Last week I wrote a post about rules. 

I’ve created some rules for myself, regarding meditation, health and fitness, and writing. Three weeks in, I’m sticking to those rules at least 80% of the time. 

Win.

Don't settle. Unless it's settling your chin on a window sill to watch the ocean waves. 

Last Friday I met with my therapist for only the second time in months, and as I recounted some of my changes, she asked me what was different.

It was a great question. Because the truth is, I’ve often tried to make these kinds of changes in the past, and they haven’t stuck. Then it occurred to me.  

“I think I’m finally on the right dose of medication for depression.” 

Is this as good as it gets?

If you’ve read any of my posts on depression in the past, you know I’ve struggled for most of my life with what used to be called dysthymia, and what is now referred to as chronic low level depression. I have, thankfully, always functioned throughout my depression, and while I realize medication is not for everyone, it was a combination of medication and therapy that finally helped me function at a higher level. 

But I’ve never thrived.

In fact, when I was 29, I had someone tell me that they always thought I’d amount to more. 

It was a devastating comment, but the truth is, I was thinking it too. I still think it sometimes. 

Last spring I was wrapping up my first full year at Spurling, and while I was finally working a job that I loved, I was still struggling. I have taken medication and sought therapy on and off in the past decade. In my mind, I was doing everything that I could to manage myself.

And while I was managing myself just fine, there was a persistent feeling that I wasn’t living my life as fully as I could.   

I wasn’t thriving. 

Last March I sat in my friend’s car in downtown Portland, watching the raindrops slide down the windshield as she spoke. 

“It doesn’t have to be like this,” she said. 

The “this” she was talking about was my overall lethargy and inability to focus. Despite medication and therapy (and it’s very challenging to find the right combination of both) I was in a funk.  

“Trust me,” she said. “I’ve been there.”

“What if this is as good as it gets?” I asked.

“It’s not,” she said. “It’s not.”

As it turns out, she was right. 

I didn't have a doctor I trusted, so I hadn't talked to anyone about medication for years. She recommended a psychiatrist to manage my medication, and I finally went to see him. (And I finally, after months of searching, found a new therapist). For the past nine months, he’s been helping me to find the right combination of medication.

Each time I’ve walked into his office, I’ve asked the same question - what if this is as good as it gets?

But we both persisted in the hopes that it wasn’t. 

So in early December, we made another change to my medication, the third in the past nine months. And if I’m being totally honest with all of you, I believe that last change has as much to do with my ability to create rules for myself as any books on productivity or habits. 

I guess I say that because I don’t want to pretend that any of this is easy. I don’t want to pretend that making big changes to your life is as easy as figuring out what you need to do and doing it. 

Sometimes we paint a picture in the health and fitness industry - that you just have to try harder and get out of your own way.  

The formula is simple, but it’s not easy.

I'm not suggesting that medication is for everyone, or that it fixes everything. We're all different and we each have to figure out what we need to get us where we want to go. 

But I have learned something very important.

Don't settle.

Persist. 

And if you need help persisting don't be afraid to ask.  

Thanksgiving is four days away. But I want to tell you today, right now, that if you have a piece of pumpkin pie, you didn’t blow it. 

If you lick the batter of the pumpkin pie while you’re making the pumpkin pie, you didn’t blow it. 

If you have mashed potatoes and gravy and stuffing and several helpings of each, you didn’t blow it.

In PA, we call these gobs. But in Maine they are whoopie pies. Whatever you call them, if you eat one, it doesn't mean you blew it. 

I often have clients who don't even want to meet to talk about nutrition this time of year because "I've been bad. I've been awful."

No. You haven't been bad. And you haven't been awful. 

You've been human. Human, okay? 

What you may have done though, is decided that after one or two cheat meals and a few missed days at the gym, you've completely screwed up all of your goals. 

No. No you haven't. 

The only way you blow up your nutrition or exercise routine is when you give it away. When I coached softball a few years back, our team struggled for wins and had plenty of games where the score was out of hand. And the only thing I asked of my players in those games was to give nothing away. 

You know what the hardest thing to do is in moments like those? 

Give a shit. (Sorry mom, I said shit. Again.)

It is so tough to drag the bat up to the plate and swing like you care because when you’re losing 18-0 in the third inning, even a home run is just a drop in the bucket. So what does your at-bat and your effort even mean in those situations?

Everything. 

You caring means everything. You caring enough to try matters. In that situation, your effort matters to your teammates, to your coach, and to you. That at-bat matters because you matter. Because we don't play sports and love sports for championships and play-off wins. We play and love sports for the moments. 

And your fitness and nutrition journey is no different.

What matters is you giving up. When you decide that because you ate something that was not on your plan, you should chuck the entire plan. When you judge yourself so hard because you “slipped up.” 

When you decide that you can’t stick to anything, that nothing will ever work, that you might as well not even try because you ate something that wasn’t on your nutrition plan. Or because you missed one workout. 

Researchers actually named this the what the hell effect. You got up and had a cookie for breakfast and decided that the day was lost. So you might as well do fast food for lunch and pizza for dinner and start again tomorrow.

 So today I challenge you. 

That eating a donut for breakfast when your in-laws brought donuts doesn’t mean your day is blown. 

That missing the gym for the past three weeks in November doesn't mean you have to wait until December. Or January. Or even Monday. 

And eating a piece of pie - even eating a whole pie - does not make you a bad person. 

Let me say that again. 

You are not a bad person if you have a meal that doesn't meet the nutrition goals you outlined with your coach. Or in your head. 

Please hear me when I tell you that you are not a bad person.  

This is my favorite quote:

"It is never too late to become what you might have been." - George Elliot

It's not too late. You're not a bad person. You can do this. 

But what you can't do is throw in the towel. (In Pittsburgh we wave our towels, we don't throw them.) Don't give up on you. A donut for breakfast does not mean you start again tomorrow. It means that you had a donut for breakfast.

Believe in yourself. And believe that one or two or five decisions doesn't define you. Ok? 

Do you want help not throwing in the towel? Do you need help believing in yourself? Do you want some guidance and a judgement-free zone to make a plan? Email me. Message me. Comment below. I'd love to hear from you. Do you have a topic you'd like to see addressed? Let me know that too. Be strong. Be kind. To others, but especially to yourself.  

One foot in front of the other.

This was my mantra. It’s what popped into my head as I jogged the first two flights of stairs at the Fenway Park Spartan Sprint over the weekend.

By the time I bear crawled the last two flights of stairs at the start of the race, my legs were garbage. 

One foot in front of the other.

We jogged around the stadium, weaving our way through the seats and up stairs. I didn't feel like I was in my body.

I slowed to a walk as I went down stairs, and heaved my way up the stairs, worrying that if I tried to go faster, my wasted legs would miss a step and I’d face plant into the concrete.

The last few weeks have been a struggle. And my body felt every bit of that struggle on Saturday. 

I’ve talked openly about my journey with depression - and some of you may recall my story from 2005, when it was a failed run that helped open my eyes to my misery. It was as a result of that run that I realized that maybe, just maybe, life could be better than either awful or just ok. 

I slugged my way to the second obstacle  - box jumps - and looked out at the field, at the Green Monster where other runners were racing in front of me. 

For the first time, I considered that this might be the first race in which I participated and never finished. 

I watched women half my age effortlessly jumping up and down onto the concrete box and tried to will myself to do the same. But my legs weren’t having it. I did my step ups and thought, one foot in front of the other. 

Then I went back to my mantra - one that I’ve used in races in the past - I am strong, I am capable. 

But I didn’t believe it. 

I kept going, keeping up with my Spurling teammates as best I could, doing obstacles where I could and burpees where I couldn’t (83 to be exact). And all along, repeating my mantra.

I am strong, I am capable. 

One foot in front of the other.

I didn't believe the first phrase and was struggling mightily with the second. 

I don’t know if I ever believed that I was strong or I was capable last Saturday. But I kept telling myself anyway.

Don't get me wrong - there were plenty of other thoughts going through my mind. The usual negative soundtrack was playing. But I tried to interrupt it as often as possible.  

In talking to many clients over the past few weeks, I know that much of life has felt the same for you. The time change (which is no small thing), being without power for a week, whatever the case may be, many of you have struggled as well.

I'm not sure what you think in times of struggle. Maybe you've also told yourself things that you just couldn't quite believe - trying to interrupt your own negative thoughts. 

I am strong, I am capable.

I can do this.

I will do this.  

It can be really tough to give ourselves a positive message in hard times. It's a practice and one that I'm not great at. But I'm learning, slowly, to deliver the positive messages where I can, even when I don't believe them. Because eventually, we absorb it. We start to live it. And gradually, we feel it. 

By Sunday morning I was feeling a little more myself. And I tried to remind myself that I survived. 

Life can feel really hard. It can feel like a struggle. Those peaks and valleys will always happen. 

But we get through them. And hopefully come out a little stronger on the other side.