Chase The Kangaroo

Today is my last day of doing the #22KILL 22 push-ups for 22 days challenge. I first heard about #22KILL on Twitter, seeing a post by George P. Bush: @georgepbush: Today I started my #22killchallenge to help raise awareness for the 22 #Veterans we lose to suicide everyday. Read his complete post . So, being a fellow crossfitter from the same box, as well as some other reasons, I wanted to join. Turns out that since 2013, #22KILL is a global movement created by veterans with a mission to: Honor those who serve(d) Raise awareness to veteran suicide and mental health issues such as PTS and TBI Educate the public about current veteran-related topics and issues Recruit Veteran Advocates aka “Battle Buddies” Support various veteran empowerment programs; i.e. Honor Courage Commitment, Inc. (HCC), Equest Hooves for Heroes, Brain Treatment Foundation, Center for BrainHealth, REACT, Adaptive Training Foundation, and more. Sadly, it wasn't until I worked for Governor Perry th...

In Stephen Covey's  The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People , he challenges you at the end of the first chapter to a 30 proactivity test.  He defines proactivity  as "more than merely taking initiative.  It means that as human beings, we are responsible for our own lives.  Our behavior is a function of our decisions, not our conditions.  We can subordinate feelings to values.  We have the initiative and the responsibility to make things happen." Proactive Model He explains what it really means to " Take the Initiative"  and that, regardless of the circumstances we've been dealt, we can choose to " Act or Be Acted Upon" .  By the mere fact we are breathing air and existing, we will have situations arise, situations that are beyond our control.  However, we do have control over how we choose to respond and how we respond makes all the difference. Covey describes our power to choose vs our circumstances as, the Circle of Influ...

The 25 Essential Books for the Well-Read Explorer | Outside Online | Occupy your off-season with the successes, failures, and bemusements of fellow adventurers. Hey, we're with you. Given half a chance, we'd much rather hit the road than the armchair. Nothing can replace the intensity of authentic experience. Yet experience needs shape and wisdom and behind every great adventure are the stories that inspired it. We read before we go; and after we arrive, free and clear in far-flung terrain and edgy places, we invariably find echoes of the voices that led us there. Paleo Poor: Your Guide to the Grocery Store | Whole9 | We’ve heard it a million times – how can I afford to eat like this?  (“Like this” meaning “Whole30®” or a general Paleo diet.)   We can’t argue the fact that it’s cheaper to eat a McDonald’s value meal than to craft your own healthy healthy dish by hand… but then again, diabetes medication is pretty expensive too.  We’re not here to arg...

"The fountain of content must spring up in the mind, and he who hath so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own disposition, will waste his life in fruitless efforts and multiply the grief he proposes to remove."  ~Samuel Johnson

Solvitur Ambulando: It Is Solved By Walking | Art of Manliness | It’s a Latin phrase that literally means, “It is solved by walking.” Or, a little more loosely, “It is solved by walking around.” Walking? “What problems have ever been solved by walking?” you may be asking yourself. Throughout history, great minds in literature, philosophy, and science have found important insight and inspiration while out on a walk. Perhaps this is because walking – at least while out in nature (which is the kind of walking many of these thinkers favored) – has been shown by modern science to improve memory and attention. Or perhaps it’s because walking simply gets the blood pumping – a hard to quantify effect of invigoration. Increase Your Return on Failure | Harvard Business Review | One of the most important—and most deeply entrenched—reasons why established companies struggle to grow is fear of failure. Indeed, in a 2015 Boston Consulting Group survey, 31% of respondents identified...

Why Mindfulness Is Your New Secret Weapon | Outside.com | “Exhaustion occurs during real-world endurance competition not when the body encounters a hard physical limit such as total glycogen depletion but rather when the athlete experiences the maximum level of perceived effort he is willing or able to tolerate.… The inexorable slowing is not mechanistic, like a car running out of gas, but voluntary.” - Matt Fitzgerald.   Read more of the article or add these to the book list: Matt Fitzgerald's,  How Bad Do You Want It?: Mastering the Psychology of Mind over Muscle . Jim  Afremow’s, The Champion’s Mind: How Great Athlete's Think, Train and Thrive . George Mumford’s,  The Mindful Athlete: Secrets To Pure Performance . An Effortless Way To Practice Gratitude | Dallas Hartwig |  Exploring the world around you is a rather effortless way to practice gratitude. It’s really difficult to truly look at the world around you and no...

"We must not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we began and to know the place for the first time."  ~T. S. Eliot "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit."  ~Aristotle "That which we obtain too easily, we esteem too lightly.  It is dearness only which gives everything its value.  Heaven knows how to put a proper price on its goods." ~Thomas Paine "I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor." ~Thoreau

The Magic Of The Campfire |  Art of Manliness  | What is a camp without a campfire? — no camp at all, but a chilly place in a landscape, where some people happen to have some things.  When first the brutal anthropoid stood up and walked erect — was man, the great event was symbolized and marked by the lighting of the first campfire. Study: Factors Associated With Consciousness Can Influence Our Autonomic Nervous System  |  Collective Evolution  | What is the autonomic nervous systems (ANS)? It regulates the functions of our internal organs. Its role is to regulate several bodily functions such as digestion, heart rate, urination, sexual arousal, respiratory rate, pupillary response, and more. It operates reflexively and unconsciously, often without our even noticing. For example, we do not decide to make our heart beat faster when we are afraid, or notice when our blood vessels change size. This system just does what it does, a...

The commonality of these quotes points to the depth and type of character within all of us.  Our character is always revealed in the end, bubbling up to the surface.  No matter how strong or polished our personality may seem, our character will be known in time. We live in an age where more emphasis is placed on personality improvement , rather than on character improvement.  A polished personality is important in our interactions with the world around us.  However, when those interactions turn into temptation or negative, the foundations of our personality will be revealed. What are we that shouts so loudly? Personality vs. Character.  There is a balance between the two.  I'm a big believer in actions over words.  Talk is cheap.  Yet when we speak, how are we carrying ourselves?  Do we come across as kind, abrasive, bores, a pushovers?  Without the polished personality, chances are our character won't have an opportunit...