WOD #170 "Lean into Ownership"

Earlier this week I picked up the book Extreme Ownership: How Navy Seals Lead and Win by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin. This is an exceptional book about what it means to be an exceptional leader, to not make excuses, and to obviously take ownership in everything that happens, or does not happen, to you. 

"Total responsibility for failure is a difficult thing to accept and taking ownership when things go wrong takes extraordinary humility and courage, but doing just that is an absolute necessity to learning, growing as a leader, and improving a teams performance." 

The stories and experiences highlighted really have gotten me thinking about how where I can personally start taking more ownership in my day to day. How many times do we look at a situation and think, "Oh, that just happened because of outside circumstance xyz," instead of evaluating what we could have done better to improve that situation in the first place?

For example, I have a huge issue with this: being chronically late to things. I catch myself wanting to blame outside circumstance x, bad traffic, or y, having to drive slower because of bad road conditions, or z, the Sunday driver I got stuck behind, instead of owning the fact that yeah, I should have left 5 minutes earlier, or woken up a bit earlier. 

Once we start taking responsibility for our choices, it's easy to realize that what happens to us is less a result of bad luck, but the decisions that were made leading up to that point. 

Another example, since I work in athletics and see this on a continual basis, is taking ownership in a bad performance or lack of overall ability. For whatever reason, society has created the cancerous habit of making excuses or pointing blame when things don't work out for an athlete or team.

​Parents blame coaches, coaches blame players, players blame refs, and so on. 

My point is, instead of relinquishing responsibility for things effecting us, we have to look in the mirror and decide what about our present situation we can actively take responsibility for and work to change.

Maybe that means working harder to be better in the small areas than other people, ie doing things others don't want to.

Maybe it means asking someone for an honest reality check.

Maybe it jsut means that we need to start leaning more into the discomfort of taking ownership.

​Whatever your solution, I challenge you to have the courage and humility to own something today. 

Warm Up

3:00 Jog
Barbell Complex

• 7 RDL's
• 7 Bent Rows
• 7 Front Squats
• 7 Push Press
• 7 Back Squats

Mobility

Dynamic Stretches

Strength

Deadlift [5, 5, 5, 5, 5]
>Kettlebell Upright Row | 5 x 12
>PoR Push Ups | 5 x 12

Workout

The run is fairly short and sweet, but each effort should feel challenging. Use the jog as active recovery to get your heart rate back down as close to resting as possible.

Run @ 80% for 1:30
Jog 1:30
Run @ 85% for 1:15
Jog 1:45
Run @ 90% for 1:00
Jog 2:00
Run @ 95% for 0:45
Jog 1:30
Run @ 100% for 0:30
Jog 1:00
Run @ 100% for 0:15
​Cool Down Jog 3:00

Recommended Stretches

Major Muscle Groups

---

Related Posts

10 Must Reads to Grow Your Life, Pt II
The Mindset of Greatness
WoD #133 "The Simplest things"
WOD #114 "Develop Yourself"
WOD #150 "Did a Giant Just Fart?"

Never Miss a Post!