I am going to be 44 in handful of days here, my wife will be 36 (what an awesome number, God’s I get excited by thinking of her as 36 years old, it makes me want to go wake her up and do things a husband must only do with his consenting wife).
Anyhow, I wasn’t starting to type this in order to brag about my wife, but well, when the opportunity presents, right? Ok, back to topic. I will be turning 44, and despite five-year’s worth of hoping to do some good and make some changes in my life, the now five-year old and the currently two year old have somehow conspired to derail every effort I have made to make any kind of positive impact on my work, sleep and exercise habits. I am still about 280 lbs, I can no longer bench press 200 lbs and dead lifting the 400 pounds I used to pick up feels like a thing of the past.
But humans can change. I proved that last night. I started back on a running program called “Couch to 10k” form Zen Labs.
Now, I’ve done the 5 k version about five years ago, and while I have amazing memories of being able to actually jog almost the full five kilometers, (not run, goodness, running with my weight on my knees and carrying this much weight?), the memories of being called, while at the far end of the loop, and something critical happening that I needed to be at home to address, those memories are not so good. But back to the point of the blog post, life isn’t about gains and resting, and then more gains.
Life is a loop, circular, repetitive, and endlessly hopelessly incomplete, until it is complete. On that day, it’s too late to make any more changes.
But today!
Today is a day I can choose to pick up the embarrassing pieces of who I was, who I am and who I want to be, and get my ass back into the shoes, or to the keyboard, and start over again. At the beginning as it were.
I pulled out what I thought were my good running shoes, and proceeded to dial up the app, and download it, again, on my phone so I could track the thing.
I use the Map My Walk App, here’s the link.
Sometimes, it’s the shoes. It turns out there is more than one old pair of blue running shoes in that cupboard, I picked the wrong ones. I can barely walk this morning and my spirits are lower than ever.
Where do I look for some form of encouragement and uplift? When focusing on the here and now, the immediate and urgent, it’s hard to forget that the whole of reality is ephemeral. Things FEEL so damned important, so pressing, so overwhelming and the need to address them NOW is paramount to us in the moment.
But. Moments pass. As with this morning, I am stiff, sore and can hardly move. Last night’s sleep was so poor that I feel I’ve not slept at all (thanks to the cat for waking me during the few times I actually managed to drift off). But to rise, stretch, get some water and start the day anew.
God’s given me one more sunrise, what shall I do with it?
What shall I do today?
*Key up the Pippi Longstocking Theme Song from my childhood*
Anyhow, life does not proceed in a straight line, most times it can be likened to driving up the seemingly endless loop of a ramp in a parking garage. Around and up, around and up, or we get turned off of the ramp and it just goes around until we learn that lesson, then we move up, or in my case, we end up on the downward spiral and find ourselves back at the bottom.
Chaos is just that, it’s chaotic. If you don’t watch the processes of your head, then you will scuttle your best efforts at everything.
Just keep that in mind, before you go out of yours. Cheers, and good luck out there friends.
Duke