51 Pushups

This concept has always been personal to me, and a competitive advantage that I chose not to share publicly. Thinking about it more recently, I realized that there’s no secret sauce and I want you to know about it.

Since I was 12 years old in Junior High School I have been doing 51 pushups before bed. Originally my reason for doing pushups was to be a better soccer player, and it worked. I played D1 college soccer and developed into a pretty good player and then played a few years of semi-pro too. But I chose to do 51 pushups because I refused to be outworked, I always wanted to one more pushup than everyone doing 50. So every evening I had it in my mind that I was going to do what others won’t to earn in life what others don’t.

But something interesting happened. When my soccer career ended, I still found myself on the ground doing pushups that first evening, the next evening and the next. This made me reflect on my reason why.

I realized the pushups were never about soccer. They were about committing every single day to the person I wanted to be. A person who is devoutly disciplined. A person who appreciates the value of hard work. And at that point it wasn’t a choice anymore, it was just me.

Now, I’m 27 years old which means for 15 years I’ve been doing this. And have I missed a night? Of course I have, I’d say conservatively I’ve done pushups 90% of the time. But check this out. By that math I have done 246,375 pushups.

There’s no secret here. It’s the daily commitment to disciplined hard work. And my success with my pushups is the same success that helps me produce a new episode every single day for you for the last two years. It’s also the same reason I believe I can achieve the massive goals on my horizon. Because every day I know I have it in me to get done what needs to be done. I believe that your ceiling for your potential can be determined by your daily habits. I encourage you to think about what you choose to do on a daily basis, and what that means for your future, because “how you do one thing is how you do everything”.