Priorities...

I've been away from blogging for quite some time, and I don't really have an excuse other than lack of time and other priorities. And it's not that everything else has higher priorities, it's just that I've set my priorities in a way that my time to blog has been squeezed. I really need to change that because I find that the best thing about blogging is that it gives me the opportunity to hash through issues and thoughts that are important to me. Like setting priorities properly.

I want to start out by saying that I believe everybody needs to be selfish. (Insert meditative pause here while you think about what an ass I am for suggesting such a self-indulgent priority). When I say "be selfish", I mean it in the sense that your own health and happiness needs to come before all else. The reason for this is really fairly simple when you think about it. Without your own health and happiness everything else in your life, and everybody else who depends on you (family, friends, co-workers) will be negatively impacted. So if being there for your kids is the most important thing in the world to you, then taking care of yourself needs to precede that so that you can be there for them. Common sense, right?

I was thinking about this the other day on my bike. It was on a day that I didn't particularly want to be on the bike because I had so much other stuff to do. Trying to get the new gym open while running the current location takes a lot of time and energy. On this particular day I had sessions to run in the morning, meetings with architects, contractors, and city hall, a soccer practice to run that evening. Every minute was accounted for and I was feeling really overwhelmed with everything. These are the days that things like exercising and eating healthy usually take a back seat to everything else. But that hasn't been an option for me for many years. I had a healthy breakfast of eggs, fruit and granola in about 10 minutes before walking out the door to the gym. I ran the sessions with enthusiasm and intensity, I left the gym, grabbed an espresso and a healthy snack of apple and almonds. Made a clockwise circuit through Nashua hitting the architect's office, City Hall, and the new gym to meet with the landlord and some contractors. I got taken out of schedule by having to run a couple unforeseen errands. Had a grilled chicken, tomato, lettuce, mustard sandwich. I was stressed out because I still had so much to do and my training schedule called for a couple hours on the bike and I still had soccer practice to run to cap it all off. By the time I got home my window was really getting squeezed for the ride. I got kitted up and headed out the door on the bike. I didn't have two hours, but I could get in 90 minutes, I just cranked up the intensity to compensate for the lack of volume. Got home, recovery drink, quick shower, and out the door with bag of soccer balls and cones to coach the GU12's.. Home by 7:00 for dinner, grilled chicken and veggies. 14 hours of non-stop and I managed to get in a 90 minute ride, which to be honest, cleared my head so completely that it was singularly responsible for allowing me to complete everything else. Without that release I would be a mess and everything else that I have responsibility for would be negatively impacted. I finished the day in bed reading a book by one of the top coaches in the world, Dan John, because learning something new every day is another of my highest priorities.

My top priority is getting my exercise in because it makes me better at everything else in my life. And by "exercise" I mean exercise that works the body and the mind. For me, it means being on the bike, or working the whole body with intense kettlebell and bodyweight routines, or nordic skiing, or competing. It needs to be active and with purpose, it needs to work my body and my mind, it needs to be meaningful.

There was a time when this wasn't my top priority. My workouts were lame. Go to the "gym" at lunchtime, back and bi's on Monday, leg day on Tuesday, you know the drill. It didn't make me better at anything. Absolutely nothing. I'd go back to my life-sucking job, leave at 5:00, get home and have a few beers or a bottle of wine, get up feeling like ass and do it again. Sometimes I'd skip the lame-ass workout, which honestly had no appreciable effect anyways. I had pretty much stopped making gains in weights since I had the same stale routine that I'd been doing forever. On weekends I would rather watch football and drink beer than actually compete in anything. I was weak, mentally and physically.

Contrast that with the present. I missed three workouts this year. Three! They were on consecutive days last May when I was coughing green shit up from a chest infection that I believe came on because I had worked out the previous week with such high intensity that my immune system had nothing left to fight it off. I'm stronger than I ever have been on the bike. I can do more pullups than I've ever been able to do in my life. I can do turkish getups with light adults. Mentally, there is no challenge or problem that I can't overcome.

When somebody says "I'm not going to workout today because I don't feel like it" or "I don't have time" I wonder how much time they spend texting lol's and omg's to their bff, or on facebook or watching TV. Instead of spending 15 minutes on facebook, use the time to do 10 burpees, bear crawl across the room, and repeat as fast and as many times as you can for 15 minutes. That's more effort than you would put in on a treadmill in 90 minutes. And it will do more good for you physically and mentally than anything else.

I don't have to tell you how good an intense workout makes you feel. I have people at Dynamic on a daily basis that move literally thousands of pounds or do close to 1000 reps of different bodyweight exercises in less than 30 minutes. It tops off their life-force. They eat healthier to get more out of their workouts so they have more "good" energy so they can do more stuff that they like to do. So that they can make a positive impact in their family's and friend's lives. The passion is amazing, the transformation complete!

Is it hard work? Well, yeah. If it wasn't then everybody would be in great shape, healthy and happy. It takes desire, dedication, and discipline. Do you have what it takes? Start with your priorities. Think about what's really important to you and if you have really dedicated yourself to it. Do your lifestyle and actions complement or contradict your priorities? If you need help, I can introduce you to some of the folks over at Dynamic that truly "get it".

I'm going to ride my bike now. I have a race tomorrow that I need to get ready for :)