When I last left you, I encouraged you to challenge yourselves, like I was.
That was over two years ago. What have you done in that time?
What have I done in that time?
For my 37th birthday, I challenged myself to do 300 days of 75 Hard before my 38th birthday. My longest streak was 9 days, between June 17-25, 2022, and I quit on September 2nd. In 77 days, I had 56 days “on-program,” and I failed.
Saying I failed doesn’t quite make the point, though. I didn’t fail. I didn’t come up a little bit short. In reality, I quit. I made the decision that I just was not committed to that challenge.
Since that time, I have gone through 75 Hard two more times. My third completion had a couple false starts for various reasons, but I did complete the 75 days.
After quitting my challenge in 2022, I haven’t taken on another. I’ve had ideas, but every time, I’ve talked myself out of it.
That’s not to say that I haven’t challenged myself, because I have. I took the starting line for the Jacksonville Marathon earlier this month. My training had its own set of challenges (plantar fasciitis and a likely broken toe along the way), and I pulled myself out of the race at mile 15. But that story is for another day.
But I haven’t done anything quite like my 100k pushup challenge. I have been tempted to just renew that challenge, but I’ve been dealing with some shoulder/rotator cuff issues that make more than 5-10 pushups rather painful, and not the “Oh, I’m sore because this was a good workout” kind of “pain,” but the, “Oh, there’s something wrong deep in there, don’t actually hurt yourself” kind. But, I’m working on that.
I had dabbled with the idea of another challenge like 100k kettlebell swings, or a shorter challenge of 10k in a month.
I’d like to blame analysis paralysis, but really I think I have just been afraid to start.
I was looking for some kettlebell workouts and came across Pavel Tsatsouline’s Enter the Kettlebell! Rather than committing to a certain volume of swings, I am challenging myself to follow the protocols in that book – starting with just practicing the two main moves: the kettlebell swing and the Turkish get-up.
I feel pretty good with the swing, but my get-up needs a lot more practice (as a side note, it sounds like the Turkish get-up can do wonders for shoulders). Once I feel much more solid in my practice of those moves, then I’ll start following the RKC Minimum program, then progress to the RKC Rite of Passage.
A constant refrain through the book is that these progressions take time. Do not rush it. That is its own challenge. Patience.
If I don’t give myself a challenge or rules to follow, I struggle. Doing 75 Hard, I have no problem getting up early to go for a walk or a run. Day 76, it’s a struggle to get up, since I don’t need to do it that day.
Even if the rules are arbitrary, they work for me. Through three runs of 75 Hard, I tell myself that I must drink a gallon of water, read 10 pages, take a progress picture, stick to a diet and no alcohol, and do two 45-minute workouts (one outside), and I can accomplish those items everyday without issue. But for me, simply saying, “I want to do that (or similar) most of the time”…well, that just doesn’t work.
I have two good physical challenges – the kettlebell program and continuing my marathon training.
But it’s not just physical. There are other things I want to do which require nothing more than consistency. Deliberate time spent.
I have my podcast, but in 2024 I’ve posted 13 full episodes plus one short introductory episode. As of this writing, I have posted 2 new episodes in the past 6 months. To give you a brief glimpse behind the screen, also as of this writing, I have 36 more episodes already recorded, which only need editing and recording of an intro and outro.
Again – consistency. Deliberate time spent working on the podcast.
I want to write more for the blog – more than once every two years.
I want to get better at guitar.
I want to continue improving physically and mentally.
The common thread? Consistency. Consistency. Consistency.
All of those things require deliberate action. Deliberate time spent.
But how do I attain consistency while being flexible to the demands of life with a wife, two kids, and a full-time job? Or is there some amount of inflexibility that is required?
Honestly, I don’t know. This blog would probably look very different if I had it all figured out.
What I do know is that “winging it” doesn’t work. At least for me.
Winging it gets me 49 recorded episodes of a Star Trek podcast, but only 13 released.
Rigidly following otherwise arbitrary rules gets me through another iteration of 75 Hard. Winging it after gets me back to where I was before.
I started writing this post in September, but New Year’s Eve seems an apt time to readdress it. I have been brainstorming some different challenges/goals/systems I will implement in 2025. I mentioned a couple of them above (kettlebells, marathon training), but I have some others, too.
Most of them relate to consistency, like the podcast. Some are professional goals I hope to achieve.
I still try to follow Scott Adams’ advice of focusing on systems not goals. Hence, I am taking on a kettlebell program, not a goal of swinging a kettlebell a set number of times. I am going to focus on eating better, not reaching a certain weight.
What I really need to do is make sure that tomorrow I am closer to where I want to be than I am today. I need to stay directionally right, at a minimum.
I need to define my priorities that are non-negotiable, whether physical, mental, creative, or something else.
Writing this has helped me process my thoughts a bit. I hope that reading it has provided some amount of value to you.
I still don’t know the answers to all of my questions, but hopefully this thought exercise is orienting me in the right direction. And if nothing else, that’s a start.
Happy New Year, everyone!