Sand Between my Toes.

* I wrote this post last night (Saturday) but only got to publish it on my site just now.

I love my life and most of what happens in it.

And while being involved in numerous projects, businesses and endeavours is, for the most part, fun and rewarding, it also takes it’s toll on my energy, my creative output and my ability to deal effectively with the abundance of ‘stuff’ in my world.

Being the periodically stubborn, stupid, rest-is-over-rated, Alpha Male that I am, I can have a propensity to keep going until I fall down; not a great long-term strategy… for anything.
(Mmm… exhaustion perhaps).
I sometimes delude myself that I’m super-human… but incredibly, it seems I’m not.

Apparently, I need sleep and rest like normal people.
Who would’ve thought?

Johnnie and I filmed a video post yesterday afternoon and the man who never scripts anything and who rarely stumbles with his words (me) sounded like he’d had forty five beers and began learning English two weeks ago.

I chatted with the bald man about an hour ago on the phone and asked him if he had reviewed the recorded post from yesterday… and the conversation went like this:

“Did you take a look at what we shot yesterday?”
“Yep.”
“Did it come up okay?”
“Nup.”
“Really?”
“Yep.”
“And?”
“You sound exhausted, you mumbled three times, your eyes are blood shot and you look like crap.”

Sometimes I get so immersed into what I’m doing that I forget that I need to switch my brain off for a day or two and recharge my batteries.
Sometimes I do so much, for so long, that eventually my output starts to decrease and so does the quality of that output.
I do this now and then.
And I end up doing sixteen things badly…. rather than a few things well.

Sound familiar?
Or is it just me?

Sometimes I forget what it’s like to be alone, in silence, with no phone, no knocks on the door, no TV, no noise, no stress, no busy-ness and no people. My gym is open sixteen hours a day and while it’s a great environment with great people, it’s also mayhem at times… and incredibly draining.

Sometimes we need space.
And time alone.
And distance from our daily grind (perspective).
And sleep and rest.
And more time alone.
And sometimes we need to put everything on hold for a minute (or a day or a week).
And to step out of the busy-ness of our existence and into the serenity and tranquility of no timetable, no schedule, no pressure, no to-do list and no alarm clock.

For a while.

Imagine that; getting out of bed with nothing (in particular) to do.
Sometimes no plan is the best plan.
Sometimes ‘nothing’ is exactly what our body and mind need.

Too many high-achievers think (on some level) that they can function at a hundred miles an hour twenty-four-seven.
Indefinitely.
They think that (somehow) they’re different.

“The laws of science and medicine don’t apply to me.”
“I don’t need sleep… I’ve trained my mind and body to survive on eight minutes of REM sleep per day…. I’ve done a workshop on it.”

The last two months of my life have been crazy.
Crazier than usual.
And while I’m being completely honest… there’s a slim(!) chance that I’ve over-done it lately.
No!
The last three days I’ve had headaches (I never get headaches), red eyes and my brain won’t get out of second gear.

Clearly my body is smarter than me.
It’s telling me to take some time off and to give sleep a try.

Here’s a brief snapshot of my life at the moment.

*I don’t share the following to impress anyone (not that it’s impressive anyway) but rather to share with you the reality and normality of my life. I get lots of emails asking me about my daily existence and what I do (specifically) when I’m not working on craigharper.com…. well this will give you an idea.

As most of you know, Sam (my business partner in the kid’s gym) and I opened our new centre six weeks ago and the response has astounded even me.
We have been inundated with kids, grateful parents, schools… and even business people who want to buy a ‘Gecko’ franchise. We have had newspaper, radio and television coverage because the concept is a new and unique business in this area… and our biggest challenge is not getting kids through the door but managing the level of interest and business we’ve generated; a good problem to have.
We are very busy at the moment refining the business model, employing staff, developing our range of services and trying to figure out the most effective way to grow this company. Sam is fantastic and the kids (and mums) love him.

Harper’s (my ‘grown-ups’ gym) is busy all day, every day; probably the busiest in Australia. 1500 plus personal training sessions per week, fifty(ish) trainers, two new staff this week and new people walking through the door daily…. all good (but demanding and non-stop).

Radio is going great at the moment, today I did my three hour show (health,fitness, lifestyle talk, interviews and talkback), tomorrow I host a five hour sports show (12-5pm) and I am doing regular work on two other stations… each hour of radio I do requires somewhere around two hours of organisation, preparation and planning… again, fun but lots of work.

TV is cool and challenging. I host a weekly ‘Lifestyle’ show on Channel 31 here in Melbourne and I appear regularly on Channel Ten (national) as the fitness editor for the 9AM show. It’s a steep learning curve and I definitely still have much to learn. They haven’t thrown me off yet… so I guess that’s a positive!

Writing is what I love to do and I do lots of it.
Apart from writing for this site, I also write every issue for a couple of national magazines (one sport, one fitness) as well as contributing periodically to several others and have written a few books. The last two months have taught me the importance of not writing for the sake of ‘churning out’ another article or post. Several times I have sat down to my computer at eleven o’clock after working a fifteen hour day and come up with donuts. I will do my best to add quality content to the site most days but I will not write just for the sake of it.

Speaking: At the moment I do somewhere between two and three (mostly corporate) talks per week and have a ball. Being the shy little wall-flower that I am, I enjoy getting in front of groups and offending, challenging, motivating and educating the masses whenever I can… I also do fitness industry gigs speaking to trainers and talking at health clubs to the members. My speaking is managed by one of the best speaking agencies in Australia (ICMI), so they do all the hard stuff and I just need to turn up and do my thing.
Nice.

Mentoring and coaching. Although I don’t have as much time these days to do one on one coaching and mentoring, I still do somewhere around five sessions per week; these are done in person or over the phone and are really rewarding and productive… some of my sessions are even with overseas clients; the world really is a small place!

Training. I do my best to train myself about an hour a day doing either weights or cardio or both. I don’t always get there but most days I do okay. I should stretch more but I don’t; I have the flexibility of a ceramic tile.

So I guess it’s no wonder I’m tired and no wonder my body is telling me to kick back, relax, have some sleep and put the to-do list away for a day or two.

Amazingly, this time I’m gonna listen.

Tonight is Saturday night.
It is 6.32 as I write this sentence and I have three invitations to various functions or social gatherings tonight.
I made a decision an hour ago to attend none of them and to speak to no-one.

I’m home alone and I’m diggin’ it.

I thought I’d hang out with me tonight.

Here’s my plan for the evening:

1. Walk to the beach, feel the sand between my toes for a while and then sit, look at the water, ponder nothing in particular and see what happens…. or doesn’t happen.
2. Walk home and eat something healthy (or not); possibly involving cheesecake.
3. Read.
4. Sleep.
5. Wake up with no alarm (hopefully I don’t sleep through my radio show).
6. Walk to the bathroom, look in the mirror and hopefully the red eyes will be gone and I’ll look (and feel) better than I do right now.

Sometimes our body finds a way to slap us in the side of the head and get our attention.
Today was such a day for me.

I’m gonna pay more attention.

Right, I’m off to the beach.
See ya.

P.S. Don’t forget to listen to your body; it’s smart.

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