FEAR IS NOT MY FRIEND

I finally had the opportunity to purchase a new computer. I am so excited because it is going to make blogging so much easier and more enjoyable. However, I have proceeded to have no idea what to blog about. One public service announcement I feel inclined to make is that Target already has pumpkin flavored everything! Waffles, oatmeal, cereal, yogurt, granola, etc. I’m not sure how they arranged to get all the pumpkin stuff prior to the other stores, but they must be pretty powerful. So, if you love pumpkin like me, you can go and get some stuff!

I guess the reason I’ve been hesitant to blog is because I’ve been in kind of a funk. I want the blog to be real, but still positive. So, I’m not quite sure what to say. I am kind of in waiting mode. My body is healing from my injury so in the meantime I’m just doing what I can. My favorite thing to do (training) isn’t really all that exciting. It’s not helping me become a better physical athlete. It’s kind of just me trying to maintain whatever fitness I can hang onto. It feels like even though I work out everyday, I am still losing the strength I have taken time to build previously. So it’s a little daunting. 

I’d say I’ve been doing much better with this the past week though. I’ve simply been doing the workouts I can do, and trying my best on them. The hardest thing is this injury has really thrown me for a loop in all aspects of my life. Suddenly I am scared of literally everything. I am fearful about doing upper body movements (such as ring muscle-ups) and getting hurt. I am worried about the future. I am worried about losing people that are important to me. I’m worried I’m not ever even going to come close to my goals. I’m worried about never really making it passed my struggles as they seem to be in full force. I am worried about my job and career. I’m worried about aging having never done anything. I’m worried about getting re-injured once my knee has healed. It’s all quite overwhelming. 

I think this heightened fear stems from the fact that the day I got injured, I had let go of fear in my training. And due to this I literally had the best training day ever! It was like 100 degrees and everyone was feeling the effect of the heat. However, I made every lift. I even hit weights that would have been considered my top secret goals for the day. I had not one miss on almost 30 sets of different lifting exercises. It felt amazing to not have fear while training, finally, after recovering from some previous injurious. I felt like I was moving to a new level. And then I did get injured. And it felt like this idea of not letting fear rule my life is wrong. After all, if I had been more fearful maybe I wouldn’t have made certain lifts, requiring me to lift less and therefore not get injured again. That seemed to be working in maintaining health for six months or so..

So now, I’m not sure what to do. I recognize that living in fear prohibits me from reaching my full potential. It limits me from pursuing new goals or new avenues to reach current goals. But it feels as though letting go of my fear in just one aspect of training, has in a way caused me to be injured again. Therefore, I’m now not close to where I was even when I did approach training from a fear standpoint and was maintaining physical health. Sure, my one rep max lifts were not going up because of that fear, but at least I was improving. I know this is completely irrational. What is they taught me in school “correlation does not equal causation.” Letting go of fear in actuality is not what caused this injury. Perhaps the huge ball of scar tissue in my knee causing pain regularly, and making full range of motion next to impossible without 20 minutes of stretching was the culprit. However, my heart feels almost betrayed by how everything seemed to happen.

I also recognize that living in fear in a way causes us to make the things we fear happen, even subconsciously. So, it’s not healthy in any respect, and only makes things worse. But it certainly is feeling difficult to overcome. Perhaps this injury is so I can learn how to truly overcome fear. I’d say the majority of struggles stem from this. And finally getting passed it, would be a huge victory in training and in life. 

Cool meme my coach made.

I think after going through quite a few injuries, and with having my eye surgeries last year as well, I felt like this year was definitely my time. I had learned so much and gotten through it all and so I assumed that this was it! My full potential could finally be worked toward. I guess that wasn’t very smart of me to assume that just because I had, had some setbacks that they wouldn’t happen again. 

I do know that there is some reason for this injury. I’ve already recognized two. So, I somehow have to change my mindset from feeling like letting go of fear was the problem, and instead understand this is part of the journey and will make sense if I one day in fact do reach my goals. I also need to stop using qualifiers like “if” in relation to these goals, and instead feel comfortable saying “when”. 

This change in mindset is difficult as it almost feels like embracing this principle of not letting fear run my life, has betrayed me. But that is not the case. The truth is, I could have gotten injured even if I was still living in complete fear. After all, doing that for the past several weeks has certainly caused some emotional damage. Fear is useless. It doesn’t prevent bad things from happening. In fact it encourages them. Just like not living in fear doesn’t necessarily stop bad things from occurring. I just have to have faith that there is a specific reason for this injury. I also need to have more faith in myself and my ability to get to where I want to go. And also that those around me are not all suddenly going to vanish leaving me to figure it all out on my own. 

I guess I’ll end with saying I still truly believe that those who follow their dreams despite their fears, will always have more success than those who let fear prevent them from pursuing those dreams. I have to remember that applying this in my life has led to some very positive changes. Regression these last several weeks has only happened by letting fear take over once again. This injury is not because I decided to enjoy training and finally started to go for my lifts. It’s just necessary so I can one day achieve my goals. 

P.S. Must take more photos.