Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. For the moment fitness has taken a backseat to fatherhood (in the context of blog topics, it has always been in that order in life in general). With the arrival of Speedy, and managing him and his big brother El Duderino, life has gotten a bit hectic. Throw in the added complications of COVID-19 and it is easy to be overwhelmed.
I’m reminded of a particularly tough loss in a wrestling tournament I had my senior year in high school. Crying in a mostly deserted high school hallway, not knowing what I did wrong or could have done better in a close semifinal match, my coach found me and gave me a quick pep talk that has stuck with me.
The bullet points were, “be pissed, be sad, be disappointed. Feel all of it. But after ten minutes, it’s time to get back to work and most of those are not productive emotions.”
I think it’s easy to find ourselves in many of those emotional states (anger, sadness, depression) with everything that has changed in recent weeks. Kids at home 24/7, uncertainty about jobs or finances, heck just plain old cabin fever is enough to test your mental and emotional fortitude.
And just like my coach told me all those years ago, I think it is important to embrace those feelings. Ignoring them or bottling them up isn’t healthy. Dig in to them, let them wash over you, but only for a short period of time. Whether it is once an hour, once a day, or once a week, check in on those feelings and realize that this isn’t normal and it’s ok to feel them.
But then it’s back to work…
This isn’t an easy process. Most rewarding things aren’t. This is a lesson I’ve brought with me for the last fifteen years and I’m still struggling with it.
With a toddler at home adjusting to a new family dynamic, a newborn on a two hour sleep cycle, and a wife who isn’t supposed to lift anything after just giving birth, (I still got the easier end of that deal, BY FAR,) my daily to do list is getting more difficult than finding toilet paper at the store. And with those chores piling up, and the sleep debt accumulating, comes the frustration, the self pity, and the jealousy.
Performing for the family is always the number one goal, especially when the shit hits the fan (read: job uncertainty, global pandemic, and newborn). It seems like I’m mostly running on caffeine, but harnessing those emotions helps get me over the hump. (At least until speedy starts sleeping more than a couple hours).
So in between the cooking, the cleaning, and the laundry. After the potty training, the arts and crafts, and the outside play time. And when bath time and bedtime have come and gone, I can harness those unproductive emotions, remember that it is natural and normal to feel them, and keep soldiering on towards Serenity.
Thanks for joining me and stay sweaty my friends.
This week’s SerenityThroughSweat has been tapered back a bit with it being speedy’s first week alive and all. But I have been able to sneak in two Simple and Sinister kettlebell workouts, some push-ups and air squats, and a few rehab mobilizations from The Ready State.
This post was started this morning while El Duderino was playing in the sand, Speedy was in the basinet, and my wife was taking a much needed nap. It was finished while I took the first watch with Speedy and my wife gets as much sleep as she can before he wakes up hungry.
