Hey, guys. Nick Horowski here. And I couldn’t find a better spot to shoot a video on a beautiful, sunny, cool afternoon. So, we’ll get outside and enjoy it. But other than that, moving on to what I want to talk about today… and that is the discussion of competition and using competition as a motivator.

Now, recently, I started training again for strongman competitions. And I love doing these. I love just being strong in general. It’s something that’s very [important to] me.
But competitions can be weightlifting. They can be diet competitions. They can be races. They could be just about anything that you can think of […], whatever you decide your competition is.

I want to discuss if competition is actually a good motivator because a competition ends. I’m looking to do a competition. It’s called 3 Months from Now. It’s approximately what it is. Well, what about after that? Would I have to set another competition to be able to have the same level of motivation?

Now, this goes motivation for making sure that I’m getting in the heavy training that I need, making sure that I have the motivation to get in the recovery work that I need, making sure that I have to do the mobility. I always do my Tai Chi. It’s part of my recovery. And I have to make sure I’m sleeping. I have to make sure that I’m not only eating quality food, but enough food to be able to fuel me for whatever I’m doing. I have to get my enough time outside—not to mention enough time with my family. And I can’t forget work because

I still need to be able to support all of these financially.

So, as you can see, there are lots of things that kind of build upon this. And I can use that competition as a motivation. But is that a short-term thing?

Now, I don’t think so because I can always set more competitions. But what if going into this competition, something happens to me physically that I’m no longer able to compete in Strong Man? Well then do I have to look again? Will I just have to find another competition to find another motivation?

So, I’m trying to show that this can snowball. I don’t know if it can snowball out of effect or out of chaos. Does this snowball get so big that it really just consumes me or anybody who’s only using competition as a motivation?

So, this is more of a food for thought because I think, extrinsically and intrinsically, I have high enough value that I have my motivation without a competition.

Competition To Me

A competition to me can just be little tweaking points along that way. I know the foods that I’m always going to eat. They’re always going to be clean. I’m just going to have to tweak my eating depending on my competition. If I’m doing less, I’m moderating that. If I’m doing more, I’m moderating that.

My sleep goes the same way. I’m always getting high-quality sleep. I noticed that I probably sleep, on average, maybe 15 minutes to half an hour more every night now that I’m training heavy. Well, that’s not true. On nights that I train or during the days where I train very heavy, I know that that’s going to come.

So, I don’t think, always, we just need to just focus on the competition. We should have those set values beforehand. But a competition is a beautiful way that I’m finding that really refines those.

So, if you’re looking to try and refine some of the things that you’re working on, set a competition, whether it be with just a friend, whether it be somebody or a group that you’re in online. This can be any form of competition. It’s really going to help refine your goals, refine your values and hopefully just expand your health. That’s what it’s all about.

So, hopefully, you can take this, make some of those tweaks and become even happier, healthier, just strong because of it.