Elizabeth Gilbert introduced the idea about happiness jars in May 2013. Later on she followed it up with with some more elaboration on what Happiness… Read More »“Positivity Challenge”-2. The Happiness Jar – it’s all about people
“Live the full life of the mind, exhilarated by new ideas, intoxicated by the romance of the unusual.”
Ernest Hemingway
“If life gives you colors, paint your world”
Another flashmob rocked Facebook these days: “Positivity Challenge” – people post 3 things they found positive at a given day. A friend and an author of the blog buildingblockblog.blogspot.com shared 3 positive things of her day, asked for 3 things I found positive.
My ideas of the day were:
1). 6+ months of IM training exposed more of LIFE for me then years of no training or just marathon level / half-iron training later on. The daily demand to balance of work, social and personal life and training is all times high these days, and I love this load. It makes me cherish every second, be mindful and present, and tuned and optimize my activities all the time!
2) people. Met some awesome people through the triathlon training. I can keep on going forever on this one: it’s the main point, actually. The kind of people I met through IM training for now – I would have never get to know there are such people and that there are so many of them, Incredible, talented, hardworking type A-s from all sorts of walks of life
(please see the list of blogs by ironman athletes below)
3) nature: all the nature elements – water at swim; air on bike; earth on run , experiencing nature every single time I am out there training.
Trail running at waterfalls – water, air, earth…
All combined, this weekend I’ve experienced life, I’ve shared it with people, I was out there in nature – again.
Read More »The power of “Positivity Challenge” + list of tri-blogs
“Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear.”
Mark Twain
I have a well developed sense of self-preservation. By now. I wasn’t always like that cause of one-sided type of courage: the courage of naive unawareness. I did my share of climbing the trees, playing at railroad tracks and all other sorts of urbanatlon when I was a child. (I grew up in a country where the hype about kids safety was not yet known). I also tend to get into all sorts of adventures regardless the possibility of a traumatic outcome. Just out of the reckless nature of unguarded curiosity unchained by generally accepted social guidelines. Or probably out of the passion for finding trouble. (Who knew I would make a profession out of it: software testing.)
But that’s not the type of courage I would like to talk about now. I tend to believe that
Courage is a choice. It’s an expression of freedom of will.
I woke up at pitch dark. At the time when some people go to sleep on Sunday nights.
“Most of all, the ultra distance leaves you alone with your thoughts to an excruciating extent. Whatever song you have in your head had better be a good one. Whatever story you are telling yourself had better be a story about going on. There is no room for negativity. The reason most people quit has nothing to do with their body”
Scott Jurek; Steve Friedman, “Eat and Run: My Unlikely Journey to Ultramarathon Greatness”
“When I’m out on a long run,” she continued, “the only thing in life that matters is finishing the run. For once, my brain isn’t going blehblehbleh all the time. Everything quiets down, and the only thing going on is pure flow. It’s jus time and the movement and the motion.That’s what love–just being a barbarian, running through the woods.”
― Christopher McDougall, Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen
“The great outdoors” presented by the valley near the Lookout Mountain hummed under my bikes airbars. It was my second loop. Two loops make the course of Ironman Chattanooga, set aside minor differences in course layout. I was on my own for the most of the 5,5 hours out of those 6 I spent on the course.
At first there was chatter with fellow triathletes riding the same route. Then I broke off and headed up. I knew the route: since the time I rode it once in a cold slit rain without any rain gear, in a company of some great athletes leading the way. Since the time I made it in heat of Southeastern June after 4.5 miles swim.I had enough of food and water for the journey. All I wanted is to be there within certain time, with predefined effort.
After some time I was on my own with the tennis balls of my thoughts roaming in my head chaotically.
“You will have enough time for talking to people in your head” – said a fellow triathete once, referring to the Ironman course.
te·nac·i·ty
With all the long weekend for the 4th of July coming up:
How often do you find yourself waking up wishing to sleep more?
Trust this sleep deprived triathlete going through the 20 hours training week – I know what it feels like!
However: each night I can’t wait to wake up – again. “When the reality is so much better then your dreams” – said somebody. I know I might have had less sleep, or have a grueling workout scheduled. Or a couple of early morning conferences to attend with another side of the world. Or some personal items to respond to. But each morning I wake up with a smile. Eager to get moving. Anxious to find out what’s next. I don’t press on snooze on my alarm (unless I don’t remember that I did! )
I’m an early bird. Lucky to get the best part of the day: when all the world is not yet there, but I am.
Like – here:
The saturated colors of sunrise , at a run up the Stone Mountain one morning:
taken me 14 min , and I want to do it again!
The clean morning air highlighted by glares of the rising sun – peace on Earth…
What helped me to pass through my 50Ks (Nashville 2013, Destin 50 and Dauset Trails 30 miler on June 7th) is the understanding – you just keep moving forward