Mental Endurance

A Marine Corps veteran who owns and operates mobile gym company Champ City Fitness, Eric Champ was consistently finding himself underwater. As a small business owner and primary caretaker of his young daughter, Eric has struggled to ground his priorities in recent months, often falling short of devoting full attention to either his business or his daughter.

This August, Eric has set out to change that pattern. By waking up at 4 a.m. every day of the month, he’s committing to giving himself an extra hour every day to lesson plan for his daughter, push to get his business on a solid footing, practice self-care, and write letters to forward-deployed service troops. A believer that the only way to spur change is by committing to something that feels unattainable, Eric is building a framework for change not just for himself – but for his daughter, his business, and service members around the world as well. Using the extra time in the day that his new wakeup time will bring him, he is determined to complete as much work as he can prior to his daughter waking up so that he has the ability to spend time with her throughout the day with no distractions. In addition, knowing firsthand the importance of a morale boost when overseas, Eric will use his extra hour of the day to thank service members overseas for their service and show appreciation for the daunting task at hand.

However, he isn’t doing this alone. You still have three weeks left to join Eric and the rest of the Ten Thousand community as you commit to your own challenge, whether it’s working to change an aspect of your daily life or set a PR.

Shifting his wakeup time to 4 a.m. will give Eric an 40 hours of additional time in August. While he usually wakes up at 5:15 a.m., Eric knows that every minute counts – and that the extra hour he will add onto his days will add up and give him more time to balance priorities, build his business, care for his daughter, and support troops overseas.

Eric will channel the lessons he learned from his Marine Corps service to ensure he clearly outlines his goals and sticks to his plan. During his time in the Marine Corps, he relied on BAMCIS during the preparation phase for his missions: Begin the planning; arrange for reconnaissance; make reconnaissance; complete the plan; issue the order; and supervise. This framework will continue to play a key role for Eric throughout August. “Over the course of the month, I will be channeling parts of these steps to ensure I am on track for a productive month,” he said.

In addition to relying on his Marines training to ensure he stays committed to a goal that will test his mental stamina, Eric is also adopting lifestyle changes that will ensure he remains present consistently. From going to bed as early as possible to cutting off the TV early, he is prioritizing recovery and shifting his schedule to ensure that he remains laser focused on his goal at hand. While he’s instituting these changes in his daily life to ensure he doesn’t lose sight of his ultimate goal, Eric knows it won’t be without challenges. “I know that heavy training days and late nights with my daughter will be especially difficult during the month,” he said. However, he remains committed to keeping his training intense and knows that the late nights are unavoidable. Ultimately, Eric knows that his biggest hurdle will be his ability to get the recovery he needs, and the lifestyle changes he’s making and the military mindset he’s embodying are designed to ensure he remains focused throughout the entire month.

Now ten days into the challenge, Eric has been faced with the difficulty of changing a routine that he had kept for so long. “As somebody who has been waking up naturally with no alarm clock between 5:15 and 5:25 a.m. for as long as I can remember, I'm completely rattled when the alarm clock goes off every morning,” he said. However, while changing a wakeup time that has been naturally occurring for so long has been difficult, Eric has remained motivated by focusing on the successes he’s already seen from the challenge. He’s spending more time with his daughter, getting ahead on his work, and writing the letters he promised he would – and he attributes a lot of this to committing to a new and daunting morning routine.

For active-duty Major in the U.S. Army’s Field Artillery branch and current Cornell University graduate student Tony Nash, the lunge holds significant meaning. Rather than viewing it simply as a tool to be used to improve his physical fitness, Tony sees the foundational movement as an opportunity to honor the nation’s armed forces and the sacrifices they make to protect the United States. That’s why this month, for All Out August, he is committing to completing 500 meters of walking lunges per day.

The walking lunge is a daily practice that allows Tony to honor everything that taking a knee means in the military and forces him to push further through hardship and adversity. In the armed forces, taking a knee holds both physical and mental significance. Physically, taking a knee is a defensive maneuver that serves as a form of security for soldiers on patrol. It allows a soldier to be able to quickly run or pivot to confront any conflict. Its importance extends far beyond physical readiness, though. Used as a sign of respect in the armed forces, it is a gesture that many soldiers participate in at the foot of a fallen brother or sister’s final resting place. More broadly, it’s also a way of gaining perspective.

As for why Tony has committed to doing this daily, he highlights the importance both for his own growth and also for driving forward his sense of community with fellow armed forces members. “Taking a daily practice to push me deeper and further is needed,” Tony says. “I have learned that shared hardship brings people together, as we all can overcome adversity.” For Tony, this is especially important as National Suicide Prevention Month approaches. “Taking a knee is essential in honoring the 20 veterans, active-duty service members, guardsmen, and reservists that succumb to suicide each day,” he said. For Tony, no position better embodies the demands of the armed forces than taking a knee, and the walking lunge is his way of honoring the work his brothers and sisters put in every day.

Two weeks into the challenge, Tony has settled into a routine and is on track to reach his goal. He credits much of his success to building a lunge crew that is completing this challenge alongside him. Comprising soldiers he has served with and others he has met over his military career, the group keeps him motivated and focused on the significance of his goal. “Even on the days where I’ve woken up with no motivation, this feeling has been quickly dismissed because of the fantastic team that has formed around doing this challenge,” he said.

Just because Tony has found a group that pushes him in his commitment doesn’t mean he has coasted. With a field exercise coming up, simply finding the time to complete the lunges has not always been easy. However, Tony isn’t using this as an excuse. “Ultimately, I don’t see this as a huge problem,” he said. “However, it is an unknown that I have to adapt to.” Further, Tony has decided to up the ante and make the work more challenging. As a way to forestall hitting a wall and losing the energy to finish the challenge strong, he’s mixing up the terrain on which he is performing the lunges. By varying the difficulty of the lunges every day, he’s keeping his mind fresh and ensuring that the days of the challenge do not blend together.

Tony is relying on his military mindset to help him get through the physical and mental obstacles that emerge. By breaking down his challenge into daily pieces, he’s allowing himself to focus on one element at a time and celebrate the small victories. “No matter how demanding the environment or event, you can only take on one task at a time,” he said. “As a long as I show up daily to complete my part, I’m moving towards my goal.” As Tony digs in for the next 7,000 lunges, he knows it won’t be easy – but he’s ready to commit. “Mental endurance is a way of life, and the easiest part was yesterday.” he says. “If I can’t advance deeper and become mentally stronger every day, I should hang up my boots now.”

A former Navy SEAL who has served in Afghanistan and throughout Africa, Alex Fichtler knows that strength is earned, not given. Embodying that mindset, he wanted to commit to a challenge that both pushed himself mentally and honored the mental sacrifices that members of the armed forces make. To recognize the invisible weight that all service members and veterans carry on their shoulders every day, Alex committed to hiking one mile up and one mile down a mountain with a 100 lb sandbag and 25 lb of body armor for every day of August.

For Alex, this represents the ultimate mental and physical challenge. As a firm believer that one must put in the work to become physically harder and mentally stronger than adversaries, Alex wanted to find a challenge that would push his limits. “I am doing this challenge to test my mind and give my body a solid gut check,” he said. “It’s all in the pursuit of maintaining and sharpening my edge.”

However, his two-mile, 125 pound carry is more than a physical and mental challenge. As an armed services veteran, Alex knows that all service members carry an invisible weight. His challenge is designed to show that no matter what is going on today or what has happened in the past, everyone has the ability to always move forward, to always take the next step, and to keep climbing. “Excuses are out, and failure is out,” he said. “All that matters is that we keep climbing, one step at a time. It doesn’t matter how steep, how rocky, how unforgiving our paths may be.”