Inspiration and Accountability

I love the atmosphere at races. Road races, trail races, bike races, GORUCK challenges, etc... There is just something about everyone being out together to do the same thing. And that is challenging themselves. And what is even cooler is that success is going to be different for every person that is there. For some it will be how fast they go, can they set a new PB (personal best), or it will be just finishing the race, regardless of time. It is a truly inspirational environment to be in. And that is why I think I am so obsessed with doing them and using races as my goal. Because of this, throughout the blog I am going to sprinkle random pictures from different races I have done in the past.

Some of my best memories and most enjoyable times have been at races. Now I’m not including the birth of my children or my wedding day into the equation. I’m just saying, I look back at all of the races I have done and I have great memories of those races. Whether I performed well or not. I can’t wait for COVID 19 to go away and for the race world to open again. 

 

But now, we will get into the title. Accountability and Inspiration. Now for some, these two words may not go together. But for me, they are inseparable. Finding the things that inspire me help to keep me accountable. Such as. . .races. Having that inspiration in my back pocket helps me stay on track or get back on track if I had a rough day. If I let that one bad day spiral into a bad week, bad month or a bad year it will prevent me from doing the things that inspire me. Kind of like my current predicament. But, we are going to move on from the negative and start looking forward at the positive.

So this blog, is something that is here to keep myself accountable but also inspires me. I will be blogging throughout this whole process. It doesn’t matter if I get back to old form 3 months from now or if it takes me 3 years. I will keep this going. There is a couple reasons for this.

1. I will put myself on blast if I screw up in order to keep myself accountable. (More on this in a few)

2. I will share my highs and lows. Hopefully there will be people that can relate to me and maybe it will help them through some of their own struggles.

3. I will share what is working and not working for me. Again, hopefully helping other people.

4. And finally, I will share my goals and successes with all of you. Maybe it will inspire someone. Maybe it won’t. But I was inspired by someone, so I owe it to someone out there to try and inspire them.

So what inspires me. I have some short term, mid term and long term goals. But what really inspires me is ultra marathons. There is something about going out to see how much suffering your body can take. It gives me goosebumps to talk about it. I have never been fast at running distance. I can actually sprint shorter distances pretty well, but that’s a conversation for another day. But, you want to know what I am good at? Even if you didn’t, I’m going to tell you. I’m good at taking punishment.  I can withstand a beating with the best of them. Just trudging forward at all costs. This gets me jacked up. But my absence from running the last 2 years has kind of pushed this goal a little further out. So in the meantime I set 2 short term goals for myself. First, run a virtual 5k the third week of June. And then run a trail 10k the third week of July. 

So I am going to close this out with holding myself accountable. Yesterday, May 13, 2020, was a shit day. And my anxiety went sideways on me because I was having such a lousy day. Well, while working through my shit day I made some poor food choices. But, I pulled myself together last night, prepped my lunch for today and got myself back on track. That’s a win in my books ladies and gentlemen. The Tom from the last 2 years would have let that nonsense unravel and turn into a week of poor food decisions. So that is it for today.  Stay healthy, find your happy, and seek  to inspire.