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Sometimes you need a brick in the head. Most of us already know what we should be doing. Eat better. Exercise. Sleep more. Drink less. Put down the phone. Eat some vegetables. Go outside occasionally. We know. Knowing is rarely the problem. Sometimes we need something uncomfortable enough to finally wake us up.
A wedding. A reunion. A doctor’s appointment. A photograph. Realizing you refuse to buy another wardrobe in a bigger size. Sometimes the brick is enormous: a diagnosis, a divorce, a moment when the future suddenly looks very different. Sometimes it is pure, unadulterated vanity.
For me, there were a few bricks. One was a photograph. We have all been photographed in ways that don't exactly accentuate our best features. I am sure a number of RESET members have a grudge against me for photos I've taken of them mid-workout. Please know that I am trying my hardest. For every photo I post, I delete 20 where you look like you're being exorcised. This particular photo was of me coaching a class. It was taken from behind while I was mid-stride, and when I saw it I genuinely wondered who that extra-fluffy, remarkably unathletic-looking colored gentleman was wearing my green RESET shirt. Oh. It was me.
The second brick was maximum vanity. I was having a ridiculous conversation with some of the boys at the gym when Darko made it abundantly clear that he would not hook up with me because I was—and I am sugarcoating his assessment considerably—TOO SOFT. Rude. Also, apparently, effective. Neither the fact that I am not gay nor the fact that my wife would not be on board with this dalliance softened the blow in the slightest. Both of those things happened more than a year ago, and I still think about them. CONSTANTLY. But neither one actually changed my behavior immediately. That's the funny thing about bricks. Sometimes apparently you need to be hit with several of them.
Then Kev and I were 62 days out from a wedding in Seattle when she said, "We are not buying new clothes for this wedding. Let's get our crap together. For real this time." That was enough. So I got all of my crap, put it in a backpack, took it down to the crap store, and got it together. I changed how I ate. I trained with more intention. I paid attention to the things I had been conveniently not paying attention to. Actually, I changed a lot of things because I am constitutionally incapable of approaching anything with moderation.
And it worked. Not perfectly, of course. There have been slip-ups, setbacks, vacations, questionable decisions, and episodes of straight-up self-sabotage. There always are. But I kept going, and that is much more interesting to me than the fact that I started. Because the brick gets you moving. It doesn't keep you moving.
Eventually the wedding happens. The reunion ends. The photograph stops stinging. Your clothes fit again. Darko finds some new and creative way to cut you to your core. Whatever emotional rocket fuel launched you into action eventually burns off. Then what?
This is where motivation gets more interesting. Research on exercise adherence has found that more autonomous forms of motivation—doing something because you personally value it or genuinely enjoy it—are associated with sticking with exercise. External pressure can absolutely get us started, but internalized reasons appear particularly important for continuing. In other words, the science has a more sophisticated term for what I call the brick and the why. The brick can be external. The why has to become yours.
And I think you have to ask why more than once. "I want to lose 30 pounds." Why? "Because I want to look better." Fine. Why does that matter? "Because I want to feel confident again." Why does that matter? "Because I don't feel like myself anymore." Now we're getting somewhere.
There is nothing wrong with wanting abs. There is nothing wrong with wanting to look great at your reunion or fit into the suit you bought when George W. Bush was president. Vanity is not automatically a bad reason to begin. If it gets you through the door, fantastic. But it may not be enough to keep you there when things get hard.
Imagine someone receives a cancer diagnosis. That diagnosis is a brick through the windshield. It can instantly rearrange what matters and create an enormous desire to fight. But when treatment gets ugly, frightening, painful, and exhausting, the diagnosis itself may not be what gives that person purpose. Maybe it's their children. Maybe it's their spouse. Maybe it's being there for a graduation or a wedding or another completely ordinary Sunday morning. The brick creates urgency. The why gives the suffering somewhere to go.
My own stakes are considerably less dramatic, but I have had to figure out my why too. I love a Costco hot dog. I love a slice of Costco pizza. I love a Costco hot dog wrapped in a slice of Costco pizza. Yet with a completely straight face and love in my heart, I will make my children SPLIT a single hot dog because, "You do not need to eat that much crap. I'm cooking dinner in a bit!" The hypocrisy is not lost on me.
But neither is the reason. I want my kids to grow up seeing health as something we take care of before someone has to hit us in the head with a brick. I want them to see me train. I want them to understand that taking care of yourself isn't something you do for eight weeks before a vacation. It's just part of being a person. I want to be strong enough to do things with them for a very long time. I want to carry bags, move furniture, get on the floor, get off the floor, travel, hike, swim, play, and embarrass them well into adulthood. I want fitness to make my life bigger instead of waiting for poor health to make it smaller. That's a why with considerably more staying power than a bad photograph.
And eventually, if you keep going, something else happens. The thing you started doing becomes part of who you are. James Clear calls this identity-based habits. Instead of focusing only on an outcome—"I want to lose 30 pounds"—you accumulate evidence for a new identity: I am someone who trains. I am someone who cooks dinner. I am someone who takes care of my body. Every repetition becomes another little vote for that person.
That fits what we see at RESET all the time. Someone starts because their pants don't fit. Six months later they're excited about a deadlift. A year later they aren't "trying to work out anymore." They're just someone who works out. The goal changes from I need to do this to this is what I do.
That matters because motivation is unreliable. Stanford behavior scientist BJ Fogg's model of behavior argues that motivation alone isn't enough: behavior also depends on our ability to do the thing and having a prompt that gets us to act. James Clear makes a similar point from the habit side: goals describe the result you want, but systems are the repeated behaviors that actually move you there. Your why matters enormously, but your why still has to survive Tuesday.
Tuesday when you slept badly. Tuesday when work ran late. Tuesday when the couch feels wonderful and the gym does not. Tuesday when you've made 14 good food choices in a row and suddenly Costco pizza begins whispering your name. That's when the why needs habits. It needs systems. It needs people around you. It needs a place you go and a time you go there. It needs enough repetition that eventually doing the thing requires less negotiation with yourself.
So if you have been waiting to make a change, maybe you need a brick. Find the thing that makes continuing exactly as you are more uncomfortable than changing. Use it. Vanity. Fear. A wedding. A photograph. A number on the scale. The fact that Darko thinks you're too soft. I don't particularly care what gets you through the door.
But once you're moving, don't stop there. Ask why. Then ask why again. Why do you want to lose the weight? Why do you want to get stronger? Why do you want to be healthier? Why does that matter? And why does that matter? Keep digging until the answer is bigger than the number on the scale.
The brick might get you through the door. Your why brings you back tomorrow. And if you come back enough tomorrows, eventually you don't need either one quite as much. It's simply who you are.
