Td;lr – We’re bringing the #Verbal back.

Td;lr – We’re bringing the #Verbal back. We want you to #JustShowUp to #GrowCommunity (but please still stay home if you’re sick)

Your MSP Co-leaders having absolutely NO FUN in Boulder, CO at MoM last summer. Photo by Jonny Wong.

Welcome to November 2022. This month we celebrate November Project’s origins and 11th birthday.

And we announce that we’re bringing back the #Verbal.

#Verbal (ṿǝr·bǝl): originating from the late Latin word verbum, meaning “word,” the term verbal means to give your word to #JustShowUp, to commit to coming to the workout by commenting “#verbal” on the social media post about the workout.

Pre-pandemic there existed a thing called “#verbal culture” 

The practice was simple: 

1)Co-leader posts on social media (twitter/facebook/instagram) about an upcoming workout

2)You comment #Verbal 

3)If you wanted to go above and beyond you’d tag a workout pal and ask if they were coming (example: @smileformesarah86 comments: @em_minge_official you IN for tomorrow? I heard @erolfpleiss might make an appearance)

4)If you didn’t #JustShowUp after verballing, you would get tagged in a post saying we missed you.

As we all learned to understand our capacities emerging from and adjusting to life during an active pandemic, we began to see fewer and fewer verbals. And for good reason — the active pandemic made us more cautious about our health and others, and the prevalence of burnout made us all rethink our boundaries. 

But we three co-leaders in Minneapolis said absolutely fucking not* — let’s bring back this tradition we loved.

We’re bringing the #Verbal back — with modifications.

Our community is better when you show up. The more folks that show up for an early workout make it seem more like recess than serious fitness. The more folks that show up means the more folks that are creating deep and meaningful relationships with their fellow NP community members. The more folks that show up, the more smiles that light the morning.

We get it— everyone’s lives look drastically different than they did in January 2020. So maybe, coming to NP looks different, too. 

Maybe you get there at 6:34. That counts.

Maybe you bounce with us, go for a run, and make it back for announcements. That counts.

Maybe you do your PT exercises at our home base. That counts.

Maybe you challenge the friend you brought to a race to see how many reps you can do. That counts.

Maybe you stretch your social fitness muscles and walk the workout and catch up with a friend. That counts.

Or maybe, you verbal only to find you have a cough in the morning — so you do the responsible thing and stay home. We’ll miss you, but we’re still proud of you for making the commitment ahead of time. 

We, as your friends, as your peers, as your co-leads know that sometimes you just need a gentle push/nudge in the right direction/subtle, gentle and loving peer pressure to commit to yourself and your community. So here is that push.

We want you to set those alarms early. We want you to lay those fits out the night before. We want you to text a friend and make sure they’re coming too. We want you to throw your #Verbal down and then we want you to (respectfully) get your ass to the workout. 

YOU make up this vibrant community and in order for us to shine bright, we need YOU.

To throw down a #Verbal.

To #JustShowUP.

To hold this community up.

Let’s practice bringing back the #Verbal when it’s easier to #JustShowUp and then we’ll be ready when it’s January and it’s -12 and the last thing you want to do is get up and get out. Let’s find your group of accountability buddies that passes “you in for tomorrow” texts around like notes in class. 

We’ve got big dreams and even bigger plans for 2023 and we need you. So…In short, 

You in? Ya’ll good?

Let’s Fucking GO,

Sarah and Tickle and Emily

*Emily has never cursed, not once in her life so she said “Oh gosh, in the name of all things Ben Bauch, absolutely not!”

Writer’s note: This morning I woke up to a text about Abvember, an activity I have successfully avoided for the last 5 years. BUT, I can’t say no to the people I love when it is something I have capacity for. So I said sure, I’d be their accountability buddy.

 

And then I was like, but wait, what if MORE of my friends did this? So I texted a group chat: are ya’ll signed up? 

Friend 1: I always get like one day into these

Me: What if we facetimed everyday for one minute of the activity of the day?

Friend 2: Lol, I was doing yoga but I’m in.

Friend 1: Awww, that sounds so fun! Ok, let’s do it!

*Invite to join Facetime call*

And just like that, with a little nudge aka some healthy peer pressure, from one person in one time zone, 4 more people are signed up in multiple time zones. Will we ever physically be in the same place at the same time? No. But we will be in community the whole month long.

And that’s the magic of the #Verbal.

See you on the hill.

Love, Sarah

Many thanks to the brillant Katherine Ellen Foley for their edits to this piece, taking it from a half baked idea to something great and (hopefully) inspiring and to Kelly Johnson for answering my panicked phone call when I couldn’t log into WordPress and Erin from the Internet for helping me troubleshoot WordPress when it was very determined to not have this blog be published. This global community is just the fucking best.

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