Sunday Story…this is

The year. The one where you finally do (fill in the blank). Yet all the years previous to this one you haven’t (fill in the blank). But this is the year. Finally, you will see it through. You will (fill in the blank).
Eat right
Lose 20 pounds
Quit smoking
Get Fit
Blah blah blah more uninspiring stuff.

Just stop already. We both know what the likely outcome of this is. I don’t need to tell you and you don’t need to look over the last few years to know.
Try this on for size…pick 1 fun thing you can do that will make someone else’s life better, more inspired, more something else. It isn’t for you; it has no consequence for you. You are going to do it because it will be both fun for you and create joy for someone else. Then do it as scheduled.

Here are some ideas:
Give your significant other 1 compliment a day
Tell your children you love them…at random times every day
Flirt with your spouse more
Write a personal note to someone every week expressing your gratitude to them

Sounds way more fun than the usual I’m going to lose 20 pounds this year only to blow it off by the 15th of January, doesn’t it? Just imagine how much richer your life will be if you spend a year doing 1 fun thing for someone else all year.

John Mariotti
wwwcrossfitodyssey@gmail.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com
775-338-2412

Sunday Story…Message Sent

Is Not message received.

I can say just about anything and you will hear what you hear. Just because I said it doesn’t mean you actually heard it. You laid all your “stuff” on top of my words. “Stuff” like your own experience, your preparation to answer what I said, your willingness to deeply listen (or not), my use of language that is different than your understanding of the same language. With all that “stuff, it’s amazing we can communicate at all.

I can talk and talk and talk but unless you are listening and hearing, all my talk is for naught. It takes two to communicate. It takes effort to make sure you are understood and it takes effort to understand.

Deep listening is a gift. Give it often.

John Mariotti
www.crossfitodyssey.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com
775-338-2412

Sunday Story…Lazy is

Sunday Story…Lazy is

As lazy does. Most of the time we view lazy as work avoidance. I don’t want to dig that ditch, or clean the garage, or do the dishes, or fold the laundry so I find other things to do that I find more appealing, or, at least, less daunting.

But the facts in this modern life are simple: if I don’t want to do it, I can find or pay someone else to do it. And there is a pretty good chance they will do it better than I will anyway. This is especially true of tasks I detest. If I don’t like yard work, for a few bucks I can get a professional crew to do it and it will look way better than anything I would have ever done.

The kind of lazy that is more prevalent today avoids a different kind of labor. The kind of deep emotional work that requires real effort, mental, physical, emotional, psychic, and spiritual. The really hard work of digging in and seeing who you are…and who you are not.

This is the lazy that avoids thoughtful conversations. The lazy that refuses to introspect and uncover hidden feelings and dig around in the psyche. This is the lazy that avoids fear in the hope things change or it just goes away.

Let’s call it for what it is. Lazy. It’s okay in the short term but in the long term, it erodes at our self-worth. We know we aren’t doing the hard work and like the dishes in the sink, it keeps piling up until we do something. All too often though the something we do isn’t the hard work, it’s another strategy for not doing what we know we should be doing.

Don’t be lazy. Do the work.

John Mariotti
www.crossfitodyssey.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com

Sunday Story…It’s that

Time again. It comes around every year about this time. Every year you do some things in January to try and make some changes to improve your life in some way. Some of them work. Most of them don’t. Some years we give them up about 2 weeks into the year. Some years we get a couple months. Some years we don’t even try.

This year let’s do something a little different. Look back over this past year and pick the 1 thing that you really want to shift. Just one thing. Is it your fitness? Your eating habits? Ending a bad habit like tobacco use or alcohol? It doesn’t matter what it is.

Take the one thing and spend the next week thinking about what your life will look like when you achieve that goal. Make it real; make it so real you can taste it. Keep that image in your head.

Go back to the goal and reverse engineer it to today. You know the goal. You know what it is going to feel like when you get there. What do you need to do today to move closer to that point? When tomorrow comes, the same question applies…what do I need to do right now to move closer to that goal?

Make a plan of small incremental steps that you can do every day. Just little things. But things you can do every day without fail. Keep that feeling in your heart and your head.
You can do this if you just break it into small bite-sized pieces. The same way you would eat an elephant.

John Mariotti
www.crossfitodyssey.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com
775-338-2412

Sunday Story…Enough

And Full are not the same. Thanksgiving is coming, that glorious holiday where enough is never and too much is the watchword for the holiday.

Too much food. Too much football. Too much T.V. Too much of everything. On this holiday it is very easy to get full. And Full is not the same as enough.

When we get full we aren’t just satisfied. We are over-satiated. We have met and surpassed any and all desire for more. But full doesn’t last, and it isn’t really even desirable. What we really desire is enough. Enough doesn’t feel like full. Somehow we convince ourselves that full is what we need. We need to be topped up, full to the brim, no room for anything else.

There is an exception…gratitude. I want to be full of gratitude. Of that, there is never enough.

Eat enough. Be full of gratitude. Enjoy your day. If you are looking for something new and unique to add to your holiday try this from Seth Godin:
http://www.thethanksgivingreader.com/

John Mariotti
www.crossfitodyssey.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com
775-338-2412

Sunday Story…The race

Isn’t real. Years ago my uncle had a T-shirt that proclaimed, “He who dies with the most toys wins.” Really? What do you win? $250,000.00? A date with a supermodel? You’re dead. I’m pretty sure the number of toys you have doesn’t count at that point. You aren’t winning anything.

You think the race is real but it really only exists in your mind. You aren’t behind. You aren’t ahead. You are creating a competition that has no winner, no loser, and the other participants don’t know they are playing.

When I do this the only person who can lose is me. No one else is playing. Can I win? Not really since there is no opponent, no judge, no start or finish, and no reward at the end of the day. How much sense does this make?

Why make a race where one doesn’t exist? Why feel like you are losing when you are the only one playing?

Here’s an idea…go all out. The race doesn’t matter, the winner doesn’t matter, the loser isn’t important, your job is to do the best you possibly can…at work, at play, in the gym, wherever and whatever. And then do it better next time.

That way you always win, toys be damned.

John Mariotti
www.crossfitodyssey.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com
775-338-2412

Sunday Story…Infinite

Choices. We do not live in a place where our choices are finite. You can pick up and move to another part of the country if you choose. You are not restricted to living within 20 miles of your birthplace. You can choose a career no one else in your family trees has ever done before. You are not stuck with doing what your father has done.

You have a myriad of choices. A nearly infinite number of people to speak to, food to eat, books to read, events to attend, attitudes to take. This is a place to hide, a screen for us to use in order to not make a choice. We can pretend we don’t how to choose, or what to choose. It is safe and easy to not choose. To hide behind a stack of seemingly endless choices is a pretense to use when the number of choices seems overwhelming.

Making a choice isn’t easy. Making the best choices are never easy or simple. You can make the easy choice of not choosing; just going along the way you have always gone along. Or you can choose the road less traveled, the not-so-popular career, the position that feels right but is difficult to hold.

Either way, you are choosing. The question is are You making the choice or is the choice being made for you.

Choose.

John Mariotti
www.crossfitodyssey.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com
775-338-2412