IF INNER FITNESS | Special Chapter - When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.

IF INNER FITNESS | Special Chapter - When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.

Our IF Inner Fitness journey continues with a special added chapter. This chapter and all chapters are copyrighted, 1999 - 2025.

When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.

There’s an old saying: “When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.” Most of us imagine, I know that I do, that this teacher is a mentor, coach, or guide. But often, the teacher doesn’t come in the form of a person. It arrives disguised as an experience, an obstacle, or even a simple object placed in our hands.

A few weeks ago, I found myself rushed into the Emergency Room with a 15.2 mm kidney stone. Yes. You heard me right. Even though I faithfully take my B6 daily supplement, it's tough to overcome genetics and family history. So. There it was. The excruciating pain soon led to surgery and a three day and two night stay in the hospital because of complications. Recovery stretched out to more than 2 weeks, and I’m still not fully back to my "normal self". Going in fit really helps but it still takes a toll on your body. It was painful, frustrating, uncomfortable, and the last place I wanted to be, especially for that long.

But sometimes the lessons we need most show up in the places we least expect or want to find them.

If you watch my videos or read my Substack articles, you know that for the past 4 months or so, I’ve been chasing a personal goal: swimming 50 yards underwater without coming up for air. I’ve been stuck at a plateau. Forty-six yards comes easily now, and I can push to 50 yards about half the time, but I can’t break through consistently or surpass that 50 yard distance.

I’ve tried everything: longer breath holds, better focus, refining my stroke, pushing off the wall with more power, tightening my turns. Nothing seemed to move the needle.

Then, on my second night in the hospital, a nurse walked into my room with a cheap plastic breathing device. You’ve probably seen one or even used one yourself if you've had a hospital stay. You inhale at a steady rate to raise a ball in a tube. It’s meant to keep your lungs clear and expand their capacity after surgery. At first, I saw it as a nuisance and just another box to check on my road to recovery. But as I worked with it, trying to pull the ball to the top, it clicked.

This little contraption WAS my teacher.

It showed me what I’d been missing. To break through that swimming plateau, I didn’t need another trick, another drill, or even more focus. I needed stronger lungs. More capacity. More efficiency. Exactly what this device was designed to help me build.

And that’s the hidden wisdom of the proverb. Teachers don’t always appear as people. Sometimes they show up as hardships, setbacks, or strange little pieces of plastic handed to you in a hospital bed at two in the morning when you are trying to rest. But lessons are always there if we are ready and open to see them.

For men in their forties, fifties, sixties. and beyond, this truth is especially important. As we age, our bodies change. Recovery takes longer. Injuries, health scares, or simple plateaus can feel like walls we can’t break through. But often, those very challenges are the teachers. The kidney stone wasn’t just a disruption to my training and life, it delivered the exact tool I needed to keep growing.

The takeaway?

Don’t dismiss the obstacles. Don’t ignore the odd opportunities that come your way. That surgery, that forced rest, that recovery tool, it might be the teacher you’ve been waiting for. The teacher doesn’t always look like a coach in the pool or a fitness guru on a stage. Sometimes it looks like a setback or a hardship. Sometimes it looks like struggle. Sometimes it looks like a cheap plastic breathing toy.

But if you’re open to the lesson, it always shows up right when you need it most.

So. Think about your own life right now. Where are you facing a plateau, a frustration, or even a setback? At the gym? On the golf course. At home? With eating? With motivation? With work? Instead of fighting it, ask, "What is this here to teach me?"

The answer may not be obvious at first, but if you stay open, you’ll find that your next teacher might already be standing right in front of you.

Fortune cookie wisdom. This one is easy. "When the student is ready, the teacher will appear."