Podcast: Mental Strength with Liz Adams

Welcome to the “BarBend Podcast” where we talk to top athletes, coaches, influencers, and minds from around the world of strength sports. Presented by barbend.com.

Today on the BarBend Podcast, I’m talking to Liz Adams, a multi-time CrossFit regionals competitor and long-time coach based out of New York City. Liz’s first sports passion was basketball but after college, she struggled to find an athletic outlet that kept her engaged.

Liz discovered CrossFit around 2012 and soon thereafter, she was coaching and training nearly full-time in pursuit of excellence in the sport. Liz competed for years, both as an individual and as a part of some of the Northeast’s top CrossFit teams. She also competed for several seasons in the sport of grid.

Like many CrossFit athletes, Liz’s journey forward hasn’t been predictable or necessarily easy. The mental toll of high-level training, combined with radical shifts in the CrossFit games qualification structure, recently triggered a period of introspection and self-assessment for Liz.

Our conversation here goes deep, and it definitely went in a direction I didn’t expect beforehand. I’ve known Liz for years, and I’ve always admired her ability to focus and prioritize her energy. What we cover in this conversation is no exception. It’s an open and honest look at an athlete choosing to shift their mentality and approach to training, coaching, and life. I hope you enjoy.

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Today on the podcast, we have an old friend of mine, Elizabeth Adams. I’m super exited to have her on the show. She’s got a very diverse athletic background, and a lot of really cool new interests and progressions as an athlete and thinker that I’m excited to dive into. Liz, thanks so much for joining us today.

Thanks so much for having me, Tao. It’s exciting to be here.

Liz, when I was first met you — I think it was 2012, 2013 — you were a reformed basketball player transitioning into competitive CrossFit, if you will. Give us a little background on your athletic career pre-CrossFit, which I’d say you’re probably best known for online and in the fitness community at this point.

At a very young age I fell in love with playing sports. I’d always played with boys mainly, growing up, and my sister as well. Either it was street hockey or touch football in elementary school, and then I found basketball. It was a way for me; I think it became an outlet.

Not only did I fall in love with athletics and being able to express myself through, at the time, it was playing basketball. I didn’t find any passion in other things at a young age. School didn’t interest me a ton but I wanted to be the first female in the NBA.

Then I wanted to play for Pat Summitt at Tennessee and I’d be in my basement with gloves on and a visor, dribbling two basketballs, like, “Oh, I want to be the best.” It’s fun to be able to reflect back at that mindset in eighth grade, that I wanted to separate from people. I wanted to train extra to be better at basketball. I fell into an athlete, I guess, in a sense.

That was a very early focus for me in basketball, where I struggled with expressing how I felt; being able to communicate and dealing with some emotions that I didn’t work with well. Basketball was a place for me to let that all go and do what came very natural to me, in the sense that I could turn my mind off and just be there.

That was my first intro into an athlete mindset, an idea of what a work ethic was, and then the kind of passion that can drive and motivate.

So you played college ball, and then a bit…?

I only played a year in college. I had fallen out of love with basketball and was curious about going to college more. I played briefly, but when college came around I knew that I was forcing it. It felt like I should do it because that’s all I ever wanted to do, but then I ended up disliking it and walked away, and was happy to do so.

As an athlete who is passionate about, you said, separating yourself, and bettering yourself, and trying to become better than everyone else at a sport. When you lose that or when you fall out of love with that particular sport, you go through a wandering period, I would think. Is that something you experienced?

It’s funny you say that because I was thinking about it yesterday. If you would ask, that period of transition — college and then after college, not having that identity or that structure of being an athlete and having a routine in a training season and something to work for.

Looking back on that period of my life, which was post-college, trying to figure out what I was going to do, I definitely was wandering. If you had asked me then, I wouldn’t have been able to talk about it this way. I definitely lost the sense of who I was and then who I was supposed to be, because it had been such a big part of how I identified.

I don’t think I was looking at it as a, “I’m not an athlete anymore. What am I supposed to do?” It’s more like I was in and out, going through the motions. It then wasn’t until CrossFit until I think I found myself again but got stuck in that same place I left off that with basketball.

Through my work with Jami, I think I’ve been able to grow, transition, and be able to experience being an athlete in a different way and all that stuff.

Let’s talk about how you found CrossFit in your early days there. I know it was a much different lifestyle, much different approach to fitness and training than where you are now and a very much a different mindset, which I want to talk about later. How did you find CrossFit? What were those first few years like and your early competition days? How did those unfold?

One of Jay’s football coaches in college…

Just for context, Jay is your brother?

Jay is my brother. I’ve trained with him for the last seven years where we competed. He’s the one who introduced me to CrossFit. In college, one of his football coaches had them in the off-season doing some CrossFit training. He hated it, but he recognized, “Oh, this is conditioning.”

To him, it was like, “This is awful,” because it’s not like eating 5,000 calories and doing power cleans. It was more like burpees and all the stuff that CrossFit is known for. Like I said, I was wandering. I was working in finance. I was going to the gym in the basement and not knowing what to do.

I wasn’t really playing basketball. I’d gotten into an intramural league, and I was having a lot of fun with that. Still, it was the training part that I missed. I think we play games, but I think it was the structure, the discipline that I was missing.

I didn’t find it in other passions. I didn’t find it in my work, where people are very [indecipherable 8:30] far in that kind of mindset in other ways. I hadn’t found it, at least, not at Morgan Stanley. He had me doing cleans or running. I was like, “What am I doing? I’m, again, lost.” He was like, “Come check out our class at CrossFit Port Chester.”

Maria actually goes to the gym at Union Square now, who owns CrossFit Port Chester. It’s come full circle, because I started with her. I’d never been at…He brought me to a class. It was a four or five o’clock class. There were pull-ups. There were box jumps. I was wearing Fordham football shorts down past my knees.

[indecipherable 9:13] . I think I had a basketball game after, and a cut-off tank top and a sports bra. Kind of similar but switched booty shorts with the Jordan shorts and my CrossFit [indecipherable 9:27]. I remember being terrible at the workout. I had to use a green band for pull-ups.

I’m pretty sure I cut reps on every movement, because it’s like, “I’m dying,” but thinking, “Why am I so bad at this? This is dumb. These people aren’t athletic. Why aren’t I good?” Being annoyed when I walked out there like, “Jay, that’s just not for me,” but then wanting to go back.

Then by the third class, it was like, “I’m really annoyed that I’m not good at this, but I want to get good at it and that was kind of it.” I bought a 10-pack to start and then went through it in two days.

[laughter]

[indecipherable 10:02] said, “You should just buy a month.” I was like, “Fine, sign me up.” She had said to me — I’ll never forget it — they had mirrors in their first gym. It was the right-hand corner. I had just finished working out or doing whatever.

I just wanted to do more and more and get better. She had said to me, she’s like, “You could be a good competitor. You could compete and you’re really good.” I remember her saying that. I was like “That’s it. That’s what I want to do.” That’s how I fell into CrossFit.

From there I realized I would be able to coach and train. In the beginning it was all about I’m an athlete. I need to do whatever I need to do to train. I just coached to be able to do that.

When did you first compete in CrossFit?

I broke my arm my first year of CrossFit. I would’ve made regionals that 2012 but during the open, I broke my humerus bone. Then was out until 2013. I had surgery in October because we let it try to heal. It didn’t, then I ended up having [indecipherable 11:07] surgery in October.

Then, competed that open, made regional. My first regional was 2013 on a team.

I was at that regionals, actually.

That was at the old Reebok HQ. I remember covering that as a writer for CrossFit HQ. [laughs] A real fond memory of that is you and your brother Jay had a partner deadlift and box jump workout. If you’ve ever met Jay or Liz Adams, or any of the Adams siblings, they’re very good at those two movements. I believe you all won that in your heat.

That must have been one of the coolest experiences I’ve had as an athlete or being able to compete. That’s up there. That might be my best experiences. We were competing against Dynamix, who everyone had talked about being the best team. They were going to the games and all this.

This workout came out and it was heavy deadlifts and box jumps. Jay and I partnered up. To be able to partner with my brother on something like that. He went first. I knew that this was my wheelhouse. That if I had time, I was going to be the best one out there.

I remember he went first, and he was behind Dynamix. The Dynamix guy was the best at these two movements, so he was first, then he was out. Then, I came from behind. I remember Jay on the finish mat cheering me on to go. I got chills thinking about it right now.

My sister, Bo, Bobby, I remember them in the stands. Katie had a yellow sports bra on. That moment of coming from behind, winning. Then being able to celebrate with my family at 5th Ave was the coolest thing I’ve done.

How many years total did you compete in regionals? Rest in peace regionals, by the way.

Rest in peace, man, rest in peace. [laughs] 2013, ’14, ’15, 16, 17, 18, six.

Six in a row. During that time, you were also competing. You were traveling for some international competitions. You trained in Iceland for a number of years. You have a very, very close friendship with a lot of athletes over there.

Over the past year, you’ve been focusing not only on your life as an athlete and that physical presence, but I know mindset meditation has become a really big part of your life as an athlete and also in your coach practice.

I wanted to chat a little bit about that and how that interest started to develop for you.

 I think it started with this intention of I dedicated and sacrificed to do what I could in the gym to be the best that I could, with always the big goal in mind of, “I’d love to make the games.”

Like I said, from a very young age, I might not have always been the best basketball player, but I always trained like I was. I always looked to the people that were the best and was like, “I want to train with them.”

I remember feeling like I just couldn’t get out of my own way. Physically, I knew I had a lot of capabilities, but when it came to performing, I felt like I was very limited sometimes. Oftentimes, I just felt stuck, almost.

I couldn’t get out of my own way in basketball, and that’s a whole different story. Jami had introduced me to meditation.

Just some background on who Jami is, just for our listeners who might not know?

Jami is my life coach, but started out as my CrossFit coach. He runs The Training Plan blog. He’s Annie and Björgvin’s coach, a very well-respected coach and programmer throughout the sports community, not just CrossFit, in general.

Anyways, he’s always, I remember he had me walking in the grass barefoot to get my heart rate down. He’s always, to me, had these more lifestyle approaches and how we can work on lifestyle, then impact our performance and athletics.

The concept, always to me, I was drawn to, and I understood a lot of what he saying, and how this could be beneficial, but struggled to experience how training the mind and all of these more out-of-the-gym, headspace stuff can really shift and transform you as an athlete.

I wasn’t experiencing it. I think I finally had looked at it as, “Why don’t I approach training the mind the same way I’ve approached going into the gym?” I’ve fallen in love with that work ethic, that process, that kind of discipline. The mind is a muscle. That’s when it clicked, where it’s the mind is a muscle. Treat it the same way or have that same intention. How can you be better through training that, training the mind?

What started as when I first started trying to meditate, I always expected something out of it. I expected to become a better athlete through sitting. I expected to become a better person. When I shifted my approach to the practice to, “Let’s just see what happens. I want to be better,” and that then turned into how can I be better for the people around me?

I say that’s been my biggest shift from a purely, “Hey, I want to be a better athlete, so I can make the games.” I know if I can get in touch with what’s going on in my head and the distractions when I’m working out, I’ll be a better athlete.

I think it’s, getting into that journey has been totally put aside any desire to compete or try to perform in that way, which is a crazy shift for me. My whole life has been one way, in that way. When I’ve thought eventually having to make a transition, I always imagined it would be a lot tougher. It’d be a struggle, or it’d be hard to walk away.

I had qualified for Iceland to compete. Jay and I had talked about not going, because WOW had shut down, and it got a little bit more expensive. At the end of the day, I could afford to go.

Annie and Jami had called me and said, “Not a ton of girls are here. A lot have already qualified. This is a really good opportunity for you. You’ve always wanted to make the games. You do it here. You’d have the opportunity to do it in Iceland with Jami, Frederick, Annie, and Jay.”

I just called him back and said, “I don’t want to do it.”

I’m probably more fit, stronger, and at kind of a peak in my fitness level. It was easy for me to be, “I just don’t want to do it.” I want to focus more on how I can work with people, work on myself and continue that journey.

That takes an incredible amount of self-awareness to understand that your goals have shifted.

[indecipherable 18:27] you because you’ve known me for seven years.

[indecipherable 18:30] face right now is like, “Who the fuck is talking to [indecipherable 18:34] ?”

It’s good to hear. I get a lot of joy out of hearing it, because I see so many people — it could be in athletics, it could be just in life — they get stuck. I fall into this myself. We get stuck with goals that we make for ourselves.

We think that because we made the goals for ourselves, that we have to accomplish them, that we’re letting ourselves down if we don’t continue going after them.

Can I interrupt you for a second?

Oh, please.

I wanted to say that I had a conversation with Jami on Monday. He had said — and I had spoke to it, too — what’s hard is when you’ve identified with something for so long, and then set such big goals. Not only told yourself these goals but told other people these goals.

Even without knowing it, there’s this, we can’t break that, because we’ve set this. Then you get stuck to that identity. Then it gets really hard to break away. One thing both Jami and myself had talked about working on is, one, not announcing big goals, like keeping that to yourself, as opposing to sharing big goals.

Something may change, where that goal can shift. Then it’s a lot easier internally to feel less pulled to that identity and make an adjustment. Whereas if I have announced it to my coach, my brother, my sister, and you, I’m going to feel that external pressure to stick with that goal. Does that make sense?

It makes a lot of sense. I always grew up hearing, and being told in school, in training, in competing as an athlete myself, “Oh, announce your goals. Tell everyone your goals. Hold yourself accountable.”

Sometimes I see the value in that. If I hadn’t done that when I was 18, I’m sure I would have ended up in a lot of trouble, but you write this weird contract to yourself. If you can’t change your own mind or embrace your own fluidity as far as goals, as far as growth as a person, it really locks you into a weird place.

Right. I think to speak to that, what mindfulness has helped me with is you talk about how it locks you in. It’s like you’re battling within those emotions that you get wrapped up in, the stress of feeling like you got to stick with this.

The anxiety of thinking, “Hey, if I don’t do this, what is my couch going to think about me? What is my brother and sister going to think?” Do you know what I mean? My sisters wanted me to stop this shit for a long time, so she’s happy.

[laughter]

You get locked into it. Then it’s really hard to unwrap yourself or untangle yourself from the stress, the anxiety, and that pressure. Then you can’t get out of your own way.

I think what’s been helpful with mindfulness is being able to create space from those emotions that can lock us in and recognizing, “Hey, that’s just stress. I don’t have to jump in with that. I recognize that for what it is. I can react more skillfully now. I can take a step back.”

The biggest change that I’ve noticed that I’m such a routine, structured person. I operated on the same schedule for seven years. I had training at 9:30, 10:00, first session. Training at 1:30, 2:00, second session. Seven years, two sessions a day, over and over again.

What I’ve noticed is things that come up that, “Hey, I can’t make the gym right now. I have a dog now. I should spend time with them.” Not having a total panic attack. Not having a total anxiety-ridden, “I’m not going to the gym.”

Yesterday, I didn’t even work out. I feel much more at ease, which I would have not been able to separate and been able to have an easy transition out of such a structure if I hadn’t been able to become more aware and start to work with my emotions better. Then not get wrapped up when it’s just been a natural transition.

I’m sure it’s diverse and something you’re very much in the process of exploring and will continue to explore. How would you categorize your mindfulness practice now and your meditative practice now? Is it a particular type of meditation? Is it something where you’re exploring a lot of different modalities and ways of doing that?

You’re catching me in a transition in that practice as well. I’ve only learned through Headspace, in and out. Then over the last, I think it’s been like 615 days, just through Headspace. Then naturally becoming curious through that period of meditating on my own and doing a couple sessions with Headspace and then sitting by myself.

That transitioned to more less of Headspace, more of myself. Then I just stopped doing Headspace, which I again I liked that there’s that competitiveness in viewers, like you got a streak. I got that streak going. I don’t want to break the streak. Then one day I just didn’t do it. I was like, “I’m still meditating. It doesn’t matter that I…I know that I have streak.”

What bothered me, I think what I held on to was other people know I have that. You know what I mean? I stopped Headspace and Jami’s introduced me to a woman who does guided meditations. I’ve just started that.

A lot of it is breath work. I don’t know the technical names of it. For me it’s been finding just a more gentle approach to myself and learning that through others. We are able to apply that kindness and gentleness. We can start to really let go of a lot of the stuff we were talking about. That’s where I’d say my practice is.

How has working on your own mindfulness and exploring that impacted your performance and work as a coach? Do you think it has?

Yeah, definitely. It’s funny that I look back at…I’ve always had strong coaches in my life. My AE basketball coach is like a second father figure to me. He taught me that discipline, that work ethic, and maybe too much of a tough attitude.

[laughter]

I’m aggressive in the athlete that I am, in the sense of the way I perform through him. Then I met Jami and this progression of more like a mindful approach to being an athlete. Then transitioning in finding that mindfulness how I embrace more of this role of really wanting to share with others what I’ve learned and what’s helped me as a person.

Then how I’ve been able to reach my potential in my [indecipherable 25:28] through working on myself, so becoming a better coach, becoming a better athlete through this idea of trying to let go of a lot of the challenges that I…These inner challenges that we all face.

I think what’s being most rewarding for me is I’ve always known that I wanted to work with people, but I never really knew in what capacity. I started working with my basketball coach in college; loved coaching the girls.

It was always more of like a big sister trying to guide them in life but also, I love being able to teach them how to play basketball and compete and all that stuff. I think that’s what really sparked it without knowing it.

Then CrossFit led me into it but I was an athlete first. I think my mindfulness I’ve discovered the passion I needed as a coach, hopefully one day to be a mentor to someone as young as [indecipherable 26:24] and help some growth with people and stuff like that.

n that coaching realm and as I’ve known you, I know I’ve seen your approach as an athlete evolve, but really, I think the growth that I’ve seen has been most impressive from you.

Every time I see you working with an athlete or with a client, it blows my mind that what you’re incorporating is on the coaching front. What are your goals not to create these things that lock you in like we were just talking about?

What are some things that you would like to accomplish, or incorporate, or learn, or practice as a coach in the near future, and then a little bit down the road, you could see yourself also working on?

Right now, I coach CrossFit classes but have transitions a lot more into personal training. Then eventually incorporating this mindfulness practice with my clients. In terms of my intention as a coach when someone would come into my class, every day I think there’s an opportunity for us to be better.

I think when I say that to clients in the gym and then the members in our class, oftentimes it may be interpreted as this big goals, like I got to [indecipherable 27:42] to show what I’ve gotten better. I’ve got to do better than this person to prove that I’m fitter.

It’s very quantitative. It’s like numbers.

Right. What I want to try to get across, or for those that are open to it in exploring this idea of it’s in the little things that we can do, if we can focus on a small decision each day, and it starts in the gym. That’s my space.

How can I get people to start exploring a small decision in a workout that could then play a big role in outside of their life? Something as little as, “Hey, there’s five seconds left. I’ve got two toes-to-bar left, and then I got to run to the bar, and I got to start some thrusters.

“I know I’m not going to finish the thrusters. I may not even get to the bar. I can either finish the two toes-to-bar, and walk over to the bar. I know the clock’s going to run out. Oh, didn’t get there, because there wasn’t that much time.”

Or, “Hey, I know I only have five seconds. It’s going to be hard. I want to try and push myself. Let me get one rep in.” The intention in a little decision, how that can train a mindset that can create a lot of big things outside of the gym to build self-confidence, to build this attitude of wanting to be better, and looking for small things in our days to make it a small decision.

For me, I have found it’s in those little things. The more that I do it, the more that I think I’m in a better position to help people understand how it can help themselves when they do it, and then the people around them.

If Liz Adams in 2019, the coach, could talk to Liz Adams in, say, 2014, the coach, what is one thing you might tell yourself, if you could go back in time? It’s a useless exercise, but it’s always an interesting thing to think about.

Someone asked me, “What’s the best piece of advice someone has given you recently?” I think this will speak to that, or the best piece of guidance, “How do I need to be to allow others to be who they are?”

As a coach, I think, back in 2014, my biggest issue was I had expectations of clients. I expected them to be me, in a sense. I expected them to be able to work out like me, or want to work out like me, or have the same mindset as me, or have the same discipline as me and found myself not being a good coach in situations where those expectations weren’t met.

This idea of everyone here, I have to allow them to be who they are. How do I need to be as a coach to let them do that in order to try and help them? Being kind…

[laughter]

…and patient but letting go of those expectations. Again, that’s all how I’ve been able to work on myself, being able to shed that and then being able to step up as a much better coach.

Liz, speaking of coaching, I know that you’re actually heading to [laughs] that shortly after this interview.

I am.

Before we parted ways, I did want to ask where can folks follow along with your journey as a coach, as an athlete, and learn more about you? What’s that best way to do that?

I’m on Instagram. I will admit I had in this whole journey this idea of being distracted and living in a world of Instagram and social media. I do find a part of me being more curious about stepping back from it and stepping out of that world, but also then understanding the other aspect and business side.

I am on Instagram. I think that would probably be the best way. Email — should I say those things?

Yeah. Give your Instagram handle.

@lizadams21. Then the link and stuff is in my bio and whatnot. [indecipherable 31:52] .

That’s an added bonus, because previously it was as a coach, as an athlete. Now, you get to look at a dog, too.

[indecipherable 32:02] . Exactly.

A one-stop shop. Liz, thank you so much for joining. I really, really appreciate you being so willing to go into a journey that’s very much in process, especially with mindset.

 I know. That’s I think what it’s all about.

[background music]

It’s just falling in love with that process and finding your process.

We have the title of the podcast — “Falling In Love With Your Process.” That’s it. [laughs]

That’s it.

Awesome, Liz. Thanks so much.

Thank you so much.