Bonus Episode: The Worst That Can Happen is You Learn More Than You Thought Possible

What is the worst thing that can happen to you when you experience a huge failure or struggle at something over and over again, whether your health and fitness journey, your relationships, your business, or life?

I just experienced something that could have devastated me—if I hadn't built the mental fortitude to handle it and, better yet, use it to fuel my future.

Listen to this short bonus episode, part of the Mindset Monday series, for how YOU can use these experiences to level up your life.

Don't forget to listen all the way through for specific, step-by-step strategies!

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Transcript

Philip Pape 0:00

But what actually happened was the worst thing that I could imagine. And that was just blanking out for so long that I almost couldn't recover. And by doing that, what it did to my brain was tell me that no man, this really could still happen. And therefore, there's something else that is an opportunity for you to learn and grow. Welcome to the Wits and Weights podcast. I'm your host, Philip Pape, and this twice-a-week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self-mastery by getting stronger, optimizing your nutrition, and upgrading your body composition. We'll uncover science-backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle, and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry so you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits and Weights community, welcome to a bonus solo episode of the Wits and Weights Podcast. Occasionally I will publish a short bonus episode on Mondays that focuses on an experience I had or a story or thought that I want to convey related to mindset and motivation, so you can get your week started on a positive, inspiring note and primed to take action. Today's episode is called The Worst That Can Happen Is You Learn More Than You Thought Possible. And it's based on an experience I just had on Saturday night. I was competing in a speech contest related to Toastmasters International, an amazing public speaking organization that I've been with for over 11 years. And if you are trying to become a better communicator, speaker, leader, I highly recommend it because it is a nonprofit, it's all volunteer run, very inexpensive, but highly effective. This is probably the third speech contest where I had reached the final level in our district, which is a pretty large area of the Northeast United States. And this is the first time I got to that level for what's called the International Speech Contest, which is on any topic you want to speak about, but it's usually motivational, inspirational type of speech. I had to win multiple contests to get to this point using the same speech. And so I had both practiced it, rehearsed it, and performed it dozens, if not maybe hundreds of times in the car, in the shower, in my bedroom, walking around the house, everywhere you can think, to the point where the speech was unconsciously ingrained in my brain. Or so I thought. And I my speech was about that. So it's very much in the space that I practice in right now as a nutrition coach and something that I have seen and experienced myself. So I started off talking about my 20s, then my 30s, then my 40s, how I struggled with my weight and my body image, and how I wanted to do all these different activities over the years, but I was seeing a decline in health. Then I was supposed to say, are any of these reasons for pursuing physical fitness less valid than the others? But I totally blanked. My brain just could not find the words. And the problem with speeches like this, because they're so well honed, so prepared, and so tightly written, if you forget a key line like this that asks a question of the audience and ties the beginning of the speech to the theme or the solution in the speech, it's very difficult to start to connect things in context, and it threw me off. It just threw me off. And it only took me a few seconds before I thought of a line in my speech a little later on, started from that point. Great. Now, normally this is where the trouble would end. I would continue the speech, I would finish it out. Maybe I missed a few lines, people don't really notice that, you're good to go. However, I got a little bit further in speech, and because that first question was missing and I was about to repeat the question in my speech, it also escaped me. And this time it was a complete blank to the point where I just could not think of anything to say. And I sat there or I stood there pondering. And here's the key pivot point for me that would not have happened even, let's say, five years ago. So I've been practicing my public speaking skills for about 10 years, and I didn't really get super confident with it until quite a few years after that. So in the past, if I had blanked out like this, there's no way I would have recovered. I would have felt embarrassed, humiliated, like the audience was just judging me and maybe laughing at me inside. All this stuff is in my head, of course. But having gone through the process of many, many times getting feedback and failing and not making it very far in speech contests and continuing to get better and better, the way I interpreted the audience on Saturday was, you know what, they're not judging me. They're rooting for me. They want me to succeed, they want me to figure it out and keep going. So even though two or three times within what was probably only 20 seconds, but it felt like many minutes, I thought, I'm just gonna give up and walk off the stage and with grace and say, thank you, audience, but I can't remember the rest. Have a great night. But I did everything within my power to recall my practice, my scripts, my words, my cues, and I found a little thread of a nugget of a phrase to glom onto somewhere later on in my speech. I started from there and I finished out the speech with as much gusto and proper delivery and mechanics and a smile and vocal variety as I could. And in the process, I had to mentally cut out some things just to make sure I met the time requirement so that I wasn't disqualified. And I left to an applause. And of course, I was in that moment, I wouldn't say devastated, but I was so disappointed in myself. Not so much that I had forgotten, but that that could even happen and that I would disappoint the audience. And further, that on my shoulders was the burden of representing my division and the other competitors that I had to beat to get there. And I felt like I let them down. And I knew that if I had pulled out the full speech as it was intended, that everyone would have this wonderful experience. And I also thought it was a great message that people could take home, and it just didn't stick like it would have if I had performed it to my best. And just as I suspected, I didn't place in the final results. And the other competitors were all amazing. So even if I had given it my all, and I wish I did just to challenge them, I definitely still could have not even placed, depending on how the judges felt about our performances. But regardless, what the most heartwarming thing was when multiple people came up after me, either to share a story of themselves or others who had gone through a similar experience, or to say, you know, you did a great job just thinking through it and persevering and then continuing your speech. And the parts that I heard were so great. I would have loved to hear the whole speech. I know you would have changed the outcome of the contest potentially if you got through it. I want to hear you next time, and I know you're gonna bring it. And I got this same message from multiple people, and a thought struck me in that moment that I persisted till the time I'm recording this episode and why I wanted to get this out to you to inspire you if nothing else, in that if I, let's say best case, I got through the speech perfectly and no stumbles, no blanks. And let's say I even came in third, second, or won the contest. I would have been proud of myself. It would have been exciting. I would have been able to tell that to folks and then go on and represent the next level. But that would be it, right? I would basically take home a win, I'd move on, it would validate that what I've been doing was the right thing and a story. Next level, what if I had blanked out for just a bit like I did at the beginning and then recovered and then finished the speech? Well, I've done that quite a few times. Even in the last year or two, I've done that in multiple speeches, or I'll just blank for a second, I'll recover, and I'll continue and all is well. Again, I don't really take much of a lesson for that. But what actually happened was the worst thing that I could imagine. And that was just blanking out for so long that I almost couldn't recover. And you could argue that if I just blanked out completely and never recovered, that that would be the worst thing. But it's pretty darn close. And by doing that, what it did to my brain was tell me that, no man, this really could still happen. And therefore, there's something else that is an opportunity for you to learn and grow. Meaning, no matter how good I think I am as a speaker, and I do have a lot of confidence and pride in my speaking abilities because I used to be such a mouse, an introvert, so scared of talking to people. And you guys listening to this podcast are like, what? I don't believe it. But I'm telling you, speaking is a skill. If you feel you don't have it or you're not a natural, BS, you can develop this and become really good at it. But I realized that there are some advanced elements of speaking that I really hadn't taken the effort to learn yet because I hadn't been challenged to do so. And this abject failure, let's call it a failure. You might call it a stumble, you might call it an opportunity. Fine. But I lost. I lost that night on that stage in that moment. I was very disappointed in myself. And that's okay. It's okay to feel that way. The question is what you do about it. And this is not to be some trite, every failure is a lesson, even though there's truth to that. This is some of the biggest failures will push you past that point of a threshold that you wouldn't have gone otherwise. And in this case, that threshold for me is wow, I know that I can really forget my speech now. And I need to figure out things like memory palaces or better ways to practice so that I'm not so beholden to specific phrases or words in my speeches, or different ways to rehearse, or having a backup joke in case I blank out again, so I can recover and add lib a bit instead of just being silent. Like there's a lot of these ideas going through my head already after one day. So imagine what I can come up with if I apply myself in this process going forward. So now I ask you, I ask you, what is one thing that you are struggling with or failing with or have had a big failure with recently? And given that this is a health and fitness podcast, maybe we can focus on your nutrition, on your fitness, on your health, but it could be anything in your life, to be honest. And somewhere where you keep spinning your wheels or you keep experiencing these setbacks, there's an opportunity there. And so what I want to focus on is how can you reflect on that experience, analyze it, and then learn from it to do what I plan to do from my experience, which is take action to make sure it never happens again, or at least, and this is the important part, knowing that that situation can happen, my brain might just lock up. What is my plan B, C and D? What is my backup plan? And this could apply to nutrition, where let's say you always struggle with a binge episode or emotional eating when something happens like a trigger. It could be that you're bored, it could be another person in your life who just pushes your buttons. It could be when you fail at something else and all of a sudden you're feeling depressed or down or anxious, anxiety. And all of these things then would lead you to making a decision you wouldn't normally make when you're cool, calm, and collected. Hey, this is Philip, and I hope you're enjoying this episode of Wits and Weights. If you're looking to connect with like-minded listeners on their health and fitness journeys, come join our free Facebook community. It's a supportive space where you can share your experiences, ask questions, and access free guides and weekly trainings. Just search for Wits and Weights on Facebook or find the link in the show notes. Now back to the show. So what I want you to do is think about that. Think about that experience. That we'll call it a failure, we'll call it a struggle, whatever you want to do. And here's what I want you to do. I want you to sit down with a piece of paper or do it on your computer, on your phone, whatever, take some dedicated time to reflect on this. Okay, it's great to have a regular time to do this, but right now with this episode, I want you to take a journal, notebook, digital document, whatever, find a quiet, comfortable space where you can think without distractions. And I want you to write down what happened. I want you to write down when it happened, when did you notice this? And if it happened more than once, make a note of that. I want you to ask yourself what emotions or thoughts are associated with these? How do they make you feel? How do they make you feel? And how did they feel in the moment? Because I'll tell you what, I felt a certain way when it happened to me on Saturday night. I felt very disappointed, I felt frustrated, but I also saw it as an opportunity. And then that night I had some trouble sleeping because my brain would constantly take me to a what-if scenario. Oh, what if I had done this during the speech? What if I had done this? What if I had done this? And on one hand, this could be unhealthy if it's an ongoing thing and you're doubting yourself and you're not letting that resolve itself. But on the other hand, those thoughts gave me ideas of what if I had done that? Well, that means what if it happens again? This is the thing I could potentially do. Okay, so document the emotions and thoughts associated with the struggles. Now, here's the next really important question. What are the possible reasons behind it? What caused it? And this might be a multiple chain of events. This might be something that immediately caused it. Like let's say you binge ate a bunch of candy sitting on the counter, and you did that because you just had a fight with your roommate. Okay, that was the emotional trigger. But there are other reasons you were able to eat that candy. One of those reasons is that the candy was even in the house, or that it was sitting out where you could see it, or that you have a troubling relationship with your roommate. So there are multiple reasons behind these. And then one more question. What has changed in your life? What has changed in your circumstances that could have contributed to these struggles? Maybe they didn't exist before and they exist now. And it could be very simple. It could be that you went to the gym and you failed your reps on your squat. You normally get them, you've been getting stronger and stronger, you're eating, you're sleeping, you're recovering, and you failed this time. What changed? Oh, maybe you went at 6 a.m. instead of 8 p.m. Maybe you didn't get as much sleep the night before. Maybe you're dealing with a lot of stress right now. Maybe you didn't eat a very big dinner. Looking at those changes can give you a clue as to what changes you can then put in place later to avoid the struggle. And then related to that, I want you to look for patterns, recurring themes, patterns that help you uncover the root cause. So if you have multiple struggles that are going on, even if they seem unrelated, there could be patterns that all tie back to why you're having these struggles. So this is a good starting point. Then I want you to be honest with yourself. I want you to acknowledge that you have these weaknesses, you have these areas for improvement. There's no judgment. It's just you reflecting that this is where you are. Everyone struggles with things. Everyone struggles with tons of things every day in their life. This is just a fact. It's okay to admit it. And what we're trying to do is become aware of it. And now the magic happens. How can you learn from that and help you grow mentally, physically, emotionally? And by how I mean what are the skills you need to obtain? What is the knowledge that you need? Sometimes we dismiss knowledge. We assume that people know what to do. Or we assume you could just go to Google or ChatGPT and ask the question and get the answer, and now you're good to go. But sometimes we don't even have that knowledge. So how can you get the knowledge? Is it a podcast, a person that you need to reach out to, a coach, a book, a training course? And then ask other people. Post something online, be vulnerable. That's what I did on Sunday, actually the day I'm recording this. I put a post on my personal Facebook page that said, look, this thing happened, right? I was disappointed. I didn't perform my best. But I'm going to take that as fuel for the future. I'm going to learn from that and I'm going to make sure that I compete again because that's the only way I can test my growth the next time. I'm going to take action now in the moment, decide what I need to learn to be better next time. And throughout this whole process, because we are often our worst critics, I want us to also be our best friends, treating ourselves with kindness and understanding. To me, this is not an aggressive go-after process of growth. This is a combination of empathy, self-compassion, reflection, opportunity, and ambition all rolled into one. So have compassion with yourself, lean on your support network, your friends, your family members, a mentor, a coach, and get their insights. This is why I told you a little bit earlier to maybe post it for the public to see, to kind of hold yourself accountable, where people can give you a different perspective. They might chime in and say, Wow, I'm really impressed how you handled that. What I noticed was XYZ. And it might give you a different angle to come from. Oh, that's what you saw on that? Well, now that's another avenue to pursue for change. Once you've done all of this, you're ready to take that into a plan for improvement where you're going to identify your steps based on the skills you need, how to get them, when you're going to do them, a plan to practice, to learn and practice them. And then how are you going to put these to the test next time? So whatever your struggle was, whether it was your squats in the gym, a binge eating episode, maybe it was you went to a restaurant and couldn't quite handle eating what you needed to eat to stay on plan. And then if it's the type of thing where it makes sense for you to go and test yourself again, maybe it's your three sets of squats in the gym. Like my, like for me, it was the speech another speech contest that I'm going to do. If that makes sense, maybe it's going to a restaurant next weekend and now practicing those skills for planning out your eating guidelines or whatever strategy you decided to use, go do that. Now I'm not saying every situation you want to force upon yourself. In some cases, it's, hey, you hope this doesn't happen. But if it does, you are now ready for it. So by following all of these tips, you can reflect on what happened, gain information and insights, because remember, anything that happens in your life, any emotion that you feel is information. And that information thus informs your mental growth and your physical, emotional, and mental development. And I'll leave you with one more thought, and that is from my friend and former client, Max, who replied to my post and he said, Man, you're doing the podcast and the speech thing and your father and all these things. No wonder you're resilient. And I thought, wow. So what he's saying is that by pursuing all these things you challenge yourself with, yes, it gives you more opportunities to fail, but it also gives you more opportunities not only to succeed, but to learn from those failures. So what is the worst thing that can happen? The worst thing that can happen is things go really badly and you learn more than you thought possible. And here's the thing if you're not sure where to get started, if you want somebody to brainstorm this with you, to talk about a challenge you're having right now related to your health and fitness, please reach out to me for a free call. I do these all the time. This is a 30-minute call. I do not sell, I do not mention pricing. Very much like this podcast and our Facebook community. It's providing, it's about providing as much value as possible and then pushing that knowledge, awareness, and impact out into the world so that we all can develop that physical self-mastery. Just use my link in the show notes. Look for the link to book a free call. Go ahead and do it. We'll get on the live video. I'll ask you where you are, where you want to be, how we can best use the time in our session to get you unstuck and moving forward. And that's what we'll do. So again, use the link in my show notes for that. And make sure to follow the show and catch tomorrow's next official numbered episode, number 69, with Adrian Moreno, where we talk about tapping into your deepest emotions and telling your power story to unlock your potential, whether it's in fitness, in health, in business, or in life. As always, stay strong, and I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits and Weights podcast. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits and Weights. If you found value in today's episode and know someone else who's looking to level up their wits or weights, please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong.