Changing It Up and Making a Mental Connection

This week I realized that with my achilles healed up, I am back to running on a regular schedule and it feels great.  My stamina is better than ever and my distances keep increasing at faster paces.  My first sub 30 minute 5K is right around the corner. 

I have known for a while that I need to change things up.  I lift from time to time but not enough. 

After my run Monday night, I was pretty tired but as I walked out of the gym, the medicine balls caught my eye.  Hmpf, what harm could a few Wall-balls do? 

I proceeded to do 3 sets of 25 Wall-balls with just 45 seconds of rest between (video below).


That was 2 days ago.  My legs are destroyed!  It reminds me of the last time I did them with Jeff at Crossfit Hilton Head.  Same result. 

It is hurting me bad but the pain reminds me of why we need to change things up.  Go to something new.  Go to something old, just do something different.  For those of you that do not have any exposure to Crossfit, most of their drills are simple exercises like this.  Nothing complex, no big machines.  Just you and a few moves....and you can feel that burn.

It was great to see Jeff in August in Louisville, September at Hilton Head Health and again down in Miami.  While it would be great to hang out once a month with him, I can always just do some of these Wall-balls and every step I take makes me think of how he pushed me every step in every class and every training session. 

Reach into your memory of a fitness session or even if it is not fitness related and make a connection with someone by doing something they would want to do right next to you.  You will be channeling their energy and in this case, a little pain!

Finding Pillars In Your Life

Last week, I learned that my college choral conductor, Dr. Vernon Opheim passed at the age of 79.  It the big picture of things, I was only with Doc for a few years in college and saw him a few times after college; the most recent being in May 2010 at his home in Tucson, AZ.  Still, I think to how much I learned from Doc about music, about myself and saw how I wanted to live as a man.  Doc was a pillar in my life.  It breaks my heart to know I will never get to see and chat with him again. 

I also look at the time I spent at Hilton Head Health.  So many people there are top notch, loving caring people.  The entire crew there represents a pillar in my life but especially Jeff.  We connected and we celebrated making the change in my life together.  Jeff is a pillar in my life.  I continually look forward to the next race we might be a part of together or the next visit I make to H3. 

My parents are also pillars in my life.  I look at how they started their family at 16 and managed to build an awesome life for us through nothing but hard work and dedication to their work.  There is so much I take from that kind of mentality every day. 

My very own family represents a pillar for me.  Jess for how hard she works and manages things while I am on the road.  Ashlie for her talents and having the best parts of me in her character.  Jake for being the guy that keeps us honest...always being real and honest about everything he says and does. 

Obviously, we have these people in our lives that have touched us.  Some by a lifetime of knowing them and some for brief periods of time recent or not.  These pillars need to be our foundation of strength when times are tough.  As I continue down my weightloss and wellness journey, I find myself looking inward and continually find these pillars holding me up...keeping me strong.  I am doing this for me but I also do it for them. 

Don't let these pillars collect dust in your memory.  Keep them to the front of your mind whenever you find challenges or rough spots.  Keep them to the front when you are succeeding too!  Use them and the values they have brought to you personally to keep you strong. 

Finding a New Way to Think or React

An interesting theme has developed with my day today. First, I was reading an article in the NY Times while my flight was boarding and landed on a business article about a guy named Dan Schneider, founder of SIB. He is a high school dropout that founded his first business when he was 16 and had his first store at 18. Since then, he has built other companies which brings me to his most recent. What the company is does not matter. He has some work practices that I find absolutely excellent.
1) Unless it is a dire emergency, nobody is allowed to bring bad news to him after 3 PM. It provokes a culture where people are motivated to leave good situations to share at the end of the day which is what will be on your mind when you go home to your family and friends.

2) When someone makes a mistake that costs them time or money, rather than rant, rave and swear (like he said he used to), he makes that person go buy everyone ice cream complete with toppings which they all sit around and eat as a team. Like he describes, "Even when a little league team loses, they get ice cream!" It changes the culture about how we handle mistakes and ties a positive to it. He said errors have dropped significantly which is the desired outcome. They have only had ice cream 3 or 4 times since the first time.

3) Lastly, he handles employee retention by rewarding employees that stay 5 years with $50,000 and again after each additional 5 years! WOW! This keeps retraining costs down as well as a positive motivation to keep employees engaged, doing their best job they can. In my line of work, ramping up new employees is difficult and then when they bolt after 1-2 years, you really lose more money and productivity than a company realizes.

Then, I jumped on the Gogo Inflight and saw that my buddy Jeff Ford posted a new blog about one of his recent half marathons. He talked about running with the outright women's champion and her awesome sportsmanship. I'd tell you about it but I think you should read it for yourself by following this link!

While I spent 4 weeks at Hilton Head Health, the piece of the journey that I did not expect was the 'SELF' piece. We respond to the condition of our mind. If our mind is not in a good place, we will have a tendency to treat ourselves or others near us poorly. Positivity counts. Find a new way of thinking like the examples above. It will pay back to you ten-fold. Wellness is a multi-faceted task to embrace!

How will you change the way you think or react starting today?

Beginning My Next Chapter

Since finding my way to Hilton Head Health in April, my life has not been better.  It was the beginning of this incredible journey towards personal wellness.  We will call that chapter 1.  My stay of 28 days at H3 was great and was very difficult to leave.  I wondered how great it would have been to have been able to do a stay of 3 months or even 6 months as others have done.  My success at home was just as great despite not being able to do it in a 'bubble' having classes with Jeff, Bob, Amber, Karla, Louise and others. 

My leaving H3 had 2 key goals for the upcoming months. 
1) No more use of a seatbelt extender on ANY airplane.    I still carry the old extender with...more as a reminder of where I was.
2) Return to H3 to run Devin's Dash on 10/8/11 without walking   Not only did I complete this but I did one on September 17th in Minneapolis.  Placing 2nd in my age group at H3 was so uplifting and will push me to do more races and get faster! 

Now with the goals met, it is time to start the next chapter in this journey.  I have not yet decided on the goals which surprisingly is the most difficult thing for me to do.  Keep in mind that the goals are behavior or activity based and not based on a number such as pounds lost or size clothing to be in.  The weight lost and clothing changes are just the beautiful by-product of reaching for the behavior goals.

I know that my future goals will include involving others at work and my great friends that I met at H3, especially those that were on the TV show filmed there, HEAVY. 

As I returned to H3 this week, I realized how many people are reading this blog or have watched my now very old H3 testimonial video on YouTube.  I felt like a celebrity!  A big thanks to Jeff for talking me up and using me as an example.  I am so glad that Jeff is my at home coach.  I want to thank everyone at H3, at work, in my hometown and my family for the support. 

You all inspire me to continue this trek!

How Changing Habits Can Change How You Are Influenced

As I flew back down to Fort Lauderdale this week, I checked my phone in Cincinnati to see if I could get a status of Jeff Ford's Timerman Half Ironman effort.  I was happy to see that my ancient Blackberry was able to interpret the website and had status of the 1.2 mile swim and the 56 mile bike.  Jeff was killing it.  On the bike, he had a negative split with the 2nd half coming quicker than the first.  I thought about him and his determination to keep pushing through such a gruelling course as he transitioned into the half marathon at the end. 

As I thought about this, it made me think about how I view a race such as the Timberman now vs. how I might have viewed it prior to my visit to Hilton Head Health.  The truth is, in the past, races like this, a sprint triathlon or even a 5K would not have crossed my mind and I certainly would not have had anyone to look up.  This is mostly because I was not surrounding myself with people like Jeff.  Even people I knew before such as a colleague in Richmond, VA that runs frequently and has run several races would not have discussed this with me in the past.  What I realized was that my changed habits and new motivations have changed the people I surround myself with as well as the context of some of the discussion.  It opens a new window to what is happening around me.  This is not to say that existing friends and co-workers are any less important because they absolutely are not. 

It makes me so proud to have selected Jeff to be my @home coach when I left H3i.  I appreciate his level of effort to accomplish intense races like the one he did today finishing 18th in his division and 255th overall which included a large list of professional triathletes.  Most of all, I enjoy having something new to anticipate and follow!

If you are an athlete or aspiring to be one like me, you might also want to check out Jeff's blog that chronicles his quest to compete in the Kona Ironman and discusses the importance of Crossfit Training.  Check it out!!

Finding Something Normal

The last four weeks for The Orracle have been kind of crazy. As I look back, my schedule has looked something like below (hang in there through the list - the point of the post is down there somewhere).

• Sunday July 10 - Fly to Fort Lauderdale -work there all week


• Saturday July 16 - Fly back home with one week at home planned and then back on the road


• Friday, July 22 - my Father in Law, Dan passes away


• Friday, July 22 - still have to DJ a wedding after such a bad day. Do this with Ashlie since Jess needs to go up to Duluth


• Take care of 'home' while Jess is in Duluth. Friday, July 29 is the funeral in Duluth


• Saturday, July 30 - DJ in the farthest reaches of Northern Wisconsin - work around funeral by staying up north, bringing kids to wedding.

NOW IT STARTS TO REALLY GET FUN!

• Leave the wedding at 1:35 AM to drive home - arrive in New Richmond at 4:15 AM, unload truck, shower, pack remaining toiletries in my bag and head to airport. Fly to Fort Lauderdale on the early flight via Cincinnatti on July 31.


• 
  
  Work all week and fly home on Friday, August 5.


• 
  
  Saturday, August 6 DJ another wedding. Get home in the wee hours of the morning. Actually SLEEP this time for 2-3 hours and then get up to head back to the airport.


• 
  
  Sunday, August 7 - morning flight to Fort Lauderdale - stay there all week and fly home Saturday, August 13.

YOU HAVE REACHED THE PRESENT TIME

• Monday, August 15 - actually go to the office here for 1/2 day, then flying to Richmond, VA.


• Thursday, August 18, 6 AM flight to MSP via ATL. Back in the home office by 1 PM.


• Friday, August 19 - meeting with a company in Minneapolis


• Saturday, August 20 -another wedding! This one is in New Richmond thank goodness!


• Sunday, August 21- Friday, August 26 - back in Fort Lauderdale


• Sunday, August 28 - Friday, September 2 - back in Fort Lauderdale

If you look at this schedule, throw in a family death and all of the travel, you can see how personal events and a train wreck of a personal work/life schedule can put fitness and wellness on the back burner. The truth of the matter is that fitness and especially healthy eating is the one thing you can actually have some control over. This needs to be the one piece of 'normal' in your life. Let the the variable pieces do what they will. Know where the places where you might be in a tough spot with food and plan ahead if necessary. Find the 20 minutes needed for a good thermal walk at a minimum which is also a great time to clear your head of the other turbulence. If you can squeeze in a workout, better yet. Knowing you have maintained a healthy eating regiment through this is the piece of sanity that you can lean on and be proud of your strength to get through anything. I owe some thanks to my Wellness Coach, Jeff Ford also because he gives me that outlet to give up my thoughts and also something to look forward to. Do I want to let him down? No way!

So many of my friends at Hilton Head Health incurred weight gain because of taking care of a loved one or because of a death (and me also going back to 1991 when my mother passed) . These are the hardest times for us as loving, caring people but I wonder how we might cope differently if eating and wellness was not the first thing we chucked to the side of the road. We all know how much better we feel when we eat well and I think that might be true of our strength and emotions as well. Let the good food and fitness be our outlet. Don't cave in to the what we call comfort foods and fast food because it just plays a bigger role in bringing us down.

Wellness is the one thing you can do anywhere and any time. Like the song says, "Let The Rest Of The World Go By".

What Would You Take Away From A Stay At A Wellness Resort?

My question seems to have a simple answer. Apparently that is not how everyone goes away.

Tonight I had my scheduled call with Jeff Ford, my At Home Coach and writer of a new blog dedicated to training and his personal goals of doing the Kona Ironman called 'Less Mileage, More Crossfit'. He said on the call that of the people he has been a coach for, I have been the most dedicated to the lifestyle that I learned at H3. I found that to be a tremendous compliment and somewhat hard to believe. Yes, I do live and breathe wellness, healthy eating and fitness once again in my life.

I feel like I was given the opportunity of a lifetime to spend 4 weeks at Hilton Head Health. To attend a program like theirs is not inexpensive. In hindsight, I'd say it is worth double what I did pay. When you decide to take that step to overhaul every aspect of your life, I feel you owe it to yourself to follow through not just now and then but with every ounce of your soul. I feel that the gift that anyone that has given themselves to attend H3i is a special one. You leave there armed with so much great information. You should live it and share it. Now, those of you that know me might get the impression that I am a bit of an extrovert. This is a possibility...and therefore talking about wellness and encouraging others is somewhat a natural trait that I have.

Will I slip up? Sure - it is going to happen. Even recently with some family events and a very hectic travel schedule my workouts have taken a back seat which makes me crazy.

I know other guests that have left H3 have maintained awesome lifestyles and just may not have been a part of the H3 @ Home program like I am.

If you are one of the past guests and have lost some of your drive, I encourage you to pull out your binder and read the notes and slides. Find that memory of what your stay was like and use it as motivation to kick it back into gear.

While I still find it hard to believe that I am the poster child, I accept the compliment....thanks, Jeff!