The Body, pt. II

If I'm honest about it, I'm quite blessed with the body I've been given.  I'm been blessed with strength, health, and looks.  I'm thankful for my body, but seem to abuse it too often.  Rather than thinking about it properly, I often allow it to be the thing that carries me, mistreating it like a vehicle, rather than treating it like the sacred thing I truly believe it is.  

One way I've been blessed is that when I put on weight, it doesn't look that bad.  It goes to my stomach in the way that makes it solid.  I look heftier, certainly, when I gain weight, but I'm lucky in the sense that it doesn't turn to flab.  

This year, I've gained weight.  Anywhere from 20-30lbs, depending when you count 'year' and where I was actually at before.  Of that 20-30, 15 have been recent - since May - and are of the most concern.  I had a tough spring and summer, professionally.  Returning home from Spring Break, I found a letter that said I had to find a new job within the Grand Rapids Public Schools.  I wasn't notified as to why that was, and never received an adequate explanation.  It was shocking because I had (arguably) one of my personal best years in the classroom.  There was a high level of rigor, I incorporated technology in ways that are ahead of the curve, and my students displayed this by raising their test scores by an average of 3.1 pts.  This was amid a school that had no administrative support, no discipline, and the most entitled students I've ever encountered.  

It was my second year in the Grand Rapids Public Schools, 11th year teaching, and on my end I vowed to take this position honestly.  If there were flaws, I'd point them out; if something didn't work, I'd go down the proper channel to get it fixed.  These things I did.  It has worked as far as earning esteem from colleagues, but hasn't seemed to go my direction, thus far, professionally.  So to have these gains, work hard and be consistent, and then be let go with no explanation was a real blow.  My body felt it.  My back started to hurt.  My legs tensed up and ached.  I'd experience shooting pains down my legs and couldn't really sleep.  

Many nights, I'd go to bed feeling drained, only to jolt awake just as sleep was on the horizon.  This would happen over and over until I'd finally get up, watch tv and maybe have a glass of wine, until I could finally get there.  It exhausted me.  It made it harder to function on many levels.  Harder to exercise.  Harder to be enthused in general activities, and made it much, much easier to watch tv and eat comfort foods.   

I watched a lot of good tv.  Ate a lot of comforting food.  This resulted in a 15 lb weight expanse that seemed overnight.  I didn't notice that much, until I put on some of my 'teaching clothes' to go to an interview and I couldn't button the pants.  I tried to put on a suit coat that previously closed with ease, and it made me look Chris Farleyish.  

If I'm honest about it, what really changed was my pattern.  I gave into the laziness, rather than overcoming the fatigue.  I allowed my circumstances to anger me, and gave into that anger, rather than using it as righteous fuel.  None of these things added to my general happiness, and my general mood was lower during this time.  

I vow to change it.

Now, my ideal weight is about 190lbs.  At this weight, I'm in great shape and feel good.  So I'm going to get there.  I stepped on the scale six days ago at 230.8.  So I got 40.8lbs to knock off; the process, however, has started.

This week, my girlfriend and I started the South Beach Diet.  We're currently on day 6, and I weighed myself at 224.6 today.  Not bad for a week.  We're also getting back to the exercise and healthy eating that went with the 190 weight.  

It's taking the power back.  

I'm focused on the goal of getting back there, and of being health.  As the g.f.'s mom says, "How you eat in your 20's and 30's determines how you live in your 40's and 50's."  To that end, comes change.  I will be:

  • Working out 5 days a week
  • Planning and cooking most meals
  • Living a more active life

I'll update every now and again.  

Cheers.  

Simplicity, pt. I

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A few years ago, I was given (by my sister Sarah, who is very awesome, but that is beside the point) a book called Freedom of Simplicity.  I began reading it twice, but put it down.  This is atypical for me, but I began the book again, determined to finish it.  

Things that I value include accepting your current position in life, facing the day with dignity, respecting yourself and your neighbor.  I believe in contentment.  

I put money aside for retirement, but something about our whole American paradigm of working, saving, and planning of retirement goes against some fundamental part of my belief.  It seems to go against the importance of now.  This goes with many other things I believe, like a job should not define a person.  We should not be entitled.  Gratitude is chief.  But there's something off putting to me about maxing out things for the future, while ignoring the here and now.  

Some context for the thoughts - I moved cities recently (nearly two years ago) for a job that I felt was the right move.  I moved to have more of an impact, to do more with the skills I have, to hopefully better the world.  This included longer hours and a major pay cut.  The move was lateral, expenses speaking, so the cut in pay effects spending, entertainment, and savings.  

There are a few ways it must effect these things.  But I think that - recently - I've been more of a complainer about the lost pay and current situation, than I have been someone who deals with, accepts the moment, and lives according to the values I profess to believe.  In some ways, I've been very vaginal in how I process the cuts, being overcome with lack, rather than being filled with thanks for what I have.  

Or, perhaps more accurately, I feel entitled to have, which puts me right in the camp of feeling that I hate most.  It's the opposite of gratitude.

The thing I want to do, as in: act with regularity, is being content with less, and being more thankful for that less.  It's become apparent to me that I need to alter my thoughts of contentment.  To think of what's in front of me, rather than what's next.  I need to alter my perspective of what possessions are and how to spend/use my money.  I know the paradigm is necessary on some levels.  

But I intend to switch some goals.  To have x amount to give, x amount to save, and to be content with the rest.  It's needed.  It's where I'm at, and I think the book - Freedom of Simplicity, will be an aid in that.  

The Body

The body is a wonderful thing.  It's something I take for granted a lot, too.  When it's healthy and intact, it's so easy to take the whole thing for granted.  To just assume that we have this thing that will work forever and feel good and be great.  But then we stub a toe.  Or get sick.  Or put on weight.  Or strain the back.  And then we realize how well it all works.  It's like the coolest toy of all time.  Feels good, feel emotions, carries us.  I'll be posting about the body.  I've kind of let mine go recently, and I'm in a fight to take it back, to help it run well.  

But right now, I'm feeling thankful for it.  

A View from Above

This past Friday, I flew to Seattle, WA to visit my brother.  The first leg of the journey was a quick connection from Grand Rapids, MI to Chicago.  It's basically an up and down, about forty miles to Lake Michigan, then south to Chicago: you actually get to Chicago before you left from GR.  

As the plane took off, I looked at the landscape, and could detect a design - an architecture - from plane.  Streets run N/S, E/W with periodic angles.  Shopping centers are circled by houses, and houses are huddled together for the (apparent) purpose of things like electricity, water, garbage removal.  People can say what they will about our great nation, but an undeniable fact is that we're well organized.  

But as I was taking this in, I noticed how similar each house in most neighborhood was.  They had the same basic plot of land, same basic design of a house.  And then I thought about the fact that many of these houses will be called "our house" by someone.  Each house will contain different people with different problems, presumably many of those problems taking the center of that house, that person, that life.  

When you get to the ground level, it's easy to get caught up in that.  From the ground - or certainly from the roof - a two story house seems big.  The lawn that needs weeding and mowings seems its own task.  The problem each individual has takes over their perspective and frame of mind.  It can cloud mood and judgment.  It can foul a day, month, relationship.  In so many of the houses, there must be people with problems with one another that say mean things and think mean thoughts and do things to hurt the other.  It seems so big.  

When viewed from the top, these problems are less than small.  That two story house seems like a mere prop on a set, a tiny piece of something much bigger.  The problems in that house seem so minute, when compared to the whole.

Some square mile pieces encompass the entire existence of some people.  They go to the same store, same bar, same place, day after day.  Their existence can be seen from the height of a plane.  

When viewed from above, those singular existences seem so small.  They are definitely not the center.  

They are a part, and there is something healthy in that.  

Applying the abstract type thoughts to real life, I'm going through a job search.  I moved to Grand Rapids from Chicago to have more of an impact as a teacher.  I've been in urban education for nine years, gotten (minimally) decent at it, and wanted to take my talents to my hometown.  This hasn't - at least according to my view - worked out.  In the two years I've been in GR, I've been at two different schools.  At the present, I'd laid off.  If I do get called back, I'll be at a third school.  Especially in urban communities where transience is the norm, new people have to earn trust and respect.  Until you've done that - which takes a minimum of two months - it's difficult to make an impact.  Students test you, admin views you with a cautious eye.  Once you've proved you're not going to leave at the first sign of conflict, then you can start making an impact.  But if you have to start over year after year, this gets draining, it can be hard.  

From the ground, it's a problem.  Jobs, and finding new ones, takes a lot of time and energy and can encompass much of the day.  While being unemployed, I've applied for over 30 jobs.  I've had minimal success in getting callbacks.  I was talking to my girlfriend about this right before I left, and we were discussing what could happen and what the options were.  When someone else makes the decisions about your career, your options are minimal; you don't have a whole lot of say.  

But what we do have a lot of say over is how we view that time and these issues.  From the ground, in the houses and buildings, the view may be taxing.  We may be drained and all consumed.  But from the top, in the over arching view, we will be fine.  Things will turn out, and all it takes is one phone call, one job offer, one person to give us a chance, that makes the difference between despair and jubilation.  

It's the view.  

Stepping back and thinking about the view from above, realizing we're only one small piece in a much larger puzzle, we're the part of a much larger grid, makes all the difference.  Then we can make that thing ours, knowing it's a piece, not the center.   

Lollapalooza

Today I get to head to see Kings of Leon at Lollapalooza.  Which is really, really awesome.  

The last time I saw them was in 2010, in Tinley Park, IL at an outdoor pavilion.  If I remember correctly, it rained at the end as they played 'Trani' and we were belting the lyrics along with the band, embracing the rain.  In my mind, the moment is magic.  

It's cool when you get to do something you love on a given day; such as: see Kings of Leon, you're favorite band.  Which, on this day, I get to do.

For the morning, J. Liddell and I are sitting on a patio, drinking coffee and doing bookish things like reading, writing, and talking about those things.  This comes after a night of enjoying the city.  We went to Tango Sur, a great BYOB Argentine Steakhouse in Chicago, and shared a Filet under the candlelight.  

While waiting for the table, we had a pre-dinner dessert at Sensational Bites.  We both lived in Chicago, her for twenty three years, me for seven.  (Win: Liddell).  Coming back here is always so awesome, and there's a palpable feeling that comes with the big city.  It's like you're always, or could be, right on the edge of things.  Something dangerous could happen right across the street.  Or anyone could walk by.  Or something could happen, and if it did happen, it could be right where you're at.  

I remember being twenty-four and walking around New York City feeling this thing.  People would casually check one another out because anyone could be someone important.  You could see the director of a show you wanted to be on, the writer of your favorite book, or the lead singer of your favorite band.  It gave walking the streets a hype.  And even if you didn't know the person, perhaps they were behind the scenes on something, working as an agent, an editor, marketer, you couldn't ignore them.  They could be someone.  

It's a cool feeling.  The closest it came for me was when I was reading The Rolling Stone magazine later.  It was an article about The Strokes, and they said Julian Casablancas lived in the same building as Ryan Adams.  Something was written about an interaction the two had, and it was mentioned that Ryan Adams would play and sing in the lobby of their building.  This was so crazy to me because I'd just seen Ryan Adams how they just described.  He lived in the building next to my friend.  Which meant that Julian Casablancas lived right next to my friend, and this was crazy to me.  On any given day, The Strokes could be hanging out next door to a good friend.  

It blew my mind.

The feeling added an awareness that was awesome, and it was good to feel that again.  It's a good energy.  

And, in a few hours, I get to see Kings of Leon.