THE SCENE: A crisp, wet 50, Almost new moon
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-RAMA:
- Projectivators
- Hairy Rockettes
- LBACs
- Tempo Squats
THA-THANG:
March Metric Workout
- Mosey to the recruiting center
- Everybody get a block and line up along the parking lot
- 15 minutes of work, change exercises every minute, count total reps as you go, move a parking lot line every 50 (everything is with a CMU)
- OHP
- Goblet Squats
- Bent over Rows
- Big Boy Situps
- Curls
- Lunges
- Derkins
- LBCs
- Tri extensions
- Deadlifts
- Thrusters x5
- 3 minute rest, then DO THE WHOLE THING AGAIN
- Put up the blocks and head back to the flag
MARY:
No time
COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
The prospect of being tested doesn’t usually make me excited. Thanks, I expect, to our public education culture, most of us associate testing primarily with being judged, usually based on a comparatively short and only vaguely representative sample of our performance. Too often, it seems that the circumstances of the test have more to do with the outcome than our preparation.
Consequently, most of us avoid tests when we can. Our experience says that we get better outcomes when we rely on more controlled vehicles like 1001 take home worksheets. We don’t like the risk if failing. But I am here to tell you that this perspective is a wound and scar that is crippling your growth, and it’s time to start stretching it out.
This model of testing is shallow and unhelpful. Perhaps unsurprisingly, I think the model presented by the bible provides insight. In the preblast, I quoted Psalm 66 v. 10 “For you, God, tested us; you refined us like silver.” Here and in many places, “test” is the Hebrew word is Tsaraph, which is directly related to the process by which impurities are removed from silver or gold, what we would call smelting. Through heat and pressure, the precious metal is separated from the dross and purified. So while evaluation is one aspect of testing, by its nature, it is also a means of purification. It is through repeated testing that gold becomes pure, and likewise, it is through repeated testing that we grow, develop, and become stronger. And, in truth, we want to be tested. From our youth, we seek out challenges. Easy is boring. It’s only under the weight of time with nagging fear and doubt that this inclination gets slowly crushed out of us.
Tsaraph – 1) to refine, try, smelt, test 2) to find out who is qualified for battle, as with Gideon in Judges 7:4 3) to smith, as in shaping metal (Jer 6:29-30, Is 40:19) 4) to refine by means of suffering (Ps 66:10-12)
Is 1:25 – “And I will turn my hand upon thee, and purely purge away thy dross, and take away all thy tin.”
Zec 13:9 – “And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried: they shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It is my people: and they shall say, The LORD is my God.”
Mal 3:2-3 – “But who may abide the day of his coming? And who shall stand when he appeareth? For he is like a refiner’s fire, and like fuller’s soap: and he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto The LORD an offering in righteousness.”
Finally, I want to show how this directly connects to the F3 leadership process, Q4.5, here is an excerpt:
So where does Failure fit into the Leadership development equation? What does it add to a man’s Leadership Foundation? If he already knows what a Virtuous Leader does and is–and is able is able to do and be those things himself–why must a Leader also Fail?
The reason is that Failure is a crucible. It is the forge by which a Leader is purified through the burning away of his me-first self-regarding nature. It matures him. Without Failure (and lots of it), a Leader will retain too much of who he was and keep doing what he did, rather than being fully transformed into what a Virtuous Leader is and consistently do what a Virtuous Leader does.
MOLESKIN:
We were late getting back. In September (ouch…) probably gonna need to get right over to the recruiting center and warm up on the way.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Wild at Heart, Escape from Haw Ridge, Hardship Hill