So, here’s a real question.
Because I’m a self coached athlete, This question trolls through my mind a lot. Not in a, am I doing the right thing type of way, rather in a are you in the right place with the proper mindset. I’m more into triathlon for lifestyle over competition, but gearing up for a full in October of 2021. I want to do more than just finish but I also have to be honest and manage all my life responsibility inputs. I’m not in a place to budget in coaching, as I often have to put other things first – mainly family – and that’s the way I love it -to be honest – and yes my wife/spouse is a part my thoughts and discussion, so being honest. My question after a bit of context above is:
How do others self-manage the competing factors of triathlon, life responsibilities, career, etc. and manage giving your self grace and not exploding 🙂 ? I can’t be alone on an island self-coached, or am I?
I’ve been sick for the better part of a month (not covid) – since Feb 11, and that means a lot of time and space for self reflection and introspection (plus I am currently reading Ryan Holiday) and this topic is trolling my brain a lot more lately as I start to move forward toward October 24 and IM California.
I shared this with a bit of editing with my Team Zoot Mountain teammates – I’ve had the honor and the privilege to be an ambassador for the Zoot brand. And as such I also shared with them that – I’m grateful for any feedback, wisdom, ribbing, etc., just looking for ideas and patterns of wisdom I may be missing. Appreciate any feedback… Cheers!
Now, the feedback loop which I won’t share direct quotes as I don’t want to go through the hassle of querying for permission etc. and this is mainly my space for journaling and for me, has been nothing short of AWESOME. The feedback from the team was honest, forth with, diverse with their specific perspectives but the patterns and threads are emerging toward similar contexts of thought.
Of note: I’d also welcome feedback from anyone who crosses my blog to the question above, I’m looking and appreciating the diverse feedback from my team zoot folks, and welcome any more thoughts. Please comment if you feel willing to do so!
For this and a few other reasons, this is why I love being an ambassador for this brand (Zoot Sports) and for the sports associated with triathlon (swim, bike, run, nutrition, headspace, sherpas). One of the respondents mentioned how ‘selfish’ triathlon can be. I find it quite the opposite and I find it is up to me to control my choices and my perception there. Sure, we have plenty of altruistic types that get lost and burn themselves and their supports out. But by and large, the triathlon community is AMAZING. Each time I go to the 70.3 in St George I am amazed at the volunteers and the community that think what we do is crazy and awesome and worthwhile. That they surrender their time and support us is amazing in our world today. I have really enjoyed and been grateful for my association through the Crushing Iron community. I have appreciated their insights and approach to triathlon, life and more. Anyway, like the volunteers and other great triathlon participants I’ve been admiring triathletes from afar since that first day I saw the IM world championship on Wide World of Sports in that house on Quincewood Circle in the Greater Sacramento area of Citrus Heights. I recall being about 9/10 years old or so watching channel 13 on a Saturday. It carried Wide World of Sports and I watched my first Ironman in Kona – highlights or events – it doesn’t matter. It was mesmerizing. These fools, crazy human athletes doing 3 sports over 140.6 miles. Ya, that’s what I wanted to do. Foolish, crazy, not selfish, b/c even tho it is completed alone,
Since I do this at work….And it’s in the book – stillness is the key – validations! From Stillness is the Key (by Ryan Holiday), the book shares this story that Emerson tells about Napoleon, which is that Napoleon would delay the opening of his mail. And he would instruct his secretary to wait sometimes as much as three weeks before he checked his mail. Knowing that by the time most of these letters were open, they would have been rendered irrelevant by subsequent events. And he said, “Look, if there’s something important, do not delay. But if it’s not important, if it’s not urgent, if it’s good news,” he said, “Don’t bother me with it, I’ve got important things to do.” — Ryan Holiday, talking about his favorite passages in the book.
Our great Team Zoot captain asked this engagement question of out team:
Team Building Thursday: Inspired by the passing of Dick Hoyt. What’s your why? Who is your inspiration?
I am finding my why and my inspirations are fluid and evolve. My external why is my family – secretly I’d like to complete a triathlon with each of them, I’ve at least watched the 15 y/o complete one (Sprint -Ice Breaker in American Fork). My inspirations, I really like the Matthew McConaughey concept of chasing yourself 10 years from now as your hero!
2021 – March 19 – Being Present, For Today, For The Moments
His (MM) pattern and thought construct aligns with this thought from Maya Angelou – “Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.”
So to that end, I like that my why and my inspirations are fluid and evolving and hope I can persist with that thought – it’s also why I asked the question of my teammates above. I hope I can keep chasing me next year to 10 years and keep finding a hero.
Today, my girls have been inserting themselves a lot as Mom and I have different things we need to complete through out the day. We are giving them a bit more independence here and there and it is clear who their preference is, well it’s not me. So, when they have just me, I get moments. Here’s what I said about Juniper and a photo too:
Being present. Taking the precious moments when your 5 year old comes in while you are working on needful work tasks. Creating the quick moments when responding to her question ‘dad take a picture of me on your bike with me, now!’
Yes, it’s easy to want to push it to the side or later. Her want was now though. And where I want to choose to be present, I had to be consciously available to create the space and embrace the moment and capture the pictures. Juniper is 5 now and not slowing down. Appreciate the present embrace the now, being present and being still.
I recently received a work award. I don’t much like to speak about myslef in my domains of work. It’s just something I put my shoulder tot he wheel and push along the best I can. Anyway my wife posted this thought:
Shout out to my hubby- in an international company with around 3200 employees, Shane was one of 15 people to earn the High Impact award this year! This is his second award and its so nice to see his hard work recognized!
About the pic (thought I’d share)… During an event like this (70.3 Ironman triathlon), many are just go-go-go. These are my kids in the picture. At these events, I am not making money, I am spending lots of $$$ actually to participate. To that end, it was more important to me to foster my relationship with my kidlets than to selfishly preserve 30 – 90 seconds – but to what end? I am not going to qualify for worlds or Kona. There was a person next to them that had a sign saying – “ain’t got time for that” and she mentioned something similar to this to me as I stopped. I shrugged her off and was like, they matter, that’s all I need. After we posted this picture originally, a friend shared an article with a picture of a pro athlete that also paused and did similar with his kids. This professional athlete’s approach struck me, it reminded me why being ‘present’ is so necessary. My special sauce at work is just that, being present, being available to do the most correct things given the information known at the time. It is truly that simple, and then I add my flexibility, my value, my ability to think within given parameters while also using the concept of ‘transference’ to get to the next right thing (thanks Anna and Elsa or should I say Astrid and Juniper?). Ya, it’s an honor to be awarded, and like the Ghost Hunters of old would say – on to the next! Thanks to Liz Livingston and thanks to mindful pro athletes and Team Zoot.
So, it has been a lot of self introspection since the Feb 11 arrival of my plague. Thank heavens it isn’t COVID related and it is a bad bout of laryngitis. A colleague quipped, we all know how much he likes to talk and so his wife must be thrilled, it’s so quiet and she can her herself think, or she may just be that much crazier. I am grateful for honest and sincere colleagues that appreciate me. No really, in the receiving an award, what was more cool is learning direct from another recipient that she was awarded one too. Why was it cool, she is my mentee and I was part of the process of hiring her. So we’ve both concluded its because of the other’s greatness we are to be thankful because alone we’d be mediocre.
“Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself” ~~ Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Well, my hope is to get on my bike today/tonight. I need to get in something and start down the long lonely path of creating non flashy consistency. I’ve burnt out before, and maybe the lesson learned in this sickness is one to help me not lean into an injury. i was just telling a fellow triathlete how I am frustrated because i was starting to push my swim time down and break the 1:30 min per 100 yd barrier for me. I’m not an elite, and my first swim started at like 4:14 min for a 100 yard. So a reflection I shared in a comment thread — I recall my first swim in the pool back in 2015 in my first 70.3 build up. It took me the better part of 4 minutes to complete 100 yards and I think I swam about 300 yards total. I HATED it, I disrespected it and I SURVIVED that first 70.3 swim missing the cut off by 3 minutes I think it was but still completed the event and distance and Mike Reilly still called me in that day. Since then, my last swim on Feb 10, before this illness I was at a 1:38 per 100 yards and my effort was about 75 – 80 % so Z2/3. It has become my sanctuary, where I shed stress and I reduce everything I carry to only 2 things, my breathing (not drowning) and my stroke. I solve all the world problems sometimes too, then I let it go – that’s my rule.
Now the fun part, we often or rather I don’t often share a lot about Dennis our oldest. Well, that’s because he’s a teen and we know how that goes. He’s doing great this new trimester so far, and he’s really listened to his mother and I and doing well so far. It is awesome to see him finally turn the corner a bit, but it is hurting our pocket book a bit. But, to be honest it’s not the reward that is driving it, but we can tell its difficult for him to find good techniques to stay ahead of problems.
So, truly I am close to getting back out and working out. I was able to get a few walks in here and there so that is nice. I was able to walk the girls around the neighborhood last night and i was a bit out of air coming up our small hill. So, tonight I am trying to get in a bike and tomorrow will see how I feel to know what I can get out tomorrow. I am starting to think about areas that I may be able to swim Open Water. The reservoir I normally like to use Hyrum State Park and its still capped, so we will see when I can start to shift there. Liz and I have been trying to determine what we want to do with our relationship with SARC our local club. It’s handling of things in the recent past has been interesting so making sure we are doing what is best for us.
Everything else is just good. We’re not in a bad position and recently we had the opportunity this week to help a lot of others and you know, it’s nice to help where we can. We do the best we can and do what we can where we can. Often times we find ourselves on each side of the fence here. It’s been a good period during my sickness, i am not in a dark space, I am really frustrated, but I am replacing the inability to work out with family activities and spending a lot of quality time with the kidlets. Sure hope that can continue.
On to the next!
