The Gym is Still My Sanctuary

I did not want to go to the gym today.

I stood in my office re-opening dresser drawers and skimming through coat hangers looking for a pair of capris I could comfortably run or jump in if I had too. I knew I was going to be late. I was already running late and standing pant-less in my office/dressing room changing my outfit for the fifth time. All while running through excuse-filled conversations that hadn't happened yet. 

It's been a weird week. Astrologically, Mercury went into retrograde affecting all forms of communication. Two of my favorite astrologers foretold of things hiding in the darkness finally coming to Light. I could feel it. I didn't even know Mercury was in retrograde until after I had admitted my raw and tender feelings surfacing, masked by bitchiness. So there, it wasn't the power of suggestion.

I left fifteen minutes late and listened to Lana Del Ray all the way there. Her raw and conscious lyrics validated the surfacing feelings of anger, tenderness, and surrender. My mind took me back to 2014, when I was power-lifting; back to my station days when processing my pounds of unresolved shit in a gray and iron filled warehouse was second only to nursing school. I was taken back to times when I didn't quit. When I didn't give in because it was hard. Times I would let the literal tears, sweat, and blood fall where they may and keep moving. I revisited a place inside of me I forgot existed. It's memory so vague, I questioned the likelihood of finding my way back to it. I thought of those who walked with me before and those with me now. I just kept driving. I didn't want to go, but as I tell my three year old - "sometimes we have to do things we don't want to do." 

I met my trainer at the door - late, emotionally delicate with a sense of acquiescence. I shared my thoughts, less humorously than what he's probably used to from me. I stood there stretching, tired of where I was in my head but cognizant of my current position. I missed that part of me that left it all there on the floor, that part that gave every last drop of myself. After a few minutes of settling-in and warming-up, I felt my emotional-self stabilizing until he mentioned twenty burpees being the center of my work-out. I wanted to rage; I reminded him of my hatred of the full-bodied, oxygen consuming, jumping-back, planking-out, and jumping-up combo. I almost got out of them until I mocked his capitulation.

I pushed myself today. I gave it all I had, and that was the first thing I said to him when that clocked stopped beeping. I couldn't tell you the last time I felt that way. He said he knew. Each time I stepped away to catch my breath, I started again before I thought I was ready, before he expected me to - maybe that's how he knew. Maybe it was my mockery and regaining of the burpees, because let's be honest, I wanted them back or I wouldn't have talked shit. The fact was, I didn't want to whine my way out of an another opportunity to re-build my long lost mental toughness I used to feast on. I finished that work-out today with pride and gratitude. I showed up and did the work with more integrity than I've been able to muster in a few years. Had I been standing against that rig alone, the tears would have fallen. I could feel them welling up behind my eyes pushed by sweet surrender and gracious exhaustion. I think those who have witnessed my climb to the top and slow descent back down the mountain would have been proud today; I was.

With Grace & Gratitude...

My Coming About

To be able to sit here in silence and peace within myself feels amazing, a most welcome change from where I was a couple years ago. Being able to sit here next to the window of my choosing with enough battery to sustain my thoughts feels even better. It's a more immediate pleasure. I've wanted to be here for a long time, both within myself and at this precipice of writing an un-bridled piece without editorial staff awaiting it's arrival. I'm staring at my front porch Christmas tree and leg lamp my mother gave me. It's a good view, there's also snow in the background. It's very picturesque. I am, however, a little torn on whether or not I should get more tea. I drank it all at the desk, patiently waiting for batteries to charge and writing about things past. But now, I am here - the present. And thank you God, because it feels incredible - liberating, joyful, and grounding.

I have spent the last two months looking in depth at my compulsive eating habits and the emotions that give rise to those habits. I also haven't drank in those few months, at all. Since my leaving the alcoholics anonymous, I drank twice before leaving the Detroit area and since moving to St. John's I have drank periodically - a glass or two of wine maybe a couple times a month. On at-least two occasions I did find myself drunk, once throwing up in a friends bed. Had my life become unmanageable? No. Did I use it to take the edge off what I was feeling at the time? That would be true, sometimes. I don't want to do that anymore, at all. I did not die from "going back out", but on a very deep level, my embodiment of the 12 steps never allowed a single sip to feel true to who I am. So, let me own that first. Second, let me accept the fifty pounds I watched come back onto my body, as a means to start again.

To say I lost myself in the 3.5 years just after I moved to the Lansing area would be gross understatement. I lost site of my dreams, I stopped doing everything that brought me joy, adventure, and ignited a sense of passion within myself, and I pulled myself away from friends and family. My writing was full of anger and secrets. Reading that, it's obvious to me why I felt so alone and lifeless. I often said I felt as though the light inside of me was being snuffed out, slowly, and it was. I had wanted out for a long time before it happened, before one of our several break-ups actually produced enough disconnect to sever what we needed to finally pull our lives apart.

It has been a year and a half since my wife walked into my life, unexpectedly and without summoning. She literally walked through a doorway, into an office full of charts and asked if I needed help with my work. I turned around to have a flame take fire in my gut without warning like a gas burning stove catching it's match. A very real sense of shock, fear, and truth washed over me. I knew she was the affair I felt coming when I started that job. And it wasn't like this was the first time I had seen her. We knew each other, we had chatted and considered ourselves friends. That day was different though, something moved out of the way and her soul breathed light back into my deepest essence. I slid her over some nursing care plans and told her what I needed her to write.

The rest isn't history, it's right here. Within the walls of our home we share, the sacred vows we offered each other, and the tumultuous path we traveled those first few months to get here. We broke hearts and lives. We also broke walls that had contained us for years and beliefs that kept us stuck. Neither one of us wanted to be that person; we just wanted to be free. We wanted to honor our own truths and get back to our most authentic selves. There was a palpable connection that superseded our human understanding, one that felt physically painful to remove, so we stayed with it. She is one of my most cherished gifts in this world.

Winter always has a way of stilling my soul and slowing my heart to give way to being present. What I feel more than anything these days is a deep sense of gratitude for the re-connections I feel to God, myself, and the people in my life whom I love, not to mention the family and life I watch unfold in front of me everyday. Finally, I feel I have returned to myself on so many levels - mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Grateful, so very grateful. I have no other words for it.

With grace & gratitude...