Move!

Must resist the temptation of falling asleep...

One thing that I have been doing for the last week or so is daily exercise. For some time now, too much for me to write out loud and not feel ashamed, I have been a couch potato. Not one in it's full form because the daily dog walks (yes there's also a dog, and more cats by the way) probably have kept some of my muscles from turning to gelatin.

For now I'm only walking at a relative fast pace for about 1h and circa 5km (~3.1 miles) a day. Later I will try to add some running to the plan to see how it goes.

The results?

For now just tooooo tired to think about results. My legs complaint. My back complaint. My arms complaint. My joints protest and complaint. My hole body is aching and I just want to sleep a bit more, and a bit more. I had no idea that I was so out of shape, unless you count blob as being in shape.

I think that these side effects will pass in the next few days when my body will catch up with the current exercise plan.

I'm not even sure why and how I'm currently following this plan so thoroughly. Well I just have been doing this for a week, it's too soon for me to say that I have a habit or that I have conquered my sedentarism, but I sense that it's a bit different this time, because somehow I've made it a purpose in my day. I would like to offer the recipe or mental process that has managed me to transform this routine of exercising in a daily purpose, but I have no clue. I will think this through to see if there is some repeatable process that can be reapplied in other context or by someone else.

But for now, I will just keep on moving.

Feedback

With the feedback of trying the butterfly now flies again.

The reason you now know some of your strengths or your weaknesses is because in the past you did something and by some means you got feedback on that. A conscious feedback from someone, an unconscious one from some kind of behaviour that you picked up, or just from a direct feedback, something you've tried, failed, broke or was successful.

If you don't do, if you don't experiment, you limit yourself to a cocoon of non experiences and no feedback.

You can read on how to do something, or how to avoid doing a mistake or an error, and you think you understand everything because someone else done it for you, but currently I'm inclined to tell you that you can't. You cannot really understand something unless you've done it. Feedback is really important, and it's at the core of our learning process, it tells you where you can improve and where you are already excelling.

In a recent job interview for the first time I got honest feedback on how I had done. This is very unusual, specially where I live, usually you go to an interview and if they don't want to hire you, you just never hear from them again. And even if you do, they don't give any kind of feedback.

When I thanked them for the feedback, the recruiter in the other side told me: "You don't have to thank me. A friend of mine says that feedback is a gift."

I have to agree with him, if honest, respectful and done right, feedback is really a gift.