Hurdles

While working on the requirements of my Ten Tigers Program, I am making all sorts of discoveries.  I have discovered that with a little practice, it is easy to do 100 pushups and situps in a day.  It is easy to do an act of kindness in a day.  It is even easy to find time to do 20 to 30 minutes of forms training in a day.  It is easy to make a blog entry once a week.  There are, however, hurdles to meeting these goals.

There are hurdles, such as, caring for a toddler, doing the necessary marketing to grow my business, going to work each day, yardwork, family schedules, insomnia, and the list could go on and on and on.  There are lots of hurdles, on some days more than others.  With all of these real hurdles to overcome it becomes very important to avoid the fake ones.

There are fake hurdles that get in the way too.  "I'm tired", "I don't feel like it today", "I'd rather play a video game, watch a movie, watch TV", the list could go on and on and on.  Imagine an athlete about to compete in the 400 meter hurdles.  In that race, the first hurdle is 45 meters from the starting line, then each hurdle is 35 meters apart.  Now imagine that this athlete has for some reason decided that there is another hurdle halfway between each of the actual hurdles.  For every hurdle his competitors jump, he will be jumping two.  What are his odds of winning, what are his odds of even placing when he adds these imaginary hurdles into his race?  

Why do we insist on adding these artificial hurdles?  Why are there days when "Good Morning America" takes precedence over my workout?  Why are there days that I put off the things that are good for my martial arts skill, my health, my mind, and my spirit until there is barely time left and energy left to do them?  Why do I insist on adding hurdles that aren't really there.  

Let's all make a commitment to start recognizing the artificial hurdles.  When you have a task to do, that you want to skip becuase you "don't have time", do it with a stop watch running.  Figure out how long it actually takes you, then remind yourself the next time you hear yourself say you don't have time.  When you tell yourself you are too tired, do one more pushup, or situp, or front kick, or wash one more dish or whatever it is that you need to do.  Then do one more.  Take note of how much time you spend aimlessly wandering the internet or watching TV shows that you could skip.  Let's make commitments to ourselves to use our time and energy more wisely.

We have enough hurdles in our lives.  Don't add any imagined ones.

Value

Try this out.  Find a martial artist who has been training for at least three years.  Ask them how many years of experience they have in the martial arts.  Then ask them if they would take $100,000 in exchange for all the knowledge, experience, skill, and fitness they gained from the martial arts.  If they say, "no", up the offer.  Offer $500,000, then $1,000,000.  When you find a price high enough that they take you up on your offer divide that total by the number of years of experience, then divide by 12.  You now have a dollar amount that shows what their martial arts training was worth to them.  

Personally I wouldn't take $10,000,000 for mine.

At that rate, classes would cost $33,333.33 per month.

You guys are getting a great deal!

The Car of My Dreams

East West Motor Company has released details on the new fully automatic Soma. The Soma is the most intelligently designed vehicle ever created. The most impressive feature of the Soma is it's Self Adjusting Somatic Technology. The SAST enables the Soma to improve its performance based on the demands made by the driver. If you drive this vehicle regularly at a high performance level without redlining the engine. The engine becomes faster, more powerful, and more efficient.

The more it is driven the "smarter" it becomes. It has the ability to "learn" from its experiences. The more varied driving conditions you expose it to the more it adapts to those conditions. Even more amazing is that as it adapts to different driving conditions, its ability to adapt to conditions it has never seen is improved.

There are two major drawbacks to the Soma. If you do not drive it, it's SAST adapts to not being driven and loses power and efficiency. Also, although it can run on the fuel found at any gas station, the more convenient fueling stations don't carry the fuel that is best for the Soma. If you choose to run it on the more convenient fuels often, you risk clogging the fuel lines and decreasing the performance and lifespan of your Soma.

A video worth watching

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42E2fAWM6rA&eurl=http://timrosanelli.blogspot.com/

It's Hard

Being a stay at home dad, and running a small business at the same time is hard.  It seems as though I'm either caring for my 15 month old, or caring for my business.  As for time for myself on weekdays, at about 8:00 or 9:00 I get home, fix supper, or eat supper, then go to bed.  It is a challenge and right now I am feeling very much overwhelmed by it.  In an odd stroke of luck, the baby and the dog are both asleep, so I'm taking a moment to communicate with the outside world.  

What I'm doing is hard, but there are those who have it much harder.  I am struggling to pay bills, but there are others who don't even have the means to struggle.  My business is growing slowly, but other businesses are failing.  I have to remind myself that the key is to keep trying, keep struggling, keep pushing to find a way to accomplish the things I feel called to accomplish.  One day at a time, one obstacle at a time, one challenge at a time.

It is the same as my ten tigers program.  It is hard, but getting through it will be rewarding.  I keep pushing through my program, one pushup at a time, one situp at a time, one act of kindness at a time.  The struggle is half the fun.

And besides, my business did better than GM last year!

Melody Hill Cave

Melody Hill Cave

One of the things I enjoy doing in my free time is cave survey. Lots of people go into caves and look around, but what I like to do is map them as I go. One cave I helped survey was Melody Hill Cave in Breckenridge County, Kentucky. We were continuing a survey that had been started by another team, so our first job was to travel to the other team’s last survey station and start mapping from there. When we got to our station, I understood why they had wrapped up that day of survey where they did. The passage at this point shrank from a generous four feet to a scant eight inches. So we started our survey.

Due to the confining nature of this passage, rather than go to each station drawing in the details I saw, I had to rough in the measurement points, then squirm through the passage making mental notes of what the passage looked like so that I could sketch it in when I got into the roomier three foot tall chamber. The cave had some more wide open spaces as big as ten feet tall, and some more constrictions as well. When we got to the final constriction my chest would not fit through, so the skinniest of our group continued on to wrap up the survey while I turned back to get to drier clothes outside the cave.

On the way out, I came to one of the constrictions and started to wriggle through on my belly with my pack strapped to my ankle behind me. My nostrils were filled with the scent of long packed mud, my ears were filled with the sound of my cave suit simultaneously scraping the floor and ceiling of the cave. I pushed with my toes and pulled with my fingertips. I moved about one inch. The passage was getting tight. I exhaled every molecule in my lungs and pushed forward again. I gained another inch. I tried again with no luck. I retreated a bit and took what seemed to be a completely different path through the constriction. Again, no luck. I tried this several times and then realized. . .

I was stuck. 

Just the other day, I woke up in a pretty foul mood. A foul mood for me usually does not mean I am crabby or angry, it usually means I want to do nothing. It usually means I want to quit. It means I want to give up, surrender, stop struggling to make my business work, stop pursuing my dreams, stop doing anything. I tried to force myself to do my ten tigers daily workout. I got some of it in, but not much. I started thinking that the whole project was a joke. I started regretting making the commitment.

My foul mood persisted through the day. I hid it in a corner while I taught classes. I kept it to myself at kung fu. I came home feeling even worse. The next day I woke up in a foul mood. Another day of forcing myself through my workout. I got it done this time though. It did not, however, make me feel any better. Another day of hiding my mood in a corner while I did the afterschool program and what felt like class after class after class of kung fu. I kept trying to push forward, kept trying to take another path with no luck. I tried this several times and then realized. . .

I was stuck.

With the scent of long packed mud in my nostrils, and the sound of my breathing filling my ears, I thought of stories of cavers getting stuck in caves. Stories in which their attempts at self rescue resulted in cracked ribs, stories in which cave rock had to be chiseled from around the caver, stories in which clothing was cut off the unfortunate caver who was then smothered in butter or some other food product that another caver was carrying through the cave. None of these sounded very appealing to me just then, especially emerging from a cave in January wearing only butter.

I stopped thinking about all those things. I closed my eyes, exhaled and squirmed backwards to a more comfortable spot (by more comfortable I mean about 12 inches tall). I rested there and calmly thought about my options. I knew that I had gotten through this spot on the way in, so I could get back through. The real obstacle was the fact that fatigue and cold had worked into my body so my thought processes were diminished somewhat. I thought about my options, I could retrieve the garden shovel from my pack to attempt digging a ditch to crawl through, I could wait for the cavers behind me to catch up so one of them could possibly find that sweet spot through the passage for me, or I could panic, scream for help, scratch at the cave walls around me, and exhaust myself, necessitating a cave rescue call out.

None of those options sounded great, but I made up my mind to wait for my caving partners to catch up with me. I turned off my lights, lay my head sideways so that my helmet rested on the ground and cushioned my head and listened to the cave. I listened to the dripping water in the distance and the empty silence between them. When it is that quiet, your ears seem to reach out, feeling, searching for a sound. Eventually, they found one. The sound of cavers talking and laughing at the end of a survey trip echoing through the dark distance, then the sound of cave suits scraping along the floor and ceiling of the cave. As they neared I greeted them, and let one pass me. He was six foot one and 130 pounds, I was five foot seven and 175. He can go places in caves that I cannot. I told them I was having trouble finding the line through this passage. He went ahead of me to the left and up a slope where the extra inch made all the difference. I followed suit and was soon talking and laughing and heading out into the sunshine.

I had no control over the size of the passage, I had no control of the fatigue in my mind and body once it had arrived, I had no control of the effects of the adrenalin that poured through my body when I first realized I was stuck, but I did have the choice on how to react to all that I was going through.

I had no control the other day of the mood I was in, no control of whatever cocktail of hormones was pouring through my body. I did, however, have a choice on how to react to all that I was going through. So I got up and did as much as of my workout as I could make myself do. I went in and taught my classes with as much energy and passion as I could muster. I went home and shared my feelings with my wife who was very patient with me. I let her go ahead of me and find that sweet spot to crawl through, and started following behind. Soon we were talking and laughing and heading back out into the sunshine.

I believe. . .

I believe you should read this:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=99478226