Random Thoughts from a Restless Mind

Sunday musings (by the numbers)…

1) 3.1415. Oh, why not? Pi on March 14, 2015? That’s really kinda cool.

2) 15.3. I will never get a MU (torn supraspinatus), and will be forever shut out of any event that requires one. So be it.

One should be ever mindful of the difference between CrossFit the fitness program, and CrossFit the Sport of Fitness(™). My “inter-mural” competitive juices have long run dry (more in a moment), so competing at the Sport of Fitness is of little interest to me. The Open is a measure of my fitness relative to my peers, a chance to experience the unknown and the unknowable, and the experience surrounding the Open is just fun.

CrossFit for me remains my fitness and health prescription; 15.3 is just Friday’s dose.

3) 90. Humans sleep in cycles of ~90 minutes. Each cycle is centered by an interval of REM sleep, the deepest type of sleep. There is some teleological thought that the natural tendency to be wakeful at intervals is a vestige of our hunter/gatherer origins, a brief time to assess threat before continuing to rest.

Our best sleep over a night is one that is an even multiple of our particular cycle (it’s not precisely 90 min. for everyone). Mrs. bingo and I have known this for some time, and I have tried to time my sleep/wake schedule to coincide with either 4 cycles (6 hrs.) or 5 (7.5 hrs). Multiple factors intrude on this strategy of course (alcohol intake, age, gender), and multiple outside agents conspire to make it more difficult (sunrise, canine appetites, spousal sleep).

In our over-scheduled/over-pressured world I am not advocating an intense evaluation of sleep, or any particular method of doing so (we are playing with the UP24, for example). I am simply noting that there is both a quantity and a quality metric if one does evaluate sleep, and for that matter rest in general. Recovery is worthy of your attention whether you do CrossFit as sport or fitness.

4) 1. A moment ago I made mention of my competitive juices having run dry. That’s only partially true. It’s probably more accurate to say that I have chosen to de-emphasize the competitive aspects of most of my activities.

For certain this does not include the existential threats that surround my business, my vocation, those competitors who would gladly contribute to its and my demise. In that arena I am certainly as competitive and driven to win as I have ever been about anything. In this arena my battle simply is one of waning energy and the ennui of competition that ever waxes. No unknown and unknowable at 3, 30, 300 or even 3,000 feet here.

What has changed over the years is the incessant, all-consuming need to win at everything else. Not desire mind you, but need. I grew up in one of those hyper-competitive families where everything was a game to be played and every competition a zero-sum game in which you only won if someone else lost. I had to win. We all had to win. We competed for EVERYTHING. Board games, backyard basketball, philosophical discussions. Everything. Seriously, there would be blood drawn as we wielded our knives and attacked a new tub of butter in the race to make the first mark.

Now? Not so much. I find myself drawn away from all sorts of quasi-competitive activities, fearful that I will either feel torn about letting loose my competitive devil, or having done so feel badly about an all-out assault toward victory. Some competitions are so silly that they simply cannot be taken seriously; these I enjoy deeply. I “beat” my buddy Scot in a deadlift WOD by 0.5 seconds by my account, and he “beat” me because his bar was 40# heavier by his. I “won” a game of “Cards Against Humanity” by expertly playing the “Tasteful Side-Boob” card. That kind of stuff.

A middle ground exists, of course, but it seems to be one I personally am not very good at identifying. There are times when I burn to compete. Times when all I want to do is win. As I have evolved and become aware of the risks of collateral damage my impulse is then to turn away. I miss the joy that is to be found in the game for fear of the consequences of the unbridled quest for victory. How does one find that space in which the competition itself is enough?

For you see, I haven’t forgotten how to win.

I’ll see you next week…

Posted by bingo at March 15, 2015 8:19 AM