467: How Your Ego Is Keeping You Stuck

In this episode, we revisit our recent conversation about asking for help—including Kevin’s week of dealing with back pain and uncover what we believe is often the real thing holding most runners back: ego. Not the loud, boastful kind, but the quieter version that shows up as perfectionism, independence, caution, or the fear of looking like we don’t have it all figured out.

We share a simple framework for recognizing how ego can stop us from starting, succeeding, and learning. Along the way, we talk about hesitating to sign up for races, resisting coaching, running easy days too hard, comparing ourselves to others, struggling to adapt as life changes, and making excuses instead of learning from setbacks.

Through personal stories and coaching experiences—including a lesson Kevin learned while relearning how to squat after his back injury—we invite you to notice where ego might be keeping you stuck so you can let go of proving yourself and focus on growing instead.

03:38 Ego Disguises Explained

06:02 Ego Loves Identity Stories

07:20 Framework Ego Blocks Starting

09:15 Race Fear And Attention

18:16 Training Pyramid Foundation

21:30 Putting Yourself Out There

25:10 You Are Not Results

26:55 Ego Stops Success Easy Runs

30:39 Honesty With Your Coach

33:53 Ego In Goal Setting

34:44 Refusing To Adapt

38:33 Competition And Comparison

40:09 Excuses Vs Learning

49:49 Ego As A Lawyer

52:16 Squat Story Ego Check

Gain access to my new secret podcast, Unbreakable: The Runner's Guide To Injury-Proofing Your Body After 40. Click here: https://www.realliferunners.com/secret

Join the Team! -->  https://www.realliferunners.com/team 

Thanks for Listening!!

Be sure to hit FOLLOW on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast player

 Leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Your ratings and reviews really help and we read each one!

Come find us on Instagram and say hi!

Don't forget: The information on this website is not intended to treat or diagnose any medical condition or to provide medical advice. It is intended for general education in the areas of health and wellness. All information contained in this site is intended to be educational in nature. Nothing should be considered medical advice for your specific situation.

Transcript

0:00

In last week's episode, we talked about how hard it can be to ask for help and what holds us back from asking for the help that we need. And Kevin and I were talking about it throughout the week after the episode aired, and got some feedback and talked to the people inside of our community about their thoughts on the episode, and we realized that there was one big thing that was the undercurrent for all of it that we didn't really name directly, which is our ego and how much effect our ego has on holding us back from asking for the help that we need. And so we started talking about it, and we realized that our ego holds us back from a lot of things in running, and so we decided to do a whole episode of how your ego could be holding you back in your running, because it definitely holds us back in ours. So stay tuned What's up, runners? Welcome back to the show Today we're talking about the ego. Excellent. There's so many angles that we could take on this, and there's some books that we're gonna be referencing throughout today's podcast. and it's really interesting that this is the topic that's coming up right now because I am reading a book right now, and this is the main thing that I've been reading about in the chapters that I'm reading right now. And then you, it came up for you too recently, right? Other than just this, or was it just that you asked me about the other book? I just asked you about the other book. Okay. All right. So anywho, if you guys haven't caught last week's episode yet, episode 466, we talked about how difficult it can be to ask for help, and we told you the story about how Kevin hurt his back and did not ask me directly for help and then essentially suffered needlessly for a whole week- Yeah, the- in pain the key takeaway off of that one, there's a lot of good takeaways, but the key very personal takeaway for that one is, if you're living with a doctor or physical therapist, just ask. Just go ahead and ask them to help you. Yeah, and I also that I always 100% want to help you. Yeah. That's true. It's never, that's never a question- That's also true of whether or not Angie wants to help you or not. But we talked last week about, how Kevin didn't ask for help because he didn't wanna be a burden, or he thought he could figure it out himself, or not wanting to appear vulnerable or needing more things, or not being the person that just couldn't handle it, and we all fall into this trap. And I also was thinking about how ego played a role in my not offering my help more readily, or being the person to say, "Okay, come on. this is what we're doing now," and taking control of the situation, because there was definitely an ego involved on my side as well. And part of the reason I started thinking about this was one of our listener's comments in Spotify, which was fantastic. And one of our... If you haven't left us a comment yet on Spotify, please do. I am just gonna go ahead and shamelessly ask for these comments and for reviews on Apple Podcasts. Whatever podcast player you like to listen to us on, please leave us a comment or review. We- I love interacting with our listeners, and I love hearing your feedback. And one of our listeners, made a comment about the male ego, about why Kevin didn't ask for help being the male ego, and I think that we all have an ego. I think that the m- men get a bad rap for having a male ego, but we females have egos too, and I know I for sure have an ego. all of us humans do, and it's just one of those things that I think we need to deal with. And so then we started talking about how this applies to other areas of our running because the ego is sneaky. It doesn't always show up looking like arrogance. Sometimes it shows up like looking like humility or being extra cautious or just wanting to be independent or being a perfectionist or just being really careful, and it's all just still ego in disguise because the ego is so tricky like that. It has so many disguises. that's the biggest thing is the ego hides as other things. it doesn't pop up and be like, "Oh, that's my e-" ego trying to protect me. I came out and said, I didn't wanna be a burden," and that sounds fantastic. Yeah. But what it really was is I don't wanna show that I don't know what I'm doing on my own, and I have to ask for help. Yeah. And that screams ego. And if I had been able to c- to say to myself, "I don't really want to ask for help because I fear that I'm not capable of doing this on my own," then it would've been- super, super obvious. Yeah. But what my head said was, "Don't put more on her plate." Yeah. that, and that's- So that was the more not wanting to be the burden and trying to be, like, more humble and figure it out yourself. Yeah. Which sounds very, selfless and giving- and that all seems great, but it's just a trap. Yeah. Because what it really was is I should be able to do this on my own, and that's, if you say it that way, it definitely sounds more like an ego thing. And so today we're gonna use the word ego, but I think that the word itself can be very off-putting to us because it has a negative connotation. And so before we get into this, there's a lot of different ways that you can look at it. You can call it your ego. You can c- also just call it your brain because this is part, a big part of the ego is the thinking brain, is the fact that we tend to overthink everything, and our thinking brain is always trying to protect us. It's trying to keep us safe, and so that really is the, a big part of what the ego is. And you can define the ego in lots of different ways depending on what scholar or definition you're looking at. But essentially, it's that part of yourself that is your identity. That's a piece of it, is your identity is an ego, and your ego is always trying to protect whatever identity you have given yourself. And so if you're a runner, if you're a fast runner, if you're a marathon runner, all these different identities that we talk about, and identities can be a very good thing in a lot of ways, and they can also be a limiting factor in a lot of ways. And so we like to explore the nuance of it all, and that's really what we're gonna be getting into today. Because one of the key things about the ego is the ego loves a story. quite frankly- It is quite the storyteller everybody loves a story. Yeah. And the ego's really good at creating beautiful stories. And if you give it a character, it will build a giant story around that character. That's- that character happens to be you. So as soon as you, you're like, here's the character of the story, the central character here, and here are some adjectives that help define that character," the ego wants to cling to those. So when that gives you an identity and it helps you achieve fantastic things, that's great, but when it prevents you from going left when you should be going right, that's... I- I don't think I've said that correctly. when it takes you in the wrong direction because it forces you to stay on the same path that you're on instead of trying a different route, then it's the ego saying, no. You've said this is your identity. That's the path that we have to stay on." Yeah. The ego doesn't like to be flexible. No. Yeah. So- No, neither does my back- No apparently. The ego's primary job is to protect your identity and your reputation, and the most effective way to protect both of them is to never put them at risk. And so the ego's job is to constantly be scanning your environment and essentially doing risk assessment and figuring out, okay, what is at risk or what is putting my current identity, my reputation at risk? And then let's avoid that. And so we're gonna k- look at today's episode through a three-part framework on the three main ways that the ego can prevent you from achieving the things that you want to achieve in your running. Sure. Because that's ultimately what we're talking about here, and everything that we're talking about here applying to running can also be applied to other areas of your life. So as always, we would love for you to take w- you know, what we're talking about and apply it to all the different areas to figure out- Where this could be holding you back. So the first thing that the ego likes to do, to keep you safe is to protect you or stop you from ever starting. And so the ego comes up with so many reasons why you should just not do that thing. Maybe you shouldn't sign up for that race, or you shouldn't even start training for that thing, or you shouldn't start strength training. Whatever it is that you're wanting to start or you're inconsistent with, a lot of that is because of the ego. It, maybe it's because of a fear of what if I don't perform the way that I want to?" if maybe you have a race that you wanna sign up for and you're like, "What if I don't perform the way I want? What will people think of my time? What if I trained for months and then I don't get the results that I want? What if I don't even finish?" there's all of these different fears that go through our mind, and all of those are coming from your ego trying to stop you from even starting. because it's, it hasn't written that storyline, so it's not entirely sure what that story is. It's fear of the unknown. it's completely unknown. Yeah. This is this is the stay inside your cave because it's safe and cozy inside of your cave. But the only possibility for growth is outside. The problem is that all of those questions of "Oh, what are people gonna think? What if I don't finish? What if I train and it doesn't go very well?" It all comes from the possibility of other people having thoughts- about your results. Which you have no control over. No, none at all. And those people are probably fairly concerned with, people having thoughts about them also. I know this has fallen for me. Yeah. I like to come up with a whole bunch of reasons to not run races, and they all seem like selfless reasons. Like- I don't wanna spend the money. Bingo. That's the big one that he always tells us. Which sounds so remarkably selfless. Because there's so much involved in an ultra. Yeah. there's, it's usually at a whole nother location. The whole family comes. It's an all-day crew, and you have to wake up before dawn. there's just, there's a lot involved where I'm the center of attention, and I'm not usually a big fan of being the center of attention- in the first place. it- you actually suggested this, I don't know, a couple years ago, is it possible that I move to ultra racing because it's such a big focus on me that I only have to do it once a year? Did I suggest that? Yeah. That, like- That's funny because knowing that I didn't wanna be the center of attention, that it took a lot to ask to do it- just once a year, and that was sufficient. And it got me out of racing more often. and that's one of the ways that the ego is tricky because it makes it seem like it's, you're putting us first. It seems like you're putting, you don't wanna put us out, and so that's the reason you shouldn't do it. But what do you think is actually underlying all of that? Underlying it is the little bit of nervousness to head in and try and do any race- Yeah because you, you can- especially because you now also have a community and have a presence online. you have people that are gonna ask you, "How did your race go?" You're, you have our clients and other people, not just, in your life. 'Cause, if no matter who you are, if you're doing ultra racing, you al- you always have your family or your friends that might be asking. But you now have a bunch of runners that you coach, and so there's probably some pressure that comes along with that as well. Yeah, a little bit. that, that- I shouldn't say probably. That's one of the reasons that I don't race more If I'm gonna be honest. And that's why Angie hasn't gotten into ultras. There we go. But the same thing happens at the Christmas 5K at our high school. there's a lot of pressure that I'm supposed to win that thing. And every year I'm a- another year older than the last time, and there's high school kids around that can show up. There's a bunch of people in the local running community- Yeah that could show up and just wreck me in that race. same thing for me too. I am the cross-country coach as well, and so I'm also thinking, what are people gonna think of my time? I don't know what my time is gonna be this year. And is, does it look bad that I'm not as fast as the kids?" which is a ridiculous thought. no one in their right mind... if I actually think about this, no one is going to expect a 45-year-old female to be as fast as a 16-year-old kid on the cross-country team. that's a ridiculous thought. But at one point I was. Like, at one point I was as fast... I could have made our high school varsity cross-country team. Yes. And, that says more about the quality of the team than the quality of me, I would say, at the time. But even so- Which then also then r- drives me nuts because then I'm like, how does that reflect on my own coaching- that I can't coach the kids to get faster than I am?" Yeah, that's not... th- there's so much. There's so many layers here, right? There's layers of ego- so many layers upon layers of ego. Exactly. And so that's one way is, not signing up for the race or not doing the thing, because you're so afraid of, not getting the result or what other people are gonna think about you, when in reality most people aren't even thinking about you. They're just managing their own sense of ego. They're running their own 5K. Yeah. They're worried about their own finishing time. Exactly. Another thing that we see of, where your ego can stop you from starting is not hiring a coach or asking for help, which goes back to a lot of what we were talking about last week. And a lot of what we see here, and this I think is also related to you and the strength training aspect of things, is this whole idea of I, I should know what I'm doing by now. I've been doing this for 15 years. I know that there's a lot of runners that have been coming to my workshops lately that have been running for multiple decades, and so there's this whole idea of I should already have this figured out. I should know this by now. I don't need to- another program, or I don't need to hire a coach," which makes sense. it's logical that you should have an idea of what you're doing, and you do, but clearly if you don't have the results that you want, there's something missing. And sometimes we're just too close to it. We can't see it because we're in it. And, having a third par- a third party come in and look from the outside and see, "Hey, have you looked at this? Have you done this?" can be so unbelievably helpful. And the best athletes in every sport in the world have coaches, and it's not because they don't know what they're doing. Clearly, especially the top performers, have also been doing these things for decades. But they also have learned that when they try to do it by themselves, there's always going to be some sort of ceiling. And when you bring in another person and get more input and more opinion and somebody else taking a look at the situation, that can raise that ceiling significantly. That's right, 'cause needing a coach is not really a reflection of how good you are. Yeah. it's really a reflection about how seriously you take your development. Yeah, but our ego totally wants to make it about how good we are. but there's so many real-life examples. Like how many authors just edit everything they've ever written? How... But you're telling me that every professional author out there doesn't have a professional editor- that they're working with? All of them do. You go to the Olympics, people don't have a coach, they have a team of coaches. Yeah. One of my favorite non-running sporting events is coming up here in July where the Tour de France starts. There is a, an enormous army of coaches and scientists and nutritionists and, mental specialists- Oh, yeah devoted to every cycling team of, I don't even know how many t- people are on a cycling team. But you're looking at, 10, 15 riders and an army of 150 people. Yeah, you could argue that the best coaches act- or the best athletes have the most coaches. The most coaches. The most coaching support at least, right? Because th- that's a lot of times what happens. but that's the ego, right? The ego's telling you, "Oh, you don't need that. you already know what you're doing." not going back to basics, that's another big one that the ego likes to prevent us from doing when it comes to not starting. So if you're plat- hitting a plateau, or you're experience that little niggle or that little ache or pain that just doesn't seem to be going away, or you're actually injured, the answer is almost always going back to address the foundation, going back to base building, to easy runs, to strength work, to mobility. But going back to basics often feels like going backward. "Oh, no, I already did that. I already built my foundation." And so the ego resists it because it feels like regression. It feels like we're going backwards, and we don't wanna go backwards, we wanna go forwards. But it's not actually regression. A lot of times it's the smartest thing that you can do. Oh, I had just a ego explosion today- when we were working out. all right, so I was lifting weights- Ego explosion with Angie. Which already, that's already putting your ego on high alert. 'Cause those of you that may or may not... If you're new to the podcast, maybe we should give them, a tiny little 30-second background. I don't enjoy lifting and Angie does, and I don't enjoy lifting while anybody else can watch ever. I kind of- Especially someone that knows what she's doing and can con- critique form. Yes. And by critique, I mean give suggestions on what you could do better to make things feel better and move better. Yeah. Yeah, no. He doesn't like that. No, I don't like that. So we avoid, usually we just avoid lifting together, which really bums me out, 'cause it's one of the things that we can really do together, 'cause we can't run together. We have- Yeah, we can't lift together also because- But I love being active, and I love doing that with you, and so lifting is one thing that we could really do together. I know. and this is- It makes me sad that we don't. I think what I'm going to try to really work on is being able to lift with you. but the second hit on my ego is I can't lift as much as you That's not true Like I certainly can't lift as much as you right now because the next hit- 'Cause you're hurt to my ego, I'm hurt. And so in order to get back into it, I had to pull back so much on the weight that I could lift. So I'm not even like lifting what I can normally lift, which may or may not be up to the same as Angie can lift, but I'm lifting like almost nothing because I don't wanna hurt myself because it's really just like the comeback. It's so foundational that it clearly... it doesn't just feel like a regression. To me, it looks like one. I'm not putting any weight on this bar. Yeah. I used to put weight on this bar. Clearly I'm going backwards. Yeah. Visually you can see it. Yes. Yeah. And the same thing happens with running too. you can see that pace. And so when you're out there and you're normally running, let's just, I'm just pulling numbers out of the air. Normally you go out and you run eight-minute pace, and then all of a sudden you're coming back from an injury and you're at 10-minute pace, that's a huge hit to the ego. Yeah. Or maybe you don't have the magic watch telling you your paces, but you know that this is your 45-minute loop. Yeah. And now it's a 47-minute loop. Oh. or not even 47, 50. Yeah. But as it gradually slides- Yeah as like years click off the clock- you can see that one also coming. True. and that's a tough one. And so people often think, instead of doing something more foundational, instead of adding to the foundation, I should push harder off of this thing. I should come up with some new technique about trying to make sure that I can figure out how to get faster." But the answer tends to be just increase the base, increase the foundation. Which doesn't feel like a great way to take a step forward, but it actually is. Because there's almost always holes in the foundation, and I teach a concept called the training pyramid inside of our programs, and I also teach this inside of, my free workshop that I run every Thursday. If you guys haven't attended my free workshops on Thursdays, it's all about strength and mobilities for runners, so you can head over to realliferunners.com/strength if you wanna sign up for the next class that I've got going. but I teach this concept called the training pyramid, and level one is the foundation. Level one is the foundation because it is the most important thing. It inc- it includes easy running, mobility, and motor control, which is actually getting the right muscles to activate in a coordinated fashion so that you can then add resistance and add the weight to the bar and do all of those things. But a lot of people don't even have the right movement patterns in. And even when we've been doing exercises for 10 years, for 20 years, whatever it is, we can't just- say, "Okay, I already finished my level one. I'm done with that." We have to still spend the majority of our time in level one, and then also go into level two and level three. But w- the majority of our time, no matter what level you're at in your running, even if you're a professional runner, I would say that most of them are still spending the majority of their time in level one. The overwhelming majority- Yeah of their time in level one. Yeah. and this is the benefit of pros having coaches, is the coach can be like, "Hey, actually, we're not gonna throw another wrinkle at it. We're just gonna put this more foundational piece in." you teach this class, the class is great, and I've heard you teach it repeatedly. And every time I think to myself, as a physics teacher, the wider your base is- Yes the taller your tower can be. do you want to try the cool things at level, at the higher levels when you can't reach them if the base isn't wide enough? It's real safe to get to the top shelf if the base that you're climbing on is really wide. Yeah. And it doesn't even seem like you're climbing up, a little, like a ladder. It's no, I'm just, I'm taking these giant staircase up. And that just seems a whole lot safer, 'cause it is. Yeah. And I saw a really great post from a popular running influencer yesterday, I think, and she was talking about how she's been getting faster. Her race time, she did a, I think it was like 2024 to 2026 comparison at the same race, and her race time was significantly faster, but her easy pace has gotten slower- Yep in those two years. And she did a whole post on how her easy pace has gotten slower and, which is funny because there's so many people that want their easy paces to get faster too. there's a lot of people out there that don't even care as much about their race paces. they do, but they also just want their easy paces to, to get faster also, because they just want to be a faster runner in general. And her whole point of that post was in order to get faster, you have to have more contrast. And so you do need those really slow, easy days to allow your body to recover and actually absorb all the effects of those harder days. Because when you go slower on those easy days, you actually have more energy and your body can recover better so that you're able to push the ceiling even higher. Yeah. that's a good way of looking at that one. Yeah. But it, it seems so tricky that slowing down- I know because people like to say slowing down helps you get faster, and it doesn't. It's that slowing down helps you do the hard part that helps you get faster. Yeah. And- it all works together. Yeah. Yeah. All right, another way that your ego prevents you from starting is just not putting yourself out there. So this is definitely one that I have been suffering from lately, is not posting the content, not, the content, not sharing the journey, not talking about the struggle. And for me, I don't know if you guys follow, me on social media. If not, please do. I'm Dr. Angie Brown over on Instagram and YouTube and, TikTok, @drangiebrown. And- There was a point a couple of months ago where I was really consistent. I posted for 30 days straight, and then I kept going for another, week or two. So I'd had a really consistent, streak going of posting. And then I just got out of the habit of it, and then it was... Like, once you get out of the habit... one of the benefits of streaks is, you're just... you just do the work. You put your head down, you do the work. You don't overthink it. You just get it done. And then I started overthinking it. Then I was like, what if I'm wrong?" That's a big thing that, my ego likes to use to hold me back, is, you don't wanna be wrong. You don't wanna look foolish. What if people judge you? What if you say something that somebody proves is wrong? And I really don't like being wrong in general. I th- and I think that none of us really love being wrong. but I think that the fear of being wrong publicly is something that definitely holds me back from sharing more information. Because if that information is incomplete or incorrect, that can reflect on me and my credibility and my identity as an expert in my field. And I think that is something that definitely gets... that holds me back from just sharing more content, which is unfortunate because I have so much knowledge and expertise to share that so many people could benefit from. And so my ego is definitely getting in the way of me helping more people just by not posting that content there's plenty of stuff out on social media that you can tell that people have... Many people have gotten over that one. I know- But but that's part of, I think, what holds me back also, is like I don't wanna be seen. if I do say something wrong, I don't want somebody to put me into that category- Yeah of those people out there that just talk out their butts and n- don't even know what the heck they're talking about. And clearly, that wouldn't be me- Th- 'cause that's not what I do, but- The number of followers that you would immediately pick up if you were actually talking out of your butt, it might not be the group that we're trying- to get as followers, but- Thank you for saying that as I was taking a drink of water. That's what I was aiming for. I appreciate it. Thank goodness my computer is still dry right now. but like I don't put anything out there because I don't have the same, like expertise knowledge that you've got. I've got a lot of ex- But people love your journey. I've got a lot of experiential knowledge. Yeah. and sure, I probably, as soon as I wrecked my back, just should have been documenting day after day. I know, right? But I'm like, "Oh, I didn't start on day one, so I definitely, I shouldn't start documenting on day three-" "because I've already missed the start of it." And I can get to that, but I can always be like, I'm in a bad mood and I don't wanna document it right now," and that's day one. And then I'd forget about it on day two 'cause you're busy dealing with the problem. And then by day three I'm like, "Oh, I missed the beginning of it, so it's not worth it." And I've done that to most things in my running journey for the last, I don't know, 10 years. because I don't wanna put myself out there. I don't wanna- Until I make you do it. I'm like, I force you to. I- I'm like, "Kevin, you need to do this." Yeah, which is fantastic, and I- And people love it and I resist the heck out of it when you do it, but then I always appreciate it having done. And yes, th- the problem is that I, it has gotten some favorable feedback off of that, and I don't want that to then feed an ego also- Yeah of now I have to put this out because people like me. Yeah. But it's- So that's rough. I know. But this is that's why the ego is so tricky- It's because it gets you from all different angles. Yes, it does. it gets you on all different angles. And, so the book that I've been reading that is really talking about the ego is by Eckhart Tolle, which is called, A New Earth. And so the chapters that I'm reading right now are all about the ego, and h- the, one of the things that he says is like the reason that starting is so hard is that the ego has convinced you that your reputation and your results are you. That is you. That is your identity. And so risking them isn't just uncomfortable. It feels like a threat to your very existence. But this is the thing that's so important for us to keep in mind is that you are not your pace. You are not your race results. You are not the number of followers you have on Instagram, or the number of likes that you have on your posts, or the number of comments on the Apple podcast that I just beg my listeners to leave me every single week and, to, to what end, but none of those things are who I am. I am just becau- I just am. I am. Like, that's one of Eckhart Tolle's big things is I am. A- and I'm not this or I'm not that, I just, I am. And so I think that It's really hard though, for our human mind and our ego to separate those two things, and so we just make those things a defining feature of who we are. Yeah. Yeah. To just send... you almost continued your sentence there, but it does simply end at, I am just because I am." I'm... It's not that I'm not this thing, it's that I just am. There doesn't have to be more to that sentence. Yeah. That is the full and complete sentence, and it's weird. Also, I read a good chunk of his other book, and the entire time I thought that it was Eckhart Tolle, so now I'm very curious how we pronounce his last name. Oh, I guess we could look it up. Yeah. I always said Tolle. I always said Tolle. It might be Tolle. We could look it up and check it out. All right. All right. So the ego stops you from starting. Now, if you can overcome that initial obstacle of starting- Crushing it. We found the motivation, we got the rate- We're in it the song. We're going. we're just doing it. We're doing the thing, right? Then the ego can jump back in and stop you from succeeding. So it's not that the ego just stops working once you've already started. If anything, it even gets louder. once you're actually in the training cycle or in the race or in the coaching relationship, the ego finds wa- new ways to get in the way. And one of the big ways that we see all the time, this is, I think we are both guilty of this. I know I have been guilty of this in the past. I've been trying to give myself more grace lately, and, especially on my easy days in the summertime down here in South Florida. I've gotten much better with this one. but this is a trap that we see so many runners falling into, which is running too fast on your easy days. So this is one of the biggest things that we see with recreat- r- recreational runners because we have all the data now. We have the thing on your wrist, your watch or your app or whatever it is that is giving you real-time statistics, of course with error, but telling you how fast your pace is right now. And that can be such a motivating factor for some people, and it also can be the thing that makes you push a little bit harder than you should on those easy days. Because running easy should, when done correctly, feel slow. And I don't mean that numerically it's slow, I mean that it feels slow because it's supposed to. it's supposed to be easy, and therefore it's going to feel slow. But then people take the next jump and they say, "Slow feels embarrassing. What if someone sees me?" "What if I post the results? What if someone sees my Strava? What if someone sees my Garmin results? What if I run past somebody and they know me? What if my training partner is running next to me and they judge this? It feels embarrassing to go slow, and so I'm just gonna go a little bit faster." "Not a lot. I'll just do a little bit faster." And then you build up this fatigue that you don't need to be building up- You're... Because why? Yeah. Because you felt slightly embarrassed that somebody else who wasn't judging you might be judging you. Yeah. Or you don't wanna take that walk during your r- run. Yeah. You don't wanna take the walking break, or you don't wanna use the run walk intervals. And because you decide that you don't want to walk, you end up, the whole run overall ends up being a little bit harder than it should be. Yeah. And you're g- getting yourself more into that gray zone, to that, four or five out of 10 instead of the two to three out of 10, just because you don't wanna take a walking break because what if someone sees me? Then they're gonna know that I'm slow, or then they're gonna n- think that I wasn't able to sustain the path. And in reality, it's South Florida in the summer, and it's 104 degrees outside. Or it's 92 and feels like 104 with 92% humidity, and your body's "What the heck? I am just trying to s- survive from this heat and cool myself down." And your ego says, no. We have a story to protect." "And so we are gonna push a little bit too hard." "We're gonna build up your fatigue. We're gonna compromise your recovery. We're gonna undermine the actual adaptations which were the entire point of the easy run, but at least that theoretical person who's not actually judging you won't judge you." That's- Who's driving by in your car that you don't even know exists, or didn't even know if that person noticed you. Yeah. But the ego's happy because they were able to complete their story. And that is why s- people end up, very often a connection to why people are running too fast. Yeah. It's wild. And I know we're gonna exaggerate a little bit here, but that's- But not that much. But not that much, right? Because this is what actually happens. another way that your ego wants to kinda get in your way here is not being honest with your coach. So if you do have a coach, or you are following a plan ha- did you actually follow the plan? did you get in your runs? Did you actually keep those easy runs easy? Did you get your strength work in? How has your nutrition been and your sleep? How's your stress level? And then when your coach checks in with you, you're like, "Oh yeah, everything is fine." Yeah. Yeah, no, stress level's like a two. Yeah. But it's not. It's nine. And you're like, no, it's fine. I've been sleeping great." But the sleep doesn't show up in the app that the coach can see. The coach can see, "Yep, look at them. They check the boxes on their runs." And they're not getting the full picture, and if you're not sharing the picture with your coach, it's real tough for the coach to do much if they don't have the full information. Yeah. All they can coach is the information provided. And if a lot of that information has to come from true responses as to how you're feeling, like the answer to, "Hey, how you doing today?" is a very deep coaching check-in. It's not just small talk. Yeah, and I think that one of the reasons why people can be not fully honest is because they don't want their coach to pull back on their training, because they want to be training at a hard or higher level- Ooh, good one and they think, if I tell my coach what's really going on, they might actually try to pull my training back." And they don't want that because they think that's going to compromise their overall results. But your coach is going to make the decision that they think is best for you to get the results that you want to have. Yeah, and that really might involve pulling back. Yeah. And that's- A lot of times it could but that's why you have the coach. Yeah. Because the coach has the outside perspective that says you have to pull back for the next couple of days- Yeah because you've got too much else going on right now. Yeah, that's a tricky one. It's, and it's hard as a coach too, because you want your client to do well, and you know sometimes that the answer is that they need to be pulling back, but you don't wanna give them the wrong message that you don't believe in them or you don't think that their training is going well or- Also, as a coach, like I'm not doing a good job coaching this person. Yep. there's that doubt that comes along too. Even though we've coached hundreds and hu- probably thousands of runners at this point, if we... I should probably go add them up, but I think we're in the thousands at this point- Yeah especially if you include all of our cross-country kids throughout the years. Oh, definitely in the thousands. Yeah. but there's egos on both sides there. Yes. And so that's why we always have to commit, and we always tell our athletes, like we have to commit to 100% honesty with each other. Because if you're not honest with us and giving us the full picture, then we're not gonna be able to do our job to coach you in the best way. And there's been times in the past where we've been working with athletes, and they, I know for me, they've left out a piece of the story because they thought it wasn't relevant. It wasn't that they were even trying to keep a secret or trying to hide anything from me. They just didn't think that part was relevant, and it ended up being very relevant- to what was going on. and once I help them see that, then they're like, "Oh my gosh, okay, now I understand." Oh, I understand the 12-hour shift work actually is an impactful thing. Yeah, like that's a big deal. We need to know that so we can help you figure this out. But there's a lot again, not wanting to be a burden, and I can figure this out, and like those things that try to seep in here as well. All right. One that I think is connected to not being honest with your coach is goal setting. Whether you have a coach or not, ego shows up in goal setting on both ends. Either setting a goal that's too big because you want that goal to be impressive to anybody else who's looking at it. "Look at this huge, ambitious goal. I've told people that I'm gonna do this thing. Look at me, I'm so awesome." You've got that side of it. And if I set a small goal, then people won't be all that impressed. I want to impress people. That's that's a clear ego. But ego shows up at the complete other end also. Setting a goal that's too small to guarantee that you're gonna get the goal. Yeah. And neither one of them is actually stretching to see what you're capable of doing. 'Cause if the goal's too big, it's just a goal for show. Yeah. It's not a goal for results, it's just a showy goal to say, no, this is the cool thing that I'm shooting for," but you're not getting there because it's just too big of a goal. Yeah. How about refusing to adapt? Your training plan isn't working. Your body has changed or is changing, and the approach that worked when you were 35 is not working when you're 45. But admitting that means that you have to let go of something. Maybe you have to let go of the way that you've been training. Maybe you're, you have to let go of a certain identity or a belief about what you're capable of, or you have to actually accept the fact that you're getting older, which is not a bad thing. We're all getting older. I'm older yes- today than I was yesterday. I'm gonna be older tomorrow than I am today. This is just an inevitable part of being a human. We are all getting older. That doesn't mean that things have to feel terrible. It doesn't mean that your training, everything has to go completely to hell. But you do have to adapt. You do. and this just goes, for life phases too. you're not the same person when you're 22 and single and in college as you are when you're 30 years old and married or when you're 35 and you have two kids. there's so many different phases of our life, and we have to constantly be changing and adapting. But I think so many times when it comes to running, we have this idea that we should still be able to do things the way that we used to do them because it, it worked then, so why did it just stop working? And the answer is, you are a different person now. Your body is different. Your experience is different. The things that you're dealing with in your life, your stress levels are different. My life as a 45-year-old with two teenage daughters is so much different than a 35-year-old when I had two toddlers in tow. both have their own challenges, and they're both so different, and the amount of stress that I have and all of those things are all different. And so instead of adapting, a lot of times- Your ego will tell you that you should just push harder and just do more because that's also the message that society is telling us. Hustle culture is everywhere. We are programmed to do more, and then when we're not getting the results that we want to have, to believe that it is an inherent problem within ourselves, and that changing course and doing things differently, it feels like that means that you were wrong in some ways. But there's nothing wrong with adaptation. There's nothing wrong with changing what you're doing because That's just part of the human experience. I think this one can be subtle sometimes. People think that they're adapting, but there's parts of their training regimen that they have never touched. I know this was me for the longest time, 'cause through high school, through college, and through most of my 20s, it was like, "Okay, these are the days of the week that I'm going to run. This is the day that I have my long run. I do speed on this day and this day, and this is a long run." And that was the schedule. And I thought that I was adapting because I was changing, the length of the long run or the type of speed work that I was doing. But I had a fixed schedule for every single day of the week- Yeah of this is exactly what happens, and there wasn't a lot of wiggle room- out, within that. And then it was like, no, you can move things all over the place. my schedule during the school year versus during the summer, I, it takes me a few weeks to realize, wait, I don't have a strict schedule during the week. I could put my weekend long run on a Tuesday- if I wanted to. And it's the weirdest feeling and- Yeah and thought that I can do it. But- that, that's the adapting. And it's not that, the ego likes to say, "If I have to change what I'm doing, then what I was doing was wrong," and it's not. What you were doing was correct, and adapting it is still correct. That's- y- you can, I... I've come around on that one, so I'm like, I feel like you, we can come around on this one- Yeah because I feel like I've managed to defeat the ego on, in phases on this one. Both can be true. Yes. Yeah. That's an important truth to remember. another way that your ego prevents you from succeeding is by bringing in this sense of competition, especially with people that you're running with, or people on the internet, or your past sense of self and your past results. We always like to say that comparison is the thief of joy. That is a very common saying. And so- I think that's als- that's actually Strava's tagline. There you go. Perfect. I doubt that. I don't think- They hadn't- they sponsor this show. But that's, it's true, though. Like Strava or these apps or on Instagram when people post their paces and their distances and all these things, if you have training partners or running groups or online communities, all of these things can be amazing tools for growth, and they can also be breeding grounds for competition and comparison. And so we have to be really careful with how we're interpreting everything. Yeah. there are so many times within a race that you can find somebody else to be running with. Yeah. And the experience of saying, "Hey, here's another person in the race, I'm gonna run with them for a while," is a completely different experience than, "Here's another person in the race, I'm going to run against them for the next three miles." I'm just gonna run with this person for the next few miles sounds- And both are helpful at ti- different times. that's the- If we're being true, honest about it. It's not like competition's always bad. Yes. We just have to watch when we use it. Competition's not always bad. But always competing can be bad. Yes. How about that? Yeah, that's a good, that's a good way to look at it. God, it's quite the wordsmith over here. so good. All right, should we move on to section three? Section three. All right, so we already talked about s- how ego can stop you from starting, ego can stop you from succeeding, and ego can stop you from learning, and this is our last kind of, section here. So this is where the ego does the most lasting damage because there's a lot of things we can recover from, but if ego actually blocks you from learning, then you're just doing the same thing and repeating the same patterns over and over again, and you're not getting anywhere. You're just literally spinning your wheels because you're never learning from the failures or from the possibility of the lessons that you had available to you in those different training cycles. And one of the biggest ways that the ego loves to do this is through excuses. So after a bad race or a bad run or a bad training cycle, your ego wants to jump in so fast because it starts building a case, before you even grab that free banana after your 5K, of like why this race didn't go well, why you didn't get the results that you wanted to get, 'cause it was the weather or it was the course or it was the taper or the shoes or the, those GI issues. Like, all of these things your ego starts looking for- All of the excuses on where we wanna point the fing- finger on why this race went bad, or why I didn't get the results that I wanted, or why this felt like crap. And some of those things are really good. it is very good to debrief and to look at the circumstances and the situation surrounding the results that you have. But we have to, again, just be careful on how we use that information. Are we using that as an excuse, or are we using these as a learning experience so that we... are we approaching this with a sense of curiosity and figuring out, okay, how did these things contribute, and what can I learn from them? Or just "Yep, that's the reason why I didn't get what I wanted." And we see this very often because we always do race debriefs with the cross-country team. And at the beginning of the season, where we're racing in South Florida and it's August and early September, the kids are always like, "Ugh, God, the weather was just so bad." "It was so hot." It's okay- Yeah but what are you gonna do about that? Because we race again next week, and it's still going to be this hot. And so that one is a lovely excuse, because you could run drastically faster if I could snap my fingers and make it 35 degrees cooler, but that's not going to happen. So what is it that we can actually learn from this and actually try and improve over the course of the season- rather than just be like, this is just gonna be terrible until the weather cools down." Because that's not a great plan of attack for how to approach getting better. So when you're actually going into the learning piece, you're looking at the situation, and then you're figuring out, okay, if this is the circumstance that I have, so for example, we have 90-degree weather with, feels like 104 in August with lots and lots of humidity, what can I do better? What do I have control over that I can- change next time so that I can hopefully get a better result? And that's one of the big things that we do with our cross country kids is, what can you control here? Because we have no control over the weather. We have no control over the time of the race. There's lots of things that we don't have control over, but what do we have control over? And then we have them list those things out, and then we say, "Okay, now choose one or two of these that you're going to try next time to see how that affects how you feel." And it's a small difference. it's subtle between these are excuses- and these are challenges. Reasons. these are- Yeah yeah, these are reasons. And- They're, and a lot of them are valid reasons. They're completely valid reasons. Yeah. But that's why the difference between the things that I have control and things I don't have control over, if I don't have control over it and that's the main thing I'm pointing to, that's an excuse. Yeah. If you have control over it, it could still come off as "Oh, m- my stomach turned on me." That could totally sound like an excuse, and it is, right up until the point where my stomach turned on me, so I'm gonna try this next time and see if I can do something. Now suddenly it's learning. Now it's trying to improve. Yeah. Your ego says, "Your stomach doesn't work very well. Running is tough, and you have a weak stomach, so you're just not gonna run very fast." And it's okay with that. This is the thing, is your ego is okay with you not having the successful outcome that you want- Oh, totally as long as you don't have to change things. Your ego would rather be unsuccessful where it is- than successful, possibly, in a new world, because it just wants the stability of being where you are. Oh my gosh, it's so crazy. And I think that we've seen this so many times throughout the years of people, especially the younger runners on our team that come in as freshmen an- or maybe they're new as a sophomore, and they come in, and the first couple races are really tough. And then they just get this idea of, I guess I'm just not very good," or, "I guess I'm not gonna be able to get faster." And they just decide that's just what they are. Like, "This is just the type of runner that I am." And then we have other people on the team that follow more along w- the lines of what we say, and they see the examples from the juniors and the seniors that used to be in their position and sh- have shown that they've just kept working and how much they've improved over the course of the last couple of years. And they decide, "Okay, w- I'm just gonna stick with the process and I'm gonna do what my coaches are telling me to do. I'm gonna follow what my team is telling me to do." And then they get better over the course of the season, and it's wild because so much of it is mental, and so much of it is just that ego deciding ahead of time of, what you want to use as an excuse versus what you want to learn from. Yeah, 'cause the learning is key, but the learning says, I don't know it already and I have to be open to something new coming in. And that is, that's tricky for the ego. Super tricky for the ego, and that's really the whole point of science. And I think that this is definitely one of the things that I have to keep reminding myself of, I need to put out the information that I know right now and be willing for that to be wrong down the road if more science comes out that shows actually that's not the way that it works. And I think that's one of the thing that's, things that have held me back in the past from sharing certain information, is making sure that people understand that. Because with the way that social media is nowadays and everything is a sound bite or a ten-second clip that doesn't have the nuance added to it, they just take this one piece and then they put that out there, and then all of a sudden people think... I actually heard, a great podcast episode with Brene Brown and Adam Grant. They've got a new podcast. So I don't know if you guys like, Brene and Adam. I have started listening to their podcast called The Curiosity Shop, and they're just great minds. and they don't always agree, which is fun to hear two intellects, talking about things that they don't always agree on and how they can do so in a very respectful manner. but she was talking about how there was a p- a part in time, a point in time where she, people just kept misrepresenting her and her research and, the things that she was saying because they were trying to get those viral sound bites or s- or viral clips going. And she's no, you, you took this 10-second clip out of this 20-minute talk that I gave," and so she just kinda stopped putting out content for a little while. you could take... She's got books that are 200 pages. You could take a sentence out of it. Exactly. If you don't take the- If you take that quote paragraph before it, just take that one sentence- and you're like, "This is what she said," that's not at all what she said. But if you just take the one sentence- it, you can be like, "Whoa, let me make a big, bold thing- and take a super successful New York Times bestseller- and now spin what she said and t- show you why she's wrong." Yeah. And I think this is something that's really important for us when we're learning how to adapt our training, is for a long time you have been training a certain way based on the knowledge that you had. And when you learn new knowledge, it's time to maybe change the way that you're training. And it goes back to, that old adage of when you know better, you do better, right? when we s- when we learn that the way that we're doing things isn't really the best way to do things anymore, the most intelligent thing and most adaptable thing to do is to change the way that you're doing them because now we know more, so we've gotta do better, and that's really what this is all about, is, if your training's not working the way that you want it to anymore, then find the knowledge that you need, find the expert that you need, and actually listen to them. Figure out, okay, what- Do I need to do? Because that is more of a sign, I think, of intelligence versus just letting your ego getting in the way and tell you that, you should just push harder and keep doing it the same way because this is what we've always done. W- this, from like a coaching perspective, this is nice to know a little bit of the history of running coaching is it's not like people have been doing the same thing for the last 200 years. There have been all sorts of different ups and downs and variations on things, and every time a coach came in they were like, they had their new groundbreaking way of doing things. If we all still trained the way that like the most successful Olympic distance runners were training in the '50s, like you wouldn't be winning anything. No one would be making the same progress. It happened that worked because it was a better system than the one that was being used in the '40s. It's not that it was the best system, it's that it was better than the '40s. And then a new system came in the '70s and it was better than the one before. It wasn't the best, but it was better than the one before, and so it could defeat the previous system. just because a coach has gold medal athletes does not mean that is the system for all time. it's just not- Yeah how it's gonna go. one of the first coaching books I read was, Jack Daniels. like it's like foundational coach of running. He disagrees with the book, and people bring up his book and they ask him questions about it. He goes, "Oh yeah, no, I've done more research. That entire chapter's wrong." Yeah. I love that. But- I love that because he's willing to be wrong. 'cause he does the research himself. Yeah. So like it's Dr. Jack Daniels. he knows what he's doing. He got- Yeah he has the research. Yeah, and I think it's really important to remember that the ego is a very good lawyer. It's always going to find a defense. It's always going to build a case why you were right, why it wasn't your fault, why the circumstances were against you because that's its job. the ego gets strengthened. Eckhart Tolle says something about that one of the biggest things that strengthens the ego is being right. Like, when we get that feedback of being right it just strengthens our ego even more. And so our ego loves being right and hates being wrong, and it's always going to try to find that out. That's the same thing, like I say ego, it's your brain. It's what your brain does all the time. Your brain has a bias. It's always... It's called the confirmation bias. Your brain is always going to look for ways that you are right. That's its job. And so this can be helpful if you're in a courtroom, but in your training- it's not always the most helpful thing. You don't always want just more and more evidence of why you're right. Sometimes it's really good to see the places that you are falling short and the areas that you can still learn. I'm falling short in my strength training and mobility, and I don't need a lawyer. I need you. Aw. Are you open to it? Yes. Do you wanna tell them the squat story today? From what happened with the squats? Okay, y- I think we should both tell the squat story 'Cause you said it, you had an ego explosion. When, earlier when you said that you had an ego explosion, I thought that's what you were gonna- This was the story you were gonna tell I thought you were gonna tell them this one, but- Okay. See, I don't remember anything going particularly wrong, so this is gonna be very interesting. So I was, I, I- See how your ego has told this story. Because the ego is a storyteller. That's actually our final section here. So we can actually both tell the story- Excellent a- and kinda see. Because- It's too bad we don't, didn't have the camera rolling in the gym to see what actually happened. But I think that it's important for us to remember that everything we've talked about today is the ego doing its job. It's protecting your identity and managing your rep- reputation, pro- keeping you safe from the vulnerability of starting or struggling or failure or all of that. the ego is not trying to sabotage you. It's designed to keep you safe and to keep you exactly where you are, and that is a problem if you're trying to grow and to get better or improve in any area. Yeah, no, the ego just literally is the opposite of growth. Yeah. it, it does not work very well. All right. So tell what were you gonna tell? All right. So squatting is what caused the issue in the first place. And and I'm totally fine that under doctor's advice I can squat again, but clearly I can't just go back to the weight that I was. So you said, no, if we just put, very little weight on it-" I said, "I want you to just squat with the bar first." Perfect. I just wanna see how you squat. So we took off all the plates that Angie had on so I could feel- real good about my confidence. Yep, that's how the story started. It was a down week for me today. I wasn't even squatting- Yes that heavy. Yes. Fir- so first she said it's a down week. See, that was my ego just making sure everybody knew that it wasn't my full weight that we were taking off. Yes. So first she announced it was a down week, then she put up- I didn't announce it to me. Then, to me, when we started lifting together she announced it was a down week. Oh. Then- oh, before the squat. Yeah. yeah. Then- Just in general as I'm over there working on, my hip and, back mobility, she starts lifting more weight than I, I can lift, and then I have to take off of the squat rack, help take off of the squat rack, more weight than I squatted when I hurt myself so that I can just squat the 35-pound bar. So that's where I started as I got into the squat rack to then let you point out how I was probably squatting wrong. 'Cause I'm going into this knowing, all right, I guarantee my form is wrong. So I, I get in there- Did you, that's the mindset you had going in? Yeah. Okay. I had the mindset going in of there is, in all likelihood my form is wrong, so whatever she tells me, I need to widen my grip, tighten my grip, move my feet forward, wide, whatever it is, this is what's going to happen. So you slid, the plyometric box behind me so that I couldn't, squat down too low to, limit my range of motion. Can I just, make a quick thing of, like, when that is your thought, I would love for you to say that out loud, because I was trying to give you as little- feedback as possible so that I didn't explode your ego. God, we really- really should've had a whole podcast about asking for help about this. Yeah I'm working on it. I know. I'm just putting it out there. Working on it. All right. So go ahead. All right. So I, I've got the bar on my shoulders and I'm ready to go. I lift it up and I'm about ready to do my first one, and Angie goes, "Okay, move your feet back." I'm like, "Okay." So I put it back down, and I move my feet back a little bit, and I'm like, "Okay, is this better?" She goes, yeah, that, that looks better." So I lift the bar up and I've got it on my shoulders, and I go down and I do my first squat, and she goes, "Okay And to which me, my head immediately goes, "Okay, that was wrong, but why?" And you did a good job, but you gave me like pointers on, like your hips have to come out farther behind you. your first move is to move your knees forward. I want your first move to be your hips back. But I can't really move my hips. I've never really been able to move my hips. I'm a phenomenal salsa dancer- in that my hips don't move at all. They also don't lie. Thank you. And somewhere along the way, you realized that my hips actually weren't working really well, and my back was still slightly bothering. And so we moved the bar to my chest- instead of across my back, and then my form was working better. Yeah. and it was great. And so then I, I'm able to kinda move my hips back behind me, and I was like sitting down on the little cushion that you had back there, and I was doing things. And it was really hard. like way hard, and there was, there's no weight on it. It's super light. Like physically, it should not have been hard, but the focus it took to make my body move in this way. Yeah. And then you're like, "And now use your glutes to stand back up." And I'm like, I'll try." And it took so much focus per rep that it was- just mentally exhausting. So I get through 10 of them, and I rack the thing, and I'm like, I don't think I've squatted correctly in my life. I've squatted close enough that coaches are like, "Ah, he's fine." I don't think that I've ever really squatted correctly. Yeah. And that's what I thought you meant when you said my ego explosion is like that, 'cause that's like a huge realization of, holy crap, like I haven't been doing this with the proper form, and that's likely why I got injured. Yeah. Because a lot of times... and this is a great example, and I thank you for sharing this with our listeners because I think this is one of those great examples. we just assume, like you've been doing squats since high school. you lifted in high school. You lifted in college. You have been lifting for a long time, so you're just going to assume that you know how to do it correctly. And so that's where it definitely can be a hit to the ego when someone comes in and tells you, that's not the exact form. that's, you're not doing that properly." And the reason that you're doing that could be the reason that you got injured. Yeah, because it's not just my ego. It's them protecting, like, all the previous coaches that I've had faith in- and trainers that I've had faith in that- Interesting what, now the story I'm telling myself, 'cause my ego immediately wants to tell a story- is I was never squatting that much that the coach thought it was gonna be an issue. That my form was good enough that I wasn't gonna be able to hurt myself. when I was in high school- There was, we did, we were s- doing squats by holding the dumbbells at our shoulders. Yeah. my form didn't have to be perfect. I was not gonna hurt myself. Plus, I was a 17-year-old high school boy. I could've had real poor form- Yeah and probably still not hurt myself. I'm holding 15 pound dumbbells on my shoulders, squatting with poor form. Yeah, and- Still gonna be fine it's the same thing with our cross country kids too. there's some of them that I'll cor- I'll correct form. Yeah. And then some of them, I'm like, okay, they're so uncoordinated- Yeah that like, I get it better than it was, and even if it's still not ideal. And I think that's probably what happened to me- Yeah 30 years ago. That it got better than it was, and- And then just stayed there. Yeah. And that's where I've tapped out. Yeah, and that's such an interesting thing. Like, how many places has that happened to us? Not only just in lifting, but in running or in lots of other areas of our life. It's this is just the way that I've always done it." that's a big sentence that the ego loves. This is the way I've always done it. Yeah. That doesn't mean that it's great. Doesn't mean that it's great, and it doesn't mean that it's gonna work like that forever. Oh, it definitely is not gonna work like that forever. Yeah. So we are officially over the hour mark, so I think we're gonna wrap it up here. But just, it's good to remember that your ego stops you from starting, your ego stops you from succeeding, and your ego stops you from learning. And it does all of this while wearing very convincing disguises like independence, and caution, and humility, and perfectionism, and not wanting to be a burden. So start to be more aware and ask yourself, "Where is my ego, or where is my brain getting in the way of me getting better in whatever area of my life I'm trying to improve right now?" And usually the answer is, maybe it's tricky to find the ego, but where does your brain not want you to change? 'Cause that's probably the ego. Yeah. whatever it feels like the emotion is, if something feels like you shouldn't be changing, that's probably ego showing up. Yeah. Those of you that are afraid to go into the gym because you don't wanna look like a fool while you're lifting weights, that is preventing you from preventing injury, and from getting stronger, and from protecting your joints, and from being able to run when you're 70 years old if you're not gonna ch- is it worth it to you, right? is it, is your ego so strong that you can't overcome that to Have the results that you want to have That's a tough one Like, be- look a little silly. we're all a little silly sometimes. It's gonna be okay. Yeah. I look silly all the time. Me too. All right, you guys. If you liked this episode, we would love to hear your feedback. Head over to Spotify, leave us a comment on Spotify underneath this episode, or leave us a comment or a review on Apple Podcasts. We would ap- so much appreciate those five-star reviews and five stars, on the podcast because that does help us to reach other people out there that need help with their running as well. So your ego's not a bad thing. Your ego is there. It's designed to support you and protect you. Just realize when it's also holding you back. And as always, thanks for being here. This has been the Real Life Runners podcast, episode number 467. Now, get out there and run your life.