TRY

Today I was surprised by trying.

Randy and I (while his folks were at our house with the kids) visited "camp" for a "date" to run(/swim/bike) a "tri." They have been doing these mini-triathlons for the last 5 years or so, which consist of a ~100yd swim, 5 miles of hilly biking, and 5k of hilly running.

What surprised me was enjoying it a lot more than I thought I would, even while we went faster and pushed harder than I thought I was up for doing on <6 hours of sleep. I was allowing us 1.5 hours to finish the thing without passing out, and my "best time" from 2 or 3 years ago was 1:04. I finished in under an hour, at 59:59! (Randy was right behind me because he wanted to keep his 4th place finish consistent with the other years he's done it, and I was 3rd.)

What is strange to me is that the event as a whole felt easier than it did in the past. I think it was my mindset, mostly. The last two years have been really good growth - spiritually, emotionally - for me, Randy, our marriage, and our family. I have been very intentional about battling lies and fear (which comes from believing lies) and the fruit has been reaching into the nooks and crannies of my/our life/lives.

I wouldn't say I was an unstable person two years ago. But the freedom to live, having been cleaning out the gunk in our lives and heads, gave me the freedom to enjoy the triathlon, and that made me go faster overall without thinking of it all as a grueling burden.

And then I got to enjoy the satisfaction of that success the rest of the day. Which was really beautiful, by the way.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

December: mud, mud, mud. Let's go skating.

Image
After I had the Flu at the end of November, we jumped into taping and mudding for the whole month of December. The following pictures are self-explanatory unless captioned otherwise. A secret hiding place! Because we're new to some things, we built the rough framing for the bathrooms with 1-2 inches extra in width. Turns out, tubs usually fasten directly to the studs and you need the space to be a true 60", not 61-62. We will have slightly roomier bathrooms, but will also have a piece of PVC trim that covers the jog in the wall by the tub. Entry Thru entry into laundry room We realized afterwards that *smart* people probably install drywall and then install the stair treads and risers. But, it works this way too. We missed 2 of our homeschool co-op days due to illness, and had to finish paper mache projects at home. Andrew got to do one this way, though, so it worked out. Randy. Will fix printers in a pinch. Sorta...
Read more

August: Upper walls, ROOF! Class 5.

Image
After a bout with the REAL flu, I'm back at this catch-up thing. (Seriously, though, the Flu is no joke. I was up to nothing but lying around for about a week, and ate almost nothing for a good few days. I still have a bit of headache/sore throat/swollen lymph nodes, 2 weeks later.) August 9: Working on the upstairs walls. Once you  get to a certain height, you kinda need to put in the  window and door bucks to go further.  Looks funny like this! August 11: We HAD to make sure we were taking a "sabbath" during this house build season, so that we wouldn't work ourselves to death. It often helped to get away from the project to reduce the temptation to say "I'm just gonna do that one little thing" and then "I'm just gonna do this other little thing" and before you know it our day of rest would be quite productive and we wouldn't be ready for another week of work. On this particular BEAUTIFUL Sunday, we visited Pelican La...
Read more

Cabinets 1

Image
Do you know how to build a kitchen cabinet? I didn't either. At least, certainly not in a day! All it takes is a little planning, the right tools, and the right people. When my brother Tim and his family visited for a week in early October, he and I (and Laura, one day!) focused on getting a few cabinets built for the kitchen. Randy and I had heard about MyWorkshopSpace at a business fair, and conveniently, it's a program located at Down to Earth Woodworking, just across Pine River from our place! For $50/week, you get to use all the tools, purchase materials through the shop, AND Allan Wiener , the owner and operator, is on-site to teach you... How best to plan your project How to use the equipment How to put everything together What not to do, too, and how to fix mistakes Now, with my super-great brother Tim, Allan didn't need to help "me" much, as Tim actually went to school for woodworking and spearheaded that week of work once he was fam...
Read more