BecauseIWasToldICan

About six months ago， I joined a gym.

Every morning， there is one personal trainerthere who works out at the same time that my lit-tle group does our workout.

He does his“routine”with such a quiet de-termination that he makes it all look very easy， al-though I know all too well how hard he is work-ing.

Whenever I tend to complain and quit， Iwatch him push himself to his own limits， and Ifind myself motivated to work as hard and with-out complaint.

A couple of weeks ago， I was watching himdo chin- ups. He made them look effortless. Ibroke away from my group and asked him if Icould try a chin-up.

I had never tried before， but he just made itlook so easy. He eagerly stepped aside and en-couraged me to step up to the bar.

I pulled myself up without thinking… once…then twice. That was all I had in me. I had nostrengthleft.

I told him that was all I had， so he steppedup behind me and pushed me up for a third andfourth“pull”. It felt so good.

The next day when I was done with myworkout， I asked him to spot me again. Again， Idid two.Again on day three and so on.

I thought it was pitiful that I could only dotwo， but when I came to the gym at the end of theweek， he was standing there just shaking his head.

When I asked him what was up， he said hewas impressed with my chin-ups.

He told me that when they are training fire-fighters， the men are required to do five chin-ups，and women are required to do one or two.

He explained that most people can’t dothem at all， and that he was amazed that I could.

He further told me that if I practised everyday， I would be doing five or six in no time.

At this point I should probably add that I am50 years old… and female.

Had he told me at the very beginning howdifficult it was， I more than likely would not havetried at all.

Or I might have tried， but given it only halfan effort， because failure would have been the ex-pectation.

I applaud him for letting me believe that forme， it was not only a possibility， but that successwas a realistic expectation.

大約六個月前，我在一家健身房報名。（剩余667字）