Choices...

I’ve been giving the address away to my blog pretty regularly, and I’m beginning to wonder who reads this, what are they gleaning from this about me, and now does everyone have the upper hand on me, and I’m still a mushroom? I suppose this was my choice, so I’ve got as much information as anyone else now, and that is to my benefit. I gain more than anyone else from this blog, thus it continues.

Last night I delved into Dave Ramsey’s Total Money Makeover, the finances book Nate and Shan have adopted and recommended. It’s (thankfully) a quick read, since he repeats himself every chapter and you really have to skim to find the information, the solid what-to-do instructions to get out of debt. I noticed he addresses credit card debt and car loans, not so much student loans. His focus is on (and I don’t mean to sound uppity or a snob) America’s poor and the poor myths, mainly addressing those of us who didn’t attend college, although now that I think of it, the personal success stories that pepper the pages are about 70/30 no school/school loans. That’s pretty good, and proves that college does nothing for your finances. People should all work and save for a couple years before embarking on a college career is they’re not sure of what they’re going to study. Case in point being myself…

The real reason I brought up DM and the TMM is because he talks about ‘gazelle intensity,’ a phrase I think is a terrible way to motivate anyone, but once he explained it, I relate to in my climbing and can see how it transfers everywhere. Gazelle intensity is the ability of the gazelle to escape a cheetah’s attack nineteen out of twenty times by eluding the cheetah not with speed but unpredictable movements that tire the cheetah before he can use his speed. I guess I’m just talking about the intensity, the focus on one thing until the goal is accomplished.

The other day as I stepped away on the not-treadmill at the gym, I realized I am an athlete. For me to have a goal like the Optimist, I have to train like an athlete. And the first thing that popped into my mind was that athletes don’t drink. Beer… They take care of their bodies, they follow strict workout regimes, they hang out with other athletes, they don’t have belly overhang (I’ve never been so aware of my body and its less-than-perfect nature than in Bend), they run daily in packs and spend hours lifting weights. Am I one of these people? Do I have that intensity? I don’t feel happy enough right now to be an athlete, to have that discipline. It helps when there are a lot of other people around doing the same thing as you, when you all have the same goal and you feed off each other to achieve that. Me, I’m too self-conscious to talk about my goal. One, because it’s so far-fetched, two, because I don’t like a lot of the people whose level I want to emulate and I don’t want them to scoff at me or talk about me disparagingly behind my back, and three, I’ve got a great chance of never making it, especially with the way things are going right now. Going as in, they’re not. I climb once or twice a week, and never for long enough. I never push myself hard enough. I also compare myself to people like E.H., who, when you read the article, you will realize is not fair to compare anyone to.

I talked to Allison of SheSends yesterday, had an hour and a half long meeting with her about my piece on Emily Harrington, (geez, writing takes a long time!) and my place at SheSends. Currently I’m the profiles editor, meaning I get to contact climbing celebrities and interview them, and also screen queries. We worked over an hour, editing Emily, making it sparkle instead of plod, and I learned some useful editorial and journalistic guidelines that my self-directed education seem to have missed (interviewees are always referred to by last name, frame the piece) and I feel a lot better about volunteering for SheSends because it’s going to go live momentarily, it’s going to grow, and I’ve got some great feature ideas. If you’ve got people you think should be profiled, let me know, I’m fired up and ready for something new.