My parents taught me so many things throughout my childhood: work hard, respect your teachers, be nice to others, brush my teeth before bed, many many more. But the most important one is they told me to accept others. They taught me that everyone deserves a chance no matter their skin color, where they came from, or what they look like. Every so often in my blog, I feel compelled to write about something that is not as funny as doing parkour or getting electrical shocked at Tough Mudder. I'm writing this blog about the marriage equality fight. This past summer was the big "VOTE NO" campaign in Minnesota. http://mnunited.org/get-involved/ I remember going to the Minnesota State Fair in September while everything was really ramping up and I saw an entire family with VOTE YES buttons on. Two parents and two young kids. I was appalled! How could these parents teach their kids that there are some people in this world who can't have the same rights as others? When I sat back and thought about it, I remembered that their religious beliefs lead them to believe marriage is between a man and a woman. I can respect their belief but it brought me to the idea of my parents. They taught me that everyone is equal and everyone deserves the same treatment. My best example of this from my childhood is in the 3rd grade. I went to a Catholic school but a Lutheran church. I was not allowed to take Communion during school service. Once I was old enough to figure this out I remember thinking "God loves all of us, so why can't I have communion?" So.....I went and took Communion. God loves us all the same. My parents taught me that, my church taught me that, and my school taught me that. And last fall a lot of these pictures were popping up on the Internet, which speak a thousand words.
This blog post was not intended to argue with anyone, get into a religious fight, but to express my thoughts with all of you. My parents taught me to treat everyone equally - did yours?
And lastly I have been listening to this album obsessively for weeks and his song "same love" says everything. Give it a listen.
My favorite line from the song: "America the brave still fears what we don't know And God loves all his children, is somehow forgotten"
I have never been an athlete in the sense of the word where you play team sports. Which means I have a lack of eye/hand or eye/foot coordination. When I did swimming they told me I could never be on swim team because I could not swim in a straight line. This holds true for running- I often have a hard time running in a straight line. But I have trouble with sports/activities that involve coordination and getting my brain to send a particular movement pattern to my body. So the best thing to do is obviously parkour. If you have never heard of it, here is a definition and a video to get you warmed up to the idea. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkour
Jessie and I went to parkour to really help us for Tough Mudder races. Climbing walls, vaulting over things, running through obstacles, etc. But parkour is so much more than that. I have a new bruise every time, I get so frustrated when I can't climb a wall but so exhilarated when I do a Russian pull through. Watch this video and pay close attention to the Russian pull through. This is the studio we are going to and what we are learning in March.
This last week when we went to the women's parkour class the instructor Megan was teaching us the Russian pull through. The big thing she said was "DO NOT LET GO" If you are going to fall, do not let go and drop on your head, your body, etc. So I get up there, put my hands on the bar and attempt to put my leg above my head and flip over. I get about halfway through and all of a sudden my butt and arm are scraping down the side of the box, but.....I AM STILL HOLDING ON with one hand. Do not let go. I eventually did figure it out (sort of). But that message stayed with me of DO NOT LET GO. In so many areas of life, we let go or we do not work hard enough towards a goal. For me this was a good lesson at the moment because I am really struggling with starting/working on/and completing my Master's project. I have every single class completed, all internship hours done and it has been 4 years since I started. But for some reason I seem content to not finish it. But when I think about parkour, I think Do NOT LET GO. Work hard on it and finish strong. Another great article/video about a boulder champion where the secret to her success is DO NOT LET GO. http://experiencelife.com/article/rock-solid/
So today take a moment and think about what you are letting go of and what you want to not let go of. What are your goals and what is stopping you? "Life shrinks or expands depending on one's courage." Anais Nin Have an amazing week.
Last summer Jessie and I ran the torchlight run in Minneapolis. After the run we're walking with a couple friends and a guy stops and asks if anyone has a phone he can use to find his friends. Jessie is the only one who has a phone so she offers it to the man. He looks at it and says "what is this?" "How do you use this?"
The man was only half kidding and giving her crap for having a historic flip phone. She might be one of a handful of people who still have a phone that only calls and texts. I have to admit I was late to the "smart phone" party. I held off getting an iphone until January 2012. And just like everyone who has one, you wonder how you ever lived without it. But as I continued to have my smart phone I became more dependent on it and had it out all the time. Not really because I needed it but because I could. One day we were at a restaurant and noticed about 8 teenage girls sitting together and every single one of them was on their phone.
And that's when the "no phone at the table" rule was born. We decided that whenever we were out for a meal with with each other or friends there was going to be no phone on the table and it had to be in a purse, coat, or the car. It sounds silly being 29 and having to make a "rule" about where my phone is during a meal but it proved to be harder than I thought. During conversation you want to look something up, answer a question, text someone or a handful of other things. But what happened to being "present" with the person you are with? Do you find yourself distracted? Not paying enough attention? Missing out on things? Or simply not feeling connected to your loved ones or friends? Try putting away the phone or ipad or computer or kindle or any other electronic device.
Why not just live in the moment, especially if it has a good beat? - Goldie Hawn Have a great week having "no phones at the table"
Thursday, March 7, 2013
Sometimes I look at my dogs and I think "I want to be my dog." They really have a great life. They wake up all curled up next to a human (me), the human is excited to see them in the morning, they get to go for walks outside, they are fed and often have treats, they get to nap on the couch and watch tv during the day, and then the human is so excited to see them when they get home. But in reality, dogs teach us a lot about life.
Which one is your favorite? Which one can you strive to do more of? My top 3 favorites are:
If you want something, look at it until you get it or it's gone
Delight in the simple joy of a long walk
When you're happy, dance around and wag your entire body
And I know some of you prefer cats, so here is a life lesson from a cat.
And for those who have watched another cat video "kittens inspired by kittens" Jessie became inspired to re-create the video herself. Enjoy
