Down But Not Out

There comes a point in every hike, climb, run, or journey in general where you think, "I have to stop." Your body is tired and you've lost coordination. In fact, you can't even remember what is was that made you start this whole crazy thing to begin with. And motivation? You tell yourself that you did your best, but your body isn't going to keep up. It's ok. Just stop.

A small fraction of people are able to overcome this break in concentration. They surmount the pain, the internal surrender, and push through. Of course, the majority of people slow down, stop, and turn around.

So when do we really know when it's time to quit? When we really can't finish out the race or when we really have the endurance to carry on?

I tell myself all the time I'm going to spend hours upon hours at the gym, but after one boot camp session in the AM, I can barely climb a flight of stairs! Is it time to take a break, or should I push harder? My endocrinologist told me that you can't max out on exercise... but what if your body doesn't agree?

So I chose to rest. Maybe that was a mistake and I surrendered too easily. But I believe that sometimes your body tells you how to take care of yourself. Down, maybe? Out of the game? Not even close.

The Old & The New You

I've been finding lately it's been really easy to forget the things I used to love to do. I talk about hiking, but haven't been in over a year. For as much as I love reading, I haven't read a book for fun since last summer (school interferes sometimes, to be fair). And what about dancing? There wasn't a summer, winter, fall or spring night I didn't go out with friends in college. Going out in State College is a year-round sport.

But now I find myself in bed by 10, asleep by 11. My friends never call, rarely text, and even more rarely have time for me with hectic work schedules.

To break the monotony, I've joined a fitness boot camp! Sure, we meet early in the mornings, but the trainer kicks my butt. This morning, partly due to humidity* (*something I tell myself to feel better), I had so much sweat pouring off of my body, I was leaving pools on the gym floor. Even my legs were sweating. I had to take quick breaks to run to the kitchenette area and paper-towel my face off so I could get the sweat out of my eyes for another 30 seconds.

The boot camp is great, but I didn't realize how out of shape I've become! My diet has been way off, so I may* be undoing my hard work. My goal is to work up to the recommendations my endocrinologist gave me.

Shouldn't be too hard, after all, right now I'm only 7 hours of vigorous exercise short of my per week goal...

It's One Door Swinging Open, And One Door Swinging Closed

Sometimes it's hard to remember that when a door slams shut in your face that another one, or perhaps a window, might be opening for you somewhere else. We tend to get tunnel vision on the doorknob right in front of us. Maybe if we knock a little louder? Look around for a hidden key?

I'm guilty of this. Trying to make something work that just wasn't meant to be. But how scary is it to think that you now have to turn around and look for option B. And option C. Maybe D-Z.

Part of positivity is reminding yourself that this door you want to go through so badly isn't the only door. Hell, it isn't even the only building! As human beings, we're naturally curious about what's out there, so why limit ourselves to one pathway?

So before you go Jack Nicholson/The Shining on that door, maybe it's helpful to think that what's waiting on the other side isn't what you think is going to be on the other side. Maybe it's a place you don't want to be at all.

Happiness and Acceptance

I read an article recently about the things you have to let go of to be happy. At first I thought, well duh, letting go of regret would make you happier! Tell me something more obvious, why don't you?

If it were so easy to let go of things--regrets, trying to impress people, living your life by someone else's standards--I'm sure there would be a lot more happy people in this world. I wish the article had said more about how to do. I'm not exactly the Dalai Lama here.

This week is a big one for me. The last week (and projects) of my first year of grad school. I know I'm supposed to be freaking out, staying up all night cramming, eating my weight in greasy foods (ok, I might be doing this last part), all I can think of is. Well. Nothing, really.

I know that these projects are going to get done. I know that I'm going to take my final. And I know that by next Thursday, I'm going to be done with the first year of grad school.

But more than that, I feel different now. I signed up for a fitness boot camp, and I know I'm going to work hard at it this summer. I've accepted what causes my stress and that it's temporary. I've accepted that I'm never going to be a size 2 (this one was difficult). I've accepted that whatever happens, happens.

So maybe the trick isn't letting go, it's just accepting things for what they are and knowing that there are ways to improve the things you don't like.

On Motivation...

Why is it when you age, your motivation starts to lag until it becomes nonexistent? When I was an undergrad, it was like I had all the energy in the world and never felt like I was too stressed to fit it all in. A few things are different now, though.

1) Social Life. Things are different when you're in a new-ish city where you can't just walk places anymore. Events, seeing friends, trips all become these big events where you have to plan parking, mass transit, how you're going to get home alone... Also, you're much more limited in meeting people. It's not as easy to just show up at a club or sport.

2) Limited Activities. Gone are the spur-of-the-moment trips down the Juniata in a kayak or up Mt. Nittany. You can't drive over to Bald Eagle lake, or spend a day walking the rail trail. Forget a leisurely stroll around an empty campus. My neighborhood becomes pretty sketchy at points, and there's basically never any parking anywhere you want to go. Getting anywhere takes forever because there is always traffic at every point in the day.

3) Different Expectations. So you're getting older. Priorities change. You can't afford to spend three hours every day in the gym anymore because you have work. OK, and you work weird hours, so now you have to find time do get homework done. In addition, you no longer have that weekly reason to be in good shape or on top of work. I can't remember the last time I went out dancing. It was such a common occurrence in college, I spent all week working out for that one night.

I guess what it all comes down to is that you have to remember that when your life changes, as you age, your motivation become different too. So I don't go dancing anymore. And I have crazy hard classes I constantly have nightmares about. Why can't I have the same motivation I did when I was 20?

Summer is right around the corner and now more than ever I'm ready to reclaim my life. Find my new motivation. I'll let you know how that goes...

I've Been On Hiatus!

Sometimes fitting in the blog time gets difficult, which is why I've been gone for over a month...

And it's fantastic timing because I've been reassessing my goals and where I am in relation to them. Answer: FAR. But that's ok because the other thing I've been discovering is that I don't need to run towards the finish line. It's not how fast you get there, after all, it's what you learned on the journey there.

And my journey is definitely one of ups and downs. Like most other people in search of happiness, I'm completely self-handicapping. This notion is when you purposefully sabotage yourself so that you get exactly what you expect... there's no variability. I'm guilty of looking for excuses to keep myself from venturing out: it's a fat day, I'm too tired, I don't know if I'll like being around __ for more than ten minutes. We all do it.

There are three weeks of classes left. I'm going to get organized, motivated, and in three weeks I'm going to be prepared to be living so far out of my comfort zone, I'm going to forget what it feels like to hide in it.

The Balance

I spoke about "The Balance" in my last post. This mythical balance that is so hard to achieve, though it sounds like it's a breeze. This is the paradox of The Balance.

I like to think of it more like a teeter-totter, when one side goes up, the other goes down. Sometimes, you're perfectly balanced, and sometimes you're way off kilter. Those balances for me are health and school. Work doesn't factor in so much because I'm a temp and can turn down work if I want to... not so much of a burden in the health/school thing.

When I find the health side is way low to the ground and school is way up in the air (bad for health, good for school), I feel burnt-out and like my brain can't handle simple tasks. On the other side, when health is up and school is down, I feel like (and probably am) falling behind in classes because I'm spending more time maintaining my emotional, physical and mental health.

Today I flipped the balance to work on health. I find that I get caught up in the school-verse and forget to do simple things like eating right or going to the gym.

The weeks I have that teeter-totter perfectly balanced, I feel like a rock star! But lets face it, those days are few and far between.

The key here is time management. I always do better when I have the time thing down and stop with the procrastination. Lately it's been online shopping for summer stuff--a new sleeping pad, a backpacking hammock, water filtration system. Even summer hikes themselves. My new obsession? "Fatpacking."