COVID-19 – Page 2 – Serenity Through Sweat

The Importance of Play

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. Today I want to talk about the importance of play. For toddlers, for kids, for parents, for everyone, play is more important now than ever.

El Duderino isn’t really old enough to understand what’s going on in the world, but he is very smart and incredibly perceptive. Most kids pick up on social cues and read the room far better than adults and well beyond what they are given credit for. So when I’m feeling stressed by everything COVID-19 related, he might not understand the nuts and bolts of it, but he reacts to my emotional state.

At the end of the day all he really wants to do is play. Play takes on many different forms depending on the day or mood. The current play du jour is digging in the dirt with his work trucks. Each truck has a name and a job and then when they get dirty they go through the car wash (hose, sink, bath, etc).

The only limit is his imagination, and maybe the weather or daddy’s bladder bringing us inside. That imagination and creativity is the beauty of play. It’s a release from reality and whatever stresses are there, even if they are just picked up from his mother and me. It is mentally stimulating. It helps him grow and come up with new ideas.

I think it’s safe to say most adults struggle with play, especially in the current lack of social climate. How many adult activities leave room for creativity, improvisation, experimentation, and just room to play? Maintaining a balanced approach to overall wellbeing is one of the core tenets of this blog (and one of my top priorities), and play is a huge part of that.

That is one of the many reasons I miss Jiu Jitsu. Running, lifting, cycling, archery, mobility work, have all played a huge roll in my sanity from home over the past weeks. But each of them lack the dynamic playful environment that Jiu Jitsu offers.

Wrestling and Jiu Jitsu offer an incredible mix of physical stressors, mental stimulation, and a plethora of opportunities to be creative and innovative. In other words perfect, a perfect adult play environment. For my brother’s and sisters on the mats you don’t need any further explanation, but for those of you who haven’t ever tried it, I will try to explain as best as I can.

Grappling tends to present itself like human chess. You are always thinking multiple moves ahead (mental stimulation). Each of those moves or techniques requires complex and coordinated physical movement, often under pressure or resistance from your partner (physical stressors). And, there are an endless number of techniques that pair together in different orders, or varitions of those techniques that allow each practitioner to develop his or her own style or “game” (creativity and innovation).

In addition to physical stressors, mental stimulation, and opportunities for creativity and innovation, grappling requires extremely close physical contact. Often times claustrophobia inducing contact. And while this may be an acquired taste, after several weeks of lockdown I think we could all use some claustrophobia inducing contact, whether we are grapplers or not.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

As excited as I am for my local gym (OBJJ) to be opening tomorrow, I will not be in attendance just yet. Speedy hasn’t reached the two month mark yet, and his developing immune system trumps my need for play.

This week in SerenityThroughSweat, El Duderino plays in the mud, does his best salt bae impression baking bread, some interval running, and a sweaty sandbag session.

Common Carriage

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. Studying for my commercial pilots license I remember being especially drawn to the murky idea of common carriage. I think it has a lot of similarities to the murky situation we find ourselves in now as we start to re open the country.

I’ve been told on more than one occasion that I missed my calling to be a lawyer. I enjoy a good heated debate, especially if there is reason, logic, and meritorious points to be made by both sides. I think this is what drew the 20 year old college kid into the idea of common carriage, and why it has stuck with me after 13 odd years despite having little to no relevance in my professional life.

I’ll start by saying I don’t really know what common carriage is because it is an Intentionally unclear regulation, but it was very important that I be able to regurgitate the concept for my commercial pilot check ride. The idea is, when you get a commercial pilots license, you can be paid to fly airplanes. But, you can’t just go around doing business with, and flying anyone who asks, because that would make you a de facto airline, and subject to different standards, procedures, and regulations. So you are left with this intentionally murky grey area where you can have individual contracts for flight services so long as you are not “holding yourself out”

If you are still following along awesome, if not, that’s kind of the point. Individuals can do business with each other because a one on one business relationship places the onus on both parties to vet each other. When providing a service to the entire community, some sort of overseeing body does the vetting, theoretically in the best interest of those being served. In other words, if I’m hiring you to drive my car the responsibility is on me, but if I call an Uber, the department of transportation has made sure (in theory, I don’t know, it’s just an example for those of you not aviation inclined) that the driver and Uber have gone through the appropriate processes and procedures.

As we start to re open our communities to business I think there is a lot of similarities in the murky nature commercial services. Let’s say like most of us you’ve been socially distancing for more than a few weeks and you need a haircut. You happen to have an aunt who is a stylist and she was already coming over for mother’s Day. Can she cut your hair while she visits? Is it ok if you pay her? That’s only one person so it is an “individual contract” not a willingness to cut everyone’s hair.

My dad is a homebrewer, and a quite accomplished one at that. He has brewed beer for countless family gatherings and events, and has been asked to brew beer for friend’s events and weddings. But, he is not allowed to accept payment for brewing beer for those events or weddings, it must be a gift, otherwise he would be distributing alcohol without the proper processes and procedures (established by the governing body in the “best interest” of the community)

Without getting too political (this is normally a fitness and fatherhood blog) I think it is possible for the social contract to be strong enough to remove the need for heavy handed, intentionally murky oversight. If you want to cut hair out of your garage you should be able to, and your customers should know what type of precautions you are taking. If you want to buy someone’s beer, you can ask them about the brewing process to see if the ingredients and cleanliness meet your standards. (And the beer will probably be garbage if it doesn’t anyway)

The onus to take precautionary measures for the good of each other is a concept that should guide business decisions whether it is an individual contract or a community service, and whether it is government mandated or not. I think companies that want to compete moving forward will do so not just in terms of product quality and service, but also cleanliness and safety precautions. Likewise, consumers should be able to make the decision what businesses that want to support based on those same criteria.

All of this is foreign, and there is no playbook, but giving people the freedom to do the right thing, rather than bogging them down with murky regulation is what will help all of us move forward towards Serenity together.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

This week in SerenityThroughSweat, Speedy is 6 weeks old and showing some appreciations for mom and dad’s sleep deprivation. My longest stroller run to date with El Duderino and some much needed projectile meditation.

Value and Balance

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. If you’ve been a reader for any length of time, (thank you) you know that I’m a big proponent of challenging endeavors. Today I want to share my thoughts on the value of those endeavors and the necessary balance that we should gravitate towards.

The bar I built for our wedding, designed to hold kegs in the blue buckets and be mobile.

I think there is value in doing difficult things above and beyond the obvious intrinsic rewards. Whether it is learning a new skill, competing in a race or grappling event, or finishing a project at work, when we challenge ourselves we grow as humans. Challenging endeavors offer us the chance to grow our skill set, learn about ourselves, and foster a resilience that carries over to other endeavors.

COVID-19 obviously presents its own unique set of challenges, that give us an opportunity to grow. For me personally, I have been driven towards pursuits in self sufficiency. One of the things I’ve always appreciated about wrestling and Jiu Jitsu, is the sense of calm I have in most everyday encounters because of the confidence in my training. I don’t see a downside to that kind of training, or that kind of self assuredness. But, what about other forms of self sufficiency?

DIY plumbing to retrofit a kegerator into the bar I built for my wedding, and resize it to live inside

Jiu Jitsu is it’s own form of magic, but it isn’t going to feed my family of four the way say, gardening, hunting, or fishing would. These endeavors meet all of the criteria we have discussed; difficult, check, value in self sufficiency, you bet, learn something about your self, absolutely. So where is the down side? Here is where the balance comes in to play.

Resized and redesigned to facilitate swapping kegs and cleaning lines. It still needs some trim work, but it’s fully functional

As we continue through week fifty-leven of lockdown, the economy, especially small businesses are hurting. Small business is a term that can be glossed over more easily than say “mom and pop”. Mom and pop, families, are the ones that are hurting. Unfortunately, many endeavors of self sufficiency are a zero sum game. In other words, if I’m providing veggies for my family in a back yard garden, that’s one less purchase at the farmers market.

Any sort of DIY trade work falls into this category as well. Plumbing, flooring, electric, HVAC, landscaping, the list goes on. Most trade work is either done by Mom and Pop companies, or the craftsman themselves are working class bread winners for a larger company. There is value in any difficult DIY project, above and beyond the finished product, but there is a balance to be found in how far we lean in to total self sufficiency and isolation.

I don’t know what the answer is, or where the right balance lies. That’s the tricky thing about balance right, it’s not a fixed point. If you’ve ever walked on balance beam or even just an elevated curb, you need to adjust with every step forward. Self sufficiency and supporting local businesses and trades are not mutually exclusive, but it is a precarious relationship that needs constant balancing. I think COVID-19 has shown us the value in being more self sufficient when things go awry. It has also shown us how much we miss all those mom and pop establishments when they are taken away from us. A lot will change as we make our way through this global challenge into a new normal. Walking the path to serenity requires determining value and constantly seeking balance.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

This week’s SerenityThroughSweat, a few simple and sinister kettlebell sessions and a stroller run with El Duderino. The cumulative sleep debt staying up with speedy is starting to take its toll, but I always feel better after a good sweat.

COVID-19 Engineering

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. I can’t remember where I heard (a good chance it was a JRE podcast) that engineering is finding a way to do what you want with what you have. At the time, I thought about ways to stay in shape with the things I have at home (before the pandemic, but knowing how hard it is to get out of the house with a newborn) COVID-19 is showing us how deep that idea really goes.

One month side by side of El Duderino and Speedy

From a fitness standpoint, most people’s routine has been turned upside down. Grapplers, crossfitters, gym goers have all had to adjust. But garage gym athletes, folks who favor the kettlebell or sandbag, and bodyweight or calisthenic practitioners have already found a way to stay fit when what they have. Running, biking, hiking, jumping rope, are all great ways to get outside and engineer your fitness with things you probably already have.

El Duderino approves of the shrimp and grits, grilled broccoli, and Amish friendship bread.

With restaurants closed and some grocery store staples picked clean, I know I have certainly gotten more creative in the kitchen. From modifying recipes to make meat last longer, scratch baking, and catering to the sensitive, yet discerning, palette of a toddler, the kitchen has become a laboratory of experimentation and family fun with COVID-19 changing our eating and shopping patterns. Finding new and different ways to keep the family eating a healthy diet has been an interesting challenge in doing what I want with what is available.

Parenting and family activities sure look a lot different when you can’t touch public surfaces. Keeping a toddler interested in anything for more than fifteen minutes is a challenge, but removing some of our usual routine activities (library, playground, science center, pool/splash pad) has made us dig deep as parents to provide entertainment and education. The resources made available from organizations as well as individuals helping each other provide a nurturing environment for their children is heart warming and incredible.

I think one of the biggest silver linings to this pandemic is our collective ability to adapt and overcome. To engineer our way through a problem. A lot of us have become teachers, IT managers, personal trainers, and chefs, in addition to any other hats we might have already worn beforehand. All of those skills have been there all along, they just needed a little nudge to find their way to the surface. With a little ingenuity, and a can do attitude, we can still do most of the things we want with what we already have, and engineer our way towards Serenity.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

This week’s SerenityThroughSweat, some solo miles in the midday Florida sun and my phone shut down from over temp mid workout with the sandbag and the training mask.