Training Recap, New Job, and Pushing Through Negativity
I am a little bit behind in my road to ironman recaps, about two weeks I believe. I usually write these on Sunday or Monday and this past week I spent most of it in an extremely negative space. While these ups and downs are all a part of life I do not like to write when I am in a negative space as it seems to end up soaking into my words. The goal of documenting this journey is yes to show the whole story however I do not wish to bring negativity into any ones world. During week 8 I spent the week off of work as I was transitioning into a new job and different company and in between I took 11 days off. This was AMAZING!! For the first time in a LONG time I was not exhausted. Ironman training and working full time takes it out of you and I don't think I realized how tired I was until off work and proceeded to sleep for almost two days straight.
Besides doing a TON of sleeping I spent my days biking, running, swimming, walking the dog whenever I wanted, following my own routine, traveling with my husband, and golfing with my parents one weekend. It was AMAZING!! Truthfully I thought that after 11 days I would want to go back to work however I realized how much I wanted to be able to set my own schedule someday. It is not that I do not want to work it is just that I don't want to work for someone, I liked having the flexibility of being at home.
In starting week 9 I also started a new job that proved to be emotionally and mentally overwhelming for me. I have not cried that much in three days in a long time. No matter what I did I could not shake this overwhelming sense of doom that I felt at beginning this new journey. Rather than feeling excited about a new journey I spent my time dreading what I doing, feeling as though I was going to fail, and not being able to get past the fact that I felt incompetent in the position. Each day I went home and cried thinking there is no way I can do this.
Honestly it took until Thursday for me to shake the negativity that was consuming about this new journey and Friday before I felt normal. To say I am now excited about the position is something I don't think I can say just yet however I have been able to move past the negativity and begin to look at it as a learning and growing experience rather than a failure. My husband has been very patient with me these last couple days for a constantly crying wife is not something he is used to. Between him and my mom who spent a lot of time talking me down from negativity and constantly reminding me that the is a greater path than just this position I was able to slowly bring myself out of the negative state into one where I took the job one day a time. Rather than trying to do everything at once, be superwoman as my dear husband likes to call it, I have begun to focus on getting through one day at a time with the position. This change in mentality made a huge difference.
Ok, enough of my negative thoughts on my job and back to the awesomeness that is Ironman training. One thing that this week did remind me of is that this is a journey, work, training, relationships, and life, they are all a journey towards something greater than the day so you might as well enjoy every minute of it so that when you get to that destination you are full of positive memories of the journey.
By Thursday I forced myself to get back on my schedule, I got up for my usual morning swim and it is amazing how getting yourself back on routine makes a huge difference for you state of mind.
I finished off Thursday with a killer shoulder day thanks to my fabulous husband who just wanted to get me out of my funk and gave me a full scoop of pre-workout, compared to my normal 1/2 scoop. I thought I was going to bounce off the walls, have a heart attack, lift ALL of the weights, and run all miles haha. Friday morning brought a welcoming end to a rough week and an early morning spin class followed by a short treadmill run. In the evening the husband and I hit the weights again for a solid back and glute day.
The sunshine decided to officially bless Spokane with its presence and I took full advantage of it by getting out for a 35 mile bike ride followed by a nice 8 mile run. Talk about mood changing, when you can run in the sunshine I swear it instantly makes life better.
Sunday was another beautiful day and I had a planned 60 mile bike with a short 1-2 mile run off the bike to work on my transition legs. About five miles into my bike the water bottle cage on the back of my bike broke resulting in me only having space for one water bottle. I knew that there was no way I was going to be able to do a 60 miler in the 60+ degree heat with only one water bottle, I've done that before it did not turn out well. For a second I thought I will just re-work my workout a ironman training is all about being flexible, then at the last second I realized I could just stick my water bottle in the pocket on the back of my Betty Designs vest and BOOM 60 miler back on!
Sometimes life just plain sucks and this week started out as one of those weeks. However, I was vividly reminded that while sometimes things can get you down if you are willing to change your attitude around you can conquer anything. For a week that started out to be too much for me to handle it ended pretty amazing with a weekend full of sunshine, long bike rides, froyo and quality time with my husband. There really isn't anything more I could ask for. Work will improve because I will do everything I can to just enjoy the journey, will there still be days when I struggle? Yes of course because life is full of ups and downs but it is how you bring yourself out of those downs that determines the beauty of your journey.
When you are stuck in a negative space how do you bring yourself out? What was your favorite thing you did this weekend?