Tell It to Me Tuesday- Chris's Journey #4

We all have them- Distractions. This week Chris here talks about his and how he overcame them and just kept on walking!

Blog 4: Distractions

Before I begin, I just wanted to put my day 10 FB post on the blog just in case you have not seen it.

"So today in my new journey to being healthier was day 10 walking. 15 walking days till my first celebration. In the 10 days I have walked 15.73 miles or an average of 1.57 miles a day. My friend Jonathan Oakes recommended that I start figuring out in distance where I have walked to if I kept walking. Well for 15.37 miles, I am 43.57% to my alma mater Flagler College. Pretty cool huh?"

Now back to my regular scheduled blog.

I do things well when I am on a schedule. At work, I create an assignment log every week that tells me what to get done and the importance of each item. In life, I need to know what we will do when we go out. Without a schedule there would be chaos in my life. Do not get me wrong, I like to be spontaneous. However, once the decision to be spontaneous has been made, I want to plan it out.

This also goes with my walking schedule. I have an automatic Tuesday and Thursday and once over the weekend schedule. Tuesday and Thursdays when I walk, I check in with Francesca for accountability and I have the weekend to decide what will be best for me. It worked well when I was just starting to work out, and it has been working out well for the first 10 days walking. I have been successful in meeting every mark and every scheduled day so far. Rain or shine if I was supposed to walk, I walked, and I was proud of that. Then last Thursday happened out of nowhere.

When I got out to my car last Wednesday night, I noticed that the car did not start as quickly as it normally did. It still started and I still got home, but I knew something was going on. I made the decision to get up early and not walk, but take my car in the shop. I hoped to get everything done and walk in the evening after work. I even planned my workout bag and everything. So got up early, got the car place, and sat in the waiting room and waited. Well, I waited for a half hour and the nice man at the Sun Tire came out and said it was the battery and alternator. GROAN!! Not only expensive (well for me) but also it was going to take time. How much time? Well the alternator and battery that my car needs was not in stock and they had to order the parts. It was going to be a few hours just to get the parts in, let alone install them. It was starting to occur to me that this day would not work out the way I planned. What about day 11? At this point in time I was not sure.

So I called a buddy to come pick me up (thanks Eric!). He took me to work and I started my work day. I had lunch scheduled that day, but with no car I could not get to it (sorry Jen). So my beautifully scheduled day was completely getting out of hand. By the time I got out of work it was 5:15 PM. Another buddy (thanks Jonathan!) took me to get my car, and by the time I paid for the repairs, it was 6:00 PM and almost completely dark. With as dark as it was getting I did not feel comfortable walking. Not because of my safety, but from my fear of getting hit by a car. OK, I guess it was my safety. So I decided to hunker down for the night and miss my first Thursday of walking.

I decided that I needed to walk Friday morning. My biggest fear in all of this (which I think I have mentioned) is missing one day. One day equals two equals not walking anymore equals mission failure. I decided to walk Friday morning for two reasons. First, I knew if I waited till the afternoon time that if a movie plan came up or some kind of fun activity came up I would blow walking off. The second reason was a message my friend Christie sent me Thursday night. She told me that she could not wait to see what was next in my journey. I am not sure if she wrote for encouragement, or if she recognized that it was Thursday and there was not walking post for me that came up. Whatever it was the reason she wrote the message it inspired me. So Day 11 was going to happen…Friday morning. Bring it. I had to get up at 5 AM because I had to get the walk in and then get to the office, but bring it on!

Then 5 AM Friday morning came. Do you know how early 5 AM is?? Well it is early. Roosters are not up yet. It is still way dark. And I was still tired! I wanted more sleep, which almost never happens. Then the thoughts came in my head. I need to rest. I need to make sure I am awake for my important 9:00 meeting. I need to do anything but walk. I almost talked myself in to it too. But then another thought came in to my head. I have a reason to walk today. I have a family in my life that is going through the ultimate test right now. The family is struggling and I was asked to pray. I put it in my head that if this family could go through this struggle, then I could walk. So I got my walking shorts on. Then my shirt. Then my socks and shoes. I then got my change bag with my work clothes in it. I left the house and drove to work.

The campus at work is beautiful and well lit. So it is the perfect place to walk at 5:30 in the morning. I parked my car, took a sip of water, and I started to walk. And I walked a new path. I walked and got more determined as I walked. I prayed and walked. I thought about my friends and walked. When I got tired, I thought of their struggle and kept walking. The cool air was agony to me. It was a lot colder than I thought it would be. But I kept walking. When all was said and done, I had walked the longest I had ever walked, 1.87 miles. I went in the Y at work showered, and went to work. Day 11 done. Take that distractions!

Today was day 12, and I knocked that out too in the early afternoon on a Sunday. I had all the same excuses in my head, but I ignored them. Today was my walking day, and I was going to walk. I strapped my shoes on and put foot to pavement. 1.67 miles knocked out.

Distractions will always be there. I will not always be able to walk on the days I schedule to walk. But the point of this is to take the distractions, recognize them and figure out a way where I do not let the distraction run my life. Here is this week’s learning lesson. The chaos that ran my life before of bad eating and no exercise and poor choices is GONE. That chaos is gone and I cannot wait to bury it from my life one day. I, Chris Hollister am in charge of my life. Me and me alone. If one day does not work to walk, fine. Plan another day. Distractions you are in my life, but you do not control me anymore. You are a blip in my radar, and a little one at that. I will walk the next day. I will walk in rain if necessary. I will walk in heat. I will walk with no music or company if I have to. But I will walk.

Today like every day I wrote on my walk FB post “Finish Day 12, hoping for day 13”. Well no more. That was a mistake to write that today. I am no longer going to hope. I am going to do. So everyone, I finished day 12 today. See you on day 13!

Sincerely, Chris