Fit For Life

What does it mean to be fit for life?

Well, maybe activities that condition your body, or maybe your mind. Maybe the ability to adjust to surprises and keep your cool. It could mean anything to you.
I selected an image of a very high mountain for my blog. I climbed Annapurna III (Nepal) in a challenging environment. Its a good visual to describe how I make friends with surprise, and we had plenty of them on the expedition! Don't know about you, but surprises come at me every day, and I do everything I can to adjust to the arrival with challenging practice runs. How do I do it? Ski off into the trees along the ski patrol boundary rope. Descend on the bike into the turns at 35 mph with fresh spring potholes to jump. Buy real estate . . .
Life is now full of really interesting surprises, and the Hubbel telescope brings back the evidence of more time acceleration constantly. Anyone who isn't aware of this has found their "happy place". If you haven't found yours yet, I'm betting you have a lot of company. Adjustment to surprise is my goal every minute.
I wasn't built or born into into it like my brother. He's a boundary skier too. Hang gliders, anything that gets him off something with air. I credit him with an "aha" moment though. On one of his walls he placed a wood carved set of letters "adjust". He could have leveled it on the nail, but insisted hanging it at an an angle. The architect in me would level it. Next day, angled again. That's when I realized the only way for me to adjust is to choose "the edge". Some edges get me in the zone, some don't. Edges are useful. They clue me in to where my reaction to surprise needs a little refinement.
I was recently invited by a prominent website to post a story about myself. Uh-oh. If I did post,"what would the neighbors think"? But then, what would they think if someone told them I had said no to climbing a fabulously beautiful and dangerous mountain in a foreign country full of amazing humans and experiences?
All Bets Were Off with myself. I wrote it.
It's good timing for me to write anything related to a healthy lifestyle. We have a healthcare emergency in this country. Too many need medical attention for problems that could have been easily avoided by compensating for a life in a luxurious country with a little movement and excitement. For those who choose to maintain their health with a lifestyle change, its never too late. Ever!

My healthy lifestyle has four catagories - what I eat, breathe, think, challenge my body to do, and how much I do of each. Of these, three can become addictions, so I practice “self-management”.
They didn’t name it “comfort food” accidentally. Food can easily replace intimacy with others and ourselves. It can derail what psychologists call individuation. Food can become the “bubble wrap” that mimics the protection we received as infants and children. Breathing is not on my addiction list. I can’t overdo breathing. Cyclists and swimmers have the largest hearts. That's plenty of breathing to cycle that blood at rapid speed and clean it up!
Living in my head is too easy for me. As a dyslexic, I use the right and left sides of my brain at the same time, using more of my brain than people who use either the left or the right. I have a 3D program running all the time. Its my personal video game. But, there's a problem with all this fun. It blocks the transition from Thinking to Doing.
What I have discovered is athletics overrides the left side of my brain and I get in pure intuitive mode. I take it as it comes, and that's it. My brain starts firing all synapses without any analysis at all. For me, a miracle. I love Jill Bolte Taylor's story about her brain "stroke of insight". Her description of it is exactly what I experience.
When I was asked by a website to contribute to a Healthy Lifestyle section for people who want to do athletic activities when they don't have the motivation, I agreed. There are however, limits to what you do. Challenging the body too far triggers a massive stress reaction that short circuits the immune system’s response and creates a longer recovery. The body starts feeding on it’s own muscle.
Feeling superhuman can lead to our demise. We all know people who get a personal trainer. It’s all good until the trainer isn’t there. They gradually lose their resolve. The self-loathing kicks in and the cycle returns to nowhere.
What didn’t happen? "Individuation" creates self-management. I relate to M. Scott Peck's comment in one of his interviews decades ago. When the interviewer asked him how does one know when they are done with therapy, Peck replied "when you know you are your own best therapist". That's individuation to me.
Another close friend, Robert Fulghum, a master at one-liners, reacted to one of my left brain episodes several months ago "Just know the difference between giving up and letting go." Not what I wanted to hear at all. Dang. More "work" to do, not realizing letting go didn't require any work. I really thought I was more evolved.
My focus with my readers is challenging the body within reason, feeding it with good stuff, and reminding the mind how to know the difference between giving up and letting go. These have been major challenges in my own life and continue to be. It's never over even when I think its over. There's more. And more . . .
What's the payoff here? Why even try? Why suffer? Why . . .
I can't tell you what it will do for you, but if you want a challenge, you can choose guidelines for self-management in your life. You can learn to depend on yourself and trust your intuition rather than on others to do it for you. And you can take your friends with you to keep you company.