On Training and Discipline

Image courtesy of Dirty Girl Facebook

In 19 days I will join the exhausted, muddied ranks of women participating in the Dirty Girl mud run.  It's a 5k obstacle course, involving mud pits and climbing walls and any number of unexpected booby traps, and it's also not the kind of event that my 15 yr old self would ever have imagined that I would willingly sign up to complete.

Five years ago (!) I entered my first ever "sporty event".  Having been a dedicated non-athlete for my entire life, I, being of sound mind and body, actually chose to sign up for a sprint triathlon (500 yard swim, 6 mile bike, and 2 mile run).  After my initial panic attack, I settled into the daily workout routine created for me by my personal trainer-slash-awesome husband.  I won't bore you with the details, but ultimately I learned how to train in timed intervals, increasing the amount of time on my feet while simultaneously gaining in speed on days with a shorter run.  It was methodical and soothing, and difficult enough to keep me at my edge.  It was also unlike any form of discipline I had ever known.

Having spent my entire adolescence holed up in various dark corners in pursuit of becoming an author, I am hardwired for working at a frenetic and haphazard pace.  Days of down time followed by all-night writing binges, hours filled with plot structure and verse and character development that end abruptly, until ready to strike again, are a natural part of my DNA.  I spent all of my college, and the majority of my post-graduate, years pushing up against deadlines, working until the wee hours to get a project completed on time.  It was always a bit of an adrenaline rush piled onto a creative high.  Like drinking red bulls and vodka (am I dating myself here?) on top of multiple double macchiatos.

Apparently, you can't work that way when it comes to performing amazing feats of physical prowess.  I'm not teaching you anything new when I tell you that the body needs to build muscle slowly, one tiny fiber at a time.  Gaining strength, like staying healthy, is all about the process and not so much the product. 

For three and a half months I slugged through my training schedule, unaccustomed to the prolonged accumulation of endurance and control.  (Mostly I listened to Haruki Murakami's "What I Talk About When I Talk About Running" on my iPod.  No joke.  Best running book, ever.)  Although I understood that I was accomplishing something, I didn't really understand the magnitude of this type of training until the week of my event.  Two days before the triathlon, I was ordered to go to yoga.  The day before, I was to do nothing (nothing!) and be off of my feet by 4 p.m.  Looking at the schedule in advance, I certainly had no complaints.

Except, I was a wreck.  Edgy and restless, I kept asking what else I needed to do to prepare.  I knew I couldn't just sit there and let all that perfectly good time go to waste.  I had to cram! 

Nothing could take away the uneasy feeling of not being ready.  (Although, being forced to lay on the couch with a magazine while my sweetie cooked me an unnecessarily carb-heavy meal was a great start.)  And nothing could prepare me for how it felt the next morning when I dove into the freezing Pacific Ocean at 7 a.m.  My body was completely ready.  I was completely ready.

It's a lesson that I vowed to take with me into the future.  I promised myself from that point on, I would approach my writing, my creative projects, and my life as an endurance sport.  No more last minute cram sessions, or acceptable bouts of non-activity.  I was going to learn the basic act of daily maintenance.

Of course, one loses a bit of that bright-eyed veneer after five years.  The edge has gone, along with the majority of my "free" time.  After recognizing that my power drive seems to have settled into a bit of a cruise, I've decided another event is in order to restore that urge. 

This time, when I run, I think about a comment spoken to me by one of the senior writing teachers in my graduate program.  We were meeting during office hours, and she was critiquing my work.  Almost as an aside, clearly without much intent, she gave me the best piece of advice I learned from the entire two years of study:

"It's clear that you have an innate sense of language.  You never seem like you have to try very hard to make it work.  Which is a large part of the problem.  You don't have any discipline in your writing."

True, but I'm in training.

Taskmaster

I spent most of this morning flat on my stomach on the living room carpet with Obj. #4, piles of brightly colored foam shapes surrounding us, exploring the wonder of patterns ("Look, red square, blue circle, red square, blue circle, what should we put next?") and listening to her squeal excitedly whenever she figured out a new sequence.  It's always fun to watch a 3-year-old problem solve, and the rush of discovery that flashes spontaneously across her face make my big old heart swell.  I also started thinking a lot about patterns: how they come into being, what purposes they serve, how I have a tendency to equate "pattern" with "boredom", and how big a role they play in my life as a parent.  I still fight the tide when it comes to recognizing that my days are set into a familiar rhythm, and I still try to shake things up (sometimes completely without reason) to the dismay of my habitual daughter.

That being said, I do want to incorporate new and better habits into my routine.  I'm forever trying to sort out how I can adapt a behavior and make it stick.  I don't know if it's my motivation level, boredom, or that I haven't yet found the right system, but most of these patterns tend to get lost in the shuffle.  So, I've been looking around for fun ways to accomplish this that help keep me on task while still letting me play around aimlessly on my iPhone:

The Habit Factor- is an iPhone app that lets you set up goals, upload photos, write an explanation for each goal, and then chart your habits on a calendar.  The app keeps track of your running streaks, provides motivational quotes, and helps you prioritize different entries.  It's also got a clean and fairly attractive interface, as far as these apps go.

Way of Life-  Although I'm not a big fan of the color scheme (don't know if this is customizable?  Maybe it can be altered), I can totally nerd out on the pie charts and bar graphs.  Fun way to analyze your habits, although this might facilitate more procrastination.

TeuxDuex- This is more of a list-making tool than a habit former, but I love the classic design and simple formatting of this app.  Available on your website browser, as well as your iPhone, this is a stylish way to keep track of your days.

StickK- Some people work better under pressure, and we've all watched enough Ultimate Poker Challenge to know that nothing puts the pressure on quite like a wager.  With this website, you state your goal and how much you're willing to gamble on achieving results.  Clearly this works, there are over $10 million dollars at stake on the site.

Do It (tomorrow)- If I had an Android, I would be smitten.  This is a beautiful list-making, day-tracking app, and if you don't love having the option to put something off for later, then I'm not so sure we can be friends.

Day Zero-  Again, this website isn't about habit forming, but it is insanely fascinating and can cause you to lose many hours that you won't ever get back.  This site is a "life list" (a term I prefer infinitely more to the infamous "bucket list") with a deadline.  Choose 100 goals that you would like to achieve in 1001 days.  You can choose to make yours public, or keep it to yourself.  See what others are doing, and discover new goals with the "Idea Finder".  I just opened mine, you can help keep me accountable here.  Let me know if you start one, I'd love to see your own lists!!

Letterpress card found on etsy

In the Greek language, there are four major words for 'love':  Agape, Eros, Philia, and Storge.  When looking up the phrase 'types of love' on the internet, a whole host of religious websites immediately pop up to tell you all about this subject matter.  I mentioned this to a dear friend of mine, one who has most recently become an ordained UU minister, and she told me that religion is one of the few fields of study in which 'love' is discussed as a subject matter in its own right.  I'm not sure that I can agree, thinking about the literary and artistic movements that have been developed in order to broach the nature and philosophy of love, but her comments do make me wonder.  

That very evening, I read this post on Mighty Girl, and I was struck by the writer's ability to verbalize her process in such a tender and clear way.  I don't think that 'love' should be delegated to a field of study, nor do I think it already is being delegated.  But I do think that the majority of us have no context with which to discuss these matters outside of our comparison to the 'love' found on screen, or in print, or within a form of worship.  Our language is simply not adequate enough for something that connects ourselves with a variety of other selves.  Four, or even four hundred, words are not enough. With an issue so tender, it's frightening how many choices are made, both by and for us, that are self-defining and life-altering.  It's amazing how often we are able to recognize our own sense of love in connection with another being, or activity, or object.  I am struck by this incredible gift that we have yet to fully understand, and am overjoyed that we might never have the right words to express this one emotion.  This, to me, is the purest form of creativity, and the one that we seek to recreate in our mastery of our chosen mediums.

stay golden

Through a series of completely amazing and unexpected events, I found myself traveling across Japan this last October.  I hadn't exactly put it on my list of must-see countries, but I never object to seeing any place that I haven't already spent much time. So there I was, on Halloween day, excited to find myself embarking on a very special "work" trip to visit communities of artists with developmental disabilities.

During our travels, we toured a small program hosting an art exhibition for those who lived onsite.  Amongst the abstract charcoal prints and brightly colored pastel animal portraiture, I found a long white banner with Kanji written in dark, feathery brushstrokes.  When I first saw the banner, I was so taken by the music of those brushstrokes that I instinctively had to own it.  I wanted to absorb that free-form sensuousness into my daily living.  I wanted to sit inside of it for a broad expanse of time.  The very kind and thoughtful man who was giving us our tour laughed softly and told me that, actually, I couldn't own the banner because it belonged to their program.  It was, in fact, their motto.  Roughly translated, the phrase was simple:  "Find identity, join society."    

Months later, I continue to be touched by this phrase and think of it often throughout each week.  So simple, so basic, and yet, such a complex and, at times, extremely difficult accomplishment.  How many of us struggle with just those basic fundamental concerns?  All those existential questions regarding purpose and desire, all those socially awkward moments and feelings of inadequacy and regret, culminating into a pure dichotomous philosophy that seeks to enrich all of us (regardless of shape, size, ability, and limitation).  Thinking about this solidifies that the duality of self and community can exist so readily, and yet, must be a conscious and daily act.  One that is supported by every branch of life, including art, work, family, and self.

 Note:  For any who are interested, the program is called Yayoien and you can find them here.

informing the other

Since Obj. #4 has begun dropping her naps, we've had to create some alternate coping strategies here at the 52 Objects household.  (I consider this to be the ultimate design flaw: that right smack in the middle of the most trying and temperamental age, those luxurious three hour midday breaks suddenly vanish.)  One of these strategies is called "quiet time", which essentially means "I don't care if you sleep, just as  long as you stay in your room for an hour."

"Quiet time" works slightly well, but this brief stint of time doesn't do any justice to the nice long stretches of calm that preceded this phase.  It requires me to reevaluate the long list of items I was hoping to attend to during this break, and somehow still fit in my own personal moment of peace.  The problem is that the minute I close the bedroom door behind me, and my daughter is thoughtfully staring up at the ceiling willing herself to stay awake, my mind goes into a sort of panic freeze.  All I can think about is everything that needs to happen in the next sixty minutes, but by this point I can't actually do any of it.  It's a numb, overwhelmed stretch of nothingness.  And it leaves me feeling exactly zero amount more refreshed, satisfied, or relaxed.

Researching this feeling on the internet is as helpful as researching "red bump" on WebMD.  There are just too many psychological issues attributed to this feeling.  I know that I'm not experiencing an actual panic attack, and my symptoms aren't related to any form of clinical depression or anxiety.  And I also know that this feeling is shared by many, many others.

When I find myself here, in this state of frustrated thought, I try to capture energy through sheer momentum.  The worst decision I can make is to walk straight into that tidal wave of overthinking, so instead, I try to pick an action and follow it through to the next step.  Learning how to create items in pieces, and learning how to appreciate the act of creating a singular piece, can feel monumental when there are so many big outcomes bouncing around my insides.  Incremental work is not my strength, and yet, it can yield such an unexpected bounty that I have no choice but to appreciate the process with the respect and awe that it so truly deserves. 

Speaking of working with pieces, and in sticking through the process, here is a little bit of loveliness that I was shown today.  I think this just might be the perfect living example of this whole post.