In the gym today, my trainer advised that if you want to improve and build muscle (i.e., get strong), you push the last three reps/times such that you think you’ll fail at any moment. In other words, you push to failure. You push, seeking that point when you just can’t.

He said he’s had clients get frustrated when he tells them they left effort out there unused, and then walk out. But they usually walk back in the next day after they’ve had a look-in-the-mirror moment.

Once they learn to lift like that, and once they learn to come back day after day and not just when they can work it in, they are lifting with passion.

Only then is when you see success.

Your brain will try to tell you to take the path of least resistance in most anything. It will tell you to stop before it gets too hard. But you do not improve unless you push past that.

In writing, you write/publish/submit to the point of failure. Writers who opine about the pain of rejection, in my opinion, don’t write with passion. They write for fun. They write to feel good. They do not write with passion.

Passion is doing something beyond the level of “can’t.” Beyond the level of shaking muscles. Beyond the fear of rejection. Beyond the trepidation of having to do something you aren’t sure will work. Beyond the concern of being embarrassed.

Those who excel, who succeed, who achieve something different than the masses, are doing so with passion. Passionate writers write through all the noise, voices, criticism, demands, and obstacles in their path. They write until it hurts.