THE SCENE: 52 and clear
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER: All veterans – skipped.
WARM-O-RAMA:
Grady corns
Tempo squats
Merkins
Mountain climbers
Mosey to the recruiting center
THA THANG:
We did a little Hardship Hill preparation training…
4 stations (obstacles) in the parking lot – 4 more across the street. 1-minute EMOM timer
Visit an obstacle and do the exercise until timer goes off. Then run to the wall, scramble up and over, and run across the street to the next station. Obstacles were;
- Tire hit
- Ball Slams
- I Merkins
- Alternating waves
- Heavy lunges
- Stack squat
- Jump rope
- 10 thrusters + 15 curls (repeat)
First lap is finished – whew! Recover to your canopy and plop yourself down in a chair. Someone throws you a beer and someone else thrusts a bowl of chili into your hand – great! While you’re there just relaxing, grab a CMU and do;
- 30 triceps
- 30 curls
- 10 Chaco burpees
Now, get your muddy shoes back on your feet, because here come your teammates over the last obstacle and it’s your turn to run another lap. This time, obstacles were;
- Slam ball throw
- Tire flip
- Battle rope slams
- “H” Merkins
- Goblet squats
- Good mornings
- Jump rope
- 10 thrusters + 15 triceps (repeat)
Second lap is finished – good golly! Recover to your canopy and collapse onto a blanket in the grass. Ah, your wife is there, and she brought you your house slippers and a warm mug of hot cocoa – thanks, wife! Everyone on your team is smoked, so a couple of JUCO studs offer to run your team’s next lap – sweet. While you’re relaxing, grab a CMU and do;
- Single arm OHP – 10 each side
- 20 CMU swings
- 30 triceps
What the?!?! Here come those JUCO guys over the last obstacle – how the heck did they get around the course so quickly? Oh no – your teammate who is supposed to run next is in the port-a-john. You’re already beat, but you have to do another lap. Too tired to run, this time we’ll crawl. EMOM bear crawl to the wall, touch, then sprint to the next station. Obstacles reverted back to;
- Tire hit
- Ball Slams
- I Merkins
- Alternating waves
- Heavy lunges
- Stack squat
- Jump rope
- 10 thrusters + 15 curls (repeat)
Finished! You won’t be taking home any wooden trophies this year – but you finished the race without any significant injuries. We’ll count that as a win.
MARY:
No time
COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
Me and 5 of the best men I know
CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
I told a short story about an acquaintance, Sarah. My wife and I have known her and her husband, Ty, for nearly as long as we’ve lived in TN. They used to live near us but moved several years ago and we’ve fallen out of touch. Last week, my wife forwarded a blog post to me – it was then that I found out Sarah has been battling a rare and aggressive cancer. In her post, she writes about how there are only three clinics in the nation which specialize in treating this cancer – and that her family feels strongly that she should seek treatment at MD Anderson in Houston. So, they are planning for her to move to Houston for 3-4 months. Looks like months of prep, surgery in December, twice-a-day radiation treatments…
She talks about sitting in the hotel lobby after the initial consult and calling a friend to unburden herself. “Knowing that I will be hardly able to walk, where do I live and how do I get myself to the treatments? How do we plan for our young daughters to visit if I don’t know how I’ll be feeling? How do I keep running our small business remotely? How the heck are we going to pay for all of this? I don’t want to be needy and ask people for help…” Her friend responded, “If you don’t let people come alongside you and help, then you are robbing them of the joy of participation.”
I love that phrase – “the Joy of Participation”. Generosity is participation. When you are generous with your time, your money, your resources – you are participating in other people’s challenges and dreams. That can be a source of a tremendous amount of joy.
In his book, “Seven Habits of Highly Effective People”, Steven Covey talks about the difference between living with a scarcity mindset and living with an abundance mindset. When you have a scarcity mindset, you protect and hoard all that you have. When you live with an abundance mindset, you give joyfully knowing that you have more than enough to meet your own needs. He didn’t make up that concept – it’s in Scripture.
Proverbs 11:24 NLT, “Give freely and become more wealthy; be stingy and lose everything.”
Yesterday afternoon, my oldest son and I drove to Chattanooga to pick up a bike. I’ve been looking for a mountain bike for him for more than a year – checking Facebook marketplace nearly every day – visiting the local shops over and over. For bike manufacturers and retailers, the last 18 months have been crazy busy – and for consumers, it’s been crazy difficult to find bikes. It seems like for every bike that comes in, there are 10 people on a waitlist for it. But with some careful planning, we were finally able to get him one and he is thrilled. Seeing him ride it last night was great – and I know that all the joyful times we will have riding will be worth all the time and planning that went into getting that bike.
That got me thinking… What would it be like if I sought the Joy of Participation (i.e., the joy of giving generously) with the same deliberateness and dedication that I sought the joy of biking with my son? What if I planned for and pursued generosity in the same way that I plan for a vacation?
Isaiah 32:8 NLT, “Generous people PLAN to do what is generous…”
MOLESKIN:
Sarah’s story; https://www.thehappyenvelope.com/cancer-journey/the-joy-of-participation
Remember to be praying for Erector and his extended family this week
Biohack had a great suggestion related to planning your generosity – set-up a separate bank account and have funds auto-drafted into it monthly. That way you’ll have those resources ready when you get an opportunity to participate in someone’s dream or struggle.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Hardship Hill set-up on October 1, race on October 2
Monster Mash Bash – October 28th
