traveling
To Arizona. Nick’s climbing Kilimanjaro with his buddies, so I hopped a flight to Phoenix to spectate Ironman Arizona and get some sunshine. Except it rained. In the desert. Regardless, it was a great time catching up with my Coeur Sports teammates + friends and my coach and disconnecting from social media. Sometimes it’s nice to just enjoy a race and the moment without taking a bazillion photos!
reading
One reason I enjoying flying is it’s a block of completely uninterrupted time to read. Rarely does that happen at home, and even when it does, I feel like I’m “wasting” time if my nose’s buried in a book (more on this soon). So, I bought two books – The Glass Castle and The Husband’s Secret – and read ’em both! Both were page turners, but for different reasons. The first, a memoir, because whoa… I had to keep reminding myself this was the author’s actual childhood. The second – how three women’s lives were unknowingly intertwined around one significant event in the past.
I’m also nearly finished with Liz Gilbert’s Big Magic. Lots of underlining and ah-ha moments and such a great reminder of the importance of creating, of making time non-screen activities a priority. A few of my favorite nuggets (I can’t pick only one!)…
The essential ingredients for creativity remain exactly the same for everybody: courage, enchantment, permission, persistence, trust – and those elements are universally accessible. Which does not mean that creative living is always easy; it merely means that creative living is always possible.
If you love and want something enough – whatever it is – then you don’t really mind eating the shit sandwich that comes with it.
It’s a simple and generous rule of life that whatever you practice, you will improve at.
It’s a mighty act of human love to remind somebody that they can accomplish things by themselves, and that the world does not automatically owe them any reward, and that they are not as weak and hobbled as they may believe.
Do whatever brings you to life, then. Follow your own fascinations, obsessions, and compulsions. Trust them. Create whatever causes a revolution in your heart.
Measure your worth by your dedication to your path, not by your successes and failures.
If you can’t learn to travel comfortably alongside your fear, then you’ll never be able to go anywhere interesting or do anything interesting. … you have treasures hidden within you – extraordinary treasures – and so do I, and so does everyone around us. And bringing those treasures to light takes work and faith and focus and courage and hours of devotion, and the clock is ticking, and the world is spinning, and we simply do not have time anymore to think so small.
watching
The Banff Mountain Film Festival World Tour. One of my favorite weekends of the year filled with beautiful and crazy adventure films that make me wanna drop everything, explore this grand world and really breathe. Two goodies I enjoyed…
THE IMPORTANT PLACES. from gnarly bay on Vimeo.
55 Hours in Mexico from Joey Schusler on Vimeo.
training
Here we go! I welcomed November 1 and a schedule in TrainingPeaks with a run in shorts (hooray for amazing fall weather!). The first few weeks of training have been easy and steady – just enough for my body to adjust to swimbikerun again. And, the functional strength and core work?! It hurt to laugh and walk for a couple days after the first session back. Big goals ahead in 2016, and it feels good to get started working toward them. Chasing the light, my friends!
pumped about
Team Coeur 2016! Even though we’re spread across the country, Coeur and these badass women have brought an immeasurable amount of joy to my life. I’m ecstatic and honored to be part of this amazing group again for the third year! These ladies are my team!
organizing
Photos. Am I the only one with 40k photos in iPhoto? I am? Oh. Seriously… who has that many photos?! In my defense, they’re from 2010 through today… ha! Anyway, about a month ago I started categorizing by month and trip / event. I’ve made it through all, but now have to go through and delete duplicates to keep less than 100 per month (preferably 50) and upload to Flickr. Damn you, GoPro burst feature! Does anyone else miss the days of film and the fun of not knowing how your pics turned out until you got the roll developed?!
thankful for
This life. Wouldn’t change it for anything (er, well, except for maybe swimbikerunning all day every day!). #gratitudechangeseverything
Thanks for being awesome, everyone. Have a lovely thanksgiving!
7 Comments
You’ve had an amazing November!! I’m excited for all that is to come in 2016 and glad we are teammates again 🙂
This just made me chortle, since you’re not exaggerating: “Nick’s climbing Kilimanjaro with his buddies, so I hopped a flight to Phoenix…”
Loved The Glass Castle. Happy Thanksgiving!
Happy November (and almost December? – how did that happen)! The AZ trip sounds amazing – a great way to connect to a community. And enjoy the training as you start to focus on 2016.
I am so jealous of all your triathlon related travels this year. I can’t wait to get back out there next year. What did you think of IMAZ? Do you have any desire to race there?
Congrats on making the Coeur Elite Team! You earned it. I am constantly inspired by your heard work and positive attitude. You encourage so many people!
Congratulations on an amazing month for you and your guy!
On spectating in real life vs. through a phone camera: sometimes I adopt the Sean O’Connell (Secret Life of Walter Mitty) approach to taking photos – staying in the moment rather than taking a photo to later display on social media. And when it happens, I smile.
On the film festival: we were offered tickets to a similar one in Kendal, in the Lake District in England but couldn’t go. I knew I would be in my element if we did. Fantastic clips.