In my twenties and early thirties, I was a road warrior.
Not the glamorous kind you see in LinkedIn highlight reels, but the real version: windshield time, rest-stop coffee, sales calls stacked back-to-back, and nights spent in towns that all blurred together. I drove the East Coast relentlessly—small towns, big towns, places I only remember because the exit sign had a funny name or the diner stayed open late.
One night landed me in Greenville, South Carolina, during a booming summer thunderstorm. The kind the South does best. Heavy rain. Cracking thunder that rattles windows. I needed a good run.
Running was my reset back then. No matter how long the drive or how awkward the sales calls, a run let me burn off the noise. So I asked the front desk if there was a workout room.
The desk clerk—too nice in that unmistakably Southern way—smiled and walked me not to a gym, but to the indoor pool. Hmmm.
Along the edge of the pool sat two basic treadmills. Not near the pool. Not safely away from the water. Precariously close. One misstep away from disaster. Okay. Whatever.
One of the treadmills was already occupied.
The guy running on it looked like he had stepped straight out of a catalog. Perfect workout gear. Shiny new shoes. Sleek shorts. Sleeveless performance top. A sophisticated-looking iPod clipped just right. He ran with the confidence of someone who belonged there, who had done this a thousand times, who knew exactly what pace he should be running and why.
And then there was me. Cargo shorts. Oversized softball t-shirt. Shoes that had seen better days. I suddenly felt like I had wandered into the wrong room.
As I tip-toed closer to the pool’s edge and climbed onto the treadmill next to him, my internal narrative kicked in fast and loud. In my mind, this guy had it all. The great job. The answers. The perfect life. The confidence I was still chasing.
He was running at a blistering pace. I immediately cranked up my speed, trying to keep up. Not because I needed to—but because I wanted to prove something. To him. To myself. To the imaginary scoreboard in my head.
Within minutes, I knew I was out of my league. My breathing got heavier. My form sloppier. I dialed it back, feeling smaller with every step. And then—almost comically—he increased his speed. I could almost feel the smirk, even though he never looked at me.
That’s when it happened.
For just a second, he lost concentration. His right shoe caught the edge of the treadmill. He overcompensated. And within moments, physics took over.
He was launched off the treadmill and shot straight into the pool. A full-body splash!
Perfect gear soaked. Sophisticated iPod ruined. Confidence gone in an instant.
There was a moment of stunned silence, broken only by the echo of water sloshing against tile. He surfaced, shocked and humiliated, scrambling to process what had just happened.
I offered to help. He scoffed, waved me off, and sheepishly slunk out of the pool—soaked, embarrassed, and suddenly very human. It was incredible.
And it was also a lesson I’ve carried into every chapter of business since.
We Need to Stay Dry
In our careers, it’s easy to stand on the treadmill next to someone else and assume they’re winning. They look faster. More polished. More confident. Their gear is better. Their car is better. Their trajectory clearer. So we crank up our speed.
We stop listening to our own cadence, our own instincts, our own lanes. We chase someone else’s pace without knowing what it costs them to maintain it—or how close they might be to losing their footing.
The truth is, most of us are just a few missteps away from our own Holiday Inn pool splash!
Confidence can be real, but it can also be fragile. Appearances lie. And the race we think we’re losing might not even be ours to run.
Business rewards focus far more than comparison. The people who last aren’t the ones constantly glancing sideways. They’re the ones who know their pace, respect it, and stick to it—even when someone next to them looks faster.
That night, I finished my run. Slower than him. Less polished than him. But still dry.
And I realized something simple but profound: staying in our lane isn’t about playing small. It’s about playing smart. It’s about building confidence through our own actions, not through the distorted lens of comparison.
Resilience Compounds Our Success
Resilience, in the end, is what separates the people who last from the people who simply look fast for a moment. It’s the quiet discipline of showing up again tomorrow, still dry, still moving, still learning. In business—as in life—slow and steady may not turn heads, but it keeps us upright, adaptable, and in the game for the long run.
Confidence without balance is fragile; resilience compounds. We need to run our own race at our pace. And remember—no matter how perfect someone looks on the treadmill next to us, gravity doesn’t care.
So keep your footing, trust your pace, and remember: success isn’t about outrunning the person next to us—it’s about staying out of the pool.