It was too cold to go running this morning so I just basked in the day light in my nice warm apartment as the sun rose over Lone Mountain.
As I was waking up I was thinking to myself this morning, “Why am I beating myself up?” Little setbacks lately have been ended up as major issues. I really need to stop doing that. But why is this happening?
I think this is one of the downsides of living in San Francisco. You are surrounded by many successful people (or at least they portray that they are successful) in both your personal life and corporate life. When you have friends who do porn, who are perfect looking, who have no issues hooking up – it amplifies all of your imperfections. The people I know who look up to me often are shocked that I have these insecurities – but I do.
And it is the same thing on the business side. I meet up with people who seem to be successful entrepreneurs, or they are successful in a specific niche. There are days I ask myself, what I am missing? What could I be doing different to tap into this market?
This all leads to having any setback feel like a huge blow. Be it my weight or issues with my career. By all means I am doing well on both fronts. When all you have to compare yourself are externally perfect – it is hard to keep a balanced perspective on your life. I need to break this cycle.
This is also a reminder to everyone that what someone externally portrays themselves as is not always the reality
Over the past few months, I have fallen out with a bunch of the habits I built up. More or less over the past few weeks I have gotten back on them and I should get back to posting my selfies here along with other social media sites. Over the next few days I am getting back to writing.
Writing these posts about what I am thinking really has helped center me. I don’t know how many people who follow me actually read them. In a way, It doesn’t matter if you are following me for my pictures or my thoughts. The goal for me is to just get what is spinning around my head down. Sometimes that’s all I need to get something that is building up out of me so I can get back to a sense of normalcy.
Many of these upcoming posts will be about having the motorcycle for a year. It has changed my life in many ways, mostly positive. And having gone head first into owning a sportbike there are many things I have learned that I think will be helpful next time someone asks me about learning to ride.
Also, selfies have also been hard for me since I have gained 10lbs due to work and family stress over the past few months. I have managed to get back on track again and will be getting myself back to it. The hardest thing to do is getting back to a running routine. 10lbs is enough to make your body hate you when running even a short distance like 5k.
But for now, here are some of my morning coffee selfies. It was too cold to run this morning, I will take a run after lunch and there may be more up later.
Actually – one of the habits I need to get back in to is my selfie habit. I have not been good about posting them up to my site here and I need to just do it again.
Part of the reason is I take the motorcycle in to the office now. When I was taking the train, it was easy for me to write down my thoughts and post up the selfies with them. But now, I just don’t feel like writing when I get home or before I leave. I really want to get back to doing it again – so let’s start.
Last night I attended yet another meetup related to work. Throughout the evening all I could think about was how fast the world is moving. In the last five years, the industry I work in has taken a completely new direction, and I am not sure if the fast pace of change is really a good thing. The reality of the world is that you have to embrace change. Change never stops and sometimes you just need to embrace it and dive in head first. When others are dragging their feet, all you can do is drag them along or let them sink on their own.
Embracing change means you also embrace failure. When things don’t work right, get up, figure out what the hell went wrong, and make things better. And looking back for too long just keeps you stuck in the past. You can step back for a minute, but the longer you wait to tackle the failure, the more the world will have changed around you.
This chain of thought was kicked off by InspiroBot. Yes – the joke AI that makes random quote images. It generated the image above last night, and it really got me thinking.
Every time I ride the motorcycle I do put myself at a very high risk of something bad happening to me. I have been viewing learning and buying a motorcycle as a birth of a new life – the life that I wish I had a few years ago, but kept on putting aside. I put aside nearly everything when my I am riding and in a way it is like I am stepping away from my former self. I now feel like a different person – there is this sense of confidence that I never had before when facing unknown situations. I feel like I can step into the unknown, not look back to the past, and embrace what is about to come at me be it good or bad.
Did InspiroBot really give me a self-revelation about my life? Talk about the rapid pace of change in the world.
It’s that time of the year – Gear Season.
At the same time, certain things stay the same. It is that time of the year – Up Your Alley is next weekend – so time to start figuring out all of my outfits for the various events I will be attending.
I think I am starting to ramble – time to take a quick shower and get my ass to the office.
Being comfortable in your own skin can sometimes be fragile. I am always amazed at what little things will set me back.
One of the things I have noticed is that I stop taking selfies when I am no longer comfortable in my own skin. Lately, I have noticed there is a direct correlation to this when I stop working out as much. Last week, I had to take a break for a bit since my left knee was bugging me a bit so I took a five or so days off from running. And what I noticed is that I felt awful at the end. It took dragging my ass out of bed a few days ago and going back out for a run to feel normal again.
Other than that, I have been having a busy week – I had a work related meetup last night and I have another one tonight. When you factor in these meetups, they make for 12-14 hour days. I am slowly getting my road trip thoughts up and published. My goal is for that to be all be done Saturday morning. Unfortunately, I am going to have to put on my corporate drag soon and head into the office.
I know it takes a while for people to accept physical changes to their bodies. Somehow I still have not accepted it. I still feel like I am much larger than I am. While it doesn’t really seem like the changes over the last six months have been big to me, they really are when put in comparison with the past. Even when that past was still good for me. Most people would still not say anything negative about my body then!
Exactly 1 year ago I posted this on Instagram.
I am slowly starting to understand what changes caused these positive outcomes. And one of the things I am quickly learning is to not dwell on the past and look forward. Look at where you want to go, your body, mind, and spirit will follow. I really think this change in my personality came with the motorcycle.
When I look at myself from this angle, and compare to the past, it is clear that my body is following where I want to go. I told myself at the end of last year I need to make some physical changes and I have. It may be a little bit here and there, and I may get discouraged.
Enjoying two of my addictions
I think it has been a good thing that I have a narcissistic selfie addiction. It has been helping me document my life as I evolve. But now I need to get ready for work and deal with my long day today.
Earlier this week, I found a deal on the Dainese Aero Evo suit that was too hard to pass up as a gear head. So I jumped on it and it arrived this morning. During an all hands call I was listening to, I decided to try and get in. It was an experience getting the suit zipped up the first time. At first I feared that I would have to return it since it was not zipping up. Then I remembered you have to bend over like you are in a full tuck on the bike.
Got one side up, success! Now the other zip was fighting me. After finding some cord to use as a zipper pull, I got the it all zipped up. I was thinking to myself, I really hope this works since the next size up was out of stock and I would have to return and pass up on the deal if it didn’t fit. Next step was to zip up the calf zippers and put my boots on. Somehow I managed to get it on while the chatter of corporate goals and visions continued on in the background.
The sensation of the skin tight leather and armor was just amazing. I knew it would be a tight fit, but I felt like I could take anything that could happen to me. But walking and standing was hard. I know this is an aggressively cut motorcycle race suit, but it really was starting to feel like a bondage experience just trying to move around. But once I sat down and put myself in a position that I would be in on the bike, and it started to feel better.
I know from my other Dainese gear that it will break in a bit and the leather will stretch. The bottom half feels like the Delta Pro pants I bought after losing weight, and those were nearly impossible to get on at first. Now, they fit just perfectly. So my fear in ordering the wrong size was misplaced. Now I just sat around listening in to the corporate chatter while covered in this.
Eventually I decided I needed to make sure things fit with the back protector in, and had to get out. And this is were panic strikes, I didn’t think I could wiggle my way out alone. Uhoh. My left arm is stuck and I am just trying to shake it free. I wish I had a camera running since it must have looked funny, but then my left arm frees up and I am out! I realized I will need to wear some compression gear under it until it breaks in.
Once the call ends, I take care of some odds and ends for work, install the back protector, put on some leggings and a compression shirt, and get back in. It was much easier the second time after spending an hour in it. It was clear that it was starting to mould to my body. At this point I take some selfies. I know, a shock, right?
I head downstairs, setup the camera to take some shots with me on the bike to make sure things fit right when used for it it was meant for. The literal second after my leg was thrown over Matte, everything just hit right and felt natural. Then I put myself in a tuck. Even though this is an aggressive suit, any normal position on my bike was at home for it. While it may be a bondage like experience off the bike, it was worth it. And looking at the selfies of myself, I really felt like me.
Now it is lunch time, so I get out of it, change into jeans, then head out to hunt and kill something. While thinking about it over lunch, it feels like I have gotten both a physical and spiritual second skin. I know over time it will physically form around my body. I can’t explain why, but this piece of gear was already starting to make a spiritual connection with me and I want to explore it more.
I really want to know, what is different about this one piece suit vs my pants and jacket that zip together to form a two piece suit?
Now I can’t wait until Saturday when I am going to ride around the North Bay and break in the suit along Highway 1 and other twisty roads. Let’s start forming these connections close and expand them further. I bought Matte to go explore, I didn’t think it was going to make me start exploring my spiritual side again – that will be a topic of a different post.
I’m feeling really happy – really can’t wait to start forming a connection this weekend.
There is a part of me wondering why I stopped being myself for a bit. After the fracture, I stopped being myself for a bit and didn’t wear leggings or my other gear out and about as I normally do. Even once I recovered, I noticed I tended to be wearing jeans instead of leggings. Subconsciously, I think this was leading me to a state of disassociation since I no longer felt like who I was.
Last night I said fuck it and let’s get back on track with life. Once I got home and changed out of my leathers I put on the Blackmilk coffee bean leggings and then headed out to Trader Joe’s to grab stuff for dinner. As I was walking up, I was thinking to myself, why was I hiding form the world?
It took me walking past a group of stereotypical hipsters looking all awkward tight skinny jeans, plaid, and the fur hats to realize a big thing. I feel like myself and I am confident dressed the way I am. I never want to be that person who is not comfortable in their own skin, even if it is just walking up the road to grab groceries.
However, Leggings and Motorcycles don’t mix. I’d like to keep my skin intact, thank you very much. It is going to be interesting to see how my wardrobe evolves from here. While I never have issue wearing leather out and about, I did break down and buy a pair of Bull-It SR6 Riding Jeans to avoid looking like a complete alien for short trips around town. On the other hand, I have found walking into a store in a two piece race suit does get you the quickest service.
Over the past three months I have made a lot of changes to my life. Between buying a motorcycle and fracturing my clavicle, my life has reshaped. And these new experiences are distracting me from other healthy habits that I was starting to form last year. One of the unfortunate things has been that I have not been writing as much, which is something I really didn’t want to drop off.
In the past three months, even with the fact that I not on Matte (the motorcycle) for over a month while the fracture recovered, I put on 4,000 miles on him. As I put on the miles on the bike, I continue to learn more about myself. But getting this on paper has been really hard for me, since I have not been able to come up with the right words to explain the changes and feelings I have. All I know is that I feel more or less myself when on Matte and I arrive at my destination refreshed.
I also stopped taking as many selfies despite my continued weight loss from my diet changes. Part of this has been a crunch for time in my day. But it really started to wane while I was recovering from the fracture. The strange thing is I kept my weight loss on track during that period, and I am down nearly 30 lbs since the beginning of the year.
This brings me to what my goals are for June. I want to get back in the habit of posting gear selfies and thoughts on a regular basis – and today seems like a good way to start it back up. I also want to write down all of the thoughts that I have been failing to get down on paper or online.
Let’s get back on track with the selfies.
Still confused on how I can truly enjoy coffee while in a helmet.
