Hi Everyone!
My apologies about the slight delay since my last post, as my assault across all mediums continue I am struggling to feel the creative juices all the time. In fact, in general I just haven’t been feeling like myself much at all lately. I have been back into training for a few weeks and if anything I am feeling worse now than I was during the break from training that I took. Basically I just don’t really feel much like myself. I joined a swim squad a few weeks ago and am so frustrated by how shit my swimming is going. Times that I would usually crush are currently impossible to me and I don’t know what to do about it. The same goes for my bike riding. My watts and speeds are down every time that I ride and I hate it. It isn’t just my training though. Lately I just haven’t felt much like myself at all. How do you fix a problem when you don’t know what the problem is? I always pride myself on my dedication and determination to everything that I attack. Not recently though. I am struggling to pay attention at university, I have started and not finished several books and this is genuinely the 3rd attempt at writing a post I have had in the last few weeks (I promised myself I would finish this one.) But the problem I am having is that I don’t know the reason for all of this. I know last year when I restarted my training there were some interesting side effects as my body readjusted to the load but nothing like this. I was even relieved when one of my courses decided to give us a take home exam at the end of the semester the same weekend as Cairns 70.3. It gave me an excuse not to race so I transferred my entry to Sunny Coast in September. I suppose this is a good opportunity to show that I am not superhuman or luckier than other people. While I am a highly motivated and determined person with big goals, I also struggle sometimes as well. It is how I choose to deal with it that will determine how long it goes on. I have mentioned that my training is not great at the moment and is causing my quite a lot of frustration. I am however, still getting it done. I know deep down that this is a phase and the sooner I can get back to normal routines the sooner I will get back to being my usual shit-talking self. I also know that if I chose to feel sorry for myself and do nothing I would take longer to feel like me again and when I did get back to business I would be disappointed with myself for not getting my training done. So what is the point of this post? I can even feel myself losing interest as I am typing right now. <I paused and drank a coffee>. I guess what I am trying to do is actually more for myself today than it is for you, the reader. Maybe I am hoping that by typing this stuff down and forcing myself to reflect the answer will become clearer. I think part of my problem is that I am not great with change and there are going to be some great changes in the next 12 months. I also think I am questioning my ability to ever reach my goal time of 4:05. I think a combination of these factors is making me feel like a bit of a screw up too. I know my wife gets angry with me when I say that I feel like a screw up who is wasting his time. But hey, as I love to say, this is my bloody blog so I get to say what I want. I have been down before so I know this is really just a phase. But knowing something doesn’t always make it easier to deal with. Lucky for me, this is not the first time I have felt like this either. I think past incidents of feeling useless, fat and slow have given me some good tips to help myself get back to normal. I am going to focus on the things that I am in control of. Step 1, I need to get my diet back in check. With weddings and trips there has been a lack of self-control and a little too much self-indulgence. Step 2, I need to find an event. Not a big triathlon or anything but I want to find a smallish, local running race, preferably a half marathon. I am hoping that this will get me out of my funk a bit and give me some incentive to train a bit harder. Step 3, acknowledge that this is just a phase but not take it for granted. I am obviously feeling like this for a reason. So I need to work out why that is and try and fix it. As I said, I am a huge believer that it is ok to not be ok all the time and while I am far from being too bad, I am uncharacteristically flat. I am quite happy to talk about not being at my best and I hope that other people who have it much worse than I do are able to as well! I also hope some of you guys have had the chance to listen to some podcast episodes. I really feel like me and Robo are starting to find our groove and the episodes are getting better and better. It wont matter how many podcasts I record though, I will keep writing these blog posts, more for myself than anything else. Find the episodes here: https://goo.gl/wYVasJ Don’t be afraid to admit you aren’t doing great and remember to TRI!
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Hi Everyone! No this isn’t a post about flashing my man junk at poor onlookers because let’s face it, no one wants to see that. No no no. This is a post about putting myself out there because, ultimately, that is something that I do on a regular basis. The funny part about how much I put myself out there is that before all of this started, I was surprisingly shy. I mean I have always been quite confident and enjoyed public speaking. But going through some of my own posts here on my blog as well as the photos I have shared on Instagram, 2 or 3 years ago, I never would have dared. The reason I wanted to start this blog was once I started to get a bit faster at triathlon people started to ask me questions. Lots of questions! It made me realise that maybe people were interested in what I had to say. I have always liked to write and thought that if I could put my thoughts down somewhere it might help to answer the questions I was getting asked to people who like me, were too afraid to ask them. I literally had zero expectations when I started this site and am constantly humbled by the number of people who read my random thoughts and ramblings and who reach out to me with their kind words. If you have been reading my posts for a while now you will be aware that is hasn’t always been positive. I have been accussed of some horrible things and had people say things about me and to me that have left me hurt and shocked. But to be honest, this experience has turned into one of the best things I have ever done. Early on, one of my good friends Jo Jo told me that my blog had become a sort of journal for me and she is exactly right. Writing these posts is something that helps me to vent my frustrations, realise my stupidity, look at my own faults and appreciate the things I have done well. I have lost count of the number of times I have written a post and decided it was no good or too angry or too sad to post and deleted it. The very few times that I have forced myself to publish an article I wasn’t completely comfortable with the response has reminded me how fantastic this community of healthy, active people I am proud to be part of really is. When I started this blog I made a promise (mostly to myself but also to you the reader) that I always wanted to be as honest as I can. I have strived to keep the bullshit to a minimum and to call it as I see it. It might not always be the popular opinion or choice but hey, I am who I am. I mentioned before that there has been some negativity and cruelty directed my way. The first time it happened to me it had a real impact on me. I thought I was just trying to pass on my experiences and opinions to others to help people realise that to live healthy isn’t unobtainable. But that cruelty also taught me an important lesson that has made me a stronger, more confident person today. I have now realised for quite some time that no matter how hard I try, I am never going to make every person happy. So I gave up trying. Instead I try to make one person happy (two if you include my wife) and that person is me. Now I am not saying I go around disregarding the thoughts and feelings of other people. I mean that as long as I am confident that I have good intentions and try to be the nicest person that I can be then that is all that matters. This is where my next endeavour comes into it. Unless this is your first time reading one of my posts or you have never seen any of the posts I put on Instagram you will know that I have started a new podcast. To me, even writing this stuff down is relatively safe. I am able to edit things, correct the spelling and if I need to, make changes. Podcasting however is about as real and raw as you can get. I mean, yes technically you can edit the bejesus out of the audio but as I have tried to explain, that isn’t my style. I want the podcast to be real and honest but I also want it to be a really good opportunity for people who read my posts or know me online to get to know me a little better (without the help of spellcheck and all the swear words that I use.) I couldn’t have picked a better person to start the show with. Robo is a guy who I am so grateful that I have had the opportunity to meet. We have so many things in common but still so many differences. Now while this may sound like another blatant attempt to get people to listen to the show it isn’t really my intention (but seriously, please do listen!) I just want to explain why I have decided to do this . It is like my blog but in audio and much much less polished. So yes, if you do like the things that I write, even if you don’t normally listen to podcasts, give the show a go. If nothing else it might give you a little more insight into who I am and why I do and love the things that I do. As always, starting something new is quite scary and I have found myself a little too obsessed with watching the download numbers. But as I mentioned, putting myself out there has led to so many positives (and a surprising amount of negatives) so what is the worse that can happen? But that’s enough of me patting myself on the back about what a legend I am (really not what I am going for here.) I just think it is important to take the time to acknowledge all of the strangers who have taken an interest into a kid from Sydney who never thought he would be able to get skinny. So from me to each and every one of you, thank you. and remember to TRI! If you click here you will be taken to ITUNES to download the podcast |
TimI lost 50kgs though triathlon and completed the 2016 70.3 World Championships. Aiming to hit 4:05 for a 70.3, the same time it took me to complete my first Olympic Distance Triathlon. I want to bring as many new people to the sport as possible. Whether you are fit and active or want to make positive changes to your life. Archives
July 2020
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