Defy Your Own Limitations

I had the idea for this blog a few days ago when I had got home from a run....a 50 minute run. It took me almost 90 minutes(!) to actually get round to going for that run. Not because I wasn't ever not going to do the run, but because I was procrastinating, putting it off, finding other "important" things to do first. It was my morning off, and I didn't have anywhere to be until lunchtime. I had a lie in until 7am and woken up naturally and knew that I had planned to run. The first hour was spent relaxing, catching up on news and doing a few bits for social media, then I thought that I would head out to run at 8am. 

8am turned into a few emails, a phone call, some more social media. I thought about having breakfast, then I realised I wanted to run first. So I decided to go out and run. Then I tried on a dress that I love and have never worn, I thought about wearing it to a party that I have been invited to. I thought about breakfast again, and then finally decided to get my running gear on and head out. I stopped and sat on a chair first. It was 9:30am. I grabbed my headphones. Found a podcast lecture that I wanted to listen to. Hair up, gloves on. Fiiiiiiiinally out the door. Why had it taken me so long to get out and run? I LOVE running! It chills me out. It's my thing, and I've worked as a personal trainer for almost ten years. I am a master of motivation! It wasn't necessarily the motivation to do the run that i was lacking (because I knew that I was always going to do it at some point that morning), but rather the motivation to do the run right then. Hmmmm.

It got me thinking. What was so bad about taking the first few steps out of the door? It's something that we all deal with.The umming and ah'ing about whether to take action, or to put something off. It can be likened to getting out of bed in the morning - do you jump up at the first sound of your alarm, or do you hit snooze again and again?! Do you make it to your workout raring to go, or do you put it off or start late and miss part of your session? I guess in this situation I wanted to relax into my morning off without the usual military precision that my day demands. It certainly provided pause for thought though, and I realise nobody is exempt from the tendency to put off creating action in the moment. 

I'm glad I went out on that run - it brought with it so many ideas and positive vibes. I do some of my best thinking when I am running, almost like thinking but not thinking. It was raining, but just drizzle, which was really nice, and I had chosen to listen a podcast about mindset. I always try to remind myself to listen to something valuable when I run, whether it be music to make me feel good, or a lecture to make me think. Sometimes just running without anything is valuable too, and it's nice to be immersed in the sounds of what's around you.

I ran through the park that I usually run around, and into the next park across the road, which has just been refurbished. I thought that I would just keep on running through the park, further than I had ever been, to see what I would come across, and I ended up coming to a gate which led into a piece of track that I used to run through when I lived in my last home, around four years ago. I was really surprised that the two parks joined and I kind of got a rush of memories of the old route that I used to run - with lots of hills and muddy paths, and a big long flat along the bottom. I ran along the flat and remembered running through there years ago and how it felt, and what I was training for, and which bit of the run I found difficult, and remembered doing sprint sessions running out along the flat as fast as I could and then walking back. The whole thing brought back happy memories and positive emotions - I'm sure I must look so strange running along with a huge grin on my face sometimes! 

I felt so grateful for those memories, and also for the fact that I had chosen to keep on running and see what was at the end of the path. If I had just stuck to the usual route and turned around where I normally would, then I never would have realised that the two parks join, and would never had ran through the old park with a new perspective. It offers such a simple example of pushing past perceived boundaries to see what is on the other side. 

I had created a perception for myself, that the edge of the park was the edge of the park, and it was only until I kept running, that I realised there was another gate, and in fact another whole park behind it. What you think is your edge really isn't your edge, and you can go so much further and experience so much more than you think, just by pushing past what you think is there, and by breaking through the perceived boundaries that you set yourself. 

Where do you impose limitations on yourself? Are these limitations real or only perceived?

What can you do to break through your perceived boundaries?

What might be on the other side of that gate?

The biggest limitations are the ones that we make up in our minds. 

Choose to defy them today. 

With Gratitude, 

Niyc xx


PS. The optimallyou video blog will be released on YouTube tomorrow so keep an eye out for that - it is all about feeling grateful :) 

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Remember Your Why

I went out to dinner with the girls this evening, for an early meal after everybody finished work, at 6:30pm. I figured I would be home by 8pm, so that I could write a blog post here, and then get an early night before my usual 5am start tomorrow. Our food took over an hour to arrive though, and one of the girls almost didn't get her meal at all, and so I arrived home at 9:15pm. I found myself moaning to the girls at the end of our evening, telling them that I have an hour of work to do when I get home, and that I have a 5am start tomorrow. The car journey home involved me weighing up the relative benefits of writing this blog post versus not writing it. Will I feel better if I just don't write, and I go to bed instead? Possibly. But what about my commitment to write something every day, and to blog every week?

This made me think. Who did I make that commitment to? Myself. Who am I letting down if I don't write? Myself. Who creates the pressure in the first place? Who makes the rules? Me. It made me think about why it matters if I do, or don't do something that I set out to do, if the only person that has created the standard and the pressure is myself. Then I realised that I needed to stop looking at WHAT I had to do, and instead think about the WHY. 

Why do I blog every week? Why is it important to show up and do what I say I am going to do? I guess that showing up and following through with my commitments are part of my values, something that is important to me. I also choose to remind myself that I love to write, and that writing is a creative expression of my ideas, thoughts, and feelings, even if it does end up as a late night post on a different topic to the one that I initially planned. 

I do what I do because I love it. Because it makes me happy, and hopefully somewhere along the line it makes some other people happy too. I'm going to wind up my night tonight thinking about some of the great things that I have done in the past week - things that I've done because I've wanted to do them. I've worked with fourteen personal training clients, and almost the same amount of coaching clients. I have delivered a corporate health and wellness talk, done a course walk around for the new Rising Sun parkrun event I am creating, and ran a successful Power Hour event, as well as leading two bootcamps, and recording the new optimallyou vlog. All of these things I have enjoyed so much, and have allowed me to make progress with my mission to serve others and spread happiness, by living my passion, and showing up for what I love. 

I always like to look for the lesson in a situation. Tonight I felt resistance, and that prompted me to explore and process what I was really feeling. Looking for the lesson made me remember my why. I mentioned the power of remembering your why in a previous blog post about exercise motivation, and I found myself shouting it at one of my bootcamps last week too - "remember why you're here, remember why you showed up, why you exercise, why it is important to you". Tonight it deserved an entire blog post. 

For the week ahead I intend to remember my why. I'll be looking forward to another Power Hour event this week, in Alnwick, and will be collaborating on our new Thrive Live event which is coming up in a few weeks time too. I'll be enjoying what I do, and resisting the urge to feel pressure attached to doing it. I will remember that in working for myself and pursuing my chosen path, that I always have a choice. I am choosing to do the work that I love and can be grateful to be afforded the opportunity to do so. 

Take the pressure off yourself this week, and choose to remember your why too. 

With Gratitude, 

Niyc xx

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