❝ Reset the odometer today from 1000 km to 1000 ml.
Why bother?
Since late last year I've been running an experiment trying to work out why people might fail doing impossible tasks.
So I figured I'd pick something I thought might be hard, break it into small bits and keep going until I finish or fail. So far so good. Every couple of days I'll get out the boots or runners and walk, run 10km. That's 10,000m a hit or more than 10K steps per session always completing the session once you start. So that's what I've been doing. Summer, winter, day, night any time I get some spare time, out come the boots.
Sometimes I run but mostly walk. I've mostly carried weights from 12 to 16Kg from about the 400Km mark, but not every day. I never go if I think I'm injured. The course is cross country on a set track, same direction up a lot of steep hills and some flats. It's hard work.
The objective is to find out if I can keep doing this, repeating the same task again and again until I crack or finish. Now it's time to reset the odometer. Now I'm trying for 1000miles. So in the next 80 days or so I'll see if I can do 60 days of pt.
Fail
At the end of it I'll have a better understanding of failure, why I didn't fail. and how I could have. This is important to me. Right now there are people failing in doing what they set out to do and they probably don't know why? This is especially true in Startups. A lot has been written why you shouldn't give up, but not much how and why you fail. My preliminary findings are:
set a goal
keep working hard
focus on the short term with eye on longterm
don't crack on short term goal
stick at it
At the same time
maintain positive mental attitude
make a plan
focus
People get distracted for some reason by the smallest of things. They also get into a downwards spiral decline, loose morale and quit. There's a big long list that can go wrong but I like to keep things simple. I try to remember, one foot in front of another and keep going until I finish. Then start again the next day. That's the simple bit. I'll be writing about it soon... if I can get around to finishing it :)
Fitness
There's a secondary benefit, fitness. Our nation is unfit. This wasn't always the case. I grew up in a sports crazed country in the most sports mad state in Australia in an era where fitness, sport and activity was encouraged and expected. Now there is a national fitness alert from diseases that used to be associated with old age. Our country as a whole is unfit. In fact the cult of fitness runs second to just about everything. It's not just economic fitness we should keep an eye on. Lack of fitness also has a financial cost. It also has a personal cost. You just can't work as hard if you are unfit. By the time you work this out it is too late. Most cannot stomach the amount of hard work to be fit and stay fit. Most could never justify the 2hrs every couple of day it takes.
I'm looking around at my High school peers (always a dangerous place to make comparisons) and you can see the results of inactivity. I can also see how much work they have to do to get into better shape. It's not just a matter of exercise but food and setting aside the time to do the hard yards.
Porsche
The shot you see here is a Porsche Boxter taken in 2009FEB18. Next target, 1000 miles. The only problem, now each session isn't the hardest thing to do.,
