What's Next?

All things worth doing take time and hard work and dedication to the process. That little phrase has been in my head for about four weeks now but today it really hit me that we are at a place at H&W Stables where we can see what we have done. In fact, Saturday we will be hosting some horse industry folks at the barn to show off what we have been doing. We cannot even total the man hours we have put in, the hours of sleep we have lost, the terribly bad diet we have maintained for the past month, but we can see that the work has paid off. Since Thursday the entire mood of the crew has shifted to a more achievement mentality versus the mentality of completion. That being said, we are not satisfied and have begun setting our sights on the next set of goals. Some of those are what we want the final product to be, some are management issues, and others deal with the day to day operations of the facility once Michelle and I go back to our real jobs next month. The other cool part of being this far along is that normalcy, whatever that is for me, is beginning to be something I can actually see in the not too far off distance. My normal summer consists of training, hanging with the family, and golfing on a regular basis. This summer has not been that but it has been quite an adventure. We did get to compete in the obstacle course race at Dirty Foot and I have been able to play golf on rare occasions but I am really saddened that I will not get to compete in the Scenic 17 Triathlon this year. The past four weeks of no training has put a damper on that part of the summer. I cannot be too upset though because after a year of not racing I am excited to say that in just over one month I will put the helmet on and line up in Senior B in Lake City to race my first harescramble in over a year. I have decided to act my age and race in the 40+ class but I still get to compete. The bike is prepped and ready and I think Michelle and Brianna are just as excited as I am to be on the bike again. I started my preparation for the first race today. I didn’t get to workout but my diet was much improved over the past month. See, I have now seen what can happen in a four week time span and sometimes you need to see things with your own eyes to know that it can be done. I may not get as much bike time but I will be in the best shape physically and diet wise that I can be when the horn goes off August 26. I have heard that in order for change to take place you must be willing to commit to it for 21 to 28 days depending on what you read. Most of us never allow the process to be seen because we want things quickly and if we don’t see the change fast enough. After this experience I now realize that if you are under pressure to make changes you will. Maybe we should not allow ourselves the option of backing out. If we buy the change we are less likely to just quit even when things get difficult or the changes don’t happen fast enough through our eyes. I never realized that buying a barn would change my perspective on allowing a plan to take hold but I bought into it and was damn sure I wasn’t going to lose my investment. The pain of failure was greater than the pain of the schedule and the monotony of the work. With about one week of vacation left I would normally begrudgingly be getting ready for the year ahead but this year I am truly pumped for the year ahead. I have an awesome new barn that I am a part owner of, I have a great family who is massively supportive, a great team at FSC to get ready, and did I mention that race season is right around the corner. I guess this summer really hasn’t been that bad when I think about it that way.