Life Without Training Wheels
After completing the 75 Hard Bootcamp in the Live Hard Program, I continued to do all of the tasks with the exception of the diet…my first mistake was thinking that I had everything under control. You see this first compromise led to small and seemingly insignificant changes in my daily actions that led me into a downward spiral. As Darren Hardy writes in his book ‘The Compound Effect’, our choices and actions can begin to snowball over time and depending on the types of decisions we make or don’t make, they can lead us in a positive or negative direction.
Old Habits Die Hard
While I was at the top of my game for once in my life, a few things (excuses) led me to slow down and ultimately halt and reverse my progress made during the 75 Hard Bootcamp. The b!+(# voice began to get louder and louder with each compromise. Still facing several injuries during 75 hard, my mind began to tell myself that it was okay to stop training and that it needed rest and recovery. While these things are true, there’s a difference between being lazy and unproductive and active recovery. As I slowed down on my workouts I began to indulge in foods (sweets for me) that I knew were not beneficial towards my long term goals and health. Other things in my life began to slide as well, this addiction to sweets and a phase of binging not only led me into gaining all of the weight and fat that I had shed over the first two and a half months in the year, but also the mental discipline that I had developed over that time as well.
The Hard Conversation
As I stared at myself in the mirror one morning I reflected back on all the decisions and lack of decisions that got me back to square one. I needed an intervention with myself, time to re-evaluate what it was that I was actually working towards in life…what was my God given purpose and mission?
Ultimately I decided that for me, I wanted to transform myself into someone capable of helping others who were like me, people who as Andy Frisella calls “success zombies”. You see I never had a problem knowing what I should do in order to achieve my goals, what I’ve struggled with for various reasons (excuses) is the lack of action. As they say, knowledge isn’t power, the use of and execution on this knowledge is power.
In order to begin the process of stepping into the person God created me to be I needed to get back into the one thing that really had me moving in the right direction…I needed to get back to the Live Hard Program. I decided that I needed to start Phase 1 and this time my focus would not be on just the next 30 days, but on building the life long habits that would ultimately take me through the rest of my life.
Phase 1
The great thing about Phase 1 is not only does it include all the same tasks from the 75 Hard Bootcamp, but it also includes 3 other components that align with helping me to reach my goal(s) in life. They are in no particular order; 1) Take a 5 minute cold shower, 2) 10 minutes of visualization, and 3) Completing three critical tasks…tasks that get you closer to your goals.
While these may seem insignificant, I and others that have completed the program would argue that these extra components are just as if not more important in aiding in your success. While I am not currently where I would like to be in life, I do know that at one point when I incorporated some or all of these things in my life I definitely was in a much better position in all areas of my life.
Forward Thinking
So as I enter Phase 1 my goals are going to be geared towards building and growing this blog, mostly so that I can document my progress and have something to look back at as I enter to challenging phases in my life. If though the process of doing so I can help inspire at least one other individual to do the same then I will have succeeded in my mission. Another goal is to complete my Permaculture Design Certificate, something that I have been gravitating towards as I have been diving into learning how to be more self sufficient and independent not to mention that I like knowing what goes into my food. Lastly and definitely not least in this season of my life is to regain control of my finances and be able to ween myself out of debt (mortgage included) and into a position that allows me to have more control over what I can and can’t do, say, support, etc.
I will bring you along with me on this journey and hope to make the future me (3/5/10 years from now) proud of the actions being taken towards achieving the life that God has designed for me and that my family, those in my life and I deserve.
Thanks For Reading
If you’ve made it this far, first of all thank you and you’re definitely a real one. Secondly please feel free to connect with me and share your thoughts either here in the comment section, on my contact page, or on any of the social links.
Much love and aloha,
Dan
