If you follow me on Facebook you're more than likely to know I do two of the same things every week: 1) I post pictures of hot, muscled guys (which I refer to as gymspirations) and 2) I check-in at my local Equinox gym when I'm there to workout. Both of these activities began and continue to be rooted in the simplest of desires: 1) to see an example of a body I am working towards and 2) to lead by example.
Now I know that I can look at pictures of muscled guys on my own computer without sharing them. And I know I can go workout without checking in. But there is a third, mostly unspoken reason for those two previous actions: inspiring others.
Almost three years ago I took upon an enormous life challenge: I wanted to quit smoking. In order to do that I decided not drinking for a month would help me kick the habit. During that initial first month I was up early eating breakfast and saw an infomercial for the P90X workout dvds which kept claiming "in 90-days you can transform your body" and thought to myself that maybe 90-days was the key to securing a habit, so I decided to go three months and two weeks without drinking finishing on my birthday. I was certain after all that time that I would have definitely kicked the habit.
However I failed to realize that within those 3 & 1/2 months I was meant to spend two long weekends at my share on Fire Island. If you know anything about Fire Island is that it's basically Swiss Family Robinson visits Sodom & Gomorrah.
My first weekend there was met with intense anxiety and fear that I was going to crack. That at any moment either a cigarette or a drink was going to touch my lips. During more than one occasion I had to step away, retreat to the beach to sit in silence and watch the ocean, smell the salt in the air and calm myself down.
When I was on the ferry leaving Fire Island late that Sunday evening of the first weekend out there something amazing occurred to me: I succeeded in making it through an entire weekend on Fire Island without breaking. Like Glinda the Good Witch told Dorothy at the end of The Wizard of Oz, I had the power within myself all along. I could do anything I put my mind to! What an incredible sense of joy and empowerment it was to feel that.
It was then that I decided to push myself even further and not drink for one year. I figured it's only one year! Imagine how more healthy and wonderful I would feel at the end of it.
I ended up going sixteen months of no drinking. And though I've had some drinks since then (but I feel absolutely miserable afterwards, so I rarely, if ever drink) it will be 3-years of no smoking on March 1st, 2014. Basically, I achieved the goal that I set out to achieve.
During my initial sixteen months of no drinking a colleague sent me a link to an article on a blog. It was a girl writing about her experiences of not being able to drink after she had made herself allergic to alcohol. If she drank, she could die. And while my life change was by choice as opposed to doctor mandated, so many experiences that she was going through were mirroring mine. As it turns out, when you are the "party friend" among your group and then you decide to leave the party, almost identical situations take place.
Even though this girl was a complete stranger to me, just knowing that somebody else was out there in the world going through the same experiences I was going through helped inspire me to keep going. Sometimes just knowing you're not alone in the world is a beautiful thing.
Which is where my gymspirations originated. I look at the guys on the cover of fitness magazines as personal inspiration for me to continue working towards my goals. Goals of bettering myself, making me a better person. And I check in at the gym to show that I'm not just talking about it, but that I'm actually doing it. All in hopes that if there is one person out there who is exhausted from work and is on the fence about whether or not they should go to the gym to get some exercise or instead go home and do nothing on the couch, that just maybe it will inspire them to go workout. Sometimes we don't have a physical, personal support system cheering us on to achieve our goals and if a photo of muscled guy or a check-in at a gym can help nudge somebody, then it was worthwhile to post.
Some people give me flack about my gymspirations (most specifically, my admiration for actor Joe Manganiello). They say I'm superficial, obsessed and question whether I have anything better to focus on in my life. I'd rather be obsessed with being healthy and bettering my life than be obsessed with figuring out where my next drink is coming from.
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