about this story is what Milton did with his fortune. In addition to creating a huge business that employs an entire city, he also opened a school for orphaned and underprivileged boys. He created state-of-the-art teaching facilities for these kids. Today the school teaches approximately 2000 boys and girls from all states of the U.S. who have very little means. They can attend K-12 and when they graduate they are given $77,000 to use toward any college of their choice. All of this is provided to the child at no cost to the family whatsoever!
Milton Hershey was a man that would not quit regardless of how many times he failed! He had the faith to keep striving in the face of failure! He was handsomely rewarded because he didn't care that he failed! Among his personal belongings that were on display at the museum was his own personal bible that he read. It is obvious that faith was the key to success for Milton!"Jesus looked at them and said 'With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.'" Matthew 19:26 (NIV)
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