10 lb weights

During my freshman year of college, I had a good friend named Brady Paselk. Brady and I were around the same height and weight (we were both pretty tall and rather thin). We were active and loved sports! One of our college days on campus, I wanted to go to the gym and work out. He wanted to hit the weight room. I liked to work out but I never really worked out with weights.

Brady played competitive sports-including football in high school, and was used to the whole workout routine. When we went into the weight room, I noticed the guys were all bigger than me. They were older, worked out longer and had huge arms. Brady said, “Come on let’s do some bicep curls,” so I followed him. He walked over to the dumb bells and unashamed Brady grabbed some 10 lb weights. He told me to grab the other set of 10 lbs dumbbells. Before we started to workout Brady looked at me and said, “If this is all we can lift than this is what we start with.” He looked in the mirror and started doing his curls.

Wow! The confidence! He didn’t care that the guys around him were lifting 35, 65 or even 95 lbs, he was content with what he could do at the moment. After we finished doing a set, we increased, building to 15 lbs, 20 lbs and so on…

Every day, I remember this story. It means the world to me. I can see how big other people’s production companies are, their houses, car(s), money in the bank- many are lifting different weights. But freshman year in the gym, Brady taught me a valuable lesson, “You should only lift what you can handle.”

Brady Paselk