The Fortitude Chronicle: A Weekly Digest of Athletic Determination

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For the Relentless Mind

How To Win

Why Everything Matters

I've noticed something peculiar about how we discuss achievement. We love to sort strategies into neat binary buckets: "this matters" versus "this doesn't." The internet is flooded with definitive claims:

"External validation is toxic. Only internal validation matters."
"Focus on process, never outcomes."
"Comparison is the thief of joy."

These clean dichotomies make for viral posts and sellable books. But they miss a fundamental truth about excellence: It's not about finding the "right" strategy. It's about mastering the messy middle where contradictions coexist.

The Paradox of Excellence

High achievement isn't clean. It's not ideologically pure. Look closely at any domain master and you'll see someone who's learned to navigate seemingly contradictory forces:

The champion athlete simultaneously:

• Ignores critics (internal validation)

• Uses doubters as fuel (external motivation)

• Obsesses over biomechanics (process focus)

• Visualizes standing on podiums (outcome focus)

The successful entrepreneur skillfully:

• Builds for customer needs (external validation)

• Trusts her vision when everyone disagrees (internal validation)

• Studies competitors religiously (comparison)

• Ignores competitors to maintain unique positioning (avoiding comparison)

Excellence lives in these tensions. It thrives in this complexity.

The Season-Based Approach

Life isn't static. Different challenges require different orientations. Consider:

• Startup Phase: Early businesses require obsession, 80-hour weeks, and outcome fixation. This isn't sustainable forever, but it's often necessary for launch.

• Relationship Repair: After betrayal, relationships require overindexing on communication, even when uncomfortable.

• Athletic Comeback: Post-injury, athletes must prioritize recovery protocols that would be excessive during peak performance phases.

The key isn't avoiding these extremes—it's knowing when to employ them. As Marcus Aurelius noted, "The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way." Sometimes the obstacle itself dictates which lever to pull.

The Meta-Skill: Self-Knowledge

If everything matters, then how do you know what matters right now? This is where deep self-knowledge becomes the ultimate differentiator.

The truly exceptional have developed:

• Emotional fingerprinting: The ability to detect subtle internal shifts before they become problematic

• Feedback literacy: Discerning which external input to incorporate vs. discard

• Seasonal awareness: Recognizing which phase they're in and what it demands

An athlete I spoke with put it simply: "I don't avoid stress or seek balance every day. I seek the right imbalance for the current challenge."

The Identity Foundation

Without knowing who you are, you can't possibly know which strategies serve you:

• If your core values include family connection, then 80-hour work weeks might be destructive rather than necessary

• If your identity includes being a creator, external validation might be more important as market feedback than ego fuel

• If your sense of self rests on meeting challenges, focusing on process might serve you better than outcome fixation

This explains why identical approaches yield drastically different results for different people. What strengthens one person destroys another—not because the strategy is wrong, but because it clashes with their identity foundation.

The Integration Framework

Excellence requires integration, not elimination. Here's a framework for navigating these apparent contradictions:

1. Identity Audit: Define your non-negotiable values and core strengths

2. Season Recognition: Name your current phase honestly (growth, maintenance, recovery)

3. Tension Mapping: Identify which seemingly opposing forces this season requires

4. Intentional Imbalance: Consciously overindex on needed areas while maintaining minimum viable attention to others

5. Regular Recalibration: Create feedback mechanisms to signal when the season changes

The Practical Application

A concrete example: When training for his comeback fight, Mike Tyson simultaneously:

• Followed strict nutrition protocols (discipline)

• Allowed strategic cheat meals (flexibility)

• Studied opponent footage obsessively (comparison)

• Focused exclusively on his own strengths (avoiding comparison)

• Sought validation from his coach (external)

• Trusted his body's signals over conventional wisdom (internal)

Was this contradictory? Absolutely. Was it effective? Undeniably.

The Final Truth

The quest for simple, universal principles is understandable but misguided. Excellence isn't about finding the "one true path"—it's about developing the discernment to navigate complexity.

Everything matters. The question isn't what matters, but when and how much.

Without knowing who you are—your values, your strengths, your weaknesses, your season—you're navigating without a compass. You'll forever be asking "what works?" without the context to interpret the answers.

Master the meta-skill of self-knowledge, and you'll know exactly which lever to pull when. That's not just the path to achievement—it's the definition of wisdom.

Two Quotes

1. “The toughness of winning comes down to this: it’s a relentless climb. The peak is narrow and there’s room for one. To get there, it takes everything you’ve got, and to stay there? Even more. So, you push harder, because the alternative is not an option, to lose.” - Colin Jonov

2. “Dark times aren't eternal sentences; they're chapters in a larger narrative. They provide the contrast necessary to fully appreciate life's highs.” - Colin Jonov

Three Tweets

To Building Fortitude.

 Best Regards,

Colin Jonov, Founder & CEO Athletic Fortitude