Letters to a Young Athlete

The pass appeared effortless.

LeBron James tossed up a three-point shot in the final seconds of game six of the 2013 NBA Finals, Heat versus Spurs. The ball bounced from the rim. Bosh, the Heat’s center, was surrounded by Spurs players. He leaped up, snatched the ball, and within an instant, passed it to Ray Allen. 

Allen, just as quickly, stepped behind the three-point line. With five Spurs players rushing to block, Allen took the shot. He made it.

The key message here is: To play beyond your present limits, you must train past them.

From Bosh to Allen, the play appeared effortless, despite the pressure of 20,000 screaming fans, millions of viewers, and the exhaustion resulting from over 80 games that season. 

Bosh executed the pass automatically, instantly, because for decades he had trained himself to go beyond his perceived limits of physical and mental exhaustion.

Years of running suicide drills back and forth across the court had taught his burning lungs and screaming muscles to suck in oxygen and find that boost. He had learned, as ultramarathon runner and ex-Navy SEAL David Goggins says, that when you think you’re running on empty, you still have 40 percent left in the tank. 

Bosh learned that he had to train past the limits of exhaustion because he was going to have to perform past the limits of exhaustion.

The life lesson here is that you need to always push yourself further than you think you can go. That doesn’t mean you should suppress the little voice in your head saying that you can't continue. In fact, It is precisely this awareness of being exhausted which you need to embrace. By doing so, you’ll slowly build the mental and physical strength you’ll need to progress beyond your limits and grow to embrace exhaustion.

Make no mistake – training in this way is brutally hard. But by pushing yourself to the limit, you’ll discover what comedian Jerry Seinfeld called “your blessing in life … the torture you’re most comfortable with.” 

However, building your resilience in the face of exhaustion is just one side of the coin. To keep it strong over the course of a career, you’re going to need deep motivation, which is the topic of the next blink.