In my last blog post I wrote a bit about discipline and our burpee challenge. We are continuing on! Today is going to be day 105 on the 10 minutes working out every single day. Full disclosure, I have missed one day of the 105. I was on vacation in Maine and just completely forgot. The problem was I waited until the end of the day to do my workout, when the entire week I should’ve done it first thing in the morning.
Here are the videos of the challenge: https://cloud.althatech.com/s/K2YadLgc2MMn5CG
Password: burpintothefuture
The 10 minute every day workout has been such a beneficial exercise both physically and mentally, that it is helping me to organize my life around goals and to achieve a higher level of discipline. Things are easier to do. It actually becomes a little bit harder to procrastinate. I have wanted to cut out bad things, because it hinders my fitness goal.
One of the important parts is in the choosing proper goals. So for exercise the goal is an ongoing, but achievable, one. The goal for the working out is to workout 10 minutes every single day until I die. This is a physical health goal. The next goal is going to be a mental goal, separate from work.
Recently, I went on vacation to Maine and stayed with my brother and his family. He has four kids, and what hit me was that my brain was exhausted when interacting with the kids. This was unsatisfactory. Why was my brain so tired of thinking? Why wasn’t I able to give attention and solve problems? It’s because I have let my mind become lazy. I have not exercised the muscle of my mind properly.
I have wasted my thoughts and energy.
I do run a small business, and this presents some enormous challenges, problems, and taxes every fiber of my being including spiritually and mentally. This is different than learning, though. Solving problems for emergencies is different than solving problems ahead of time, based on a conscious choice, to achieve a goal.
My goal is now to get the OSCP. This is the pre-eminent pentesting exam. It takes 24 hours and costs $1,000.00 just to take it. If you fail, you wasted that money. This is a learning goal.
Achieving this goal requires me to build a curriculum, learn, memorize, and develop an entirely new skillset. It’s going to take months just to get to a base level in this skillset. It’s been really fun! My mind feels sharper, even after just a few weeks of learning for learning sake. It’s healthy.
Another thing I am doing is beginning college. I’m going to an online college to get a bachelors in Cyber Security, and this is also in service of the OSCP goal.
These are one and two year out goals. The OSCP and degree respectively. Third I need to set a spiritual goal, I haven’t gotten there yet other than what the Church describes, which is go to Mass on Sundays and confession 1x a month. I am failing in this discipline, because sin and Fear are holding me back. Please pray for me.
Setting goals, and achieving results towards these goals, as small as they are, has helped me in respect to my internal fear and respecting of persons. What is respecting of persons? Well, in my opinion it has to do with misrepresenting other people in your mind. It’s linked to fear. You care overly much what people think, and THINK about what OTHER people THINK about YOU. This is stupid, but I have struggled with it my entire life. This leads to manipulation, and I believe is linked very closely, or is, narcissism.
Trying to control things that are outside your control.
When you do this, you end up NOT controlling the things that are INSIDE your control. You burn energy, both spiritual and physical. The devil has you playing to his tune every second of the day!
What has struck me in setting the goals of burpees and OSCP is how effective material goals are in this process of mental and spiritual progress. In myself, I have been so prideful spiritually that I have been AFRAID to set material goals thinking they are, “Beneath me!” and not beneficial. How stupid and foolish this is. You are in a place in life for a reason, you have desires for a reason. You have certain levels of control in your life for a reason. Accepting how you are created, the GOOD parts, is the proper way to move forward in reality.
I am a layman! Part of my existence is to work in the material world, and operate outside the Church. If I wanted to be a priest, I would be a priest! Set goals, get married, love your neighbor, have parties, get a better job, work harder, learn, achieve material goals. Don’t become so spiritually prideful that you mis-categorize those things that make up living a good life.
Give reality a chance, and don’t sin while doing it.
Don’t let life pass you by. Set achievable goals, begin your new life today. It starts with baptism, ends with salvation, and is an exciting journey along the way of conquering those things in our lives that hold us back from loving our neighbor and loving our God.
“Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”
