Whatcha Gonna do in 2022?

By Ellie Bishop McKenzie

If you read John Mariotti’s Sunday Story, “The Critic and The Cheerleader”, then you know that as this year draws to an end you need to kick your inner critic to the curb and allow your inner celebrant to have all the fun. There are so many important parts to this decision, including making a conscious choice to think positive and focus on how lucky we are and how amazing our lives are. However, it also helps us when it comes to making goals for the year to come – because yes, it’s that time again! But let’s have some fun with it this year!

John Mariotti at the CrossFit Games 2014

One of the things I like to tell people is to live the life you want your kids to live. We wouldn’t want them to talk negatively about themselves, so we can’t do that to ourselves. We don’t want them to be unhealthy, so we have to live healthily – eat right and exercise. We don’t want them to get bogged down with work and forget about living a fulfilling life, so we have to get out and LIVE a fulfilling life. Because as many of us parents know, our children are much more likely to do as we DO than do as we say.

So as you assess the last year and plan to make this next year amazing (no matter what craziness is going on in the world!) I want you to get creative and think about what fills your cup and makes you happy and fulfilled. What positive things can you say to yourself each day to get you excited? What changes can you make to live healthier but still enjoy every day? What do you want to change in your work life and your personal life so that you are living your most fulfilling life?

I INVITE YOU TO MAKE 3 LISTS – The Mundane, The Nuts and Bolts, and The Extraordinary.

Mount Kilamanjaro

• The Mundane is those nagging things we know we need to get done this year such as replacing the old water heater or lowering your cholesterol or getting that dreaded colonoscopy you’ve been putting off 🙋‍♀️. They’re not a lot of fun but we know they need to get done.
• The Extraordinary is the wild, crazy things you’d like to accomplish like climbing Mt Kilamanjaro (one of mine) or getting into a body building competition or competing in the CrossFit Games or maybe buying your first house.
• The nuts and bolts are the little things we need to accomplish to get those other things done. For example, to get the new water heater we need to make some phone calls, get some pricing information, set some money aside and schedule the thing. To do my best at entering the CrossFit Games I might need to learn how to do a muscle-up, improve my cardio, increase my major lifts by 5-10% and maybe lose 10lbs by tightening up my diet. And to climb Mt. Kilamanjaro I need to contact my frinds who have gone before me and get recomendations, research Climbing companies, set some money aside, book the trip, find child care during that time (if needed), find the necessary equipment and so much more.

Then you can pick and choose which of these things you think you can accomplish each quarter, each month and possibly even each week. You’ll accomplish the mundane with a lot less effort and you will get out and LIVE that extraordinary life you’ve been putting off. And that, my friends, is priceless and it sets your inner cheerleader on fire!

Here’s another thing to remember – losing weight and getting fit is important – especially with COVID in our new world. However, most of us don’t view losing weight as something that fills our cup. So maybe give yourself a bigger goal – something that you can ACHIEVE or ACCOMPLISH – that will involve losing weight so that it doesn’t feel like a total drag on your psyche – it’s only the nuts and bolts of the bigger, better thing you want to accomplish.

If you have goals that include your health, or anything else we can help you with, we invite you all to schedule a 15 minute goal setting meeting with us where we can go over your goals and see how we can help you reach them and keep you accountable. Remember, you only have one life to live. Make your Journey Extraordinary!

15.1of The CrossFit Games Open – This Is Hard

Two years ago I entered my first CrossFit Games Open Competition. This is what I wrote about that first day of self-torture…

Today I completed workout 13.1 for the CrossFit Open. It was hard. The workout was as many reps as possible of

• 150 wall balls with a 14lb ball to 9 feet,
• 90 double unders (jumping rope with the rope passing under twice for each jump)
• 30 muscle ups on the rings.

The 14 pound ball was heavier than the 10 pound I was used to. I couldn’t get my rhythm on the double-unders and I have never successfully performed a muscle up.

But the really hard part was what was going on in my mind. You see, I just moved back to Dallas and have been trying quite unsuccessfully to find a job. I was a teacher, but this is not the easiest time of year to find a teaching job. So, for now, I am just doing everything I can to find a job. I am keeping very busy working on ways to make money, but I haven’t actually made any yet and I am getting nervous! And all of this was going on in my mind while I was doing the workout.

At several points in the workout I found myself wondering, “Why?”. Why am I putting myself through this? Why does it matter if I push? Could I ever do anything with any of this? Am I too old for this?

I finally came back to the realization that I stay fit so that I can keep up the fight. I realized that this workout is just a metaphor for the rest of my life. Every day we come across obstacles, hurdles, things we have to deal with even though we really don’t want to. Sometimes it’s just cleaning a dirty house and sometimes it’s struggling to pay all of the bills or put dinner on the table. Sometimes it’s learning how to get out into the world again after a difficult part of your life and sometimes it’s deciding to get up off that couch and change your life. What ever the hurdle is, you must have the fight within to take it on. That is what a CrossFit workout is all about.

At the beginning of a workout I am always dreading what is to come. I look at it with apathy, apprehension and misery. As I start to warm up I feel the dread begin to slip away as I plan my strategy for attacking it full on. Once the real workout begins, the doubt actually increases. I wonder if I can do it, why I am doing it, how I am going to possibly finish? About one-third of the way through I start to think maybe I can handle it. After all, I have already completed so much, another small amount isn’t that much harder. That’s when I start to really push. I get faster, stronger, better. About two-thirds of the way through I am really feeling the pain of the workout and part of me really wants to quit. That’s when I tell myself again that I only have a small amount left and I am not a quitter! I give my all in that last third and finish the best I can. I am heaving, sweating, trashed. But I did it and I am proud.

And although I didn’t get a score that will take me to compete in the CrossFit games (I was number 2060 in my age group out of about 14,000 women my age who competed), I got through the obstacle… just like I will get through all of these other obstacles in life. I will find the fight within me to be the best I can be. I will persevere. I will succeed. And I will do it with passion and grace!

~~~~~~~~~~~

Now here we are two years later. Since then, I have opened up a CrossFit box with an elite Games competitor, survived a life-threatening illness and completely changed my life. This weekend I competed at CrossFit Dallas Central again for 15.1. As soon as I got there I was crazy nervous once again – so much adrenaline I was almost shaking! The self-doubt set back in and I hesitated, but I really wanted to look back with no regrets and know that I gave my best so I jumped right back in. I was in the last heat of the night with only one other girl, which put me right in the spotlight – not where I wanted to be. To make it worse, the other girl was probably in her twenties, tatooed up and looking fierce! I was so intimidated! What surprised me is that I kept up with her the entire way. I really did!I think she ended up with 3 more reps than me, but that’s not much. On the max clean and jerk I ended up with a higher score than her. I couldn’t believe it!

Sometimes it’s hard to see ourselves as amazing, accomplished, strong people. We see the faults in ourselves so easily. But today I am remembering the fight… the journey. I am persevering. I am succeeding. And I am doing it with passion and all the grace I can muster!

• Ellie Bishop McKenzie
• Crossfit Odyssey and Odyssey Martial Arts
• The Journey to Extraordinary
• 6162 Sherry Lane
• Dallas, TX 75225
• 214-234-0299
• info@crossfit-odyssey.com
• http://www.crossfit-odyssey.com

Andi and Scott Knowles

Since February is a month for lovers we decided to honor both Andi and Scott Knowles as our Extraordinary Athletes of the Month. Andi and Scott joined CrossFit Odyssey around April of 2014 so they have been with us for almost a year. They have two sweet boys, Maguire and Cal, both of whom you have probably seen working out with them at the gym. If you aren’t sure which ones they are, look for the girl with incredible long blond hair and her hubby.

          

Andi and Scott came to us to get in a little better shape. They had heard of CrossFit before and they had been to other CrossFit boxes, but those were not quite the right fit for them. They both fit in perfectly here at Odyssey and have become a great addition to our little family. Andi has been consistently getting better in the gym, always challenging herself and pushing herself. You will often see her doing an extra run or getting in a few bicep curls at the end of class. When she hits a WOD she hits it hard and gives it her all – and you can see it in her shape! She is sweet, encouraging and supportive to everyone in the gym… and if you’re real nice she will give you the number of the gal who does her hair! Score!

         

Scott wasn’t quite as enthusiastic at first, although he always gave it his all. However, he just decided to give up sodas and has lost 10 lbs since the beginning of the year! He is always friendly and helpful to others, always works hard, always helps in any way he can – even going so far as to help me get ethernet hooked up to the computers.

        

Their two boys are equally sweet and often come workout in the gym. Maguire is a senior in High School and quite the athlete! Cal is 12 years old and just getting started. They both love to come help mom and dad out at the gym. Maguire is best at lifting weights and Cal is an awesome burpee machine! Best of all they are learning that physical health is important and fun by participating with mom and dad and spending quality time together doing it. Congratulations Andi and Scott! You guys are all doing an awesome job and you have become a great example and great friends at the box! We are thrilled to have you as a part of our CrossFit Family!

Kindness

About a year ago, just a few months after we opened, I was contacted on Facebook by a very old friend from high school. She and I were not great friends in high school, but I would call us friends. She was a year older than me so we didn’t have as many opportunities to get to know each other. After she graduated I only saw her a few times in 25 years and I probably haven’t seen her since 1989 or so.

When I opened the gym I didn’t want to be pushy with my old friends and bug them to come support my endeavor. However, several old friends have contacted me and wished me well – people I haven’t seen or heard from in decades. Some of them said they wanted to give it a try, but very few actually came and tried a class and I didn’t want to be pushy with people I hadn’t seen in 25 years, so I have always encouraged people to give it a try, but never more than once or twice.

She contacted me by Facebook and was very sweet – she said she was proud of me and my endeavor and she really wanted to give CrossFit a try. She said she really needed to make some changes in her life and she thought this might be a good start. I told her how much I appreciated her contacting me and I encouraged her to come try a class, but I left it at that. A month later she died of a drug overdose.

I had no idea what was going on in her life – I hadn’t seen her or heard from her since High School. But it turned out she was in a bad place and she knew it. Sending me that one little message was her way of reaching out. And, like me, she probably didn’t want to push and she probably didn’t want to bother and she probably felt insecure about what was going on in her life. So she didn’t push either.

I wish she had. I wish she had said, I’m in a really bad place and I really need some help. I wish she hadn’t let the fear of being judged or the fear of doing something new and different or the fear of failure or whatever it was that stopped her get in her way. I wish I had pushed and I wish I had called her and I wish I had said, get your butt down here and let’s make the changes you need to make.

When I started taking Martial Arts a few years ago I learned about John Mariotti’s Acts of Kindness program. He required 15 Acts of Kindness written down for every belt test. That’s 15 for whites, 30 for yellows, 45 for greens, 60 for blues, and 75 for the reds. A black belt requires 300 Acts of Kindness written down. By the time you achieve your black belt you have completed almost 1000 Acts of Kindness. Students must write them down so that it is a conscious effort. From this students learn that they can be kind – they have kindness within them. They also learn that kindness is needed in the world and that they can make a difference. They learn how important kindness is in the world – that every act of kindness makes the world a better place. I have seen simple Acts of Kindness change people and change the world.

Now, I know that her situation was probably way out of my league and I may not have been able to help much, but I also know that kindness is an amazing thing… a simple word can completely change a person and how they are coping. A simple phone call may have given her that tiny spark of hope that made her have a great day that made her decide to make one good choice for herself that may have altered her story.

So, I want to say to each and every one of you out there… Get your butt in here! Call me. Send me a note on Facebook or an email. I’m not a therapist and I may not be able to solve your problems, but I will be your friend and I will help you make some positive choices in your life that can help you be the person you want to be. I will offer kindness.

“No try, do.” ~ Yoda

Do you remember in Star Wars when Luke meets Yoda and Yoda teaches him how to use the force? It’s an awesome scene that relates to so many of us in so many ways. Belief and faith are incredible forces within us. It can make us or break us – allow us to achieve incredible feats or leave us down and defeated.

There are so many areas in life when your belief and faith can set you up. We often hear from our children, “I can’t do that”. But as parents we teach them that with a little effort they can accomplish the goal set in front of them. As adults we have learned that by giving something a try we can do more than we thought we could do, but we still see images of people doing the incredible and we tell ourselves, “I could never do that”.

And sometimes you can’t. I mean let’s face it, only one guy makes the team as the quarterback. Only one guy is the winner of a race. One guy is considered “The Fittest on Earth”.

But a whole lot of the time you can. I hear people everyday say they could never try CrossFit. And what amazes me is that they have never even seen it or tried it except for maybe seeing The CrossFit Games on TV. Of course, what most of us do in the gym is nothing like what those people do. They are the Fittest on Earth. What we do is learn how to move correctly. Those people have already figured out that part. What we do is learn to get healthy. They are the pinnacle of health.

I see men and women – but mostly women – everyday who say they could never lift a heavy barbell and then when we get them out there lifting they are so much stronger than they ever knew. They think they are going to hurt themselves picking up a 35lb kettlebell even though they pick up their 50lb kids several times a day… And kettle bells don’t wiggle!

This is Mary with her diaper bag, a backpack, a port-a-crib and a wriggling baby.

So what if we approached a workout or a run or a race or an obstacle course by telling ourselves, “Wow! I’m totally going to DO that!” What if we approached obstacles in our personal lives and our jobs the same way?

No try, do.

It might take you a little time to get there, but get there, you will, if only you have faith. If you don’t believe, then you will fail long before you ever begin.

Click the picture to watch the video!

Kate Cruickshank

January’s Extraordinary Athlete is Kate Cruickshank, who is also last month’s athlete’s (Michele Rodgers’) best workout buddy. Kate came to us through the Hyer Elementary School mom connection. Kate is originally from Australia and came to us for a month in May, but was back in Australia for the entire summer. While she was gone she walked 18 miles every day with her husband, but managed to damage a nerve in her toe doing so. When she got back she couldn’t wait to start back up at CrossFit, but we had that injured toe to deal with. She really didn’t want to let that get in her way so we went after it! We were very careful scaling her moves so as not to make it worse and over time it has bothered her less and less and she is doing more and more. In September she even entered the Adult/Child Throwdown with her son, Ben, who also loves to CrossFit. In October Kate entered the October Fitness Challenge along with her buddy, Michele. She worked really hard and lost 3 inches all over her body. She is also the one who convinced Michele to give up the diet sodas, which helped her immensely! She is all about getting involved and making friends and having a great time. She is supportive of everyone at the gym and she is great at leading by example.

Way to go Kate! You are doing a great job!!

Gratitude Part 2 – The Road to Recovery

As many of you know I had a horrible illness over last summer. On July 1st I went to my Olympic lifting training in the morning and felt fine. Around noon my right shoulder blade began to hurt as if I had maybe pulled a muscle. By the 6:30pm class I was barely able to bend over to pick up a pencil off the floor.

When I finally went to the hospital they thought it was an infected gall bladder and took me to a room to prepare for gall bladder surgery. Once I got to the room I started feeling very weird… my arms and legs were numb and I started shaking and my teeth started chattering uncontrollably. They insisted I was having a panic attack, but I told them I didn’t think that could be right. It felt like something was pushing on my spine and causing strange reactions.

They went ahead and removed my gall bladder, but I still felt numb in my arms and legs so they took an MRI, which showed an epidural abscess – an infection on my spine which was pinching the spine and about to paralyze me. I went into immediate emergency surgery where they cut through the muscle, drilled a hole in my spine and sucked out the bacteria. Then they did a culture on the bacteria and gave me an IV infused super-antibiotic. I was in the hospital for a total of 2 weeks and after that I had a picc line IV which ran from my right arm directly to my heart. I had to attach an IV once a day and lie down and give myself my antibiotics for about an hour. This lasted for another 6 weeks after the hospital.

During my recovery time I wasn’t allowed to lift anything heavy at all and I wasn’t allowed to sweat. However, while I was in the hospital I noticed that movement made me feel much better, so I got up and did some slow, steady squats while holding onto my bed. My doctors and nurses approved, so over time I started adding lunges. By the time I left the hospital I was doing lunges down the hospital corridors. I couldn’t believe how much better I felt with that little bit of movement. Once I got back to the gym I continued to do squats and lunges and slowly added simple yoga, slow GHD back extensions and GHD situps to parallel (I couldn’t lie on my back), and slow box step-ups holding onto a rail. When I went back to see my spine surgeon he said I was recovering at twice the pace of his normal patients. He also said that the reason they caught the infection as quickly as they did (before the infection paralyzed me) was because I knew my body so well and I was in such good health.

After the 6 weeks ended and the IV was removed I started gradually back into regular CrossFit workouts. My legs felt like lead and there was a slight disconnect between my brain and my legs which made the top of my body slightly ahead of my lower body to the point that I almost fell down a few times. Running was difficult and box jumps were out of the question. Strangely enough, however, double-unders were incredibly easy and I PRed them at 80 reps a couple of weeks after I got back. My Olympic lifts all felt great, too and I have PRed almost all of them since getting back. Step by step everything has come full circle and I feel great in what is really a very short amount of time.

So what is the point to all of this? Well, two things. For one thing, I am seeing a whole new side to gratitude in my life and what I am learning is that gratitude is entirely a choice. It would be really easy for me to say that I have had a really long string of bad luck – nasty divorce, having to move me and my 3 kids into my mom’s house, getting horribly sick and then pounded with hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills (not to mention not being able to workout for such a long time and gaining weight because of it – cherry on top).

But I can also say that I feel like one of the luckiest people alive. I mean, I am out of an unhappy marriage, living with my awesome mom in an environment where my kids have so many people around them to love them. We are back in Dallas surrounded by family and friends. My kids have great schools and great friends. I opened a business that I LOVE and that allows me the comfort of spending time with my kids in a positive, happy environment. My business partner is one of my best friends and now the 6th fittest man on Earth – and he is training me! My strength and good health helped me to identify and fight this crazy infection off. My illness forced me to get a ton of rest, which in the long run made me stronger. I had incredible doctors who cared for me even though they knew I didn’t have the money to pay them what they were worth. The doctors and medical companies are all working with me and letting me make payments and some of them have even written off my debt.

Don’t get me wrong… Some days I feel like the pulling the covers over my head and hiding from everything that is out there in the world. It can be a very scary place! But I have a choice as to whether I want to view it as a scary place full of bad things that could happen or as an amazing place full of amazing people and places and things to do.

That brings me to the other point to all of this – that I have learned how truly important good health really is. I not only believe it helped me identify and rapidly heal from this infection, but I adamantly believe that living a healthy life is the one thing that ALLOWS me to be grateful more than anything else.

Recovering from a serious illness can wreak havoc on your body and your mind and can send you spiraling into horrible depression. Of course, depression can also come from  many other places – I experienced it a lot when I was younger. Once you are in that depressed place it can be really difficult to climb out. Getting yourself some exercise can be just the magic you need. There is something that happens when you get the blood flowing in your body and your mood elevates and you can see more clearly and you are able to get a few things done and then you have the sense of accomplishment that leaves you feeling awesome and ready to conquer the world. The same can be said for a healthy diet. When I nourish myself with food that makes me stronger and healthier it elevates my mood and gives me the strength to see the world as an amazing place and not that scary place that I dread.

The problem with most of us is in getting yourself to get up and get to the gym in the first place. We all have excuses – not enough time or too embarrassed or too out of shape or don’t have the right clothes or a broken foot or a stubbed toe or a pulled muscle or a picc line IV. Whatever your excuse is, you are almost always able to do something. Slow walking, leg lifts while lying in bed, standing up and sitting down, moving your arms… something.

We have a saying at CrossFit Odyssey… Dead Last beats Did Not Finish, which trumps Did Not Start.

All you have to do is start. Do something. Make the choice to find the amazing in the world. Get past the scary and find the gratitude for all that life has to offer you.

We can help.

Ellie Bishop McKenzie

CrossFit Odyssey and Odyssey Martial Arts

6162 Sherry Lane

Dallas, TX 75225

214-234-0299

info@crossfit-odyssey.com

http://www.crossfit-odyssey.com

Welcome to Our Neighborhood

Last week at church a strange thing happened to me… I found myself childless for almost an hour! I knew there was a Distinguished Lecture Series Seminar going on so I thought it would be nice to have a little adult time and listen to something intellectual. The speaker, Dr. Scott Bader-Saye, was discussing “The Bonds of Affection in a Culture of Isolation”.

I got there a bit late, but what I did hear was the common discussion of late of how we all spend too much time in isolation these days due to our televisions, smart phones and gadgets. You know – how we have stopped talking to each other because we are too busy with our social media; how we see couples at dinner and one or both of them is staring at their phone instead of enjoying their time together. I get it. I see it all of the time and I am guilty of it – very guilty.

There was a moment during this lecture that hit me though. it is about how we have all become so egocentric that we think the whole world revolves around us and should cater to us. He was showing us a video of several people in line at a grocery store or something similar and they are all waiting somewhat impatiently for their turn. The narrator tells us that they are each wondering why all of the other people in line are making their time there so difficult. Then there is the lady in line who has the crying, whining, begging children. Everyone is annoyed at the fact that they have to listen to that and wondering how much longer it will take to get through the line. But then we are reminded that if we look at this mom as a person we find out that perhaps her child is autistic and perhaps her husband is at home sick with cancer and perhaps she is just struggling to get by.

At that point I started crying. Yes crying. Right in the middle of church with everyone there. I was shocked and trying to cover up the fact that I suddenly started crying when I realized why I was crying. I felt like I was that mom… struggling my hardest to hold everything together and somehow pull off a show that I’ve got it all under control. Here I am a single mom of 3 kids with a new business trying to do it all and make it all work. I mean, it will never happen! I will never be able to do all of this!

Then I realized that I am that mom… and so is everyone else. I had fallen into that egocentric place where it’s all about me instead of realizing that it’s all about all of us. As a good friend recently told me, we all have a story. Her story was that her husband recently died of skin cancer and left her to raise their son alone. She is fighting all kinds of demons everyday that I can’t even comprehend. You can read more of her story here: http://thrivingthroughadversity.blogspot.com/2014/08/everyone-has-story.html?m=1.

Then Dr. Bader showed us this quote… “A positive cause… is the by now well-established effort to build or rebuild local economies, starting with economies of food…. It’s purpose, to the extent possible, is to bring producers and consumers causes and effects, back within the bounds of neighborhood, which is to say the effective reach of imagination, sympathy, affection, and all else that neighborhood implies.” You can see the rest of the article from which this was derived here: http://www.neh.gov/about/awards/jefferson-lecture/wendell-e-berry-lecture.  It means effectively that it is up to us to get out and make connections with the people around us and learn their stories. 

All of a sudden I wanted to jump up and say, “I’m doing that!” You see, that’s what this place, CrossFit Odyssey, is – at least to me. And this is what made me and so many others love CrossFit. Now, I don’t want to get all Kum ba ya on y’all, but really, that is the goal of this place. Yes we want to get strong and we want to get healthy. But part of how we do that is by making those healthy connections. As we join together in our CrossFit box getting ready to sweat and suffer and overcome together, we get to know each other. We learn each other’s stories and we gain an appreciation for one another. That rarely happens in any other kind of gym because there is no real demand for you to invest in the other people in your environment. We don’t put our headphones on and hop on a treadmill and zone out. We don’t stand in a row and follow the movements of a teacher at the front of a room. We talk and laugh during the warm up and relate stories from our day. We work in teams. We compete with each other and ourselves. We cheer each other on. We lie on the floor in exhaustion and laugh together about how crazy hard that was. And we create bonds.

Since we opened this place I have learned a lot of stories. I have members like Father Arthur whose entire lives are committed to helping others. I have several members who have lived abroad learning about the world – in Africa and Thailand and Brazil – giving help to those who need it. I have members who have suffered hardships that I can’t imagine. And I have members who are strong – in their hearts and minds and souls, and it amazes me every single day.

So, if you want a chance to get to know your neighbors and learn their amazing stories, join us. If you want a chance to get out of your head and be a part of the community and a part of something great, join us. if you want to tell your story, join us. We would love to hear it!

Sharon Hughes

November’s Extraordinary Athlete is Sharon Hughes. Sharon is about to celebrate her 55th birthday this month. She is a mother and a grandmother but she looks and acts like she is about 35. Sharon is actually pretty new to CrossFit Odyssey, but what we really love is how she has taken the bull by the horns! Sharon’s first week was a lot of burpees and a lot of pullups – and you all know how much everyone loves those. We scaled her way back to start, but she picked it up incredibly fast!

If you don’t know Sharon, you will have to get to know her. it doesn’t take long to figure out that when she wants to accomplish something, she is going to do it. Fear is not a word that is a part of her vocabulary. It wasn’t two months before Sharon got her first pullup. Now she has 2 or 3! She even signed up for the Tough Mudder after only about a month of CrossFit!. For those of you who don’t know the Tough Mudder, it is a 13 mile obstacle race designed by special forces to test your mental toughness (see last moth’s article: Why YOU Should Do the Tough Mudder or Something Like it). Just signing up for a race like this is the first hurdle. But Sharon made the commitment and showed up and conquered in style! She attempted every single obstacle and completed all of them except for the monkey bars, where she slipped and fell into the water. She battled icy water, deep, disgusting mud and electric shock and she finished strong!

Sharon is also a great friend and supporter to everyone at the gym. She cheers everyone on, she makes friends, she comes to happy hours and she has even tried to help a couple of people with their job searches. She is always early or on time and she never skips her workout, even if she had a little too much fun the night before.

So if you meet Sharon, giver a pat on the back and tell her “way to go”! She is on the path to extraordinary… and oh what a ride it is… especially in that cute little Porsche she just bought! PS… I want a ride!

Why YOU Should do the Tough Mudder – or Something Like it

 

 

 

 

 

 

A couple of years ago when I was living in a small town in Nevada I met some people at my local gym who were going to do the Tough Mudder. The Tough Mudder is a 12 mile race and obstacle course with climbing and running and monkey bars and water and electric shock and it looked really, really scary. I was awed. I couldn’t believe these people (who all looked very normal) were going to do something so difficult. I remember talking to someone about it and he said – you can’t do that, it’s for elite athletes and you could never do any of that stuff.

A day or two later I was still thinking about it and it really

irritated me that this person thought I couldn’t run this race –  and more that I could never do it. I like to think of myself as a strong individual and it became obvious to me that this person did not see me that way at all. And when I talked to the people at the gym about it, they all thought I could do it. So, I decided I wanted to give it a try.

The Tough Mudder is designed by British Special Forces to test your all around strength, stamina, mental grit and camaraderie.  It is a proud supporter of The Wounded Warrior Project, which helps soldiers who have been injured in the line of duty while protecting those of us who can actually take the time to do stuff like this for fun.  The Tough Mudder is not a race, but a challenge.  It is about facing your fears, never giving in, and above all else, camaraderie.  You never leave a teammate behind.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As a kid growing up I never imagined doing something like this.  Especially not at 43 years old!  The first challenge was army crawling through a muddy trench under barbed wire.  No big deal.  The second was jumping from a 15-foot ledge into a pool of murky, cold water.  I suddenly discovered that I had a fear of heights and of cold water, but I did it.  We had to carry a log about a half mile and then we came to The Arctic Enema – jump into a vat of green ice water – and I mean, there was a LOT of ice in there – and then you had to go under water to swim under a board and then swim to the opposite side and get out.  I didn’t know you could get brain freeze from the outside!  Then there were a series of monkey bars, cargo nets, Berlin Walls (10-12 foot walls you had to jump), ring swings, uphill hikes, tunnel crawls, log jumps, wall crawls and mud crawls.  My favorites (not) were the Electric Eel (crawl through a trough of mud with electric wires hanging over you – and yes, you do get shocked, and yes, it hurts!), the Mud Mile (crawling through cold, muddy water with a lot of dips so you fall in a lot), Mount Everest (a 20-foot quarter pipe that you run up and grab the ledge – or the hand of another Mudder – and pull yourself up) and finally the Electroshock Therapy (run through a field of live wires with as much as 10,000 volts of electric shock).  To see more about the crazy obstacles and the Tough Mudder go here: http://toughmudder.com/obstacles/.

I have had a lot of people ask me why I would do something like this.  All I could say was that I wanted to see what I was made of.  And I learned something about myself –

I am one Tough Mudder!

I left that event feeling like I could conquer the world – and I felt like I had earned just a little bit of respect from that person who doubted me.  It also gave me the confidence to make some other changes in my life that I needed to make. I no longer felt stuck, incapable, powerless or hopeless. I felt like my life was my choice… and it has been ever since!

Now whenever I feel like things are getting too difficult in life I remember this race. Then I think of all of our military men and women and the hardships they endure day in and day out – for you and for me. Then I make a choice and I find a way to conquer.

Last year I had another friend who wanted to do the Mudder. She had already lost over 100 lbs and she wanted to give it a try… but she was scared to do any of the obstacles. She did the race with John and I and she completed every single obstacle in the race! She was amazed at how invincible she felt! This past summer she completed her first marathon!

We all have days where we feel helpless, hopeless, stuck, incapable and powerless. This race is the kind of thing that makes you realize that you are not any of those things – it helps you realize that everything is a choice. You can go around or avoid the obstacles in life, you can skip the race of life altogether – OR you can take a deep breath and jump in headfirst and conquer. Believe me, those obstacles will be the things you look back on in life with relish!