START SCRUBBING - Health and Fitness Takes Work

Start Scrubbing

Pool water is drained, muck and other shit has been scooped out, and now we are ready to fill it up with fresh clean water.  I wish it was that easy.  Now comes the hard part, and I know what you’re thinking.  Draining out the water and scooping the muck seemed hard, it’s going to get harder? Yep! If you haven't drained your pool yet, go back and read last week's article, Drain Your Pool.
 
Now we have to scrub and clean the whole pool.  Draining the water and removing the muck was just identify what was dirtying up our lives; the milkshakes from Starbucks, spending money on useless shit, wasting time, and/or making excuses.  You know what I’m talking about, you just emptied it all out last week.  Now it’s time to scrub, and when I say scrub, I mean roll the sleeves up, grab the muriatic acid, and start scrubbing!  This is literally going to take a while, good thing for you pool season is still a few weeks away, but we need to start now.  If you start cleaning now, by time summer comes, all we’ll be doing is a little pool maintenance to keep things clean and life will be good.
 
Back to scrubbing!  This is where we maintain not getting the Starbucks, drinking the pop (the ones you swear you only have 1 a day), going to gym, reading every day, and all of the other habits that will turn you into the person you want to become.
 
So where do we start?  The first place is to start thinking that you are the person responsible for scrubbing the pool.  Too many of us have gotten spoiled, dare I say soft, and don’t like hard work.  We think it's someone’s else’s job to do it.  “Can’t we just pay someone to do it?” or“there must be an easier way, isn’t there a pill we can get to just throw in the pool that will scrub it clean?”  Side note, this is why I do CrossFit.  I knew I had a hard job in front of me, so I looked for the best tool for that job.  Now there are a lot of other tools that will get the job done, I just want to know which was the best.  For my job it wasCrossFit, clean eating, and a focus on mindset.  Also, remember, it isn’t easy for me, I drain and scrub and my pool every year and then perform daily maintenance to keep it clean.
 
No one can scrub for us or give us a miracle cleaner.  We need to start looking at ourselves differently.  We are the ones who we are hiring to do the scrubbing.  Don’t know how? Find someone who will show you, not do the work for you, but show you how to do it yourself.  Quit making excuses that you don’t know what to do or how to do it.  We live in an age where information is at our fingertips.  If you don’t know what to do, take the time to sit down and figure it out, just start scrubbing!  I have no idea how to work on cars, but the brakes and rotors on my truck needed to be replaced.  I watched about 10 YouTube videos, bought new pads and rotors, and replaced them myself.  It took about a day’s worth of scrubbing, and you know what?  When I was done, even after all that scrubbing, it left me feeling fucking awesome! 
 
Stop thinking of the scrubbing as a negative, this is something we are fortunate enough to get to do, start with some gratitude for even having a pool, start thinking about how great it will be once the pool is ready to use, and get to scrubbing.  You are the one for the job, not someone else, this is a job you get to do, and to be honest, if you want to enjoy the pool, it’s a job you have to do.  If not, have fun sitting in your shitty blow up pool while you get to watch your neighbor enjoying their’s all summer, and what the fuck?!?! The neighbor’s pool has a slide!

Reach out to me if you need help learning how to scrub, I’m always willing to help!
 
In Strength,
 
Eric Karls M.Ed.

CrossFit Conductor
Chief Awesomeness Facilitator
Certified Level 3 CrossFit Coach

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