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.
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.
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.