The Power of Measured Effort in Achieving Goals

I'm just listening to a podcast with Chris Williams. He's interviewing Greg McKeown, who wrote Essentialism and Effortless. And Greg McKeown was just recounting the story of the race to the South Pole between a British team and a Norwegian team. and a lesson that was explained was that it's smarter to not go with maximum effort to achieve a goal because what ends up with maximum effort is that there are more opportunities to overexert and therefore end up having to stop to deal with that overexertion.

The wiser plan and the one that actually ended up winning, the Norwegian team, they went with not effortless effort, but measured effort. so they stayed within their ability and they were able to recover every single day and be ready for the next regardless if the weather was good or bad whereas the British team they went with maximum effort and then when the weather was challenging more challenging they did not have the reserve to deal with it and they had to stop

Now how this applies in my world is fitness training And I remember years ago I heard an Olympic coach when asked, what is the secret to success? When I heard it, it didn't really hit me the way it should have. I didn't understand it. I didn't, I was too naive at that point. But over the years, I've come to understand it, and it ties into this interview and this explanation of a more measured approach to goal achievement. And what he said was the key, the best athletes avoid injury.

And when you think about that, it makes a lot of sense. because if an athlete ends up injured, they have to stop training or at least they have to modify their training. That means they're not optimally training anymore. Whereas someone who takes more measured approach will not push to maximum effort except for in competition where that matters. but in training, it is that long-term view. It is the, I want to keep training, doing the fundamentals, taking care of the structure of the body, and avoiding injury. Those are the ones that make the most progress because they do not have to stop.