How Does It Feel.....

The music this week is from a playlist that I created on my IPod, wwwwaaaaaaaaayyyyy back when the 'marathon imperative' first pushed its way into my 'why do I have to dream so big' brain.



F. ME! TriGreyHound says it better than I think I have ever heard it said: "I'm struggling against the gravitational pull of normal". Indeed.



I'm freeling a weensy bit frustrated... but how would you ever know....

"I'm trying to break these blues, but I can't even get them to bend...."

Anyway, I managed at least a brief workout this morning. Possibly only because I committed to doing so after railing away for an hour to my shrink (and to think he has put up with me for ten years - thank GOD for Canada's wonderful healthcare system) yesterday about the absolute futility of continuing to try after failing so many times. Of course, as I write this, I realize how silly I'm being. I'm just angry and frustrated with myself because in the midst of an otherwise OK weekend I ended up making a very bad choice.



I'm angy because I know that it was a choice that I made but I'm frustrated that I wasn't, in the moment, able to make a different and better choice.



This sort of says just about everything about me.....



But, on the other hand, the very fact that I'm writing this and still getting frustrated and still trying is exactly the reason why I'm still alive.

"It's my life, it's know or never, I'm not going to live forever..... I MIGHT AS WELL LIVE WHILE I'M ALIVE"

Amen.

I WILL!

How Do You Solve a Problem Like Scott (or those gay men and their show tunes....)

OK, first of all, I am so excited I could pee my pants....

I just spoke on the phone to my Internet bud, Spence (Two Thirds the Venture on my sidebar). We think that we are twins separated at birth, albeit a country apart (I'm not quite sure how to explain the 10 year difference in our ages though...). It felt kind of weird to communicate by phone rather than by e-mail, however, I totally believe that people come into our lives for a reason. Right Spence?

So, now to my sidebar, where you will note that I have not one, but three You Tube clips (F. me, I love You Tube). This week's clips are of an awesomely talented woman by the name of Elicia Mackenzie who just won a reality type competition here in Canada, to be cast as Maria in the Sound of Music which is opening in Toronto in October.

Now you MUST know this about me -

I DON'T DO REALITY TELEVISION

- really... I'd rather stick needles in my eyeballs (and besides, I start crying when they kick people off the island) but never mind. Because I'm a big theatre mo, I couldn't resist and I totally picked Elicia as the winner from the first night. I screamed when they announced her as the winner and almost dumped a pot of boiling water down my naked self. I have tickets for January 3rd - I CANNOT wait. Sad as it sounds, I'll probably have to go and wait at the stage entrance to get her autograph....


Anyway moving on....

My second week back at work felt better than the first (the brain was not so cobwebby) but alas, towards the end of the week I was back to the exact habits and patterns that I AM SO DESPERATELY TRYING TO CHANGE:

• get up at the crack of dawn
• start obsessing about deadlines and everything that I have to do at work
• worry about how I can make the lawyers like me (OH, this is swell, at the age of 46...)
• skip working out, promise to do it after work and rush into the office (yeah right!)
• eat second breakfast at about 9:00 o'clock
• leave the office exhausted
• arrive home, inhale BIG bowl of pasta (trying to convince myself that there are half as many calories in twice as much...)
• flop on the couch and watch television
• promise to get it right tomorrow
• go to bed
• repeat

So, I continue to try to figure out a way to start my days by pressing PAUSE. If only I could meditate and get myself balanced and centred, I might actually make some progress.

My day could look like this:

• get up at the crack of dawn and feel INTENSE gratitude for all the richness and blessings of my life
• take a moment to love the cats and realize that life really is quite simple
• meditate
• work out
• FEEL GREAT and not give a flying fuck whether or not the world likes me.... (sing a rousing chorus of "I Am What I Am.. I am my own special creation....)
• then.... after I have taken care of myself, go to work
• be uber productive because I feel so good
• come home feeling energized
• cook a healthy dinner
• maybe watch some television
• repeat

By Friday of last week I was exhausted and decided to join some of the law students in our lounge for a beer, which was just enough to convince me to buy cigarettes on my way home. As I often do, I smoke half a dozen and then ripped up most of the package before going to bed Friday night , swearing never to smoke again, only to wake up Saturday morning feeling GROSS. My answer to this? Go to the store and buy more cigarettes, blow off my workout and rush to the office ON FREAKING SATURDAY MORNING....

TRULY I TELL YOU (an example of WWJS) smoking again after quitting for 2.5 years feels like the worst kind of failure. But, I do know that beating myself up is not going to make me stop any sooner. I did it once and I will do it again.

Now you'll have to excuse me - I have a triathalon to fantasize about....

I WILL!

Fresh starts and new beginnings....

So, going back to work last week was HARD! Having been off for a month and therefore moving slower than a fat snail, I didn't fully appreciate how hard it was going to be to accelerate from 0 to 100 km/h in about a second and a half. Anyway, I got through it - but it wasn't pretty.

Chalk the experience up to a transition week.

With week two upon me, I am all charged up about my goals and plans for a healthier life: I have the right groceries in the house (even cucumbers, which for me is unheard of); I have worked out this morning and have a sketch of a workout schedule in my head all ready to be put on paper and then put into operation; I'm organized at work (OMG, while I was away, we got these sweet plasma quality computer monitors that are like 36" wide... it's a tough job but in all honesty, they give us all of the best toys); and although I have a couple of HUGE deadlines between now and the end of September, I'm optimistic that I can get them done after I have put my health first.

On a spiritual level, I want to throw out a request to lift up my sister W. and her husband D. who are both dealing with difficult challenges in their lives. As well, I finally spoke on the telephone to a man that I met online and with whom I have been communicating by e-mail for a couple of months. Who knows?

Maybe this go around, I can get the loving thing right... do you hear me God?

My workout this morning: 18 minutes on the eliptical, bicep curls and shoulder presses; stretching. Tonight, I am planning to power walk about 7km.

This week's video clip features highlights from the cross-country jumping at the Badminton Horse Trials in England. I am going to a similar event just outside of Toronto at the end of August (though not Olympic level). When I was in my early teens, I dreamed of being a three-day event rider at the Olympics - my idol was Princess Anne.... lol... I competed at the pony club level but for various reasons was not able/did not pursue my dreams.

The "athlete within" (or Defying Gravity... literally)

So it's on.

I've power walked over 30 km this past week and several times, I have had to stop myself from starting to run. I could feel 'the run' welling up within me and I thought that I could explode from the joy that I felt. I'm of the mind though that if I want to set my sights on a future marathon, that I have to stick to low impact activity until I've lost some weight.

OMG - I have not felt this good in a long long time.

I have returned to living in my body and it feels like home. I don't know whether this makes any sense or not, but I tend to live too much in my head and yield to my baser emotions which results in a rejection of my physical self. Even with all the extra weight I am carrying, I somehow feel light in my body. This is in contrast to trudging through my life, a self-destructive/self-hating blob of fat.

While I have been away from work, I have been striving to let go of no longer needed baggage. As it is told in one of Jesus' parables (I am no theologian, so I could have this terribly wrong... but anyway), following much knashing and grinding of teeth, I am (finally?) burning the noxious weeds that have been allowed to grow in my field of beautiful golden wheat.

I am reconnecting with my humanity which is resulting in connections with others. The heart is mending.

Six months ago, I sat in my therapists' office and opined that I could see nothing in my future except blackness. Now, I see bright, vivid colour, and I'm letting myself believe in all kinds of possibilites.

Many years ago, during another really healthy time in my life, I developed a concept of the "athlete within". I understood this athlete to be the mature and competent man that I know I am and I am so grateful that this "athlete within" is emerging once more.

I'd much appreciate links to other blogs written by emerging runners or runners who have faced enormous challenges to live their marathon dreams (older runners as well). Without a doubt, the mountain before me is steep and there are going to be consequences to be paid for planting the weeds, but I'm resolved to give it my all.

"So if you care to find me,

look to the western sky....

And nobody in all of Oz,

no wizard that there is or was,

is ever going to bring me down...." (Wicked)

I BELIEVE I CAN.

So don't be afraid...

Today's sidebar (and the title of today's post) is a clip from the Closing Ceremonies at the Gay Games in Chicago in 2006. I wept as I watched, recalling my experience at the Games in 1994, when Ms. Lauper performed at the closing ceremonies; singing Girls Just Wanna Have Fun with about 100 drag queens.

I SO need to do this again!

I can FEEL the desire welling up from within.

I BELIEVE that my true colours are still deeply buried and the person who wears those colours deserves to emerge into the light and LIVE.

So - I'm throwing down the hammer as some of you say - I'm starting to train baby....

Cologne here I come.

I have a lot of work to accomplish in 2 years - but something tells me that this is a pursuit worth throwing myself at.

That was harder than I thought....

So, two weeks of my month long vacation/sabbatical are behind me. So far so good. The demons are grumbling that they want to come back out and play but my renewed committment to healthy(ier) living is pretty much shutting them up. It's about time.

So far this week, I have logged 19.4 k in fitness walking (and probably another 5 k getting from place to place), 5 hours of meditation and yoga and 10 minutes on my new elyptical. Huh, just 10 minutes? Perhaps, it's a good thing I didn't know how hard it would be working out on an elyptical until after I bought it and had it installed. Truly, baby steps is my mantra du jour. I can't be hard on myself for only being able to do 10 minutes. Rather, I need to consider it a starting point - 10 minutes today, maybe 11 minutes tomorrow and so on.

My inital reaction to my new elyptical is that I really miss my treadmill. Sadly, it had to go because my neighbours started complaining about the early morning noise of the friendly giant in #423 pounding the running board (why they waited for 2 years to complain is beyond me). At first, I thought I could retrain myself to work out at night but if I have learned one thing about myself, it's that I cannot will myself to work out after my work day is finished. As I have written before, I would be all to happy to live my life at 5:00 a.m.; a time of the day that is anathema to the forces of self-destruction. Clearly, not working out played its part in the dark and nearly tragic drama that has been my life for the past 18 months or so. In the circumstances, I was forced to conclude that it was too expensive of a toy to be used, not for its intended purpose, but rather as a clothes rack that doubled as a comfortable bed for the cats (it was too funny watching my James give me the evil eye for taking it away. For several days, he layed on the living room floor in the exact spot where it was positioned - and if you know cats, you know that he was sending me a clear fuck you statement).

So, I think my primary goal for the next year will be to concentrate on gaining aerobic strength using the elyptical and perehaps do some swimming and if I can get a bunch of weight off, I might be able to start doing some running next year. I really hope that this can happen because I am starting to fantasize about going to the Gay Games in Cologne, Germany in 2010. One of the highlights of my life was competing in the Games in New York in 1994 and I so want to have that experience at least once more in my life. Although never say never, I doubt that the marathon is in the cards but maybe I can manage the 10k?

This leads me to another confession: towards the end of my dance with devil, I started to smoke cigarettes again.

YYYYYYYYUUUUUUCCCCCCCCCKKKKKK!

What a gross and foul habit. I am having a really really hard time with this given that I had quit for about 2.5 years. I suppose it could have been worse - I only started again at the tail end of the slide and I'm confident that I can quit again without too much fuss. If ever I want to know why 10 minutes on the elyptical feels like such a challenge, I need to look no further than the stupidity of smoking cigarettes. It is the more amazing given that I had a conversation just a few months ago during which I commented that I didn't think I could smoke a cigarette if someone was holding a gun to my head. More amazing still, is that I wasn't craving cigarettes. The first relapse was an isolated incident that just happened one night; I went to the store for potato chips or some such and when I was paying, I just blurted out, small Players Light King and before I had a chance to stop myself, I was ripping open the package and had one lit almost before I was out of the store. Although it took several months, I didn't really start again until early June when my work stress was particularly acute and I was desperately worried about the general state of my life and the escalating impact of my self-destructive behaviour.

My inner demons were particularly pleased with this turn of events. The good news is that I know without a doubt that I will be a non-smoker again. The experience of not smoking for so long will serve me well as I get it together to quit once again.

On other fronts, my return to yoga practice is going really well. I stayed away for too long because I knew that I would feel really self conscious and started to believe that I wouldn't be able to do a downward dog pose if my life depended on it. For me, the best thing about yoga is that it is not competetive and doing anything is better than doing nothing at all. It totally helps that a respected teacher has opened up a new studio in my neighbourhood and thereby removing the excuse of having to travel out of one's way to practice. As well, my firm agreed to let me use my gym membership benefit to pay for classes.

The benefit of a yoga/meditation was particularly manifest in my life yesterday. I woke up in the morning feeling all out of sorts and particularly lonely. I went out for coffee and a bagel on my way to the studio and was desperate for an excuse not to go. Had I not have gone, I know only too well where I would have ended up. The good news is that I forced myself and saved the day.

All in all, things seem to be getting back on track.

Thanks so much to Katy for her feedback on my recent post - I have shared it with my shrink and a therapy group that I have joined and they all agreed with her and had a good laugh to boot. If ever I get up the nerve to do standup comedy (which I would really love to do someday) I will surely use this as material.

BELIEVE

So, what happened?

Today's sidebar offering is a video of Elaine Stritch singing "Here's to the Ladies Who Lunch" from Sondheim's Company. Ms. Stritch (is she not just too freaking fabulous for words?) originated the role of Joanne on Broadway in 1970. Although I've never had the privilege of seeing it, I frequently listen to the soundtrack, and the following lyric somehow captures the essence of who I am, where I find myself and, why I went away:

"HARRY: You've got so many reasons for not being with someone,

but Robert, you haven't got one good reason for being alone."

It amazes me (and perhaps the brilliance lies therein) that one line can speak so much truth.

You see, I live behind thick emotional walls borne of fear and shame that stubbornly refuse to fall despite years of therapy - a part of the puzzle of my life that I just can't seem to resolve. Not that therapy has been a waste. Quite to the contrary. It's just that it has taken years of scrubbing my soul with SOS pads to get to the dense and murky depths of my soul where these particular demons live.

So as the story goes, about a year and a half ago, I was in a place where the scab got picked and I just couldn't go there, effectively giving permission to my demons to run amok. Boy were they happy because within me, they were assured a host who would provide them an excellent place to party right on. I vividly remember a particular yoga class during which I actually felt my heart open and I started to weep. In that moment, I was as human beings are meant to be - alive, vulnerable, present and in the moment. If you recall, my last blogs were all about yoga and health and letting go of body image issues (physically, my walls are comprised of fat and the effects of willful self-destruction). Well, my friends, to get there, one has be willing to, as they say, lean into the pain and deal.

Now, to be clear, I don't believe that all of this happened in the space of one yoga class - but during the winter/spring of 2007, I arrived at the proverbial fork in the road and I skipped down the path to Hell because I just didn't have the courage (or whatever else one needs) to walk a journey of love. Moreover, at least some of this can be attributed to that old canard, the mid-life crisis (if only I had spent the money on a little red sports car....instead of on.... ummmm... ok then, moving on....) .

All the while, I was dealing with the stress of my job, the aftermath of a national political leadership campaign and the death in April of 2007 of an unlikely best friend, Marie. She had moved away (to live with her daughter) several months earlier, following the death of her husband, only to find out that she was full of cancer. I never got to see her again or to say goodbye. There are days that I just want to scream at God for giving me so much death and loss to deal with. But, I know that have not been singled out. As my Mother once said enroute to a cemetary - I'm afraid that if I start crying, I won't stop.

I write none of this to feel sorry for myself to throw myself out as a victim. I blame no one for this state of personal affiars - I learned a long time ago that I am responsible for my choices and actions... the good and the bad. It's just that my sack of hammers got too heavy and I couldn't cope - so I did what I know best - I tried to avoid the pain by escaping to imaginary fantasy worlds (quite lovely in the beginning) that one can only get to, by doing things that I'm neither proud of nor that I can describe in a public blog. Suffice to say, I'm lucky that I'm still alive. I come to this tendency to escape honestly; it is after all the way I survived childhood. It's not that I was ever actively suicidal (that's just not how I roll), but I sure didn't much care if my days on the planet were numbered as the result of my own negligence. For way too long, I worked during the week (full of fear and anxiety) and once Friday arrived, promptly set about to free myself from the desperation of living that engulfed me. What a sorry assed existence, let me tell you.

Fast forward - this behavioural folly eventually led to the dead end that I could have predicted it would lead to when I chose to go down that road in the first place, and the drama became more of a problem and more painful than that which I was trying to escape. So, I sought out help, took a trip to New York, moved into a fabulous new office (I know this is shallow of me, but it's really big.... alas, on a more humble note, it is big by accident and not by virtue of any real or imagined importance), arranged for a month long vacation/sabbatical, and here I am.

The important thing for me in all of this (and I hope for anyone reading): Even though I knew on some level that I was risking death, I persisted on the road to self-destruction because I decided that it was appropriate to beat on myself for taking a road that I had already taken more than once before and that was getting me exactly nowhere. However, this time round and relatively early in the process of getting help, I came to an ability to see the past year or so as just another leg of the journey; a journey from which I expect that I will emerge from better and stronger than before.

It has been a journey that has taught me much. Having found myself in middle age (and btw, would somebody please explain to me just how the fuck that happened so quickly - just yesterday, I was 21....) I have decided that the point of living is to be authentic and to live my life as the man God created me to be.

I am currently of the mind that to do so, or at least to try, is to live a life without regrets.

So, it's back to yoga, trying to eat properly and hopefully start training again. Early days, but I BELIEVE I WILL.