"Push through the pain, brother!"

Personal trainers like to bring their clients to the Santa Monica stairs. They come in bunches, doing a variety of cross fit-ish types of exercises, which they put their own twist on to stand apart from the myriad of trainers Los Angeles produces on a weekly basis.

The idea of pushing through pain has always puzzled me. My attitude towards exercise has always been, if you're suffering, you're doing it wrong. I've been in pain while riding my mountain bike countless times, but I was always having fun. I understand all about that 'dig deep' kind of pain to clean that last pull up, or break that 5 minute mile. But pushing through pain has become a badge of honor that many people confuse for a misplaced sense of accomplishment, in my opinion. 

"Dude, that last clean and jerk really hurt?" Um, ok. Does that make it any more satisfying? More of an achievement? The funny thing about pain is, it's all relative. What hurts for one person is a walk in the park for others. But one thing you rarely hear elite level athletes talk about after completing some herculean physical task was how much it hurt. You hear them talk about how much fun it was.  

So when a weekend warrior is doing push ups and grunting loudly for all around him to hear his mythical feat, and his trainer is barking at him to, "Push through the pain, brother!", it makes me wonder...why are you doing this? For pains sake? Suffer in silence. You're quest for pain is interfering with those of us who enjoy the journey.