At slow weights today I mentioned to Sherry that I feel like there’s a mental block for me right now when I reach the failure point.  She asked me what thought or image or feeling comes to mind when my muscles reach failure.  After imagining my way through it, I realized it’s panic and “I can’t”.  I imagine myself explainingto someone (her) why I can’t continue, and argue to myself that I’m doing my best.

This strikes me as interesting because first of all this is parallel to other events in my life.  And the slow weights could be a good place to begin practicing and training myself for a better response to the point of failure.

She mentioned the Release Technique.  A program by Echart Tolle, Lestor Levenson, and a few other self-help gurus.  About reaching that point of failure and turning towards it, releasing the desire to change the failure, and letting it pass through you. 

We talked about how discomfort is merely the desire to change reality.  Embracing reality, going towards the feeling rather than running from it, allows the feeling to move through you and past you.  You learn that the thing you were running from is not nearly as uncomfortable as the discomfort created by running away from something that you can’t run away from.

There’s a valuable piece of knowledge in there somewhere.