Adventures in Colorado



Notice where the step meets my body! 

 Start of the run, 8000 feet, finally hit peak to turn on trail....14,500 ft!  Distance to get there, 1 mile.  It was insane and brutal but of course I loved it.  Switchbacks for 6 miles down were crazy and could have been crazy fast except for the lack of oxygen in my lungs and severe dehydration setting in.  Less than 24 hours in Colorado and triple digit heat wave added to the challenge.







At the top

And the world seems a little better now that I got to go for a run with Craig again.



So very sad

Change of plans, wildfire broke out while we were on the mountain running.  We got out with hundreds of others and changed outline for the day!

Mountain biking through here, of course yet another adventure whenever I am involved.  Flat tire means a race back to vehicle to rescue Matt!

Well yes Craig I will bungee jump with you!

Royal Gorge Bridge. Highest suspension bridge

Amazing view and so beautiful.  Took ride to bottom of gorge and also cable car across the gorge.  Completely awestruck!

Blog: Life Lessons 70.3

LIFE LESSONS; To Be Continued

 Today as I crossed the finish line, earning the 70.3 title, I crossed it a wiser person than I had been at the start line.  This morning, waiting in my wave to head into the water, I was filled with fear and uncertainty.  If I was honest with myself at the lowest common denominator I was afraid of failing and in fact had verbalized this several times in the days leading up to today’s triathlon.  I am not sure how I could have defined failure, mostly it was a vague cloud hovering over me.  As I headed into the water this morning, the only thing I could think of is wondering what the hell I was doing there. 

I was given the gift of several lessons today though.  Or perhaps I re-learned the lessons. I was reminded of  what finishing and winning means, and also was reminded about who I am in this sport.  I have always been quick to point out that I am not a triathlete and  I am still uncertain about my ability to make it to the start of Ironman in September.  Ironically enough, my IM goal was sparked while running 220 km across Africa which should be an indication of what it is that I love to do, versus what I am doing. 

I waited at the start of the swim today, looking at the buoy’s  and although I am sure I had thoughts, I couldn’t tell you what they were.  Primal fear was the only emotion I can recall and I am sure any thoughts I had were related to the fear.  Let me be clear on how much I despise swimming and how completely uncomfortable I am with it. My swimming is always one step shy of desperation and completely miserable.  Most times I can settle into a somewhat calm feeling after the initial waves of panic.  Today I couldn’t find it and fought my swim and fear the entire way.  1.2 miles is a hell of a long way to fight and by the time I got out of the water I was exhausted. 

Coming out of the water, I had two thoughts.  First relief it was over and a sense of pride I had done it.  It wasn’t pretty but I did it. I was reassured by the thought that cycling would be easier, although I have also yet to have a great ride this year.  I have been plagued by an inability to find a fit that doesn’t result in screaming pain from my back all the way down my legs.  With a recent bike fit, and new components I was feeling confident today would be a better day on the bike.   Within 5 minutes on the bike I was filled with dread.  My back was hot with pain in the first few minutes and with 55.5 miles to go I realized there was a chance the finish line would not be in my future today. Looking back I am not sure how I managed to finish the bike, other than sheer stubbornness. A few weeks ago it was pointed out as a criticism that I was stubborn, and thankfully yes I am. I will admit that the pain was so bad that I literally spent miles crying on the bike. I had one driving thought the entire time and that was to get off my bike and just be done.   I am not sure I why I didn’t, why I stayed on. 

The two memories I will have of the ride is the pain and the rainstorm that popped up with winds that moved me sideways. It rained so hard it sounded like hail on my helmet.  I tucked in as far as I physically could at that point and I remember just laughing and thinking “well we do need the rain”.  The winds were strong enough I thought I was done as it blew me from one side of the road to the other.  I had about 2-3 miles left to go when the storm popped up.

I could hear thunder and see lightning and despite spending hours fighting the urge to get off the bike and quit, I felt desperate fear they would close the race down.  My immediate thought was that no matter what I was going to run my 13.1.  WHAT???  It was an automatic thought and even as I thought it I wondered why the hell I wouldn’t wish for them to close the course.  There is no more dignified way out than if you are not allowed to finish right? I wish I could explain it to you, because it doesn’t make sense to me either.  It didn’t make sense to me last month in Utah either when I had a chance to run the half marathon instead of the full.  For a brief moment I was overwhelmingly relieved at doing a shorter distance and then although it would have been so much easier in many ways, I realized that I was going to do the full no matter what it took. 

I do understand though, my physical urge to get off the bike and quit was just that.  A physical urge, disconnected from who and what I am.  Isn’t this true for anyone doing their own race, from a 5k to an Ironman.  Our bodies recruit our nerve endings, enlisting a relentless campaign to somehow stop the pain.  My finish line is really about the ability to override the constant battle. I imagine they will have to pull me from a course before I ever raise the white flag.  It has less to do with pride or stubbornness, and much more to do with knowing what it feels like to not be able to move my body. 

My second lesson today came on the last part of the race, the run.  It is no secret running is my love and it is what makes my world right many days.  Having made it through the swim and the bike and feeling more beat up than I ever remember, I came out of transition wondering how I would possibly run 13.1 miles.  My body was on fire, the pain and fatigue were overwhelming and despite my love of running, 13.1 seemed completely impossible.  I headed out onto the run and the first half mile is a solid uphill climb.  I was pretty sure I was not going to make it and yet like on the bike I also knew it was not an option to quit.  Ever.  One foot in front of the other, I kept going and watching people finish the run as I was just heading out which added to my defeat.  Adding to my misery I knew I had to do two loops, which is always a form of mental cruelty in my opinion.  Well-meaning volunteers would yell out encouraging words of “almost there” and I wanted to scream at them that I was just starting my $#@! run!   Thankfully words took too much energy at that point and I just kept moving. 

My epiphany came somewhere around the 6 mile mark.  Despite being on the course way longer than I had wanted to, despite the brutality of the first two events and despite the heaviness and fatigue in my entire body I realized I was loving the run.  The trails are home to me, I know every inch of them and I felt peaceful and happy being there.  Although it had been hours since I crossed the start line I felt happy.  I found myself thinking how great the day would be if it had been hours of running instead of having to do the other two events first. 

I have wondered if I would be one of the people who stood in line to get a spot in IM 2013 when I get to Madison this year.  I figured I would know when the time got here, and maybe I still will.  I realized today however that although I have unbelievable pride in my ability to not quit today, I am really not a triathlete.  I am a runner who is registered for a triathlon.  I came out of the first two events so defeated and tired.  Yet, still I can say with all honesty that even in the pain of the run I didn’t battle once with the thought of quitting, nor did I curse the run as I did the entire bike and swim.  This will be my summer to have an affair with the triathlon world but in the end I have no doubt running will remain my true love.  The Dr. Suess quote "be who you are" comes to mind and I am proud to be a stubborn runner.  Perhaps I will evolve over the year to feeling like a triathlete, but I have a difficult time imagining the peace and joy I did today when I finally got to run.  I am determined to finish what I started and will march toward the start of Ironman Wisconsin, yet in my heart I will get through the first part so I can do the best part.  

So many moments brought tears to my eyes and I walk away today, proud of finishing.  I am aware I still have many obstacles in getting to the IM start line in September, and I am grateful for today’s lessons.  I was brought to this journey by them, by women like me and by the fight to the finish line.   I am grateful in ways no words can explain for every moment of today and I carried several ladies with me reminding me that to be able to fight is the greatest gift we are given. 

Blog: Capture the Moments of Life

Olympic Stadium Beijing~Family wanted his picture with the "blonde"

The moments of life speed by and at some age, seem to gain momentum.  Some days gain the momentum of a downhill slide, careening out of control.  Today was another one of those days and after a day that stretched too long, I got home and spent an hour playing with my dogs in the back yard. Watching the sunset, I found myself letting go and forgetting the day.  I had not even taken the  time to change out of my work clothes and running around the yard barefoot, laughing at the playful antics of my dogs, I didn’t care.  I grabbed my camera, laid in the grass taking pictures of the dogs with an amazing sunset in the background, and forgot I was still dressed up. 

Most days I spend listening, coaching, counseling, and sometimes challenging people who want to make changes but don’t always want to have to make those changes.  I am passionate about my work and  grateful I get to do it.  I am lucky to be a part of the process as people experience amazing life changes.  However as much as I love what I do, by the end of the day I feel as though I need refuge. I live in a world where every part of it has grabbed for a chunk of me my energy and spirit is often drained.

Taking pictures of the sunset, playing silly games with my dogs, I forget everything else, my brain slows down and I lose my edge.  I couldn’t tell you what my list has on it and what I should be doing.  I simply smile, laugh and play and feel love as they unselfishly give to me with their own natural ability to be in the moment with me.  

Embracing the moment is challenging for me, and it does not come natural.  Often as I race through my days I check myself realizing I am not in my moment, I spend a lot of time fast forwarding or reviewing the tapes from the last game. It’s a little dance I play in my overloaded life, this mental tug of war. Experiencing the moment and tugging myself back to it again and again.

Last week  I tucked in tight on my bike and allowed gravity and a hill to do what it does. I watched my speedometer hit 35 mph and felt the amazing thrill of the moment.  There are times when the moment is so powerful it is impossible to go elsewhere.  Freefalling at 120 mph, in those moments before you pull for your chute, the moment cannot be ignored. Jumping off a platform attached by a rubber band, feeling the thrill of weightlessness in space. Those experiences are too strong to allow the moment to escape and those experiences make being in the moment easy. But what about the moments every day.  Last night laying in grass playing with my dogs and feeling filled by the beauty of my surroundings and my experience, I remembered the most important truth.

This moment will never come again and I have lived long enough experienced life enough to know the moments can be gone in an instant.  I get  this one section of time and when I am in the past or future moments I am cheating myself and also honest enough to admit often trying to escape myself.  In the pain of self-expectation I destroy the chance to do what I am truly supposed to be doing which is to just be.

Although it likely was not intended as a statement of self reflection Nelson Mandela once said  “If you want to make peace with your enemy,
you have to work with your enemy. Then he becomes your partner.”   When I read this I think of the enemy as myself.  It is my expectations, my fear, my ability to hover over the timeline of my life with a magnifier, second guessing and predicting. My enemy is the judgmental critic  with anger and blame, fear and shame, and a need to push beyond what I would expect of anyone else.  It is the place in me that guards against vulnerability, demanding adherence to a standard I have not yet found the author of.

A few days ago, someone said to me “You are so stubborn”.  It was not meant  as a compliment.  My immediate response was “So what? It’s one of my best traits”. 

It is also my enemy at times, and just as all of carry our greatest strengths in the same hand we carry our greatest weakness. I accept that I will never be satisfied on a large scale and not only do I accept this, I embrace it.  In satisfaction I find complacency which is dangerous.  I am reminded while running in the grass with my dogs or feeling the wind in my face downhill, that fulfillment is a different thing.  It is lasting and but only found in the moment.   In my moments of love and laughter, tears, beauty and life I am grateful for being able to embrace the moment.

Blog: Your Smile

“Because of your smile, you make life more beautiful.”

Thich Nhat Hanh To my mom who is the most beautiful and giving person I know.  You are the kindest and most giving person I know and I am touched by it and inspired by you every day.  I hope to be the love and gentleness you show the world.  Flower shopping Mom, lets take the Jeep! Shopping for flowers, you putting up with my craziness....black thunderclouds and I decide to take my Jeep and a dog.  It's never boring with me anyway.....thank you for laughing and loving it, it will forever be one of my favorite days!!!

Pictures from kerrie

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Ready to Run~

Face Your Barracuda

I spend a lot of time talking about fear, other people’s fear, mostly. It comes with my occupation and it is often our greatest motivator and our greatest barrier.

If you ask people why they feel fear in the absence of actual danger, their answers are usually related to past experiences, rejection, failure, judgement, and a whole list of negative emotions and thoughts. I call these the easy answers, they are used so often they have almost become cliches. I was recently in a professional setting and another therapist commented on how a client was not growing because of fear of change.  The tone of the therapist was just shy of condecending which angered me as much as his comment.  No kidding the client is afraid of change, welcome to the human race.  Anyone who says they are not is either not being fully honest, or numb.  Good or bad, change provokes fear.  However we live in a therapy culture where statements like this have become cliched and when they are spoken, people nod their head knowingly.  I think our fear is more than the tired statements which are easy to accept.  

When I feel fear, after I am done reacting with the full intensity of my personality, I try to figure out what it is that I am afraid of. It sounds like a healthy trait and it is, however if I am being completely honest, I despise something else having control over me. Which is the basic truth behind my tendency to tackle fear head on. I can also be guilty of coming up with the easy answers at times,  but when I challenge myself to dig through the  deeper and real layers, the common demoninator is almost always about me.  I find myself innately worried and afraid that  that I am not good enough, or perhaps I don't belong anywhere or somehow someone will see who I really am and that part of me will be exposed. Keep in mind this is not a rational process, it has the emotional intensity of a tropical storm although this is not visible from the outside.

The center stage for my fear these days has

Being Real

"Real isn't how you are made", said the Skin Horse.  "It's a thing that happens to you.  When a child loves you for a long, long time not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?"  

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse for he was always truthful.  "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."  

The Velveteen Rabbit

Kerrie.Mexico2012

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Grace

On a daily basis my job is to listen to people ask painful questions about their value, their worth, their purpose. I am no different, I ask myself the same questions.  I wonder sometimes how vulnerable and authentic I really have the ability to be.  On stage teaching a fitness class, in front of a room of students with my curriculum ready, or in a therapy session  connecting with someone, I can choose my vulnerability carefully, selecting it with caution.

As someone who spends her life and if fact makes it part of my mission statement to connect with others and help them reach beyond their safe zone, how vulnerable can I be?

I am a complicated person and my life has few linear lines.  My life is messy and chaotic, split in too many directions, none of which I could imagine giving up.  For those who know me, I am sure the revelation that I wanted to be at least ten different things comes as no surprise.  An avid reader from early childhood, I explored amazing worlds through books which sparked my interest and curiosity.

Early in life I knew what I wanted to be, I just couldn’t decide because the list was too long.  I wanted to ride horses, and be a cowgirl dancer.  I wanted to work in the rodeo but maybe work for the FBI.  I would  be an archaeologist and a lawyer, but then again I really dreamed of being a writer or maybe an artist.  I wanted to travel the world, be beautiful and graceful and when I was really old, at least 30, I would get married and maybe have children.

The world of books and my naturally creative mind gave me dreams, but the world of reality gave me something much different.  In fact if I am to tell the complete truth, by the age of 6 some of those dreams had already been shattered.  I lived in a world in which a college education was a farfetched dream and to finish high school was a big deal. My world didn’t have time for nurturing dreams and creativity, it was one of survival, chaos, and violence.   Even as I write these words I start to squirm because this feels somehow a bit too authentic and vulnerable.  I have an avid aversion to ever sounding like anything from a daytime talk show and when others share their stories in a public way, I find myself fighting the contempt of judgment. So I have always hugged the other end of the continuum, not  talking about it at all.

 I was thankfully blessed with stubbornness and grit which has helped and hurt me in life.  In a fairy tale world, these traits would have given me a happy ending and I would have beaten the odds and lived happily ever.  I didn’t get the fairy tale, my story was a different kind of book .

By the age of 15 I decided if I were to survive I needed to move out of my home.  What followed was an initial attempt to stay in high school and pay rent. Finally needing to decide between dropping out of school or working as a way to stay on my own, I sealed my fate for the next few years.  I had always been an above average student and although already in an alternative school by that time, I continued to get straight A’s and loved to learn.  Because of this walking out of school with my withdrawal papers was a painful and shameful experience.

It becomes difficult when you are anchored with shame to live a purposeful  life or to live a life of value.  Within a year I had made choices that would alter the course of my entire life.  At 17 I had moved to a foreign country, was engaged to a man 9 years older than I and had no direction or purpose of my own.  Fear of my future with him allowed me to briefly call off the engagement,  but it lasted only as long as a persuasive phone call from him.  We were married one month later, I was less than a month over 18.  The clichés’ could not be more painful when I describe my wedding night.  I watched him get drunk with his friends from the base and tell me that I hadn’t looked as  fat  as normal.  I was 1500 miles away from any family or friends, it was  before cell phones and accessible internet or email, and I was horrifyingly stuck.  I find myself wanting to back away from the vulnerability I feel   when I describe the utter despair I felt.  For months with no phone, no car, no job and no high school diploma watching him leave for work every day I  wondered what I would do to get through the day and what my future was.  I am not proud of the way I escaped, lying to an elderly man to get Greyhound bus fare, telling him my mom was sick.  Promising to pay it back knowing I would never see him or step foot in that bayou again, I added to my list of shame.  Many events followed including a near terminal illness, a hospital stay which meant my then husband found where I was living and many other events that come with living a life of  hopelessness.  Through it all I found myself returning to the little dreams that would be my big dreams.  A GED,  a divorce, a place of my own where I wasn’t afraid, a home that I could call my own.    

When people ask about my marathons and races, the questions that seem to be the most common are how and where does it come from.  People are genuinely curious about the desire to push to limits. They seem to hope for a simple answer that will give them  the formula  to replicate some aspect of it.  I don’t ever have a good answer for the question often wishing myself for the answer.

I can only  guess and  those answers are likely to change by tomorrow. My best guess is this. I know that my mistakes in life have shown me exactly who I do not want to be.  I know that when I allow myself to be totally and completely, vulnerable, authentic, connected and genuine I somehow feel better despite my urge to cover my emotional nakedness.

I know that the stubbornness, defiance, resilience and determination I have are not things I get to claim.  I have them by grace and my moments of defining decisions in life have fine-tuned them. I have  at times hurt myself and others with them.

There are times when I experience flashes of clarity and joy.  I have learned to celebrate and cherish these moments and know that when they come there is a message I need to listen to.  I had a moment yesterday when  I pulled in to my driveway after too many hours of work especially for a  Saturday.  Chronically tired these days and overwhelmed with a list which grows bigger every day I felt drained. But as I pulled in I felt a tug from the past.  That scared,  hopeless and homeless kid, the one without a diploma, stuck in a no win world, tapped my shoulder and reminded me that as tired as I am , I am a long way from my roots.  She reminded me that I am tired from a long day of working at my own damn agency.   She reminded me that I have been this tired before. The fighting that got me here is the reason that I am the first person in my family to go to college, that I was the first to even get a GED.  She reminded me that the house I was pulling into with its beautiful country view, wide open space and three amazing dogs waiting for me, was better than the homelessness of my early years.  She reminded me that with bad odds I have raced through China and Africa and half the United States.   I am so much more than my early years promised and so much more that 15 year old walking out of high school for the last time filled with shame.

I sat in my driveway with tears running down my face and wondered how the hell I had made it here and why ?  I thought of the woman I met with earlier in the week who talked about the other women who have it all together and how she feels so inadequate. 

My headfirst dive into vulnerability in writing this is to be as real and authentic as I can be and to honor the process I encourage others to take every day.  The people around you don’t have it together , sometimes they just have a better cover.  I will forever be that homeless vagabond kid, fighting the shame of being a dropout and a life of  poor choices.   I hear the voice so many others hear asking “who do you think you are?” challenging my dream of being loved, being accepted and being good enough.

I hear this voice when I dream of what I want.  I want someone to cherish me and to be loved fiercely and passionately.  I want that one certain person to fall head over heels for me, just the way I am.  I want to feel the certainty of knowing I am  good enough when my dogs come running and are overjoyed to see me. I want to connect with others and  share moments and feel the peace of acceptance.  I want to exist with grace and to live each day judgment.   I want to be daring enough to show the real me, with my scars and my shame.  In my risk to be fully authentic  I want to find love and peace and connection.  And I want to know that I didn’t put on a shiny cover, and that in that act I allowed someone else to find the peace that comes with being as authentic as you can be.

Blog~Grace and growing up

Serendipity and Friendship

My Letter to Craig

Don’t you wish you knew ahead of time the moment’s that were about to change your life?  Not the bad things of course, just the good ones.  The moments which seem to fall into the category of random or chance and later you realize that although you were minding your own business, by chance something amazing had just happened.  The problem with these moments of serendipity is they are almost always seen in retrospect and rarely apparent in the moment. It is one of those moments that I look back on and wish I had been able to appreciate the significance of the exact moment I was about to gain an amazing friend.

On a Monday morning more than four years ago, you walked into my Core class at the gym.  You looked familiar, and I made the connection to the café casually mentioning it after class as I was packing up my things.

I really can’t describe our relationship from that moment on, mostly because it feels as though we have always been friends.  I recall the moment we met, but struggle to imagine a time when you were not in my life. There wasn’t a moment we decided to be friends or evaluated our fit, you were there and we just were.  You seemed to fit effortlessly into my life despite our major life differences which should have made it challenging.  Over the past few years our lives have connected so thoroughly, we have too many mutual friends to count, and so many shared experiences that the reminders are everywhere.  From the paint on my walls, the millions of words we have shared, to the trails I run, and the love you have for my dogs, there is not a part of me you have not touched.  As I said good bye to you today, I made it just inside the house before I sat on the floor and  cried so hard my body hurt.  I cried until the pain in my head forced me to move although the pain in my heart was still overwhelming and suffocating.

You are a once in a lifetime friend, and even though this hurts so much more than I imagined, I am so very grateful to have you as a friend.  I realize as you pack a truck and move across the country that I won’t lose your friendship, but I will lose so much in your companionship and the special gift of comfort, love, laughter, sharing and joy you give to me.

You have added to my life in a way I never dreamed possible.  Memories have been flooding my head and heart over the last few days since you decided to move and I have cried a hundred times.  My tears are selfish, I don’t want to feel this loss and don’t want you to be so far away. It is my own need for what you give in friendship  that makes me wish you had turned down the job and stayed. My running routes will never be the same and when I finally bullied you off the treadmill to cautiously try running outside, you quickly outran me in a way I predicted immediately. Your running addiction rivals mine.  I drove past Millie’s tonight and started to cry remembering our breakfast, shivering in our wet running clothes and your look of horror at the tiny pancakes that came with your breakfast.  I cry as I remember the love you gave Annabelle in those rides down to Madison for chemo and how you showed up at 5:00 am on those Monday's as a friend to make the trip, giving her hugs and kisses all the way.  I remember telling you after my last surgery that you had to stop bringing daily bakery plates, and how our Sunday morning runs became walks and then walk/runs as I worked at healing .  I think of all of the times that without production you were simply and quietly there for me, often before I even knew it or knew I needed it.  I laugh when I think of trying to convince you to go camping and your horror in the lack of toilet facilities.  How many times have I told you what a diva you are!  I can’t stand the thought of summer without the things we do together. Of not being able to see you at the gym, go for a run, have dinner, sit for hours talking and share the  beauty and comfort of a friendship and connection. 

What will I do without you? The hole you will leave will be impossible to fill and at this moment it seems at though the pain will be infinite. I know I am asking the same question that many others are asking. I watched tonight how many people were moved to tears by the thought of you leaving and how they couldn’t form words because they were too choked up. I witnessed the love so many  other’s have for you and how much you touch each person you meet. You are a once in a lifetime friend not just to me, but to many. You are an amazing man and I wondered today if I have been the same kind of friend to you, and if I have given you the same things you have given me.

In your absence, I am going to send you messages when I think of the things that remind me of all the shared memories. I will tell you the sadness I feel when I am wishing you were  here,  and the smiles when I remember the good times.  I will send these not to cause pain or guilt, but so you are reminded how deeply you are missed and how much you are a part of my life.

My emotional intensity has never been subtle and I do not seem to have a neutral zone in me.  I am terrible at being vulnerable, more likely to threaten to punch someone in the face than show weakness.  I love as passionately as I fight and I am cautious when letting people into my life.  Without quite knowing how it happened you became such an integral part of my life that I have no defenses. Today, saying goodbye I cried openly and felt the loss so deep it was overwhelming. I love you my friend and  my pain is a testament to the amazing man you are.  

The last year of my life has been a test of my strength on so many levels and in an effort to recover and to maintain my equilibrium I have had to work more hours than humanly possible and have lost precious moments.  In retrospect of course I wish I could have spent more time with you and although I know I have been doing what I need to do, I still wish we could have spent more time together. 

Thank you for walking into my class and my life and for being an amazing man and my best friend.  Thank you for sharing so many amazing moments with me and for being so genuine and real.  I have such gratitude for you and I am reminded frequently that I can only hope to be the kind of friend you are.   You have some challenges in your life right now that will be life altering and I hope I will be the kind of friend you have been to me.  I am grateful more than you know that you have a partner to share this journey with you and to share the adventure with. As you head out to your new home and begin your new life, trust yourself.  You are one of the truest people I know.

2012 ~Back to the Start

The year 2012 is just around the corner and in a few days a large number of people will make a resolution, promising some kind of change.  Most will be changes they have thought of hundreds of time, maybe promised before and perhaps behaviors that have been pointed out by others or suggested by a health care professional.  They gym will be packed with all of these newly dedicated people, overdoing it and trying to lose all the weight and get in shape  in the first three days. 

I don’t usually make NY resolutions, I don’t believe in using one date out of the year to make changes.  As a health professional I find the idea of focusing one week a year on growth and goals crazy. Why aren’t we doing this every week?   I often point out to my clients that they generally spend more time planning their vacations and picking out a car than on their personal goals. 

My best thinking happens while I am running, and often by the time I get home from a run I am overflowing with ideas, goals, plans, people I want to talk to, articles I want to write, things I want to create.  I lose some of them in the transition of rushing to shower and getting out the door, but the big ones I keep long enough to talk into my phone on my way to work.

2012 will be one of my biggest challenges and one I have been thinking about often the last few weeks.  As January 1^st approaches, I will be once again starting to train for Ironman Wisconsin.  Déjà, I was here last year.  I am now $1200 into registration for a race I have not done, and one I am quite sure I don’t have a chance in hell of completing.  “What the hell am I thinking?” is the recurring thought that keeps looping through my head.  I am not strong enough, not conditioned enough and not sure I am able to fight hard enough.  I can’t swim, yes I said can’t.  The furthest I have ever swam is a quarter mile, the last time I was able to ride seriously I needed help getting off my bike because once bent I couldn’t straighten on my own.  My running mileage total this year is the same as one month last year!  Again what the hell am I thinking? 

I know and I believe beyond any doubt that I cannot do this.   Yet as I organize my planner for 2012, my training plan is in there and along with everything else I have in my life I will begin the process.  This year, unlike last year I don’t even have an endurance base to build from so starting from scratch takes on a whole new meaning.   

Mapping out my calendar, my first week of January looks like this.  Teach at the college two days, work at my clinic 4 days, work at the EAP office 2 days, work at Gold’s 4 days, 3 social engagements, 2 little boys at home that are more exhausting than all those things combined, 3 dogs that I love to spend time with….and somewhere in there did I mention I need to start training for a race I am sure I can’t do.  I am convinced I am on the wrong side of the desk in the therapy department.

I have been here before though and know that what I can’t see today does not mean the same thing as impossible.  I know that what I am not capable of today, is not a life sentence and that God willing I will get to the starting line and God willing I will be upright crossing the finish line.  When I was weeks from leaving for Africa and so sure I could not possibly do this I reached out to someone who had been a huge support and has wisdom beyond human capabilities.  Ray Zahab is an amazing man who has an amazing spirit.  He said all the right things and he was completely right in this prediction.  He told me at the start of the race I would be too scared to breathe, and in the middle of the race I would wonder what the hell I was doing t here.  But there would be moments where I would look around and realize the beauty of them moment and be amazed that I was. He said at the end when I crossed the finish line it would be the best feeling in the world and in moments I would start to plan my next race.  He was right.  Knowing this I will not make resolutions, rather I will focus on results. And when the negative thoughts, doubts and fears take up residence in my brain I will know they are there, and know that despite my efforts to quiet them they will return a hundred times.  But they won’t stop me from training and they won’t stop me from putting it out there on the calendar.  2012 I will focus on results instead of resolutions and when I am afraid I will focus on faith and get out there anyway.  I will take all my fears and doubts to the starting line, knowing I will leave them out there on the course, to be replaced by gratitude and grace. 

Where are you Christmas?

"Where Are You Christmas"

Where are you Christmas
Why can't I find you
Why have you gone away

Where is the laughter
You used to bring me
Why can't I hear music play

My world is changing
I'm rearranging
Does that mean Christmas changes too

Where are you Christmas
Do you remember
The one you used to know
I'm not the same one
See what the time's done
Is that why you have let me go

Three days before Christmas, driving home, I listened to Faith Hill sing these words. Its been one of my favorite Christmas songs since I first saw The Grinch. I was tired in a way that can only be from days that are too long and stress that is too much.  I felt the lump in my throat and my chest start to tighten and without the energy to fight it I cried most of the way home. It has been such a crazy year of crazy. I thought about my world and truly how much everything was rearranging.  Last year at this time I had a plan mapped out and my goals were laid out in front of me.  Yet despite my plans so much had changed that I barely recognized my own life some days.  Physcially, I am fighting back again from another surgery that I hadn’t expected.  I am a foster mother to a 4 and 7 year old set of boys with special needs, 9 months into this “couple months” placement with no clear ending in sight.  My workload is busier than it has ever been and balance is a getting more than five hours sleep a night.  I lost my dog, people have left my life and some days I am not sure where I belong in my own life.  I have friends I am too tired to call, and despite my faith, church has become something I do if there is time left over.   I am drained and empty, having giving everything to everyone else during the course of the day, and as I fall into bed I count the scarcity of the hours until the alarm goes off.  I could get a bit more sleep if I skipped my morning run, but in the complete darkness running with Ellie before work, I can believe there is a me in there somewhere.  

Christmas has always been an emotionally chaotic time for me, sometimes high and sometimes low.  I didn’t embrace the season and it’s celebrations until I was well into adulthood and it took several decades of seeking my own meaning and celebrations to find joy and peace in it. It was a hard fought battle to let go of what my Christmas had been as a child and intentionally make a decision to live it with a different meaning.  This was most challenging when my dad died nine days before Christmas in 2005, but I held onto the meaning of the season, the connection, the love that people share a bit more openly this time of the year.                            

Except this year, I couldn’t seem to find it. This year I was so overwhelmed with the changes in my life, the uncertainty and the fight that I felt numb and empty. Along with those painful feelings I retained just enough awareness to be angry that I couldn’t quite get there even though I wanted to.  I sometimes remind myself that even Mother Teresa questioned her faith at times, and  it comforts me on a rational level, but it does not quiet the emotional hurricane that sweeps through me in times of struggle.

Moments and Peace

MY MOMENTS, MY QUESTIONS, MY PEACE

The past six months have been a whirlwind of frantic days, increasing workload and a sense of losing any grasp of order in my life.  A short term placement of two little boys which happened on the heels of my unexpected surgery, took my already chaotic life to a new level of insanity. The past month has been even more hectic and my long days even longer.  These days the moments of sanity I manage to get are infrequent. They typically come when I am doing one of the things I love most, teaching fitness, coaching, or running and training. 

When I was training for Africa, running 135 miles a week, working long hours and juggling life, there were plenty of nights I drove home and spent the twenty minutes crying. I wasn’t crying about anything in particular, it was a pure release of complete exhaustion.                            

Lately, most days I am a bit closer to that than I am comfortable with. I continuously remind myself of the big picture and that despite my questions I need to rely on God’s plan. Some days this works and other’s I have to just try to run it away.

Last weekend I headed out for a run with Ellie.  Ellie is so many things to me, but of all the things she gives me, a running partner tops the list.  Maggie at 7 months is still too young to run and Tanner at age 12 is just too tired.  Aside from her energy which reminds me of a Tasmanian devil, Ellie has been my security blanket as I eased back into running after surgery.  She is the presence that keeps me feeling confident when I am a few miles from home, safe on the trails, and present when I could be feeling alone.  My brief but frightening stalker from last year no longer worries me as much and the doubt of getting back home from the run is less daunting. Within a week of her joining my life this year, the sound of the leash brings her running and literally dancing at my feet. Our routine was established almost immediately and the sight of me grabbing my running shorts sends her into frenzy.

As I headed out with Ellie this last week, I was irritable, anxious and stressed.  My weekend had no less than six social engagements, two little boys that were going to be bat crazy after a home visit with their mom and more paperwork waiting for me than I can do in a month. On top of all that, it was 30 degrees and raining. I absolutely love running in the summer rain and will do a go out of my way to run on a warm rainy day.  Winter rain is different and I tend to find it miserable and painful.  But Ellie had too much energy and I couldn’t stand the thought of the treadmill.  Because of the rain and temperatures I decided to drive to the start of the trail, seeking out the protection of the woods.  I got dressed and grabbed a leash, and Ellie who doesn’t care for the rain at all, was so excited she could barely sit still in the Jeep.  My obligations the last two weeks have affected some of our runs so she had way too much energy.  We got to the trails and I was surprised to see how muddy they were.  In the insulation of my office and work from pre-dawn to late evenings I had forgotten how much rain we had this week. We took off and I didn’t even bother dodging puddles as we wound through the woods.  We were a bit more protected in the shelter of the trees but not so much that it kept us dry.  I had just barely an hour to run and although I wasn’t really measuring distance, I turned on my GPS anyway.  As I warmed up and we ran the familiar ground, I found myself allowing Ellie a few more stops to explore the smells and explore, and eventually I turned off my GPS.  I lost interest in my pace and distance, and when Ellie’s attention wandered to the side of the trail I stopped more than usual.  I walked up the hills, stopped fighting my heart rate and gravity, and allowed Ellie to set the pace. We slowed for sticks and sprinted for squirrels and listened to noises. We were splattered from head to toe in mud, soaking wet and had to entire trail to ourselves. When I finally looked at my watch I realized we had been running for 90 minutes.  I was well past my schedule and yet knowing how tight my schedule was, didn’t pick up my pace and even took a small detour to allow Ellie to sniff the shore of a pond. I was reluctant to end the run and felt unsettled.

It took a few minutes to figure out what I was feeling and I realized it was sadness at ending our morning out there.  I wanted to stay in that place all day and just meander through the mud and the rain. I wanted to capture the moment and the contentment I had found in the rain and mud.  I felt physical tightness in my throat and chest as I finally turned around and headed in.  Ellie must have been feeling the same things I was. Normally after that long on the trails, she is ready to drink some water and get her post run snack.  Not this morning though.  As I toweled off her muddy legs, she kept pulling against me trying to head back toward the trail.  She kept looking at me and I knew she could likely sense how much I wanted to go too.  She and I shared our usual banana on the way home and I thought about the difference in this morning’s run. 

I am not sure I can explain in any way that does it justice. I know this though. I spend every hour of every day trying to achieve, to be better, to do well, to be a good person, to help others.  I spend the hours of my life asking questions, of myself, my life, my faith, my past, my future and  of others.  I live in a state of relentless drive, to propel myself forward in a universe filled with the pull of gravity.  I am never far from the street kid, homeless half my life and living on my own at fifteen, proving to the world that she would not allow her past to be her future. 

In the woods, with Ellie none of those things matter and I am the closest I can be to letting go. It doesn’t matter who I was then, and the fear  goes away.  Ellie, who was so badly beaten she was blinded, trap marks around her backside and so scared of strangers she pees herself, lives in the moment.  In her presence, she gives me a beautiful gift, because I am able to do the same.  I find peace in the moments, silence in my questions and a wisdom that is more intuitive than intellectual.  This amazing four legged girl, so badly treated by others, can love the moment, living in just the smells, the trails, the run. With her along side me, I am at least content knowing my futile attempts at controlling my world can rest for a moment. A fairly popular sticker reads “Who Rescued Who” and there is no doubt in my mind she rescues me, moment by moment, day by day. Defined by too many roles, tugged at by too many people and fighting with too many demons, I lose sight of the battles on our runs. She turns and looks up at me with her blind eye squinting against the rain and her tongue hanging out, and she is a reminder of the love and loyalty in my life and that I get to do this.  For the moment I find peace and the moment gets me through another day.

My Buddies