Thurs, Fri, Sat and Sunday... Days 48, 49, 50 & 51

Balancing life with the 1000 is like a five star buffet... you get lots of amazing little treats, but no matter how much you eat you always seem hungry for more. The only problem with stuffing yourself to full of five star goodness is the after effect... the stomach ache, the feeling of not wanting to do anything, the “oohhh I ate to much feeling.”

I feel like the majority of the 1000 Challenge has been five star buffet dining, however this week I was definitely fighting the feeling of “oohhhh I ate to much.”  

Spending most of the week stuffed up, sore throat, runny nose and hive breakouts that stopped short of resembling the plague; left my extra energy and time I set aside for the 1000 vastly depleted.  The preceding combined with my normally long work days - I am not going to lie I found myself really struggling this week.

The 1000 Challenge has been nothing short of an amazing experience.  I look at pictures and marvel at reviewing my life and the variety it has had the last two months.  Having said that all that enjoyment has come at some sacrifice.  My long days have become longer with me trying to create additional minutes here and there to do the extra stuff that brings the 1000 to life.  My social life unless it revolves around the 1000 has become less diversified.  I have hurt feelings and let people down sacrificing my available time for others and put that into the 1000.  I did not realize the extent of this until today when a friend put me in my place.

Setting aside her time with her friends she volunteered to be my tour guide for the day.  She spent a great deal of time looking into locations, people etc... so we could pack the most experience into our day as possible.  The lengths she went to on my behalf I can't imagine, she was excited to be my tour guide, to be a supportive friend, to share in the experience of the 1000 Challenge, and more than anything, just to hang out.  I let her down.

Getting up at 430 this am after a late Saturday night, I thought I had enough time to work, watch the sunrise and explore the snow if any had fallen the night before in the mountains of Santa Barbara.  What I didn't anticipate was how many other people would want to see the snow and the challenges it would cause to get down from the mountains.  Needless to say when I finally made it back down around 215, well after the 11am meet up time we had planned, most of the day light had been used up and with it so had much of what my friend had planed for the day's adventures.  When I called to apologize she explained to me the efforts she had gone to to make the day special, efforts, thoughts, feelings, energy, all of which I did not take into consideration because I was so focused on my life, my challenge, my, me, my, me...

Letting my friend down was the proverbial icing on the cake of my most challenging week of the 1000 to date.  A week that began with a successful Valentine's dinner that left me feeling happy and energized, and is now ending with me writing this blog, feeling tired, disappointed in myself, and for the first time unsure of myself during the 1000 Challenge.  

Before you think I am a total Debbie Downer here, let me digress for a moment and say that I did have a lot of really great times and experiences this week.  The hiking on Saturday was epic and the snow in SB today is something I will never forget.  Having said that in the midst of all the good there was also some struggle.

One of the goals in doing the 1000 Challenge is my hope that people who follow it will see me doing little things, big things, weird things, funny things, and they will become inspired to do the same in their lives.  That people will see we can all smile, laugh, and make our lives just a little bit better every single day if only we just try to.  And as important as that is to me, it is also very important to acknowledge the other side of life... the struggles, the challenges, the difficulties etc...

I love sunshine and rainbows, but I am a realist and I know life is not always going to be that way.  Skies do turn gray, storms do blow through all our lives; some storms just pass through the night, barely leaving a trace, while others blow through with such force that when they are gone we are left staring at the shambles of life how we once knew it.

This week was a stormy week for me.  Tuesday I wanted to stay in bed.  Wednesday I wanted to cancel all my appointments and hide from the world.  Thursday I was pissed off for still feeling the same as I had on the previous two days.  Friday I felt a lot better, but was so covered in and uncomfortable from hives that I again wanted to lock myself in a room full of back scratchers and just itch and scratch myself for the rest of the day.  Saturday I felt better, had an amazing time hiking and then took the rest of the day to be with friends, it was good and it was needed.  However, it came at a sacrifice and brought me to today: feeling a mix of excited, behind, overwhelmed, and frustrated. 

And so while as much as I want to jump on here every time and write to you all about the sunshine and rainbows of life, it is also important for me to share the stormy side of it to.  I screw up and struggle just as much as the next person, what's important for me is that in the midst of that struggle, that I keep trying.  As "off" as I felt this week, the highlights of it were definitely those in which I was out doing the 1000 Challenge... the little moments in which I was actively going out and seeking out ways to make my life fuller, richer, and happier.  It was those moments, the moments of me trying and fighting against the struggle that stand out above all else this week.

Shit is going to happen.  We can't change that.  What we can change is what we do when it does happen.  We all are going to have times in our life when we struggle and face seemingly insurmountable challenges.  The struggle, the challenge is really unimportant, what is important is what we choose to do when faced with these challenges.  Do we give in and accept that the struggle is now our life and therefore we are the struggle?  Or do we try?  Do we go out and no matter what the odds, no matter how hard life seems, do we go out and attempt to do something, anything to improve our situation in that moment.  If love can move mountains, if a smile can turn a frown upside down, imagine what power all of us have to make our lives better if we only would choose to wield it.  Just imagine...

That's what I am going to do.  After I send this I am going to close my computer and spend my remaining waking moments of the night imagining the power I have inside of me to make my life better... to make it the life I want.  I can't change the hurt I caused by letting friends down, I can't go back and and make myself feel better this past week.  All I can is learn from the experiences, hopefully better myself, and do better to DO better the next time.  Do your best to be your best.  I was not at my best this week, I am glad I got the reminder.

Enjoy the pics,

Carpe Diem,

Jesse