The psychology of strength

When I was younger, I used to value my strength on my ability to lift things. When you're big people just assume you're also strong. I hung onto that like it was some crumb or glimer of beauty in an otherwise ugly existence.
I'm not skinny. But at least I'm strong.
I'm not pretty. But at least I'm strong.
I remember 6 th grade gym class - small town alberta - their idea of a physical fitness test was to make us run laps around the gym for 20 minutes straight, once a month. The kids with the highest lap count were healthy. The ones with the lowest were destined to a life of fat jokes and solitary lunches.
I remember faking out of them consistently. I was 'sick' or I hurt my ankle. I had the dates circled in red in my agenda. Like some ominous countdown to shame.
I once even tried bargaining with my gym teacher to say if she let me out of running I'd prove my physical abilities in brute strength by bench pressing 200 pounds (this seemed like  a logical amount in my silly preteen mind).
To my delight she complied. But she made me do it in front of everyone. Mocking me when I failed and pointed me towards the running area that was set up and told me if I stopped running she'd fail me.
I spent those twenty minutes convincing myself not to cry. Not to be weak again in front of anyone. That I was strong despite failing. But the cackles of the kids passing me, lapping me sometimes 3 times got to me. I broke. I walked out of the line of kids. I walked to my locker. I walked home.
It was that night that I pleaded a case to my mother to let me home school. That I would do better somehow, away from the public school system. I must have been pretty convincing, because I never went back.
I started an incline interval treadmill work out today that, despite being labeled as beginner level, was exceptionally challenging. Every minute you up either the speed or the incline until you reach a point where you bring it back down a bit and then back up. I think the term is laddering.
It sounds easy in theory. You do this for an hour and life will be great after.
A guy was in the gym doing maintenence to the treadmill when I showed up. He said he'd only be a few minutes so I started off on the bike. I dig the bike. It makes me sweaty as fuck. Which I'm told is a good thing. But I much prefer the treadmill. So half an hour later when he was done I hopped on and headed out, telling myself that I had just done a half hour of cardio, so even if I could only do one minute I was still ahead of the game. I honestly anticipated pain the first few minutes in and had already justified myself to stop at any moment. Weird thing was, at minute 5 I had a flash back to that day in gym class. I haven't thought about that day in 20 years. I removed it from my brain entirely until today. When it popped up. I heard that tiny weak voice of tiny adolescent me say just stop. Just go. Go home. Give up and leave. They're all laughing at you. You can't do it. And though I'm not a terribly inspirational person - as in I don't find motivators in posters saying 'you can do it!' (Must be the cynic in me) - I took a sip of water and said to myself. I'm sorry. I'm sorry that the misconstrued views you had about strength put you in a position to fail publicly. I'm sorry you were a weird little fat kid with no friends and a brain that wouldn't shut up. I'm sorry it took me so long to realize that you were hiding playing hide and seek and I never came to find you. I'm sorry I gave up on you then. But I'm not giving up on you now. So you need to believe me when I say I'm sorry.
And I am sorry. To that little kid who had to suffer to find her greatness. Who had to endure to find a way. Her way. I wish I hugged her more then. I'm hugging her every day now.
The beauty about strength is that it doesn't come from muscles.
It doesn't come from 50 reps or benching 200 (which for the record, I still can't do. But one day I fucking will)
It comes from the mushy grey matter inside your skull that controls what you do and how you do it.
I made it 36 minutes out of the hour. So something like 54%. Which is a fuck of a lot better than the 0% I got in that gym class.