You're not going to believe what happened last weekend.
“Don’t stab the tire” sounds obvious when you’re stuck in the snow on the side of the freeway, doesn’t it?
But obvious doesn’t mean easy when you’re squatting down, cutting chains off car tires while your numb hands tremble and bleed and snow piles up on the back of your damp sweatshirt and wet hair.
The next thought I had should have been obvious as well.
“I did this to myself.”
It had been less than a week since we decided to take the trip to Lake Tahoe over Donner pass (yes, we were stranded on the same mountain that a family of pioneers died of frostbite and dined on the dead 170 years ago).
We weren’t going to go, because the forecast called for snow.
Then, I said it.
I explained to my wife that “we definitely should go.” Because our kids “haven’t experienced enough hardship. They’ve never even been stranded on the side of the road during a snowstorm before.”
We laughed it off as the tongue-in-cheek statement it was meant to be, and decided to go. I even threw out my signature statement: “It’ll be fine.”
Six days later I’m shivering, bleeding, thinking of who we’ll probably eat first if this thing really goes south, and laughing. I couldn’t stop laughing. The whole thing went down exactly like I had described it earlier that week. I manifested it!
The truth is - what you think and say matters.
Maybe I bought those shitty tire chains with a subconscious hope that they would break.
Maybe I purposely packed my jacket at the bottom of the trunk knowing there was a strong possibility of being exposed while putting on the shitty excuse for chains during a snowstorm in the dark.
I hope not. But what I know is this: What you think and say matters.
Next time you catch yourself saying you “always” make that mistake or are “never” good at something, do a second take.
Re-frame it to what you are “working on”, what you “used to” struggle with, what you are “getting better” at.
If you tell yourself that you're not "not a good runner," you will find yourself avoiding running or making excuses while you struggle on runs. Instead, tell yourself "I'm getting better at running." Becuase everytime you work on it, you are!
And for heaven’s sake - think twice when joking about putting your family directly in harm’s way...or at least bring the family dog so you have somebody to eat first.
Be great,
Danny Lehr