A little Update!

Update.

3 years ago today I asked Erin to be my wife. We were standing there watching the planes take-off and land at the airport… actually watching my parents plane take off on their way to Massachusetts. I actually didn’t really have a plan. Typically how I do things. Not really that I didn’t have a plan… or want to have a plan… but like many other areas or situations in my life I wanted it to be so nice and so perfect that I gave up even trying for fear of not succeeding. So I just went ahead and kept the ring on me… and figured an opportunity might present itself. It did. And it was a cool/cute/hilarious story. Anyway… you really just never know how life is going to turn out. One thing that is for sure… God is good and he definitely provides. I asked Erin to marry me before I even had a job! We were both in school and looking back I would have told myself it was a bit too early because finances were tough for a while. But I think it set us up to be very financially responsible now and we learned some good lessons. Sometimes you wish you had a crystal ball to show you exactly how things are going to turn out to make sure your ready. Unfortunately or maybe fortunately?... we don’t. So we gotta be ready for anything. Life is an adventure. You wake up and just gotta face what comes at you. You just never know. We never knew that for the better part of our first two years of marriage we would be dealing with some incredibly difficult issues that NOBODY wants to have to deal with in the honeymoon phase. Life if supposed to be fun, spontaneous and exciting during this point… not dark, boring and emotional. I would bet Erin didn’t really want to have to deal with this. And she has. Which is why I love her and know without a shadow of a doubt… she’s the one. Many women in today’s world would have left me a LONG time ago. Not Erin. She is amazing. The good thing is… life is turning around. We had a nice date-day on Saturday where we went to Williamsburg and we(Erin) hit the outlets. I will say… I was a well behaved husband and took advantage of the beautiful sunny day and gratefully sat on the benches and got a nice tan and never complained once! We had a fantastic dinner at Food For Thought. Neither of us had ever been there before and after an hour wait… it turned out to be totally worth it. Freaking delicious! Sunday we went to a beautiful wedding at the Founders Inn. And thank goodness we found a TV that had the Masters on! Got to enjoy the wedding, and see Bubba win… GREAT DAY. However I think the best part about the day was the relationships we got to develop. The couple getting marries lives in the Condo unit directly behind us and we go to church together. We are all part of a newly/nearly married Life Group at church and a few of the other couples were invited to the wedding as well and building these new relationships with other couples in the same phase of life as us, has been hugely beneficial and we absolutely adore these new friends. Sunday was a good day. Saturday was a good day.

Friday? Hahah well… Friday was a good day to… except for softball really sucked. First of all we lost both games by the slaughter rule… secondly… I just did not have fun! I forgot how much I don’t like baseball/softball. I am not 100% sure im going to keep playing… we have enough people on the team that we had to rotate each inning, and for both games we had enough people to create 2 batting line ups. Not fun… and not trying to give up my Friday nights for the next 9 weeks.

But… all that to be said… Life if getting much better. I am learning and putting into practice many good lessons. First of all… I have learned that it is hard to really love others, when you don’t love yourself. So I have been actively trying to “love myself” and keep postitive thoughts, and it is actually working as I feel like I am finding it much easier to love others. I’m enjoying my workouts again, enjoying my food, enjoying church, enjoying my friends and stuff Erin and I have been doing. I have also been dreaming a lot lately. Not the dreams that you have while you are sleeping, but dreaming about things I want to achieve. Dreaming about potential. Dreaming about life and pursuit of happiness. Had an interesting “conversation” with someone I look up to very much recently and it has really got me thinking about things. Cant really go into too many details on this one just yet. But as much as I have enjoyed the hopes and dreams I am also remembering to live, love and take in the present and enjoy Today without worrying too much about tomorrow.

So ya everything is good and I am looking forward to this new phase of me that is starting to show signs of life.

And of course happy “engangement” anniversary to my lovely wife J

Life is Good

Life is Good.

Those t-shirts are so corny yet so awesome. They typically feature a little stick figure person enjoying some form of leisure (usually in the simplest form)  with a big smile on its face. Life is Good, and that’s how it’s supposed to be.

Life is good. Or atleast I can say life is BECOMING good. This has been a great week. I have been trying to incorporate many changes into my life all for the better and all of them are small little tests and challenges I am making to try and see if I cant start to overcome and curb things that cause major anxiety or stress. Here are the main areas I have been focusing on this week.

1.       SLEEP! Newsflash for those who don’t know me… I am THE morning person. I love mornings… the earlier the better. Previously my alarm used to be set around 4:30 and to be honest I rarely made it to my alarm. I love getting up when its dark outside. I love taking walks before the sun comes up in the real true dead of night. I don’t know why. I read in a book recently that some people enjoy it because they (I totally fall into this category) are extremely productive in the wee hours. The reasoning behind this was interesting. When you get up that early… its quiet… you know pretty much for certain you wont be getting phone calls, emails, texts, or anything that may disrupt a certain task. The interesting point the author made was it seems like waking up early allows you to take advantage of having the maximum amount of self-esteem before anything else has a chance of getting up and beating you down. Work isn’t nagging you yet, family issues, drama, friend problems…. They are all still sleeping. I found this to be true. I am fresh, awake, clear-minded, and focused in the mornings. However this poses a major challenge by about 8pm when I am DONE and ready to sleep. Its difficult to get up that early and stay awake until 11 or so. So all that say…  I have switched my alarm to 5:30 (latest possible to where I can get every thing that needs to be done) and force myself to stay in bed as long as I can. Some mornings this is tough. Minutes creep like hours between 430 and 530 when I can only manage to fall back asleep for 10 min at a time. BUT I AM TRYING. And to be honest it feels great. I do miss my morning walks, and still take one from time to time, but the extra hour of sleep albeit.. only an hour… I notice a major difference.

2.       DIET! YES I EAT FOOD! And lots more of and I am really starting to bring in some variety. Previously I was literally eating ONLY chicken, broccoli, green beans, eggs, protein powder, and strawberries with dinner. Now I still have my major hang ups with certain foods. Sugar…unless its nature form (fruits/veggies) is still something I do not believe is a necessary part of anyone’s diet. I still avoid gluten/simple carbs as much as I can and try and get my carbs from the good healthy variety (again fruits and veggies). But still I have been bringing in many more forms of fruit and added back my greek yogurt from time to time. I eat oatmeal again which I must say is delicious and I have missed it. Besides bringing back foods into my diet I am also trying to get rid of all the junk I eat. Also… if you haven’t tried the PB2 peanut butter stuff… its amazing. I mix a huge dish with my dinner fruits and eat the crap out of it.  What I mean by junk is all the artificial sweeteners and artificial flavor enhancers and stuff. I have depended on those such things SO HEAVILY in my previous quest to get the most flavor/taste for the least calories. Splenda and all those artificial things are one of the leading causes of depression and anxiety….HMMMMMM connection? So all in all I’m just trying to get rid of the fake stuff and incorporate a nice balanced whole foods approach. The other night a made a quiche that was so freaking delicious I ate the entire thing. A 9” pie baking dish… destroyed. Eggs, veggies, my soy cheese, and a grapefruit… probably the best meal I’ve eaten in a long time.

3.       WATER! Yes how simple is that! I used to track my water and liquid intake like a hawk… Why? Liquid is heavy, heavy is weight, weight makes the scale go up, my mind would get all jacked up. Yes… I know its only water and you pee the excess out anyway… but still… it messed with my head.

4.       FUN! Ive talked about just trying to have fun. Life should be fun. When life is fun… and fun is good… Life is GOOD! Tennis is a blast. The gym is fun again. Ive totally blown all expectations out the door and working out is fun again. I go in… focused… excited… with a new goal, to just enjoy the individual workout that day. I have no weight goals anymore, no “must see my abs again” goals, no “I must be able to clean and press five billion pounds this year, I just go in… do my thing… work on my weaknesses and go home. Its fun. And it feels so much better this time around.

5.       GUM. Yes chewing gum. I am making a conscience effort to scale back on chewing gum. Its always been used as my nervous comfort “food” and pretty much if I am not eating a meal… I have a piece of gum in my mouth. Its also been a way for me to enjoy a “sweet treat” or “sweet TRICK” in my brain to curb my cravings for food while I was dieting. Its all just artificial junk and sweeteners and serve no purpose what-so-ever. This is honestly the hardest thing I am trying to do.

Now that things are going better in my own personal life and I am making massive strides to positive changes, I need to focus on being the best possible husband I can be. Erin is amazing. Erin is beautiful inside and out, and I am beyond blessed to be married to her. I have not been the best possible husband I can be. Not even close. I admit it. I have been non-existent at times, and was so consumed with me. This must stop. She deserves so much more then I have given her. Unfortunately I cannot go back in time and make up or give back the time I wasted, but I can make sure that none of that happens going forward. We have such a wonderful life, wonderful friends, wonderful families, theres no reason why we shouldn’t be having a truly wonderful marriage and life together. We are still so young and so much of life is still ahead of us and there is so much potential for us to do amazing things together. I must change. God as my witness I am going to change. Like I said… you cant change the past… but you can learn from it and make sure the future is good. And that’s my job. Because we all know… Happy Wife….Happy life. J I love you sunshine!

ONE LAST THING! … still haven’t weighed myself. And honestly… couldn’t care less. I walk right by that scale everyday and give a nice two finger salute (figuratively) 

Delightfully Destroyed

Delightfully Destroyed

So last night’s first USTA tennis match was SO much fun. I played Court 2 doubles with our team captain and neither one of us have played more than a couple times in the last year.  So needless to say we were pretty much not prepared at all and got absolutely destroyed! …. Kind of. We took each game to 30-40, 40-30, deuce, but pretty much each time choked on the last point or two of the games… so the 6-1 6-2 score line doesn’t realllllllllllllllllllly reflect the match. Haha (they all say that) But seriously it was so fun. I was really nervous and timid in warm ups and could not get a serve in to save my life. My strokes were ok but timid and reserved. As I warmed up and got used to the level of play that I was up against I def. began to calm down and settle into my game. I choose to serve the first game and get it over with, and after missing almost every serve in warm ups… I got every first serve in through my first game. Really stoked and just the right confidence booster I needed to start the night off. So anyway despite losing fairly convincingly… I found myself having loads of fun and each point we lost I tried to make a point to either give the team credit, or just laugh and smile and keep the mindset of “its just a game!” Another thing that was nice about last night was that Erin and my Dad came to the match. I originally thought this was going to be bad and I was going to feel an immense level of pressure having people watch me. It actually spurred me on to play better and keep a positive attitude. On a different note… I was also super stoked because physically my body felt fantastic. I had tons of energy and virtually no pain or discomfort in my legs. I was a bit nervous because Monday I had a pretty solid upper body workout and wasn’t sure if I had over done it. I made sure to not work my legs much at all, but everything felt great! So all-in-all it was a great night of tennis and I cannot wait until next week!

Expecting Expectations

Expecting Expectations

Welcome back. I had a pretty good weekend im not going to lie. Friday and Saturday I had two KILLER workouts. I know I talked last week about how bummed I was about getting back into the gym. The more I thought about it the more it was revealed to me that this was the root cause of my little puzzle cry-fest. I was able to drop the expectations this weekend that I had set for myself and went it to the gym with a clear head and razorlike focus and did work. Nothing like a great workout. Pretty much sets the whole day up to be awesome. And the best part of Saturday’s workout was I planned it so I was finished right at 1230 so I immediately got to enjoy lunch and the Chelsea match, which we won. GOOD day. We then went to a wedding that evening and spent Sunday performing our normal routine of Church, Bible Study, Lunch, Target, Lowes…. Home. I have a nice little set of plants im growing this year consisting of Stevia, Broccoli, Spinach, Kale, Green Beans, Edamame, Rosemary, Lavender, and some flowers for Erin. Anyway… all that to say it was a decent weekend. OH YA! I had softball practice on Friday. It was….interesting. The range of talent on our teams spans from one girl who didn’t know you needed a glove… to a collegiate baseball player. Batting practice was funny. I actually hit all 20 pitches that came my way so I was pleasantly surprised with that. All-in-all it is going to be fun.

Anyway… on to my next topic I want to discuss. Expectations.

The buddy of mine who actually got me this job with VDOT came and visited me yesterday. We had a nice, surprisingly deeper conversation then what I was expecting. Him and I have a few things in common so he offers a unique set of views on somethings, so I enjoy when he comes to talk. He started throwing some questions at me and kept probing deeper each time I answered. What we revealed was quite interesting. He came to the conclusion that I have a tendency to set unrealistic expectations for everything. Case-in-point… the gym. Getting back in after taking the month off… I EXPECTED to be fresh, energized, ready to kill it again, and even worse I EXPECTED people to notice that I hadn’t been there for a while. None of these EXPECTATIONS came true those first couple days and it set me off into an emotional wreck. I EXPECT things to be certain ways in marriage, and in life, and with family things, work, you name it… I have an EXPECTATION. I am not one of those people who do very well with “wingin it” or just going with the flow. Everything I do… EVERYTHING… is planned out in my brain, and I struggle when things don’t go the way I had planned… or EXPECTED. I envy those who can just wake up and go where ever the wind my take them. I am control freak…and a control freak with massively high and most of the time unreachable expectations sets up for almost guaranteed disappointment. Even with my tennis match tonight. Instead of being super excited to just get out there and play and test myself against new possibly better opponents, I am super nervous that I won’t perform to the standards…. Or EXPECTATIONS… that I have set for myself. Maybe that explains why I have a tendency to quit things or give up before I really get into something. I set the bar or EXPECTATION so high at the early stages of my things that I set myself up to fail. Not that shooting for the moon is a bad thing… we should all go for gold in all things that we do… but in doing so we need to be able to take the set-backs and take the inevitable stumbles or road blocks that will happen… and get back on track with our eyes on the prize. For some reason I tend to stumble over the first pebble in my way and turn around and give up. I didn’t EXPECT that bump in the road so it must be a sign to not pursue. WRONG. I am by far my own worst enemy. I really would love to get deeper into this and see if I can’t uncover the root cause. Why do I set myself up for failure with unreal EXPECTATIONS. Am I trying to impress everyone? Myself? Maybe someone more specific like my parents? Erin? What is it? What causes this. Why do I feel like if you can’t be the best at something, then its really not worth doing? Why do I never give anything enough time or effort or commitment to actually be the best at something. I know I don’t do this. I pretty much gave up on guitar because I couldn’t learn the solo in Comfortably Numb. I can’t figure out how to paint like Thomas Kinkade so I left my canvas on the easel and haven’t looked at it since. Maybe this all ties into the stuff I talked about with “Identity” where I EXPECT myself to be better than others, or the best at something, and when I realize I might not be the “best” (by my standards/EXPECTATIONS) then instead of just allowing me to do something MY way… or allow my own creativity to creep in and make it original… I give up. EXPECTATIONS can be dirty things.

On a totally different un-related note… I want to give a huge shout-out and plug for Erin and her best friend Lyndsey. They were in charge of both planning and coordinating the wedding we were at this weekend and it was fabulous! They did a great job and everything went as planned and ended up being perfect. Tons of hard work and time went into it and by Saturday night they were both exhausted and did fabulous. SO if anyone is looking for weddings planners they are legitimately looking into this as a side job/hobby to do!

And on another note… Erin is wonderful. Watching her on Saturday made me very happy and proud to call her my wife. I am truly blessed. J  

Strange Day.

Wow. Yesterday was a bizarre day. I was super busy running around all over Virginia beach for meetings which was kind of nice to break up the monotony of sitting at my desk all day. As I wrote about yesterday, I am having a huge problem figuring out what the heck I want to do. I went to the gym again yesterday and went in with a plan… followed the plan… and that was pretty much it. I didn’t mind it. But I wouldn’t say I really enjoyed it. Didn’t hate it. But wasn’t super awesome. So anyway I did my work out went home, ate dinner, and decided to sit down and really try and nail out this puzzle I have been working on lately. I wasn’t feeling totally super after my workout, but wouldn’t have said I felt sad by any means. I think it all took a downhill spiral when I went upstairs after dinner to change into my comfy nighttime clothes (pjs). I still struggle when I take my shirt off and see all the flabbiness of lower stomach that I once worked so hard to get rid of. Its not a huge deal… because I can also notice that my face and my color look much fuller and better then it did 3 months ago, and I feel better physically as well… but still you all know my issues with my stomach. SO anyway, as I began to work on this puzzle… I found myself getting more and more sad/depressed as time when on. There were many times I literally almost started crying. I have no idea why. I put on the most positive music I could find on spotify and tried to focus on anything that would make me feel better but I couldn’t. I never actually broke down, but I would have bet money at any given second I was about break down like a little kid and just cry. I felt beat down. I felt defeated. I felt horrible. I do believe in spiritual warfare and I truly believe that the devil was unleashing an attack on me last night. I know that sounds weird to some people. But I think its true and it happens. I felt like there was no reason to continue to pursue anything I have been thinking about recently and just wanted to quit it all. Quit working out, quit the sports, quit setting goals and pursuing my true passions in life, quit it all. Going right back to the old Matt… fat, lazy, and unmotivated sounded awesome. I don’t know why. I am not one of those people who can reach a certain point or level of something, then fall down a few steps, and get right back up and get to that point again. I always get down on myself and feel like whats the point. It took my years to get there, I don’t want to wait that long again. I guess you could say I respond well to instant gratification and not prolonged gratification. I don’t know. I am just struggling so hard dealing with this whole gym situation. I think the only way I can make this work is to follow some sort of plan. I do well with structured things. If its written out… ill do it. If it is not, and I have to just wing it…. I tend to slack off and just do the bare minimum. I think the other problem as far as the gym is concerned… is I am trying really hard to not overdue it like I was. I am also trying to not work my legs super hard considering what I found out after trying to play tennis after a leg workout. Not good. So im pretty much lost in the gym right now. I have pondered the idea of only going a couple times a week and bringing back more cardio/running stuff. I enjoy being outside. I enjoy running/biking/walking/tennis… outdoors things. Sitting on a bench pushing weights up and down really isn’t my cup-o-tea.  See this is why its good to write down all your thoughts and feelings and work through emotions and feelings publicly. I just jotted down a little weekly schedule on a piece of paper for my fitness plan. And looking at it I am pretty happy with it. Each day is different. Its formulated to work around my tennis matches.

Switching gears.

I know I said I was going to focus on diet and nutrition today. I don’t really feel like getting all into that one. So ill push that to next week. I did some research today and I actually thing I found the root to a lot of my physical pains, fatigue, sleep issues, and anxiety. I need to do some more reading on this so im not going to discuss just yet incase I am wrong but I think I found some things I need to drastically clean up with my diet. But on a general diet and nutrition note… I made a big step yesterday! I went to harris teeter and bought some apples and grapefruit. I phased them out of my diet last year because I had convinced myself that they were far to high in carbs and sugar. DUMB. They are delicious. And I will eat them. In fact the one happy thing about last night was my delicious ice cold juicy grapefruit that I had with dinner. So anyway im going to end it here. I feel like todays blog once again is all over the map. NO EDITING though! So I apologize if its hard to follow. Pray that tonight is a better night. I have softball practice so that should be fun. 

Fork in the Road

Fork in the road.

Ok. So. Like I said the other day I completed my month hiatus from the gym. I was super excited to get back to however I know I need to do things differently this time so I decided to have my first session back be with my dad and his and my moms trainer. She is a great friend and knows my whole story and has been a part of it from the beginning so I knew she would know how to ease me back into things. It was a decent workout… wasn’t all that challenging to me personally but it is a very different style from what I typically do. I went to my gym on Tuesday for my first workout on my own and managed to tone it back from what I used to do but still found my self doing more of my familiar exercise routines. I finished my workout and that’s when things started to happen in my head. I thought I was going to be all fired up to get back and start again… but I wasn’t. I left the gym… satisfied that I completed my workout… but felt pretty empty. All the same people were there, all the trainers that I got to know, life went on in the gym without me and nobody noticed I was gone. Not that I expected them too… but everyone knows that feeling when something is such a huge part of your life and you suddenly stop… you feel like the world pauses with you. It doesn’t. So like I said I finished my workout… (didn’t weight my self! Still going strong with this one) and went home. I noticeably am weaker, which is to be expected. But the emotional emptiness I felt upon leaving really messed with me. It is not that I didn’t enjoy it… it felt good to sweat and push myself physically… but I questioned why I was in there. What are my goals? I thought I had a huge list of goals that I wanted to accomplish on this next “phase” but I found myself questioning all of them. Why? Am I quitting? Is this me giving up before I have really started again? I don’t know. But I do know one thing that I discovered last night…. Body building and weight lifting DO NOT mix with tennis.

I recently joined a tennis league and am really excited about it. I starts this coming Tuesday. Considering I haven’t played for years and have joined a rather competitive team… I need to get some strokes in. So my dad and I played last evening. It was great. I hit fairly well considering how long it’s been. Tennis is kind of like riding a bike. The mechanics come back pretty fast. But like I said it was super fun and I definitely re-ignited an old passion. However there was one major problem. I could not move. My legs were so sore and worn out from the last two days of working out that I could not get around the court. Tennis is a game of explosive movements and quick feet. My feet felt like bricks because my legs couldn’t move them fast enough. It was awful. I legitimately apologized to my dad multiple times because we were both hitting the ball well, and having fun, but I was so hindered by my legs. This brought me to a major mental road block. I really like tennis. And given the right amount of time and practice I can and will be really good at tennis. The problem is… I can not work out to my previous “standards” and play tennis at the same time. But at the same time the more I thought about it and the more I reflected on my feelings leaving the gym Tuesday evening… im actually ok with that. Going to the gym everyday does nothing in terms of produce “measurable” results. I can get better at tennis. I can win more matches, serve more aces, beat people better than me, shoot even have some freaking fun! I cant really do that at the gym. Yes, I could lift more. But so what? Would any one else be like DANG heard matt added 10lbs to his deadlift!!!.... no. But if people came and watched a tennis match they could visibly see improvements over time. I feel like this is somewhat hard to explain. I am not trying to just take one “Matt the gym rat” and turn it into “Matt the tennis player” because then I am till putting a definition on my so called “identity” but I don’t know I just feel like it would be much more beneficial to myself and my situation if I focused more so on tennis. It is a 1000x more fun. I can do it with other people, I can challenge my self and work on improving my game.

 I think the greatest thing about this past month of no gym has been it has showed me that the gym doesn’t do anything for me. It doesn’t bring me joy. I don’t need to go everyday. Nobody cares if I do. Nobody notices. The chains are beginning to break. I am beginning to see the gym as more of a tool to help me improve areas of my fitness, specifically for the sports and things I actually enjoy doing, versus something I have to do every single day. I can go to the gym now and just focus on improving upper body strength and core rotation muscles to help with my tennis game. Or go and work on shoulders and arms to help with softball. The gym is a tool in the larger picture…. And I think im ok with that. Yes I still have a dream of doing crossfit… but there is no way I could do crossfit 5-6 days a week (got to do it that much to get your moneys worth) and play competitive tennis… and be able to enjoy it. So all that to say… the road back into fitness for me is not at all what I expected it to be like. I feel like im standing at a fork in the road… but all the forks eventually come back together. Its like I just have to learn and experiement with how to manage them all together. Monotony is gone. This might actually be fun!

Tomorrow… I plan on talking about food and diet and my major dilemma with them. 

Beware the Ides of March

I conquered March. or did March Conquer me?

I did it!!!!!!!!!!! 31 days away from the gym. I am really excited to start back up. As I explained a few weeks ago I went ahead and decided to for-go the dream of diving into the world of crossfit. It still pulls me back every time I see a post  or a picture or something related to crossfit. So many times ill be sitting on the couch with Erin and ill be reading something and sure enough some reference or article related to crossfit will pop up and ill let out an “ughhhh”. I still want it really bad. But I decided against it for now. So that’s that. I originally thought this hiatus from the gym was going to be a grueling marathon of negative emotions and honestly thought I wouldn’t make it. The first week sucked big time. As time went on I began to be ok with it. There were some days which were harder then others. I maintained all my eating and meal portions to stay the same as when I was working out so I can honestly say I did not quit working out but also go on a major calorie cut. Physically I will definitely say my body has changed. I definitely have more cushion around the mid-section and my definition around my core has diminished. This has been tough to watch! I have jiggles again where my “lose extra skin” around my lower belly seems to have softened up again. All of this I am surprisingly ok with because I know its all over now and I can totally re-focus and begin what I have decided to call “Phase 3” Fat Matt – Phase 1, Skinny Matt – Phase 2, New Matt – Phase 3.

I have created a few new fitness goals which I am excited to pursue. I do plan on trying to “bulk” a little and put on some lean muscle and possibly/hopefully get the definition back in my core. But at the same time I am not totally concerned about it. Instead of numbers/body weight/body fat goals I have decided I want to just be able to do certain things. I want to be able to do 10 strict pull ups. I want to be able to do a muscle-up, Handstand pushups and I want to be able to snatch my body weight. I AM ALSO GOING TO SEE HOW LONG I CAN GO WITHOUT WEIGHING MYSELF!!!!!!!!!! AHHHH this will be tough. There are scales all over the gyms. But im going to give an honest effort. I think this has been the most beneficial part of taking a month off. I have not weighed myself since Feb 28^th. NO IDEA what I weigh. I am going by clothes fitting and visual results. The other major goal I have for this new Phase… is just to have fun. I don’t want to be tied to the gym anymore. If I want to work out with weights… I will. If I want to run… I will…tennis….other sports….crossfit stuff… whatever. No tie-downs. JUST HAVE FUN!

Mentally this has been kind of a different story. It has created a bit of a identity crisis. For the last five years I have indentified myself as a gym rat and was totally consumed with making sure I went 5-6 days a week and hit my target reps for each workout. I was recognized by everyone when I came in it was comfortable. There was a day where it kind of sank in when I realized… you know what…. No body notices or even cares that I haven’t been at the gym for two weeks…. The gym NEVER defined ME…. I defined MYSELF this way. So all of a sudden I was sitting then and literally questioned… Who am I? If for atleast the entire month of March I can not identify myself as a gym-goer workoutaholic…. Then what the heck am I? Am I going to be Matt the Tennis player? Matt the crossfitter? Matt the runner? Will I try to rejuvenate my Matt the gym rat…. It was crazy. I brought this issue to Erin one day and she stopped me mid sentence and asked me the toughest question ever… “Why cant you just be MATT.” Holy crap. Such a simple question rattled my brain. What do you mean…. JUST MATT. Ive always seen myself as Matt…. The fat kid. Matt…. The weight loss guru…. Matt…. The gym rat…. Matt the…. Fill in the blank. It was like I was given a blank canvas and someone said you can paint WHATEVER you want when ive only even painted paint-by-numbers and has a patern or a guide to follow. I feel like I just veered of course onto this road….never traveled. Its exciting in a weird way. But also terrifying. Almost so scary that I have thought about giving up on “fitness” all together. Que… the QUITTER. I am determined not to do this. Having signed up to play both tennis and softball this spring I know I wont totally quit… but today I am sitting here thinking about going to the gym after work and I am at a total loss as to what I should/will do?!  WHY? I used to be able to walk in the gym and knew exactly where to go, what to do, for how long, and how many times. It’s incredibly bizarre.

But I will figure it out. I keep telling myself… FUN. FUN. FUN. Its all about having FUN this time. If you walk into the gym and weights do look appealing… walk out and find something else to do. FUN. FUN.FUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!