It happens to all of us at some point - we get on a good roll, with work, with fitness, with life - and then life happens.

This is a photo taken by my friend Joe Chandler, whom I worked with at Rocky Mountain National Park all those years ago - he named this sleepy owl “Lefty” and I’m guessing Lefty is having his own fitness funk…

We miss one workout, then another, and then before you know it, you haven’t worked out in weeks, or did any meal prep, and you feel like a sloth.

Sloths are pretty cute though, you have to admit….

When we start to feel like we’re behind on everything - then we start to get overwhelmed. And I don’t know about you, but when I’m overwhelmed, I’m also prone to anxiety and fits of existential despair, fearing that I’ll never amount to anything every and also I’m a horrible person.

It’s a completely logical place to to when you get off track, obviously.

Friday, I asked my therapist to hold me accountable to three workouts over the course of the next week. Yes, I asked my therapist to keep me accountable to my strength workouts. Here’s why:

My workouts are my domino - I know that when I get my workouts in, other habits fall into place. 

If you are off track or have found yourself in a fitness funk, you don’t need all of the things, even if you have all of the feels.

Stop thinking of all of the things you need to or want to do, and find one.   

What’s the one action that can take that will propel you forward with all of the other actions?

I have a list of things I’d like to do, and a bigger list of things I feel that I should do. The best way for me to get out from under the weight of those project lists is to focus on the one.

For me, it’s my workouts. When I get my workouts in, I feel better. When I feel better, I eat better. When I eat better and workout, I sleep better - and have better brain function and I'm a better coach, co-worker, and spouse. 

For instance, I have many clients tell me that they know that if they go grocery shopping, that meal planning happens more easily. And when meal planning happens, meal prep happens. When meal prep happens, they feel in better balance and like they have more energy. When they have more energy, they workout.

And on and on it goes. 

So what’s the one thing you need to do?

Perhaps you need to put your screens away and get into bed by 9:00, because you know that when you do that, you get more sleep and wake up feeling more rested. Maybe you need to hit your 10 minutes of meditation, or a morning walk with your dog or 30 minutes on that new Peleton in your basement. 

The bottom line is that you don’t have to figure out everything. Not today, and not tomorrow. 

You need to figure out the one thing. That one domino that will help all of the other ones fall into place. 

Sometimes when people ask me hard questions,  I give a pat answer.

Co-worker: Have you seen the stapler?

Me: I have pants on. What more do you want from me?

I put these on today. 

Usually I’m making a joke. 

Sometimes though, I’m not joking at all. Sometimes I’m using humor to cover the truth that, on this particular day, I got out of bed, brushed my teeth, took a shower, put clothes on and drove to work. 

Hell, I even plucked my chin hair. 

There are days when those basic tasks feel far from basic. 

There are days when everything feels just a bit harder. I don’t know how else to explain it. The difference between snowshoeing on unbroken snow and on a well-worn path, maybe. In both cases, you’re following the same path - but in unbroken snow, those steps take a lot more out of you. You’ve got to work a lot harder to get where you want to go. 

On those days, the self-judgement and guilt that follow is relentless. At least for me. 

Many days, I battle a constant feeling of “why does it feel so hard to write one *&^&^^% email?” 

Why does everything feel so hard? 

Why can I not just buckle down and get things done? 

I just, as of last week, completed a fitness product (Stronger You: The Ultimate Fitness Guide) that I began in January. My goal for completion was March, then April then….well, August. The disappointment I feel in myself for taking so long to finish far outweighs the accomplishment of completing something.  

Sure I finished, but it took me forever. 

I don’t always know how much of those delays are laziness and how much are my weekly, sometimes daily struggle with this thing I’ve spent the past decade plus trying to understand. That thing is dysthymia, also known as persistent depressive disorder. I write about it often on this blog because….well….I believe we need to talk about it more. 

Last week, I wrote a post about fears, and I mentioned that my greatest fear is that I’ll never give to the world all it is that I feel I have in me to give. That I’ll spend so much time spinning my wheels worrying about what I should do, that I’ll never get around to the doing part.  

A friend of mine took a screen shot of that last line and told me to post that sh** somewhere I could see it everyday. 

Some days life is as simple as making a list and checking off the boxes of tasks that you want to get done. 

But some days, life isn’t that simple. 

I’ve said before that sometimes I don’t know where the depression ends and I begin. And that’s the daily frustration. 

Sometimes I lose interest in things like music, books, my guitar, exercise. Many days I lack productivity and on many more days, I’m overwhelmed with an overall feeling of inadequacy. I spend so much time thinking and feeling that I should be more. Dysthymia is sometimes referred to as mild depression, because you still function - until you hit a major depressive episode, as I’ve done in the past. 

The trap is that you feel like you should just snap out of it. Recently, I read in a post on dysthymia which mentioned the prevailing myth that a person can just look on the bright side. 

Stay positive! 

Stop being such a Debbie Downer!

If you’d just look for the good things, you wouldn’t feel this way!

Recently, I heard the expression that there are only good days and great days - no bad days. And that expression really wounded me deeply. Because it made me feel like I just don’t try hard enough to see what’s good. It played into those feelings of inadequacy and low self-esteem that hit me so hard some days. 

I was relieved to see that concept written as myth, because so often, I feel like a failure for not snapping out of my funks. For not being able to counter a tough situation with straight out gratitude and positive thinking. Mind over matter they say.

And I say, what is wrong with my mind, that I can’t make anything matter?  

It was myths like those above that prevented me from seeking treatment for most of my life. It’s myths like those above that often still give me the greatest heartache at the end of a long day. I don’t always know and understand what I can and cannot control. I don’t always know how much blame is mine. And that is so, so, so, very hard. 

I treat my depression the best I can. I have an amazing therapist, an amazing spouse, I take my medication and I work hard to make the lifestyle changes I know can help. I exercise often, try to meditate, work to let people in to my life and my struggles and try to be open and honest about the struggle. 

That last one is harder than it sounds. 

Sometimes people think that depression is only obvious sadness; that it’s crying in the middle of your living room floor or bursting into tears when your boss looks at you sideways.

Those are often side affects of major depressive disorder, which is it’s own unique monster. I’ve crossed paths with that one before, but it’s the “mild depression” and I beg, beg, beg to differ with the idea that any depression is mild, that clips me at the knees. 

I wrote this post today because I got up and put pants on - but for some reason - perhaps the reason that I can seldom see but always feel - putting pants on felt like an accomplishment. 

So today, and many days, both behind me and probably ahead of me, the best I could do in a day is put pants on. 

But I’m going to do my best to celebrate those pants. And maybe even, if I can find it in myself, bedazzle the shit out of those pants.

Working with a bunch of under 30 guys means that I’m perhaps a tad more sensitive to my age than is reasonable. I promise you that once I came on board, coach's meetings became more challenging, especially when we talked about training “middle aged” clients. 

Josh: Generally we won’t have a 40 something year old…

Me: What? What won’t you have a 40 year old do? Hmmm??? What??

Josh: Drag an SUV across the parking lot with her teeth. 

Me: I'll be tying a rope to the SUV in the parking lot if you need me...

The most challenging part of aging for me, and I know I’m young, is balancing my athletic skills and wants with the realities of a 41-year old body that I’ve already put through the ringer playing various sports throughout the years. 

My competitive days might now revolve around golf and slow pitch softball, but I still want to train like an athlete - not just because it’s fun, but because it’s who I am. So with that in mind, here are my random thoughts on training, and if you are a coach who works with aging athletes, perhaps these are some things to consider.

1. Don't tell me I can't do something

I want to be like Donna, and Eileen and Kathy and so many of my other clients who are working out and training hard, and smart, into their 60's and beyond.

Listen, I know there are things I shouldn't do anymore, in the interest of my long-term health. I might have to let go of that goal of running a marathon, given that broken foot that side-lined me for all of last spring.

But, if you know what's good for you, and me, you'll never tell me I can't do something. Maybe that's hard-wired from my years of being one of three girls in Little League, but I'll break myself doing something if you tell me that I can't. 

We all have particular gym identities, and mine is that of an aging athlete. For me, that means that I want to throw medicine balls, deadlift until my face falls off, and move like an athlete. Let me do that, ok? 

2. Recovery isn't a suggestion, it's a necessity

I didn’t think anything about running or working out every day when I was in college and my early twenties. This week, as I’m finally picking up a training routine after being hampered by injury, I’m on my fourth day in a row of training, and my legs know it. So tomorrow’s workout will be foam rolling and light stretching, because I’m not a spring chicken any more. (More like early summer).

Recovery doesn't necessarily mean sitting around on the couch. Foam rolling, yoga, a massage, light stretching and walking can be part of a recovery day. 

3. If I don’t warm up, I pay the price

Pretty much what I just said. If I don’t warm up properly, which is following a complete foam rolling routine and a full body warm up, I’ll tweak something sooner or later. Our muscles aren’t filet mignon, they’re beef jerky. (It's a gross but effective analogy. Just think about ripping apart that jerky. You're welcome for the visual.)

You don't want to tear muscles because you skipped your warm up, right? Me neither. Let's get out there and show those Millennials how it's done.

Right after we warm up for 20 minutes and slather ourselves in Biofreeze...

4. I still think of myself as an athlete

I’m not going to the Olympics (maybe the senior ones someday) or making money as an athlete, but I still think of myself as an athlete. That means I want to train like an athlete. I want to move in other planes of motion. Think about the cone drills, back pedaling, drop step moves and shuffles we do when we play a sport. I might not jump onto a 32 inch box or explode on a sprint (I use the term sprinting very loosely) like I did when I was younger, but it's still important to train power and explosiveness. And I still want to move like an athlete. 

Playing sports isn’t just something that I used to do; it’s how I first learned to relate to the world. I was on my first team when I was five, and was on teams almost every year of my life right up until 2015. 

5. Be smart when it comes to injury

Remember that commercial about being like Mike? Yeah, be like Mike, but don't be like Kim. I’m the best example of what NOT to do when it comes to working out around an injury, for all of the above reasons. I find it hard to balance my competitive mentality with the restrictions of an injury, but the reality is, the sooner you take care of an injury, the sooner you get back to doing what you love.

This is an "area of opportunity" for me. But I think my last injury did more to teach me patience than anything I've previously dealt with.  

6. You might have to train differently than you used to

We have a client who has had a double knee replacement and double hip replacement, and she has a crazy hard core athlete mentality. But she’s also accepted the limitations of her body and embraced what she can do. It’s not that she can’t train - it’s just that she has to train differently. And she’s made peace with that.

All of us would do well to follow her lead. 

I often joke with clients that there should be a support group for aging athletes, and I mean that. I’m not sure that there’s anything more defeating than when you ask your body to do something (run a marathon, weed the garden, play a pick up game with your kids) and you find that you can’t do it.

Feeling betrayed by your body is an awful feeling. 

But it does no good to sit around and overthink about it. And it does no good to pretend that your body can do exactly what it did when you were 20. If we can learn to adjust expectations (not lower them necessarily), then perhaps we can embrace the privilege that is growing older.  

Often, I find it’s helpful to both have a coach, who can program for you, and a solid community of people who can keep you sane when you’re on the sidelines. 

And if anyone out there is looking for a coach, I'll be opening up a few spots in my private coaching group in September. 

Be strong. Be kind.