FOCUS

Distractions are everywhere. I don’t care how well you can plan, how good you are at staying focused, or what kind of zone you might find yourself in.

You can and probably will be distracted.

I have not really been able to do anything for about a week now. I have been able to draw some, which is good. I have not posted at all, which is not as good because I want this to be more of a regular thing for me.

My personal distractions this last week are:

FOOTBALL
Family
Work
Beer
Being a CRABBY ASS
Sleep
And of course the eternal war that goes on in my head.

When there is no balance there can be no creativity.

Lil’ Big Man

It is the classic case of judging a book by its cover. When people see me they assume that I am healthy. I probably eat right, I might work out, and I would be the last person that one would assume to be completely out of shape.

Yesterday in talking to my wife I told her that I have a disorder. It may not manifest itself like it does on people that overweight, or even obese, but I believe that it is the same deal.

I guess I can thank my Dad or anyone else on my family tree for giving me the metabolism to eat what I want and not gain weight as a byproduct. With that said though, I think that whatever happens to people who eat themselves to death on the inside on their body can still happen to me. That is what scares me. That is why I decided to talk to my wife about it and come clean with the amount of food that I eat in a day.

I will stop and get something to eat before I get home from work, and then I will sit down at the table with my family and eat dinner. I also go behind the family when they are all done with dinner and I eat what is left while I am “cleaning up”.

I eat to silence the noise in my head. I eat because I am comfortable doing so. I eat to be social. I eat when I am sleepy. I also eat until I hurt. When I wake up in the morning I am full with all the food that I have eaten the night before. I eat breakfast simply because it is the "designated time to eat”.

To combat this I am going to try to mindfully eat. I will only eat when I am hungry, not when it is time for breakfast, or lunch, or even dinner. If I am not hungry, I am not eating. It is way harder than it sounds. I have to think every time I want to get something to eat, “Am I eating this because I am hungry, or do I just want to eat something right now?” If it is the latter, than I need to think about why I have decided to eat? What might I be trying to cover up with food?

I tell you what; I am not really off to good start.

MAN IN THE MIRROR

I recently found one of my own journals that I managed to fill about halfway.

I decided to transcribe what is in the journal to this blog. I know that I have about two or maybe three other journals with equal amounts of entries. At one point I thought that I want to get all this in the same place, and this seems like a good place to do that.

In reading my very first entry from 1999 and putting it on the blog, and then skimming through the pages of the journal I am frightened.

Frightened for many reasons. I started the journal process right after it was clear to me that my wife was leaving me. I was away in Japan deployed with the Marine Corps and I had four months before we were to come home. I was 25 years old and my wife at the time was 23 I think.

When I started to transcribe I felt like I had to make a comment immediately after I got done because I felt like my thinking at the time was so foolish. Even though it is my goal to keep track of everything that has brought me to the point where I am right now, I did not want to be linked to the thoughts that I wrote down on paper. As I go on and continue to transcribe that first journal, it is certainly not going to be a very flattering picture of me.

It seems like in hearing that my wife was leaving me, my main concern was my money. When I left my current wife I remember that was an issue of mine as well. I am bothered because it does not show a whole lot of growth on my part.

At one point I say in that post that I am going to fight for my money my name. Never did I say that I was going to fight for my marriage.

There are a lot of things that I am feeling about that particular post, but I am going to dismiss most of it to being young and inexperienced in life.

In the future I will just leave comments in the posts that I transcribe from journal entries.

IT MEANS NO WORRIES

I can summarize my day in just two words.

FUCK IT! (what a wonderful phrase)

Today was a wash. It was wrong at every turn. There was definitely a short supply of good news. When things looked like they might get better, it just went to shit all over again.

Somewhere toward the end of my day at work I as able to fine a new sense of hope. I stopped thinking about how much more shit this day would bring.

I was able to effectively erase this bullshit ass day with two little words...

My boss is a jerk that only talks to me when he has something negative to say

FUCK IT!

I had two employees call in sick

FUCK IT!

I had to stay late to cover

FUCK IT!

My wife is talking to me like I am the dumbest asshole on the face of the planet

FUCK IT!

The day kept dragging with no end in sight until I was able to just let the day go by simply saying

FUCK IT! I got tomorrow.

I know that today is just today, and I get to hit the reset button when I go to bed tonight.

So if you spent anytime talking to me today after 3pm. I didn’t hear anything you said. I was already in FUCK IT mode.

I’m going to just double down on tomorrow.

LET'S GET IT ON

I woke up yesterday with so much enthusiasm. It was like a friend, or loved one was coming home after a long trip. Football was on TV.

I had to work, but that did not stop me from getting as much action in as possible. I called my son (the next generation of worshipers of this game called football), but he was still in the bed. At first I thought, “How could anyone be in the bed minutes before the kickoff of the season?” (I know that it started on Thursday, but that is a new phenomenon. Football starts Sundays.) But I let it go, because he has not fully matured into the fanatic that I know he will be one day.

So we had Bret Farve in a new jersey, Tom Brady go down for what might be the season, Peyton Manning not looking very Manning-ish. Rookie Quarterbacks showing there ass and leading their teams to victory, and a would be second string Mike Turner from San Diego, leading the league in rushing yesterday by starting in Atlanta. D-A-M-M!!!

This is why we watch the game. This is why we can’t wait till the season starts and hate to see it end. Anything that can happen any given Sunday (Monday, Thursday, and sometimes Saturday), usually does, and you my friend get to sit back and watch it all unfold.

With that said, as a Browns fan I am never dissuaded when my team does not win. I am in it for the game. I know that Dallas is a good team, but we looked good early. Next week we got to get up for Pittsburgh. I hope that we have a good showing. I could see yesterday that our secondary is soft. Romo had way too much time to pass, so we need to bring more up front, and it seemed that our offense was just not clicking. I also know that we are coming together as a team, and that takes some time. I like to see the growth. With that said, I would also like to knock the snot out of Pittsbugh, but that’s just me.

Tonight we got Raiders and Denver. We will see Jamarcus and McFadden in primetime, that may give some life to that very annoying and obnoxious (no matter how bad they are) Raider Nation. We also have Green Bay and Minnesota which will feature the other quarterback with not just his team and a city on his shoulders, but the entire world. If there is anybody in the league this year that has to prove himself it is Aaron Rodgers. Oh yea, there is also this kid named Adrian Peterson that will be playing tonight as well.

ARE YOU READY?