Come Close
Posted: June 7, 2013 Filed under: Random Workout | Tags: blogging, exercise, fitness, free range, gluten free, happiness, health, hipster, hope, karma, kindness, life, love, lululemon, marathon, meditation, motivation, musings, natural, paleo, passion, running, Seva, Toyota, whole foods, WOD, yoga 8 CommentsLike gravity, karma is so basic we often don’t even notice it-
What do five random posts:
Plus an outrageously random video about a Dude and his Toyota Supra:
Have anything to do with Karma?
I hope you stick around a little bit longer than normal to find out!
What is karma exactly? We often think about karma in terms of “Black” and “White” – “Good Karma” and “Bad Karma“. You do something good in the course of your day, or your life and good will come bouncing right back to you; you do something bad, and bad “things” will come roaring back with a vengeance. The little known fact about karma? Karma is neither good or bad, black nor white … Karma is truly about our action, non-action(s), responsibility, accountability and consequence. Karma is an action that has no change in state. Karma simply is.
How do we interweave this “new” definition of karma into our day-to-day lives, without over thinking it and trying to be a modern-day zen master? For the sake of our conversation this morning, Karma translates into: There are no bad decisions you can make.
“You guys still with me here?!? Anyone, hello … “
What in the world do I mean, there are no bad decisions you can make? Exactly that, there are no bad decisions, there are only consequences to our decisions. You can go out and purchase all the latest and greatest running gear, brag and boast about all your accomplishments in the yoga studio to your friends on Facetube, punish and abuse your body by over training, drink too much and party even harder. None of these fine examples are a bad decision …
What you have done is potentially propagate consequences for which you need to be responsible and ultimately accountable for in the future. This Dear Reader, is karma, plain and simple.
Notes:
Discovering how karma works for us personally, means taking and owning responsibility for the choices we make and being accountable to these choices. Because every choice, as you can imagine and probably know … Has a consequence.
*If you skipped watching the video? Dude has a sweet ride and an even better message about life!*
Next Lifetime
Posted: June 5, 2013 Filed under: Random Workout | Tags: Bliss, blogging, exercise, fitness, free range, freshly pressed, gluten free, happiness, health, hipster, hope, kettlebell, kindness, life, love, lululemon, marathon, meditation, motivation, musings, natural, nature, paleo, passion, perspective, pilates, running, trail running, walking, whole foods, WOD, yoga, Zen 7 CommentsAdopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience-
Surrounding us is an odd “thing“, one that we rarely take time to notice and more often than not, have come to take for granted: This little thing called “Life.” Many of us search the entire span of our existence for peace, zen, bliss, the perfect pose, best 5k time, serenity and yet? These same things can be found in places that we overlook each and everyday. Even in a quiet summer field, life continues to flourish and live, eat and exist in a natural way, adapting and overcoming the world we merely “exist” in …
… A small doe emerges from the cracks of a wheat field and wanders up to the man-made nature trail, alongside the many busy feet and tires that tread next to her, encroaching on her survival. Interesting, this stunning animal, living, overcoming and flourishing despite our encroachment upon her natural environment; oblivious to our presence, just as we are to our own presence.
What if we paused for a second to take notice of this natural beauty? Is this an annoyance to you, throwing your pace off, adding seconds to your precious run time? One can only wonder…
Notes:
Have we lost focus on the true purpose, the true use of our senses? How can we become self-aware when all we do is tune out our own beating heart and the beautiful world we live in?
Roll If (ya) Fall
Posted: May 31, 2013 Filed under: Random Workout | Tags: blogging, courage, crossfit, exercise, fitness, free range, freshly pressed, gluten free, happiness, health, hipster, hope, kindness, life, love, lululemon, marathon, meditation, motivation, Musing, musings, natural, paleo, passion, pilates, Risk, running, walking, whole foods, WOD, yoga 5 CommentsThere is no intensity of love or feeling that does not involve the risk of crippling hurt. It is a duty to take this risk, to love and feel without defense or reserve-
Avoidance of any kind of risk, big or small, is a byproduct of our fear of the unknown and needless to say: This avoidance of fear will lead to a very bland, uneventful life. Bangers and mash anyone, anyone? If we never took risks, you can rest assured that the blog posts we are reading this morning would not be Draconian in nature. No “second thoughts” before the big event tomorrow morning or lamenting nauseously about getting injured, again. By taking a risk, we embrace the courage of doing something we have never done before, even if it makes us look goofy, takes us out of our normal comfort zone and pushes back the boundaries society has firmly placed on us. Exploring the unknown, the sense of accomplishment and determination to push harder are all “things” that come as a direct result of having courage, taking risks in our daily life.
Courage generously gives us the willingness to explore and deal with the changes and challenges that will come our way. Having read this little bit, I implore you to go back and re-read the post from Wednesday, in a new light.
Notes:
If you take the time to look around yourself this weekend, noticing what others have attained and wishing that you had the same? This mental foreplay you are experiencing provocatively shows you that you can create this same reality for yourself. Each one of us has the incredible ability, deep inside us, to create real lasting change in our lives. It takes infinite amounts of courage and determination, its hard although once we embrace these driving forces? We can change and we will change.
During your weekend run, bike ride, yoga class or even your 6am TRX class. Chase away the doubts in your mind and live the life, as you have created, as you imagined.
What we call
Posted: May 30, 2013 Filed under: Random Workout | Tags: Anaïs Nin, blogging, family, free range, friends, gluten free, health, hipster, hope, kindness, life, Literature, love, lululemon, meditation, motivation, musings, nature, Poetry, whole foods, WOD, writing, yoga 3 Comments… Our destiny is truly our character and that character can be altered. The knowledge that we are responsible for our actions and attitudes does not need to be discouraging, because it also means that we are free to change this destiny. One is not in bondage to the past, which has shaped our feelings, to race, inheritance, background. All this can be altered if we have the courage to examine how it formed us. We can alter the chemistry provided we have the courage to dissect the elements.
– Anaïs Nin, The Diary of Anaïs Nin Vol. 1
Notes:
Be well today and please keep in touch. Especially those of you who were scratched the wrong way yesterday.
Rat Race (Pro)
Posted: May 29, 2013 Filed under: Random Workout | Tags: blogging, crossfit, exercise, family, fitness, free range, Freinds, gluten free, happiness, health, hipster, kettlebell, kindness, life, love, marathon, meditation, motivation, musings, natural, paleo, passion, running, trail running, walking, whole foods, WOD, yoga 16 CommentsThe truth is that everyone is bored, and devotes himself to cultivating habits-
Feel free to file this post under the “Stopped over, liked and promptly forgot what I read ten minutes later” category.
You, me, the dude shaving in the car next to you during the morning commute, we are our own worst enemies. Especially so when we start talking about cultivating and living a “authentic” life, full of true and unbridled happiness. We make excuses, hourly, as to why we can’t overcome something or we are too busy surfing the webz, checking our work email during a Saturday morning group ride. To stop and realize just how destructive our growth-inhibiting patterns of behavior really are.
What follows is a series of blunt and prickly questions. I suppose we could call them the “Stinging Nettles” series of questions?!? I want these to irritate you, making you look inward to find a solution rather than applying aloe-vera gel to cover up the stinging pain …
Do you constantly put “things” off? We make excuses at every turn as to why we put off doing “things” that will markedly change our lives for the better. How many times will we hear or read this today: “I know meditation and yoga can help me BUT … I’m experiencing (Insert anything here) right now and I haven’t been doing them lately.” Seriously folks, If you know a life-enhancing practice like meditation and yoga will help you make a problem disappear? Why then put it off?
Are you a pecksniffian varietal of toad stool? Our minds tend to veer towards the negative side of life, completely normal. We look at all the “things” we don’t have and feel worse as a result. Dear Reader: There is always going to be something you will not have and embracing life in this way will leave you forever unsatisfied, a Toad Stool of high moral arrogance. Looking up and seeing the sun rise, taking a deep relaxing breath of morning air or even the very experience of rolling out of bed – Alive? Something not Nothing.
Do you fell like playing the “Blame Game”? “I could had run a personal best BUT … This amateur yoga mom b!tch was in my way!” Gosh does it feel good putting blame on someone other than ourselves?!? Blaming others is like having good sex: Awesome. How about we entertain the thought of taking responsibility for having some degree of responsibility for what happened and look to how we can turn the situation around, rather than blaming all the yoga mom runners of the world?!?
Saving the best for last …
Are you hopelessly a perfectionist? Perfectionists will be displeased no matter what, anything that isn’t perfect or doesn’t meet their extremely high standards? Weak sauce! Breaking News: Achieving a state of perfection within any walk of life is an impossible goal. Perfectionism turns us into pawns of success, by narrowing our focus on failure which then kindly results in a lifetime of self-doubt, pity and dare I mention? Depression. We might as well say then that perfectionism allows us to be more efficient at finding the best deals online, keeping an organized and tidy inbox or prepared for anything that may come walking through the door. However, having high standards and goals will help us achieve “things” in life, these standards can get in the way of the pure happiness of doing something we enjoy and yes, perfectionism can and will impair our enjoyment of this thing called life.
Notes:
Today marks a day of change here, a day of change in tone and added clarity. A day of asking questions instead of “Liking” and walking away.
CultFit 