Yesterday was the final day of the #pushforbetter “Push-Up Challenge”, sponsored by the Canadian Mental Health Association’s (CMHA).
At the beginning of February, I signed up to participate in the fundraiser. Its goal was to complete 2000 push-ups over an 18-day period (Feb 11 to 28). The 2000 push-ups represent the number of lives that are lost to suicide worldwide every day.
I failed the challenge miserably.
By day 2, I could not move my upper body, and then, an unexpected medical procedure on my hand days later only added to the terrible pain I was already experiencing.
Epic fail.
I’m left feeling very disappointed in myself that I gave up on day 2 of the challenge and that I couldn’t achieve my goal even though I knew going in to it that it was probably a bit out of reach for me knowing my upper body muscle tone is very weak.
But failure can be a valuable learning experience.
It leaves room for growth and personal development.
It helps shift our perspective.
It gives us time to pause and self-reflect.
It teaches perseverance and resilience.
I know it’s not realistic to expect success from every new goal we set for ourselves. It may be a difficult concept to accept, but it also takes a lot of courage to admit when we have failed or experienced setbacks, which is something I should be very used to by now.
Today, as I write this and self-reflect, I am trying to see this experience, not as an epic fail, but as a way forward towards continuing my mission of spreading mental health awareness and advocacy, helping to end the stigma and giving others a space to feel less alone instead.
I also think it’s best I stick to climbing mountains and not push-ups!
#pushupchallenge #epicfail #success #mentalhealthawareness #suicideawareness #advocacy #youarenotalone #youareenough #valuablelessons #growth #perspective #perseverance #resilience #selfreflection #endthestigmatogether #cmha #summerofrich #climbingmountains
YouAreEnough 