Shove or shine…

Today is the 40th day of my 40 to 40 journey. Today I will run my 40th mile, complete my 40th meditation and 40th yoga session. Today my heart is full and antsy for this transition to a new decade, and tomorrow that anticipation will be met with the privilege of beginning a new trip around the sun.

This journey for me was about pausing, appreciating, challenging, and intentionally crafting a path forward in a new decade of life. In it, I have found the process to be beautiful. The practice and consistency of lacing up my shoes, finding my mat, and sitting quietly, to be a revealing mirror, reflecting back the truth of how I am showing up in that moment, on that day. I’ve been humbled and challenged mentally to show up day-in and day-out to face myself in these activities. Some days I have loved what I have seen and felt that I could conquer the world, other days I struggled to simply be with myself.

Last week as I was running, a thought crept into my head, have I set up this frenzy of activity to busy myself to distract me from something of greater purpose? What am I running from, anyway? That thought has been lingering in the back of my head ever since. It has stolen my words and nagged at me from the moment it entered my mind. I think because the answer is, in part, yes. I typically don’t run from my fears (unless you want to talk about vulnerability, I definitely run from that), but this? This I feel I’ve been running from for quite some time.

Here’s the thing, you can’t outrun your purpose (especially not at my pace!), you can’t outrun your fire and candidly, I really don’t want to. My fire is my spirit, I want to embrace it and nurture it. AND… it sometimes feels far too powerful for my own comprehension which causes me to freeze or fidget. So perhaps that is the very point, perhaps that is the vulnerability of living life fully, showing up, trusting, and taking the next right step in a way that honors who you are, who you were created to be, and who you are becoming.

I’ve said it in previous blog posts, but the goal here is to make myself available to become. I do not want to spend my time shoving my energy in spaces that were not meant for me. I’ve spent a lot of time doing that, I have mastered the art of the shove. I have a lot of energy to give and I have wedged myself in so many spaces that were not on my natural path that the effort to get into and out of these situations has been utterly exhausting. Anyone feel me on this? Please? Now that I have a bit of perspective, I think all of this wedging and shoving was a big creative fear-based ploy to hide in the areas that felt safe to keep myself from going after the big stuff.

Damn. Now that I see it, I think I have to do different. And you know what? I’m terrified.

For now, after many cleansing breaths, I am going to lace up my shoes, hit the pavement and finish this 40 to 40 journey strong. I have a feeling that the real journey is only just beginning. Bring it on.

Until then, it’s a beautiful day out there. I hope you do something that lights your fire.

Live MAS!

Powerful thighs and body lies

Over the past 39+ years of my life, I’ve had a rocky relationship with my body. Is that true of most women? Also men? Having grown up in the 90’s when heroin chic was IN and curves were nowhere to be seen, my perception of beauty was skewed at a particularly vulnerable time of life. Look, I am a broad shouldered, athletically built gal with powerful thighs (newly adopted phrasing), no matter how many fad diets I limped my way through, or how many long sessions on the stair master (it was the 90’s after all) there was no way I could manipulate my body to look sickly thin and I regret spending so much energy even trying.

I remember in my teens writing to the editor of one teen magazines proposing that we change the images of beauty and the narrative in the magazines, of course, offering myself as a young writer to address these things. Needless to say, I never heard back from the teen magazine, and it took a very long time for those images to change in my head and on the actual pages.

I share all of this to say that when I talk about the goal category of fitness on this 40 to 40 journey, I’m not talking about getting to my ideal weight or getting into that special outfit (hello, amongst other things, we are in a pandemic!). It’s about celebrating my strength, health, and growth as a woman. Honoring and feeling good in this badass body that has been many shapes and sizes. A body that has delivered and nursed three giant, beautiful, healthy girls, and managed the difficult task of saving room for donuts, beer, and Cheetos in the process ;). This body has lived. This body is happy. This body has a few flats and more wrinkles than I’d like, but it still shows up strong for me every single day. The category of fitness is in celebration of THAT!

For accountability, here is my progress:

Goal	Status
run 40 miles in 40 days: day 24, mile 24 (a PR might I add!)	✅
40 days of yoga: day 24, session 24	✅
hit movement goals for 40 days (shoutout to my apple watch): day 24, will close #23 today	⚠️
~~track and hit macros for 40 days~~ >> cut alcohol and sugar until Feb 10	❌>>✅
surf as much as humanly possible: one big happy check!	✅

⚠️ Sick day 21, couldn’t get the rings closed, made up for the running the next day and will certainly be making up for the movement goal on day 41!

You see that ❌ up there? Well all was humming along (yes, 5 whole days) until 1/6/21 when white supremacists stormed the capital and we saw white privilege play out before our very eyes on TV. It was at that point that I cracked open a bottle of wine and hit the Doritos and watched as democracy crumbled. The rest of the week was a bit of a snowball, a big, stressful, delicious, snowball.

After that derail, I decided to pivot that goal to cut out sugar and alcohol from my diet until my birthday. I’ll be honest I’m 8 days in, and I can say, without a doubt, that is the longest I have gone without either in over a year. What I am realizing is that more than fitness, this is actually an exercise in mindfulness. I am catching myself constantly having to say no. No, to licking my fingers after serving a treat to my kids, no to snacking on a crumb of something, and no to mindless snacks. Now I’m painfully aware of how many little tastes of sugar I would have during the day. I’m grateful for that lesson… and I’m also not.

Do I feel better having cut out sugar and alcohol? I know you want me to say yes. I want me to say yes. But so far the answer is NO. Not better, not worse, just more aware of my actions, so I’m counting it as a win for now.

I’m not after perfection, I’m after growth and hoping I am aware enough to celebrate the small wins along the way because I have a tendency to be too hard on myself… and my suspicion is that many of us have the same tendency. So, if you ever need someone to celebrate a win with you – I’m your gal!

One more thought, whatever body you find yourself in now, please love it. Celebrate it. Don’t be ashamed of it. Put on the bathing suit, wear the top, do the thing you’ve told yourself you can’t. Your body will show up for you as it has every day of this beautiful life and we will all be better as we watch you shine.

As always, it’s a beautiful day out there, I hope you do something that lights your fire!

Live MAS!

40 to 40, the obstacle-coursed path to a new decade

For years, my daily prayer has been the same: that I become the very best version of myself. That I shine brightly by the day. That I operate not at half-dim but at full-wattage.
Alicia Keys, More Myself

As a compulsive goal setter, it was both awesome and unfortunate that when setting my goals for ’21, I realized that Jan 1 was exactly 40 days before my 40th birthday. Any of you goal setters out there will instantly see the danger here. With this kind of serendipity, it is really hard to stop at just one goal. Must… keep… reaching!

Not all will understand the desire to reach. Here’s the deal, to the best of my knowledge, we get one shot at this life here on earth. ONE SHOT. We are each born with our own unique gifts and strengths and my fear for myself (and for us all, really) is that in an effort to find our way in this world, we tone down or become disconnected from what makes us each awesome. To site the wise Alicia Keys, that we spend our days walking around at half-dim. That thought hurts my soul.

Hear me, 40 is not old, though my kids tell me otherwise. But assuming we get 80-100 years in these bodies, I realize I’m nearing the middle of the journey and because we don’t know what tomorrow holds, maybe less. That’s okay, and, I am simply at the point in life where I see that, feel it deeply, and don’t want to spend one more minute on this planet disconnected from my purpose or not burning at full-wattage. To honor myself, to be an example to my kids, to love on the people around me as best as possible, there is a sense of responsibility to get after it. Anyone with me on this? This may be my favorite topic… my door is open for discussion.

So what started as a simple exercise to set some goals for 2021, turned in to something much larger, it turned into a 40 to 40 journey that has me taking stock in life, pounding the pavement, and celebrating the beauty that has brought me to this point.

The themes emerged naturally:

Detox
Service
Mindfulness
Fitness
Joy

Okay, that’s good. But what does this mean?

Detox: Release the things, thoughts, behaviors in my life that are blocking my energy and heart. Service: Discover opportunities to give my time and abilities while stoking my passions.
Joy: This one is my favorite, because it can be so many things. Basically, extract the maximum amount of joy from this life, the people, and the opportunities in front of me.
Mindfulness: Reclaim my mental energy and gain awareness. Meditate every day for 40 days. Fitness: Celebrate my health and push myself to do MAS (more awesome stuff). Specifically:

Run 40 miles in 40 days
Hit movement goals for 40 days
Track and hit macros for 40 days
Surf as much as humanly possible

In case you missed my last post I am now 23 days in. Tomorrow, we’ll dive into the fitness journey. I’m finding that the goals above are all interconnected and the themes that bring everything together are mindfulness and joy which is fanning my flame.

In the mean time, it’s a beautiful day out there, I hope you do something that lights your fire!

Live MAS!

Dusting off… clumsy transitions from what was to what is becoming

I launched this blog back in 2019, a time when I was working to find my way out of a difficult period in life. A phase in life which had me swallowed me whole. Simultaneously obsessed with work and not actually challenged by my job, exhausted mom of 3 girls who were brought into the world in the hazy span of three and a half years, sub-par wife, and a deeply passionate human being with no healthy outlet to pour myself into.

It was only a few months earlier I had the idea that I would spend the next year, 2019, infusing my life with MAS (more awesome stuff), which then prompted a whole flurry of activity including a life-changing year-long fellowship and gathering groups of girlfriends (new and old) to do all the things: dance classes, hikes, cooking classes, book clubs, fitness classes, surfing. I was on a quest to find something I could get lost in. The blog was one of those things, until it wasn’t.

As things go, the writing came easy for a bit, it shaped my thoughts and it lit me up. Then, I got in my head about it and kept pushing out my next post until, eventually I lost my voice. Has that ever happened to you? You’re on track with something that feels awesome, get scared, and step back, only to lose yourself in the process?

I know myself to be a positive, can-do person. Determined and driven to a fault, walking around on this planet with far too much fire burning in my belly 24/7 and yet it seems the things I burn most passionately for, scare the hell out of me to actually go after. What is that? Side-note: one book calls it an upper limit problem, where self-limiting beliefs keep you from accomplishing what you’re after. I’m adding that on the “to be addressed” side of the list. I see you upper limit problem, and I’ll deal with you later.

Anyhow, for the sake of this blog post, let’s keep moving along. It was suggested to me by a great writer friend of mine, that I should dust this blog off and give it another whirl. He had been watching the story of my “40 to 40” journey unfold on Instagram (@live.mas.love.mas) and both chatted and texted me suggesting that I get back to bloggin’. People like that in life are priceless. They are the ones who push you in the ways that are most uncomfortable urging you to get after it. I am crazy about people like that, and they can be super annoying because they don’t accept fear-based excuses, meanwhile getting all fired up to see you accomplish your goals. How do I know? Because I am one of those annoying people, and so I say all of these things affectionately and with confidence ;). (If you are reading this Tom, thank you for the push and you only annoy me when you are right, which is often.)

SO… I’m dusting this thing off, getting the first (again) post out of the way, and inviting you all to follow my journey tracking my overly ambitious obstacle course list of goals to keep me entertained (and swearing under my breath) as I near my 40th birthday. Today is day 22 of 40, but we’ll start at the beginning of the journey tomorrow. Until then, I hope you do something today that lights your fire!

Live MAS!