Cliches keep me up at night. Becoming one and promoting one. I fear the day I sound like you, I fear the day you sound like me, I fear the day we are all comfortable with copying one another.

No one and nothing is immune to becoming a repetitive catch phrase that annoys rather than motivates. CrossFit, as much as we hate to admit it, most likely already is cliche in some instances. Our world is good at many thing, maybe none more so than than making clean things-dirty.

I believe constantly looking for the signs of suicidal imitation is step one in avoiding cliched living. I can say exactly the same honest truth that someone else said yesterday and it may hold greater meaning if my timing is right and my heart is just, or it can mean nothing. We are all destined to become a cliche as soon as we stop doing what it takes to be fresh.

Read something

I write so much because I love it even when I don’t. I write so I can read better. I read so I can learn more. In fact, the entire reason we learn to read is so we learn how to learn.

Screw the dead guys, read what you want, but read. I have my absolute cannot live without books, but I really hate certain books I am “suppose” to like. In fact, this is what keeps most of us from broadening our library in the first place. If you don’t like Thoreau or Hemingway or whoever then don’t pick them up. Read enough, for long enough, and your tastes change making becoming a cliche all but impossible.

Write something

Gore Vidal said, “write something, even if it’s a suicide note.”

Don’t try to write a book or a chapter or a page. Don’t start a silly blog like this one. Write a thank you note to your mom, or your wife or somebody. Scratch your name in the hood of an evil mans car saying, “I know what you did last summer,” just to freak him out. Writing is something you can give that will live on in others no matter how small or broad your pen may be.

Say something

The more things you say, the more chances you have to repeat yourself. The more you observe, listen, and focus, the better your chances at saying “something”. Something real, honest.

The older I get the more quiet I become. It’s not that I don’t have anything to say, it’s that no one is listening to anyone anymore. Saying “something” is so much different than everything else everyone else does. Saying something is direct, it’s meaningful, it pisses people off, it blesses people, it changes things.

Punch something

Avoiding cliche is finding something your so passionate about, that it makes your want to fight for it.

I could say it’s CrossFit for me, but that’s not really true, and that’s not deep enough to be honest. Cliche is superficial, honesty is core.

CrossFit for me is an outlet I love, humanity is the source. I’m not saying something silly like “I want to help everyone.” I am saying we-humans-are awesome and can be so much more. My passion, the thing that makes me want to punch things, is releasing the potential in others that I believe we all have. I know I am nothing more than one big ass talent scout, and all I want to do is find your switch, turn you on and let you shine.

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