6 Ways Fitness Helped Me In Life

6 Ways Fitness Has Helped Me In Life

It’s all about finding the right fit!

First, let me just say that I’m not everyone and most people will have learned these lessons by grade school…. But, from the cradle I guess I’ve been a little askew. I’m wired different than my organized, disciplined, well-behaved brother. I always needed a pint in my pocket and pill bottle in my glove box, because I’ve never found delight in a few beers and good conversation like most of my friends when they go out for fun. I didn’t sit well in school- and even more poorly in Sunday school. I like to sit in steam rooms and sweat lodges more than on my couch. I enjoy riding my mountain bike uphill better than downhill. I like water more than anything besides coffee. Rather than relaxed and social when I get buzzed I get uneasy and uncomfortable. So in many ways I’m just structured different. That said, MOST people don’t need triathlon to learn these things…But, it seems I did. I’ve tried everything from yoga, magick, extreme religion, extreme anti-religion and (dis)establishment, drugs and sex, I even tried locking myself in a library on adderall for nearly a year so that I could start earning doctorate in psychology. I’ve been locked away in jails and I’ve been sent to rehabs. I’ve been involved in year-long behavioral treatment programs and I’ve been an active member in Alcoholics Anonymous for as long as I can remember. But, I didn't learn these next 7 lessons until I picked up triathlon and fitness.

1) COMMUNICATION & TEAMWORK IS REQUIRED FOR SUCCESS AND GROWTH

Everything to this point in my life was done alone, and it really didn’t get me too far. I was unwilling to ask for help and this was largely in part due to my unwillingness to admit my challenges, difficulties, faults, shortcomings, fears etc. I remember sitting in class petrified about asking how to solve a math problem. I was the kid with the fewest questions and some of the lowest grades.

I wasn’t able to get far in Triathlon without some help. First, my personal life crumbled. Then my health and training. So I had to reach out to my ex-wife, the nutritional, yoga stretchin, mindful guru that she is. She taught me how to foam roll and eat right. Ironically, she also helped me to learn nearly every other item on this article. I would have never made it this far unless I finally admitted my challenges and asked for her help… I didn’t even know that spandex aren’t supposed to go in a dryer.

In addition, I needed a coach, badly. I may have been raised in a sports loving family. I was on a different sports team every season and I practiced and worked hard in each of the disciplines. In each of those sports I was able to use natural athletic ability and strength to succeed fairly well, but not so in triathlon. This sport is a different beast all together. I talk much more about this in an article on the Trials to Triathlon blog titled, “Gratitude & Acceptance: The Keys to Endurance Performance.”

2)PREPARATION… DAILY PREP, EVENING PREP, MORNING PREP IS ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY

When looking at quotes for spontaneous living I found highlighted Lindsay Lohan, Notorious BIG, ASAP Rock and this rapper named Quavo… When I search for quotes on preparation I found Confucius, Colin Powell, Oprah Winfrey, Hermann Hesse, Barak Obama, Elbert Hubbard, Venus Williams, Steve Nash and… Will Smith. I don’t know about you, but I kind of see a trend.

I value spontaneity, I really do. In fact, I lived half my life planning each day to have little to no plan. It didn’t get me far. But then again I wasn’t a rapper and/or a teen idol.

I quickly learned in triathlon that planning was necessary. It seems like there are thousands of little items you need to train appropriately, and if you forget one of them then your trip to the gym all of a sudden turns into an anxiety producing realm of regret and self loathing… I’m sure you have gotten to the gym without shoes… Most people will understand that.

But picture this: You have been thinking of going to the beach for a few months. Not just any beach, Tahiti. You hop on the plane, travel 19 hours and arrive. You touch your toes to the sand and unpack your bag. You look high and low in the 2x2 suitcase for the swimsuit you know you brought, but it’s no where to be found. On top of that there are no stores to just go buy a bathing suit. My mom has a funny story about this. On a trip to Tahiti for an anniversary, she ended up bringing home a bikini top made out of coconuts (for some reason they had no pictures to show us!)

Triathlon preparation is not like preparation for a trip. Triathlon preparation has to be done all day long. From laundry to cleaning to fixing your bike. Each and every part of the puzzle has to be working well, so that you can train. I haven’t had anything go wrong on race morning, yet, but I’m pretty sure this valuable lesson will help me to avoid this catastrophe.

Life is no different. I learned I won’t ever be able to reach my goals if I don’t constantly plan what the next step will be. At first, this seems glum and horrible. But honestly, it starts to become fun.

3) WITHOUT PATIENCE AND ACCEPTANCE I GO INSANE

This is a huge one. I thought that I had a problem with anxiety before triathlon, but try putting a wetsuit that feels like a boa constrictor around you and submerging yourself in freezing water while hundreds of other people are doing the same, while all freaking out.

IF, and that’s a big IF, (because I don’t always do it) but IF I accept that I will be in the water for the next 20-30 minutes and continue to put one arm in front of the other while kicking and sucking in my stomach to maintain form, THEN I will likely get to emerge from the water in good standing and most importantly, alive. IF I begin to get impatient and my head fills with dreams of hoping on the bike and freely breathing oxygen, THEN I will likely drowned or be forced to roll over on my back and perform backstroke like my first Olympic Triathlon. When this happens, I swim a full minute slower than freestyle. That would mean my 25-30 minute swim turns into a 45-55 minute swim, and with the work I have put in the pool, this is unacceptable.

I used to think the more ferocity, stress and strength I put into things- the better I could perform. That was true in some sports, like football. But not so in triathlon. That was also true in some relationships, but not so with ones that mattered. I’m now starting to see that life could have been much easier and enjoyable and less panicky had I learned these lessons early on, like in grade school when teachers and parents tried to teach things like patience and acceptance.

4) NUTRITION HAS EVERYTHING TO DO WITH PERFORMANCE: SWIM, BIKE, RUN, EAT

This was actually a really tough one to learn. I had always thought that you can eat whatever you want when you exercise a ton. But the truth became clear a few months after I started training. If you eat whatever you want you WON’T be able to exercise a ton. Shocker!

As I have mentioned in my article, “The Nutrition Decision That Saved This Triathlete,” my eating habits were outrageous when I first started training. First let me just say single hamburgers just don’t make sense to me. They need two patties and they need bacon and cheese, otherwise I just don’t eat them. I remember one night after a gruesome training session I went to Mcdonalds. One of my favorite places to get munchies when I was stoned. I wasn’t stoned, but I had the training munchies, and these are just as real but even more fierce! I ordered 50 chicken nuggets and two double quarter pounders. I ate most the chicken nuggets on the way home and when I got home I took the bun off one the double quarter pounders and added the two patties to the other two quarter pounder patties. That meant I had a full pound of patties with cheese in between each one. I ate the whole thing, no problem. Training munchies are real, and they are even more fierce.

Fast forward a few months into training, I hit what I would consider a cardiovascular crisis. I woke up with a heart rate above the rate I usually had while running (165). It settled down and I went to the gym for my bike ride. I hopped on the bike and wasn’t able to put the energy into my spin enough to bring my heart rate above 130. This meant I had encountered overtraining. Why? Well, truth be told at this point I didn’t know what hard training was, so it couldn’t have been due to overtraining. Rather I venture to say it was due to consuming the foods I was shoving into my mouth. I took two weeks off and began to eat healthy. I hoped on Juice-Plus in place of the synthetic nutrients of a Hammer multivitamin and I stopped eating hamburgers. I also began eating whole grains and less butter, more oatmeal and less eggs, almond milk and less cheese, more leafy greens, salads instead of pasta salad and the list goes on and on.

Needless to say, my training has amped up 2x what it was last year and I haven’t had any cardio concerns. On top of it, I am performing better and I’m not cranky as a two year old until I get food and a nap after hard training sessions. It’s everything. It’s the fourth pillar of Triathlon. Swim, Bike, Run, Nutrition. Simple.

5) REST AND RECOVERY IS ESSENTIAL FOR BOTH BODY AND MIND

This fact is simple, but something I didn’t understand until I found triathlon. I used to run on fumes for days on end. I’m not talking about the drug induced insomnia that went on for weeks, I’m talking about clean and sober living. I would stay up late into the night watching TV, barely sleep and then work in the hot sun the entire next day. But my mind was chaotic. Everything around me felt like a drama playing on repeat. People got on my nerves, loneliness got me depressed, hot weather bothered me, cold weather bothered me. After a week of working I had to take Saturday to veg on the couch and watch drama on my TV all day while slinking in and out of sleep. I was miserable.

Then I found the beauty of rest and recovery. My recovery comes through various means, not just sleep. stretching, eating right, hydration. My rest comes through meditation, morning ritual, reading, writing, yoga, mixing up my widespread panic mix with some classical music, and yes sleep- when life allows it. With these I feel vibrant, without it I cave.

6) A CALENDAR ACTUALLY CREATES FREEDOM

Even if I didn’t have much going on, I felt as if I was strangled by time and responsibilities. Sometimes this caused immobility and recluse like behavior. I often felt like just giving up. I used to tell my ex-wife, “sometimes I just feel like running away.” She would ask, “where would you run to?” I never really had a reply because there was no where to run. The reason I needed to run was because my life was totally unmanageable. I had this thing to do, that thing to do and this thing and that thing and somewhere in between these things I was supposed to train and eat and make love. I started to go a little bit insane.

Then we made a calendar and it hasn’t been long, but I feel like I can breath. Not only do I have time to spend hours a day training, type articles on my blog, write a book, be a father, do errands, go to AA meetings and work on my health and wellness coaching business, but I don’t feel stressed while doing them. I don’t feel trapped by the next thing on the to-do list. I also feel like I have more free time. The last thing may be an illusion, but I feel like its truth.

In closing I just want to say that I knew all these things were essential to being a human being in society. I just never really understood how to apply them. Triathlon kind of forced me to my knees and made me either give up on the sport or develop new habits and new behaviors. I don’t know if I’ll do triathlon forever, but I do know I’ll keep these lessons dear to my heart and triathlon will always be a part of my spirit because of that.

PEACE.

A Note On Integrity Endurance Coaching

Not everyone should do a triathlon. It worked for me, but what worked for me doesn’t work for everyone. Maybe you already understand these tools. Maybe you understand them, but haven’t utilized them. The trick is to find a program that will help you to utilize these types of tools so that you not only become a stronger athlete, but a more efficient business person, coworker, student, family person etc and I can’t wait to help you find that niche! Schedule A consult NOW