If it's not on paper, did it really happen?

"What is most important to you"? This was the question asked to me today when I was searching for what to write about this morning. I thought this is a huge question for a Monday morning, but then I thought what better way to start off the new week by tackling something difficult.  

We could all make a list of the things that are important to us. I bet the majority would put our families first. But why? I am sure you will say because they are my family and I love them. But isn't that usually the case for everyone though? I think if you really want to define what is most important to you, you must go deeper than just writing down what is important to you. You need to write down the real why's.

Why is my family most important to me?

1-  Fourteen years ago this May I wanted to have someone else in my life more important to me than myself.

2- A little over 19 years ago I helped create a life that would forever change my path in life

3- A little over 12 years ago I helped create two more lives that would forever change my path in life

4- My choices in life and how I choose to live it are moved and shaped by these four people I call my family

5- Losing any of them is my biggest fear of my life

6- Their love is my love

7- Their pain is my pain

8- Their happiness is my happiness

9- I am full of pride when I think of my wife and kids.

10- My family has the most meaningful place in my heart, mind and soul

When we write the reason's down on paper It allows us to see the real meaning behind the why's. This forces us to think deeper and more clearly about the why's. It allows for the emotions that are involved to come out into the open. It reminds us of the power these feelings and emotions have over us. Even though we know these things deep down inside, seeing them on paper in front of our own eyes gives us the ability to add definition to these feelings. They keep our feet firmly planted and our eyes always looking forward, because your future is their future and their future is yours too.

Finding time for your passions

What are you passionate about and want to spend more time doing? Man that is a loaded question. I have a lot of things that I am passionate about. Luckily I get to work everyday with one of my passions as a coach, trainer and owner of a gym. But there are a hand full of other activities that I am very passionate about. The issue is that I don't get to spend the time doing them as much as I would like to.

I think that is the big issue for most of us. We spend so much time and rightly so prioritizing things in our lives. We end up sacrificing the time away that we would like to spend on some of the things we are passionate about. It is important to allow yourself the time to participate in the things that you are passionate about. Sometimes this can come in the form of a daily practice. Whether it be time at the gym , yoga, running, hiking, biking or etc.... It does not matter if this is supposed to be alone time or time spent with a group or friends. What is important is that you have figured out how to create time for yourself to immerse yourself into something that you are passionate about, even if it is for only one hour a day. 

When we decide to make the time to do the things that we are passionate about, it allows us to recharge our batteries so to speak. When this happens we end up creating a higher amount of positive energy that we then can share and spread more freely. We don't feel pulled in a thousand different directions. We don't feel as if our positive energy is being drained through negative forces. Doing things that we are passionate about allows us to grow as human beings. It allows us to see how far we can reach and how far we can grow. It allows us to enhance our own personal human experience. In turn it helps show the people around us what they are capable of doing if they allow themselves to follow and participate in their own passions.

Defining your perfect day

What is your perfect day? That's a huge question. Now we can all probably sit back and given sometime come up with a perfect day, but I bet you it would be a lot harder than you think. The reason being is. If we think of your perfect day in the form of what you would do from the time you wake up until the time you go to bed, the activities to a perfect day for you could be so many it would be impossible to get all of them done or even remotely enjoy them all in a day. 

I think when we ask ourselves, "What is our perfect day" you need to go deeper into thoughts, ideas and emotions. I believe a perfect day is not just about what you can do or accomplish, but more importantly what goes into making a perfect day for yourself. What emotions our involved in your perfect day? What our the effects on the ones you love the most? What our the effects on the people you meet and the places you go? What is your true north purpose for your perfect day? When we look at our perfect day from this perspective, the list we would need to make our perfect day would be a lot shorter.

My perfect day has to be based on positively influencing the people and the world around me. Through coaching, training, and showing a genuine compassion towards the people that I will be involved with each day. Expressing a love and care for what I do, what I believe in and how I choose to live my life for myself, my family and my friends. My perfect day is filled with fun, overcoming obstacles, learning, teaching, expressing, positivity, love, anger, belief, compassion, and joy.

You see the list is not long, but it is powerful. It is not filled with activities, but it is filled with the thoughts, ideas, and emotions that go into the days activities. The perfect day does not happen everyday, but if you base your life on the thoughts, ideas and emotions that surround your true north, perfect days will happen more often than not.

Deciding when to take the big risk

What risk are you happy you took? I think a lot of us can write a long list of the risks we have taken throughout life. I think a better question though is, "What risks have you taken that scared you the most". I have a feeling that list would be much shorter. Quite often we freeze up from fear when we start to think about taking a risk or chance on something or someone. We get paralyzed with fear and analysis. We say to ourselves, "I can't do this unless I get everything perfect". The funny thing is we rarely if ever, get everything perfect. 

Instead of freezing up with fear, which is a perfectly natural feeling. Why not try to make a list of the biggest and scariest risks that you have ever taken and that you are happy you did. Look at that list and ask yourself, " Did I make everything perfect before I took these risks". I bet the answer is NO. I would suspect you did try to make sure you where not taking a risk blindly. I would also think that one of the main reasons that you will find in this list is, you believed in yourself and the abilities you already possess to make this risk a reality.   

The biggest and best things that we accomplish in life usually start with a pretty big risk. We find the courage to take on the challenge not because we are risk thrill seekers, but because we believe deeply in an idea or a person. When we let go of that fear real growth happens in our lives. This growth usually leads us onto a life journey that we have only dreamt about. 

Now taking on big risks everyday is not necessarily a good thing. There are risks that we should think long and hard about. We should make sure that much of what is needed to be done is well thought out. But sometimes a risk will come up that you believe in with all your mental and emotional fiber. When this happens you have to let go and see what happens. If you believe in it this much, It means you are willing to put the work in to make it happen. And if it doesn't work out, you can look in the mirror and not have to say your sorry to yourself for not trying and taking a chance. To many of life's regrets have been left on the table because of fear.

Approach and Acknowledgement

How do you acknowledge someone? Acknowledgement goes along way, whether you acknowledge someone positively and negatively. When I see people acknowledging others with smiles and positive attitudes it is usually in a setting where everyone knows each other and are happy to see each other. Quite often though I see the exact opposite when people are acknowledging someone they don't know or someone that is representative of a business or group. 

When we run into this situation, we often approach it with our guard up or have a predetermined prejudice against this person. We all have been guilty of this at some point and time. We approach the situation with a bias. This bias makes us have to work so much harder to get to know this person, let alone tear down the bias wall we had already built before the encounter ever happened. When we approach this situation from a positive point of view and drop the bias, the possibilities of creating a welcoming situation increase greatly. 

Think about every time you have had to meet with or deal with someone who is a representative of a small business or a group or even a corporation. When the initial contact is started from a negative mindset, what are the real possibilities of a positive outcome? Not very high and more often than not you leave the situation in a worse frame of mine then when the encounter started. When we approach this same situation from a positive mindset the chances of a positive outcome for both of you increases. You also have the ability to carry on with your day in such a much better mood. This positive mood can then build upon itself and can carry you through out the rest of your day and on top of it, the person on the other end gets to do the same.

When we choose this approach, all though not always easy to do. We gain a greater appreciation for the people we are surrounded by that we don't even know. We start to realize that they are just as human as we are and probably have the same daily issues that we have. We take notice of the effect directly or indirectly that we have on them just through how we choose to acknowledge someone. So next time you are ready to give someone a piece of your mind (a negative piece of your mind) ask yourself, is this really going to accomplish anything or am I just going to be stuck just as unhappy as when it started. Most of the time you are going to just as unhappy and a lot of time you will walk away feeling worse.

MLK Jr

Darkness cannot drive out darkness;

Only light can do that. 

Hate can not drive out hate;

Only love can do that.

- Martin Luther King Jr.

Of all messages that need to be spread throughout the world these days, this could possibly be the most important one needed. There is too much selfishness is this world these days. It is almost as if a winner takes all and screw the rest attitude has taken hold. This is not what I was taught by my parents and if I behaved like this there was a consequence for my actions. We wouldn't let our children behave this way, but yet we seemed to be OK with certain adults behaving in this fashion. It's time for this negative behavior and attitude to stop and the only way that will happen is if we step up and make it stop. 

Acceptance

Learning to accept can be one of the most difficult and rewarding traits to embrace in your life. A lot of us out here think and feel along the lines as fixers. We want to fix things that don't feel right or feel good. We all know that it is not possible to fix everything, but we sure give it one hell of a try. Now this is not a bad trait in itself as well. People who want to fix things all the time can be very passionate and compassionate people, but the realization that not everything can be fixed and acceptance is needed, is equally as important. 

When we come to a place of acceptance on the things in life that we have no control over and can not be fixed, we gain a calmness in our lives. This calmness allows us to sit back and realize that some things take time and more often than not, they take their own time. Acceptance allows us to move on more freely. It allows us to accept the things we can not change and work on the things we can change. Acceptance allows us to deal with emotions and feelings in a much healthier and positive way. It allows for the healing process to truly begin when dealing with a difficult event in life. 

It's hard to learn and allow acceptance in your life . It can be very difficult to let go of something of great importance to you. Letting go can sometimes make us feel like we will lose something, when in reality the memories will always be there when you need or want them. Acceptance allows us to grow an inner strength that was not there before. When we let go, we grow. And growth in a positive direction is what life is all about. 

If you are holding onto things from the past or even the present, let them go to create a life memories of their own. So you can keep on creating your own life. 

Learning to Adapt. Or, Finding the Third Option

Yesterday I recorded our gym podcast and the subject was about whether to stop or keep moving forward. The idea behind this mindset is based on, In the moments of deep discomfort, you get to choose whether to stop or keep going. Now during these moments you have to decide whether this discomfort is your brain reacting to this discomfort or is there discomfort due to an injury or a growing injury. The irony is that is exactly what I am going through today.

As I was finishing up my day of coaching and training at the gym I started to feel some discomfort in my knee that kept getting worse as time went on. I could not for the life of me figure out what I had done to hurt my knee. As the night went on the pain became quite uncomfortable. I started to realize the pain I was feeling had nothing to do with my knee. It was being caused by right glute, quadricep and calf tightening up to the point of cramping. I found myself putting my tens unit on my quad at 1:15 in the morning so I could relax and get to sleep. When I woke up at 4am this morning to get ready for work at the gym I had a decision to make, do I stop or do I keep on going because today is my long run day.

So what do you do? Do you stop or keep going? Or do you think of a third option? Adapt, figure it out and adapt. So i decided to adapt. I decide to push my run off onto Friday and deadlift on Saturday, but that still left today. My lower body is what hurt. My upper body was fine. The answer was to workout the upper body instead. Because of this third option of adapting I was still able to keep going and move forward. 

You can do the same thing. There is always a way to adapt, you just must be willing to look for it. Because when you decide to stop or quit the only guarantee that you will have is, that what ever you were trying to do WILL NEVER HAPPEN!!! So don't quit, figure out a way and make it happen. We all know you can.  

Scared? Just Breathe

Yesterday while out on my Tuesday trail run I heard an interesting thought or Idea about how we choose to react to various situations. I am sure many of you have heard of the "Fight or Flight Response". The definition to this says -  is a physiological reaction that occurs in response to a perceived harmful event, attack, or threat to survival. When we find ourselves in a stressful situation our Sympathetic Nervous System kicks into gear and there is an instinctive choice that is made. Either we stay and fight or we run like hell, but that is not what really happens all the time.

In today's day and age most of us are not having to deal with life and death situations which is what the Flight or Fight Response was originally designed to help do. That is not to say we as a human beings still don't have to deal with extremely stressful situations. Instead of fighting or running away, most of us actually just freeze. We don't do anything, we don't react, we don't think and most of all we don't breathe. When we get into these stressful situations we end up shortening our breathing patterns dramatically and stop breathing through our diaphragm (I.E. Belly) and start to do shorter breaths through our chest. When this happens all rational thoughts go out the window and we just stop. We freeze in place. When this happens we leave ourselves with no way out. But there is one thing we can do when we find ourselves in this situation.

BREATHE!!!!

Stop everything and breathe. Stop movement, let the mind become aware of what is going on. Mentally back away and start to take long slow deep breaths from the nose into the belly and out through the mouth. This form of breathing allows the high heart rate you our experiencing to slow down. When the heart slows down the rest of the body slows down. When heart and body slow down, the mind has a chance to think clearly and allows for rational thoughts and decisions to be made again. This type of breathing practice can be used in all sorts of stress related issues. Such as driving in your car dealing with traffic. There is nothing you can do about this stressful situation except breath and relax. You have no control over this environment, so stop trying to. All you are doing is increasing stress and cortisol levels and making yourself miserable. 

Realize the things that you can control and deal with them through proper breathing and rational decision making and then take care of the situation. Realize the things that you can't control and then allow yourself to properly breathing and have rational thinking. Then let go of a control you don't have.

Running through humidity

Yesterday here at the gym I was having a conversation with a couple people about yesterday's email about Monday motivation.  The topic of how to pivot your way of thinking when there is something you hate to do, but know that it needs to be done. The subject was running when it is really hot outside. Admittedly it is not easy when you are dealing with the environment at times. We have only a small number of days when the weather is perfect to be working out outside in the elements. So we have to work with what we get from mother nature.

I said that I love running when it's hot and humid. The looks I got where the looks of are you nuts, running when it's hot sucks. Well yes, from that perspective it does suck. But what if you told yourself that everytime you run when it is hot and humid outside the sweat you feel coming out of your pores of your body is nothing but toxins and crap leaving your body. When you are done with this run, the cool refreshing water you are going to drink is going to be nothing but goodness coming into your body, while you just got rid of nothing but negative crap trapped inside your body. This perspective or way of thinking about hot humid runs is vastly different and actually quite motivating. 

We as human beings are designed to take on adversity. Adversity isn't about something just about something awful or something that is a pain in the ass. Adversity is nature's way of making us stronger inside and out. Adversity is how we learn the most about ourselves and those around us. Adversity teaches us who we can count on when the proverbial $#!% hits the fan. Adversity is a tool now just something that makes life difficult.

If any of you have ever seen the movie Wall-E you will know that one of the main lessons to be learned from the movie is that when we try to remove all adversity from life and continue to try to make life easier, we end up surrendering our freedom of choice and our autonomy. For me, these two virtues are the absolute most important virtues you can possess in life. When we refuse to take on adversity, adversity ends up taking us on and always ends up winning. Don't let your adversities win. Own your adversities and make them become the fuel to your success.

Just another manic Monday?

What do you do to get motivated on a Monday morning? So often when I come into the gym on Monday morning or even Monday afternoon, I see a lot of people moving super slow. Their eyes are still sleepy as if the just woke up about 10 to 15 minutes ago and in a lot of cases that's exactly what happens. Or they look like they just came out of the trenches after a long day of work. The looks on their faces says "It's only Monday and I still have the rest of the week to go". this is no way of thinking or living. I believe a lot of us let Monday's affect us psychologically in a negative way and we let these feelings manifest into a physical discomfort. So what can you do about this issue of "NO MONDAY MOTIVATION". 

The first thing is to realize that Monday is just another day on the calendar and it comes around every 7 days. 

The second is to pivot the attitude towards Monday's. Turn the attitude of doom and dread into "alright it's the beginning of a new week, I wonder what this week has in store beside the typical daily routine. Let's see what fun we can have and create".

The third is to change the mindset from "oh my god look how much I have to do" and turn it into "look at all the things I get to do this week". If you can't do that, then maybe you should be doing something different!!!

The fourth is to start a gratitude journal. Write down 3 to 4 things that made you happy or feeling accomplished from the previous day.

The fifth thing. Do a mental or better yet write down at the beginning of the week and inventory of what you accomplished the previous week that went towards your goals and then write a list of things you plan on doing this week that goes towards your goals.

The sixth thing is to ask yourself, why do I let myself feel so negative at the start of the week? If I hate this feeling so much and I dread waking up to it every Monday, why don't I ever do anything about it? Why am I so stubborn and stay in the same mindset all the time even though I know it is not healthy for me mentally, emotionally and physically? Write your answers down and keep them with you so you can read them and remind yourself when you feel yourself starting to slip into negative mindset. 

The point is there are numerous ways to pivot the mindset into a more positive state of mind. You just need to find the pivot that works for you and you must be willing TO DO THE WORK that is needed to make that mindset shift. 

The 3-Part Test

Here is a great test I heard about yesterday, It suppose to help you find your true purpose in life. It's pretty cool. Before I give you the test, a lot of you may say some things along the lines of. " I am already doing my life true purpose" if you are great, keep going, but most of us have no idea if we are and worse yet most of know we aren't and don't know what to do about it. Some of you will say "I'm too far into my life to change course or worry about finding my true purpose at this point in my life". I hope that isn't the case, because everyday you wake up, life starts anew. Everyday is an opportunity to find your true purpose. Also purposes can change and morph due to life different events. The point is we all can benefit from this test. Who knows maybe you have a couple true purposes in your life. It is imperative that you find yours. The world is waiting and probably needs it.

The idea is to come at this test from a positive perspective. The idea behind this test is to help you find out what you could or should be doing that helps contribute to making your life feel fulfilled and happy 

Part 1 - Ask yourself what are you good at doing in the sense of professional job attributes. Write them down and make a list. Narrow the list down to the one thing or the common thread that runs between them. Write your answer down.

Part 2 - What are you truly passionate about. What puts an unremovable smile on you face.  What is it that you find yourself sometimes saying, "What if I could really do something about______" You fill in the blank. Again write them down and narrow it down to that one or two things. Write your answer down.

Part 3 - What makes you angry! What is that one thing. That one thing that you are passionately angry about. What do you see that makes you say this isn't right and something needs to be done about it. Again write them down and narrow it down to that one or two things. Write your answer down.

Once you have answered all three questions and oh by the way these answers should be thought long and hard about. Take part 1,2 and 3 and form a sentence or phrase. 

Example: Me

Good At - I think I am pretty good at coaching and being a leader 

Passionate About - Health, fitness and strength

Makes Me Angry - The Lack of Human Movement

I believe with my ability to coach and lead people, that I will be able to coach and train people to a fitness, strength and nutrition based lifestyle. I will show as many people as possible that they can move and you will build strength inside and out.

That pretty much sums up what I started 4 years ago in two sentences. I didn't know about this test back then, but if you would have asked me close to 5 years ago to write that sentence, it would look a lot like that. 

Hope some of you decide to take on the challenge of this test. Could be pretty cool.

Learning, everyday.

"What I Learned Today" should be something we ask ourselves everyday. I try to learn something new everyday. Whether it be something about myself, my marriage, my job, my kids, my clients, it can be anything. The point is trying to keep yourself in a white belt state of mind. It is said that the best black belt martial artist always keep the mindset of a white belt martial artist. They keep this mindset to remind themselves that they can always learn something new no matter big or small. When you have this type of mindset it allows you to stay humble and grounded. It allows you to look at life's lens with compassion and integrity. 

When we let go of this mindset of "What I learned today" is when arrogance and ignorance creep into our daily lives.  I am not a fan at all of arrogant and ignorant people. They have a narcissistic attitude and they rely on you to feed their narcissism it to keep them going. I have no time nor patience for this kind of mindset invading mine or my family or my friends lives. When this kind of mindset enters into your life it stifles the ability for positive growth. It promotes anger, strife and division. There is plenty of anger, strife and division in the world around us everyday, Why would we want to add more or be apart who adds more to this negative way of living and thinking.

Always willing to learn is the key to true happiness and positive growth. Like I said yesterday "More is Caught Than Taught" and this has so much more truth behind it when we decide to ask ourselves everyday, What Did I Learn Today.

Living through positive actions

I was listening to the Spartan Up podcast yesterday while I was out trail running. The guest on the podcast was Justin Batt and he was talking about a book he wrote called Daddy Saturday's. The book is about how fathers and mothers as well who live extremely busy lives can make time to stay connected to their kids in a positive way. It wasn't about showering their kids with praise and lavish adventures. It was about reconnecting to the basic principles of being a good parent that teaches and guides their children as well as holding them accountable and not trying to always fix everything for their children. One of the takeaways that I loved about this interview was "Move is caught than taught.''

This concept made me think about not just my responsibilities as a parent, but also my responsibilities as a human being. We all share this space called life. We interact with each other everyday. Our moods, our behaviors, our actions, what we say to each other has a direct effect on everything around us. This concept goes directly to the heart of "Actions Speak Louder Than Words". When we try to always try to talk our way through a problem or issue or more importantly a teaching moment, a large majority of what we say is either lost in translation or just blocked out. Our actions however usually can have the greatest impact, especially if we stay consistent with our actions. Our actions are what is caught more often than taught. When we choose to live through positive actions instead of just positive words, the chances of your actions having an impact on someone's life is so much greater. 

I believe it is our responsibility as human beings living amongst each other to try as much as possible to live by this concept. It's too easy to look the other way or ignore all together the child or the person sitting next to you who really needs a caught instead of a taught. Yes, living life with this concept in mind is difficult. It requires compassion towards others. It requires leaving you ego at the door. It requires letting go of your prejudices that have been built up over time. It requires reaching across the aisle sometimes to give the helping hand needed to get something positive done. Most of all it requires selflessness and unconditional love.

Conquering for the Long Run

Recently I wrote an email called the "The Long Run" Which was about looking at goals through a long term lens. Yesterday I was finally able to reach one of my long run goals in weight lifting. I was finally able to hit the 500 lbs mark on the belt squat rack machine I have here in the gym. The goal of hitting the 500lbs mark was awesome and I am really proud to have finally completed it. What I am most proud of though is not the lift, but the journey that it took to get there. 

This journey took 9 long hard years of work. Along the way I suffered through a few devastating injuries. Two reconstructive ankle surgeries to the left ankle. Tearing the disc between my 4th and 5th vertebrae. Right elbow tendon surgery. Right thumb ligament and tendon surgery and then 9 surgeries to repair the bone damage caused by a tumor in my upper Jaw. I chose not to let any of these setbacks stop me. I looked at each set back as an opportunity to start over again and use the lessons I had learned along the way to get better and ultimately achieve my goal. 

This is what the Long Run is all about. It is so easy to pack things in when times get tough or if you have suffered through various set back. But for those of us who believe in the Long Run, there is no quitting. There is only, "Find Another Way". I have always said your goals need to be just as important to you as the things you value most in life. Your goals need to be a part of you no matter how long they take to accomplish. 

Now it's onto the next Long Run.

Stop and smell the roses

This Morning one of my gratitude's I wrote down in my morning journal was "Staying grounded, not to high not to low, Breathing and feel my own pace".

Quite often we forget life doesn't always need to be done at a pace that is not your own. We spend so much of our days under the rush and pressure of others. We forget that this is our life. If I need or want to stop and take some time for myself, I'm allowed too.

For some of us this can become very difficult. We may feel we don't have enough time during the day when in actuality we have way more time than we think. When we don't think we have enough time, that is us just being to lazy to look at our daily schedules and changing them up to create that time needed for ourselves. Basically we are making excuses. But,

For some of us though, It is difficult because we let ourselves feel guilty for wanting some self time which leads to anxiety. Guilt and anxiety a lot of times comes from the feeling that you don't deserve this time. I believe when it comes to feeling like this you must find a way to tell yourself, NO IT'S OK for me to want and need some self time. I have a right to this time and quite frankly I have earned it. The only person you owe anything to, is yourself. I don't say this to be rude or selfish sounding. I say this because, if you don't take care of yourself, who will? In order for you to be there for the people you love and who need you the most, you need to be as close as possible to your best every day. You can not do this unless you take care of yourself along the way. It you want to help and serve others around you, self care and self time is essential. 

So stop and take a breath today. Smell the fresh air. Raise your heart rate. Release the bad energy through physical action, so it can be replaced with positive energy. You are depending upon you to do this.

Perceived Limitations

I am always amazed at how far the human body will go when it does not know any better. This is most evident for me here at the gym. 

Every so often someone who is new to the workout boards will mis-read the workout board. The board starts out with 12 burpees warm up burpees, but what they interpret is that the 12 burpees are part of the first super set of work that goes for four rounds. When this happens they start each round out with the 12 burpees instead of just doing the required 12 warm up burpees. I will more often than not let them do this perceived mistake and I won't say anything until they start the last round of four. Invariably the look on there face is "What the Hell" usually with a laugh at the same time. 

What is so awesome about this is that they have already heard the stories of other members doing anywhere from 150 to 250 burpees in one workout. There reaction is no way will I be able to do that. This Is said almost every time. But because they and their bodies don't know any better they continue to do the burpees because that is what they interpreted when they read the workout board. In the end they end up doing the 78 burpees instead of the required 42. By the end of the workout they are in a different frame of mind about what they are capable of doing, just because they didn't know any better. 

When you let go of your perceived limitations great things are possible every single day. When we wake up every day we have no clue what the world is going to give us, be it good or bad. What we do know deep down inside, is that we have it within us to survive and go beyond our perceived limitations. We can grow beyond who we are at this moment and become more intune with ourselves and all of our real and true possibilities. 

New Beginnings

I thought this would be a good way to start off the new year. Hope you all Enjoy.

New Beginnings by Gertrude B. McClain

It's only the beginning now
...a pathway yet unknown,
At times the sound of other steps
...sometimes we walk alone.

The best beginnings of our lives
May sometimes end in sorrow,
But even on our darkest days
...the sun will shine tomorrow.

So we must do our very best
Whatever life may bring,
And look beyond the winter chill
...to smell the breath of spring.

Into each life will always come
A time to start anew,
A new beginning for each heart
...As fresh as morning dew.

Although the cares of life are great
And heads are bowed so low,
The storms of life will leave behind
...the wonder of a rainbow.

The years will never take away
Our chance to start anew,
It's only the beginning now
So dreams can still come true.

The Long Run

Good morning to the last day of 2019 and the last day of the decade. What an unbelievable year and decade. I could never have imagined in 2010 that I would be doing what I am doing today. Life is amazing and awesome. What an amazing force we get live each day.

Your goals are not short term investments, that is what you have a financial adviser for. Goals are for the long run, meaning the lifetime run. There are no finishing lines when it comes to goals and achieving them. Goals are meant to be built upon each and every goal. There are no shortcuts or gimmicks or fads that will outlast the long run. The shortcuts and fads all fade away and then reappear under some new marketing branding. They never gain traction and are only meant to make money for the person or group who created them.

The long run is a lifestyle. The long run is about making your goals a lifelong commitments. It is about doing something meaningful in your life that will make a difference everyday. It is about continuous positive growth even when you fail. It is about not giving up even when you fail. It is about learning and adapting and moving forward. It is about waking up each morning and saying "I get to do this". Even on the days when you feel like crap and don't want to do the work, you drag your ass up and get it done because it is now part of your life requirements. The long road is not the easy road. You chose this lifestyle because you don't want it to be easy, you want the long run to be life fulfilling. You want to take the long run because you know life feels so much better. 

This feeling is not a shortcut, fad or gimmick. It is the true and real life you want and deserve to live.

Goal setting to avoid the sabotage

So what is the right goal? The right goals are the ones that set yourself up for future successes. I think we sometimes lose sight of this and end up going after these huge audacious goals. We dive into them feet first without any plan and 99% of the time we land with a thud instead of hitting the ground running.

So instead of setting yourself up for a likely failure, set yourself up for success by picking one goal to start with. A popular goal is getting back to living healthy and getting back into shape. Great goal, but a huge goal as well. There are so many aspects to becoming healthy again. There is the obvious physical part, but there is also the mental and emotional pieces to becoming healthy again. These two parts are complicated and way harder then we let ourselves think. 

I have always been a firm believer that when we break things down into simple forms, the chance of success rises exponentially. Take getting back into a healthy lifestyle. Sure we can sign up for the gym membership and join there full spectrum eating plans and do all the daily check ins and clean out all of our cupboard and refrigerator. But like I have asked before, what makes this time any different from the last? It is said that it takes 10,000 hours to master anything. So why not get yourself started with one goal. Get yourself about 100 hours into that one goal and then build on it from there. 

If your goal is to get back into a healthy lifestyle, then do the easiest part of it first. Join a gym, but make sure it is not just joining a gym where you go try to workout, but have no clue what you are doing. Join a gym where you have planned workouts already available. Or join a gym with friends so you can all help yourselves be accountable. From there you can start to create success and build upon your successes,. but most important to all of this, you must above all else WANT TO DO THIS !!! It can't start out as just a need or have to. It needs to be "I WANT TO DO THIS". Lastly you can not allow yourself to make excuses. Punch your excuses in the face. They don't belong in your life. You are the one that is in control, not your excuses. This philosophy will work for any goals you put forth for yourself. It does not just have to be the gym. It can be going back to school, changing a bad habit, getting a new job. You own this, now go get it.