Happy New Year - 2013 Will Be Better Yet!

The close of a year and the birth of another always gives one time for reflection. We say goodbye to bad habits and with resolve say hello to new ones that will carry us to a better life. We must remember that the root of resolution is RESOLVE. Too often people view resolutions as more of a “I’m going to try to do (a particular task), if it gets too hard, it’s okay if I stop.”  About 7 years ago, I joined a goal group based off of a Flash Forward seminar I took. We encouraged each other to speak in concrete terms. We traded resolution, and replaced it with goal. 

These last two years have been more difficult than I anticipated. I look back to the person I was in early 2010. I was filled with goals and ambition. The brain tumor made it easy to work hard at work and work hard on projects when I got home and only sleep 6.5 hours a night. After surgery, life stopped being so efficient.  I needed lots of sleep to heal. Now, my sleep rhythm has returned to a typical 8-hour night of sleep. I’m losing 1.5 hours of efficiency daily by having a normal sleep pattern. I’m frustrated. Despite this frustration, I’m filled with excitement for the future and my productivity. Goal no longer feels like an appropriate term for the way I have defined 2013.

On my cabinet above my coffee maker, I have my 2013 Assertions. It is a list of daily non-negotiables and below that, long-term objectives. A business wouldn’t enter a new fiscal year without clearly defining how they will meet their goals, and neither should I. By seeing the assertions daily, I am constantly reminded what my objectives are.

The past two years while difficult have been good. I had the misdiagnosis of brain cancer and have over come the anxiety of that and the other misdiagnosis for the need for a second surgery. With those, I went back to my day job and got promoted; ran two half marathons; wrote a commercial for a dating site; wrote an 8-minute short film (still to be shot); & spent lots of time with friends. While I still struggle with PTSD, and need to concentrate on over-all health (who doesn’t), healing is no longer my primary objective.  I can now focus the way I have in years past on setting and achieving my assertions. I accept I am not the same person I was. I cannot weep for the person I lost and I cannot berate myself for not being the person I expected myself to be. We learn from each struggle we face.  I have learned sleep is important and I have learned to I need shake out the chaff of daily life to get to my objective. I have 

written my map and I am excited for what 2013 holds.

Marathon Drop Out- No Shiny Medal For You... (to the tune of "Beauty School Dropout")

Yesterday, I had one of those runs that no runner wants to have— I dropped out of a race.  No one ever trains; pays registration; wakes up early all to drop out of a race. There are a myriad of reasons why a runner may do this, but I guarantee that odds are if you do this once, no matter what the distance, you’ll likely never do it again. If you were sick, you may tell yourself that you will never race while sick again and if you got injured, you may say, I’ll train smarter. Sometimes these dropouts come out of the blue and no matter what you do, it can’t be avoided…. A spectator crosses into you causing you to tumble over; a twisted ankle; etc.  Yesterday marked my 8^th long-distance run in the three years I’ve been long distance running, and every race I’ve seen a runner hobbled on the side of the course… yesterday, it was me who pulled out. We all have our reasons for dropping out, and even if it is sensible to others, to us, it is the end of the world.

But, Sunday was a learning experience.

Part of the NF Endurance Team
walking to raise money...

I had been diligent with training, so much so that six months after brain surgery, I was able to do a half-marathon. Did it hurt? Sure, but I did it... But yesterday showed me that each race is different.  The summer was very difficult, with 90+ heat after work and the weight of a suggested second brain surgery for this fall, staying in marathon shape was more difficult than I could have imagined. Thinking about the ICU, and the slow rehabilitation runs and how my neck hurt from longer runs because the muscles had been sliced apart…. This idea alone messed with my training more than the surgery itself. Training, really training and doing 20-40 miles a week was something I wasn’t emotionally equipped to do. Despite the poor training, I was going to take the opportunity to walk with the NF Endurance team and spend the whole 13.1 miles supporting friends doing their first half-marathon and getting to know each other more while raising money for the little-known condition, neurofibromatosis.  Having missed them at the start and then not being able to find them at mile 1.5 on the back portion of the out and back- facing 13.1 miles alone was daunting at best.

Fall started blowing into Los Angeles recently, training didn’t seem so difficult with cooler temperatures. Little things like my running GPS dying did not bother me, nor did the unconventional work hours. I had a rollercoaster summer, but made it through August and September with no surgery and two surgeons telling me to stay far away from the O.R. These small setbacks were not going to get me down… I’m training like it was my first marathon again. The only difference is- Now I know how much work it takes and I know how terrible the wall feels.  Even though some weeks were tough on my training schedule and I’ve been repeating them, I knew getting back to where I was would take some effort since I allowed one opinion of “You must have surgery” to scare me into nearly a nearly static life.

I’m sure this residual brain tumor will take me on a rollercoaster for the rest of my life, I just have to mentally prepare and remember that I should just keep doing what I love doing.  Even though I have been better about training, I need to take Sunday’s setback of dropping out of a race and use it like most of my setbacks and let it springboard me into something better.

It seems that there’s no point in having setbacks if you don’t learn from them to be a better you. August taught me to just stick with it and push forward and the Long Beach Half Marathon taught me to train smarter. Together- training, along with friends and prayer, will push me to my next race February 19, the Inaugural Rock n Roll Half Marathon in Pasadena.