Getting Powerful

Mark Allen writes:

I saw him in the hotel lobby in Bermuda and said, "I hear you're going to the Ironman." "Yeah," he said, "I've decided to go back." At that moment, I gave some of my power of to him. I could feel it going over from me to him. I was so aware of it, I thought, "I've got to that back, I can't let that sucker go into the race with my power in his pocket."

It's real. Someone says to you: "You look tired." Do you say, "Yes I..." Or do you say, "But I feel great." It's important when you aim to be the best, but it is still relevant to situations at work, situations in everyday life which are invariably competitive.

Mark Allen again:

When I arrived in Kona that year, I went around sunset one evening to do a swim at the pier. Tinley and Murphy Reinschreiber came swimming to the beach. Murphy swam over to me, but Tinley was so out of whack with himself that he swam underwater to try to avoid talking to me. When he finally came up, I said, "Scott, how's it going?" He just nodded his head. He wouldn't even speak to me. And I thought, "This is Scott Tinley?!" In the past, he'd been better than anyone at keeping his focus and power within himself. He never before gave that up to other people...It was the first and last time I ever saw him do that.

It's applicable also to the opposite sex. I know I occasionally give power to someone I feel is dropdead gorgeous. It's not hard to do. It may be someone walking by me, or a picture. And they respond by taking it. They take it wherever it is served. Why? Because it is not an energy that satsifies. It leaves you hungrier for more. It's cheap fuel. It's candy bars.
It's interesting though when that doesn't happen. Have you ever complimented a woman and she has accepted it for what is was worth. I mean, if she felt it wasn't true she'd set you right. She'll tell you, "No, I haven't lost weight, but thanks for the compliment." Then you know you are dealing with a strong, and beautiful woman. Someone who knows who she is not just about what she looks like.

And it also works the other way round. Do I build my emotional life on the weaknesses of other people. If I am doing that, I'm enlarging other people, and worse, enlarging their weaknesses. Vanity, is a weakness. Do I respond to the weakness in others, or their strengths? When it comes to anything meaningful I have to do the work, I have to find my inner resources, I have to pay the price. I have to work, and learn to see what can work over the long term. Confidence can come and go during the course of a day. Personal Power is built, brick by brick, day by day workout after workout (or, to stay true to the metaphor, date by date, makeout before makeup!).
The way we see the opposite sex says a lot, I feel, about the way we see ourselves. We make the person we choose to love into mirrors for ourselves. We have to choose whether we to see our own flaws or what's fabulous about the two us together.

One of the areas I felt I had to watch carefully over my domain, manage my interests, was in triathlon this year. There were a few races, and two New Zealand guys had said from the beginning they meant to beat me. The first thing I had to decide that what I was doing was not about them. I was racing to see what i could do, first and foremost, to improve on the previous season. I mostly did do this, although I feel disappointed that Cheorwon was less spectacular on the run than I expected it to be. Nevertheless, my cycle there was my best cycle this year, and my best timetrial in probably a few years.

So I had to use the energy, the competitive energy between us, to motivate me. But I had to base what I was doing on my own strategies, not simply reactions to their training or performances. I had access to their training - they logged it on BeginnerTrathlete. I took a very independent approach. I trained on my own, I started all the races we did not even knowing where they were. This was about personal power. Before my first race, I called Bernard, probably the night before the race, and asked him how he was travelling. I wanted to travel in a separate vehicle. I wanted to know before we left what they intended to do. My focus was on them. The intention was for that not to happen, by going in a different vehicle, but my mind was not in the right place. So when I called I didn't say how I was travelling, I just asked how they were travelling. He was surprised to hear from me and I was a little hesitant and unsure over the phone, and he was calm and assured. That was a withdrawal, and a big one.

I was in good condition for the race, although I had not rested that much for this first event.
Once we arrived, shortly before this very first race of the season, I was given a message, Corneli came over to me and told me that Bernard was 'sick'. I was actually angry to hear it. I think I said, "I don't care." Or: "Why are you telling me this!" I didn't want to know. I didn't want to swim in the cold water and say to myself, "Hey, don't worry if you're getting tired, he's sick, so it must be worse for him." I wasn't nearly as hardscore in that race as I should I have been. Part of that was as a result of Distraction - I played computer games until 6am the previous morning. How dedicated is that? And since I wasn't crystal clear in my actions, what i ate before the race turned out to be...well...not nearly enough. I actually walked in that race. My energy crashed towards the end of the bike. But had my personal power been focussed only on me, I may have had enough mental power to see that I wasn't taking care of me, that there were some things I could control, and improve. Like what I was eating. Like when I was sleeping.
Before that race he also offered a cheerful, "Good luck." My response was slightly muted, and that was the moment I felt the full transaction took place. He came 3rd and I came nowhere in Gangneung.

I decided after that race that the next race was a new beginning. I trained really hard for it. I trained to turn the loss of the last race around as far as I could. I wanted a 180 degree change. My preparation level was excellent.
After I finished the race I had a deep deep level of satisfaction. And when I found out I had won the race I thought, "Yes, I deserve this. I did everything right."
I had almost no contact with Bernard or Andrew beforehand. It is not meant to be unfriendly - it is meant to maintain focus. At one point the two of them walked with JD through the transition area, and when they passed my bike they said "Hey," and I said, "Hey," and that was it. I knew they were there, I just focussed on what I was doing. I felt like they wanted to see how I had set up my bike, but that was all. If they wanted to key off me, fine, but I wasn't interested in what they were doing. Both of them got disqualified in that race, but I won mine. I stayed within my Personal Power. I got my 180.

Ryk, in the picture above, has generated more and more power, by being consistent. He's been swimming at a high ;evel for years. For at least a decade. If you're a swimmer, you'll have a deep understanding, down to the warm marrow of your bones, what it takes to swim those distances in the cool sharp silver water, day in and day out. He started his swimming career by going after the 1500m in the Olympics. That's a really tough event. And preparing for it - well, it takes a special kind of person. He worked hard, but success in the 1500m wasn't easy with guys like Thorpe and Hackett around. (I met a guy in Jeju, Matty White, who used to train with Hackett.) Success came slowly and I guess not often enough for Ryk in the 1500m. So when that didn't work for him, he used all the work, the price he had paid day by day getting himself strong and powerful for the mile, he used that for shorter distances. Years later he is at the top of his game. He didn't rock the world in the 1500m but he didn't let that take his personal power away. He used it. He built on it. He took what he had and made it count. Now he is cooking in the 100m. And in Athens he chose to share it in the relay. He chose to go for a Gold Medal in the relay that he knew he could win, over another race, an individual event, that he might have gotten a medal. And he got it.

When I have a good sense of my own Power, other people don't intimidate me, Idon't feel like I don't have enough of something. It feels like there is enough. Enough time, enough magic in the universe for all of us to shine.

Here's a funny epilogue to this subject matter. Mark Allen again:

There are many examples of athletes using this kind of power game to their advantage. Moments before the swimming finals of the 1964 Olympics, gold medalist Don Schollander followed his main opponent into the bathroom and stood behind him while he tried to take a leak. There were maybe 100 urinals in there and the guy became so frustrated and upset that he couldn't get on with it, and ran out. You could say the guy was totally pysched out by Don - that he gave Don all his power. That's when Don Schollander won the gold medal.