Taking a break from training; Taking a break from life.
Have you ever had the feeling that you just wanted life to stop? Have you ever felt that life had passed you buy? Have you ever wanted life to stop just long enough for you to catch your breath and survey they landscape of your past? I have felt that way. I feel that way now. I really want to get a fix on where I have been and where I am going. I want to know my direction. Hell, I can’t even remember the last time I had a direction. I cannot even remember the last time I even knew where I was headed.
In three weeks time I will be back out on the road, and I do not mean on the road in the sense of driving to some destination with a plan of action just waiting to be put into place once I get there. No, I mean back out on the road as in wandering, without a place to call home and without even the slightest, remotest illusion of a future of happiness to comfort me. The very thought of what that will be like weighs on me like a ton of lead. Unfortunately, I know all to well what awaits me for I have been there at least a dozen times before.
Generally speaking when I reach a place like this I am able to endure it, outlast it, push through it. These things do indeed come to pass. I usually come out clean on the other side, but this time it feels different. This time there are so many things weighing me down that these feelings are hitting me harder than before. The reality of uncertainty is harder to bare this time. Oh, what I would give for the sweet serenity that accompanies good old fashioned denial. No such luck this time.
The fire that took place some 4 months ago is reaching out from the past and rearing its ugly head in a manner of speaking. At the time, the fire forced me out of a home and into a 4 month span of house sitting assignments that in a way has been a huge blessing. I really do believe that God was with me every step of the way. He just took over, placing one firm, flat stone after another under each foot as I walked forward. It was a rewarding time for me in terms of trust and faith, though it was far from easy.
I can remember what it was like initially, bouncing from hotel to hotel. The uncertainty then was as palpable as it is now. But I had my brother with me. We were still a family, albeit a small one, but a family nevertheless. That helped get me through. This time, Beau is not here. He left to go be with his girlfriend. So, I am on my own in a way I haven’t been before. Mom is gone; so is dad. Both of them met there match when cancer came calling.
So here I sit. Lunchtime on a Thursday. I haven’t worked out for next to a week or so, and when I did work out it was at a gym. I haven’t touched my beloved weights in all that time. I can’t explain it. I brought my weights with me because I knew I would need them to stay in shape. My arsenal consists of Ironmaster Quicklock Dumbbells and Super Bench, Ironmind Vulcan Racks and Dipping Bars, Olympic Husky Handle Dumbbells, Pillars of Power Safety Racks and more. That’s a lot of weight to be carrying around, figuratively and literally.
So I have all these wonderful tools stuck in a basement that smells of cat shit, placed on a cement floor that is usually covered in various amounts of cat puke, warm piles of which I have stepped in more times than I care to think about. In fact, the more I think about it, it’s a miracle I worked out even once in that basement, let alone for the past three months or so. Alas, even those workouts have now stopped.
Depression has settled in. A pinched muscle in my scapula/trap tie-in has gotten worse and I am virtually a crippled on the right side of my body. I am weak as a kitten. So the basic movements that have been a staple of my training for the last several years are no longer possible with dumbbells. My equipment is virtually useless to me right now. My body is useless to me right now.
Add to all of that the pressure of impending homelessness, a car that needs a transmission overhaul, isolation, frustration, lack of imagination as well as inspiration, and zero financial wherewithal and, well, you get the picture. It’s bleak folks.
The truth is I just do not know what step to take next. My health is my number one priority. My fitness goals are so important to me. Yet none of the things I need to achieve them are in place. My supplements have dried up for reasons I cannot go into here, and I am feeling the effects of that. I know I could achieve the best fitness level of my life in 6 months if I had the tools in place to do it, minus the injuries of course. For now, I am just going to have to do the best I can to stem the hemorrhaging of my strength and stamina. I have to come up with a plan of action. I have to decide what I want. I will leave the how’s up to God. And that brings me to my final point.
In the end, being denied my dreams is what is killing me the most. The Word says that “hope deferred makes the heart sick.” I just want to accomplish what I know I am capable of accomplishing and right now I have so many obstacles in the way. I just want to have my hopes and dreams realized. In the meantime, I wish life would stop for a while and let me catch up to it.
Let’s hope that things turn around really fast. I know with God at the helm that is always possible.
TPO Webmaster
