Clocks

This morning I woke up an hour before my alarm clock went off. Wait, I am lying… I do not have an alarm clock. I use my iPhone. Anyway, I woke up early. I woke up early before my get up early and go to the gym alarm. This got me to thinking. Clocks.

There are many clocks in our lives. Our cells are slowly dying and being born all to an internal clock. Our children grow up and change to their internal clock. We are born and we die to some unknown clock. It reminds me of the movie- All Dogs go to Heaven. We all have a clock that will eventually run out of time.

We spend every day racing against the clock that we have set for ourselves. I have a goal- to do a Tough Mudder- in 3 months and something like 16 days. I am in no way ready. I am still not strong enough to pull myself up and over a wall. I still weigh somewhere near 300 pounds. I am scared. I am scared that I cannot do it. I am scared that I will embarrass myself. These fears are part of what is driving me to wake up early enough to go to the gym at 4 in the morning.

We all assume that we will live to reach old age. We have plenty of time to accomplish everything in life that we believe we should. There is plenty of time to focus on our career before we settle down and have children. We can wait until we have enough money, until we have earned accolades professionally. The bad part is- that damn clock. It is ticking down an ever quickening countdown until our eggs are old and cracked. We never know exactly what age is too late.

I always thought that someday my life would begin. I kept waiting for the alarm to go off- and I would finally be a grown up. I am in danger of missing my entire life waiting for that moment. That is part of the reason I have to do this TM. I need to start living life- and stop waiting until I am good enough. I am good enough now.

A woman I work with lost her son this weekend. He was shot by his older brother, on accident. This led me to imagine how I would survive in that situation. What regrets would I have? Would I wish I had done more with Ty? Would I wish I had told him I loved him one more time? Of course. There is no way to live with absolutely no regrets. We can only do the best we can. This requires constant vigilance. We have to strive to be the best person we can be every single day. I have so many things I want to learn. So many things that I want to get better at.

Boxing is still so tough. This very nice girl in my boxing class made an astute observation last night- as I wheezed and panted my way through the workout. She said, “you give up on yourself to easily- you quit.” Wow. I do. I convince myself that I cannot push through. The mental aspect of boxing and working out is such a struggle for me. I have spent my entire life underestimating my ability and my strength. I have 15 weeks until my TM. I am not going to be thin by then. I am not going to have some amazing super girl transformation before I go meet all these people who have been supporting my journey to wellness. I am still going to be a work in progress. You know what? That is okay. All the best people are a work in progress for their entire lives. I need to enjoy the work. Our life is a journey. A quest of sorts. I need to relish in the adventure of it all. And stop waiting for the damn alarm to go off.