Author: Carl Setzer

One thing that strikes me, on this fitness journey, is how a sedentary my life had become. My fitbit’s basic plan is to accomplish 10k steps per day. Well, today, I just got that. At 11:40 at night. That entailed pacing around me house for a few minutes. And I did an hour of taekwondo and cycled for about an hour. I may not be as sedentary as some. Yet, reaching these basic steps require significant life changes.

That speaks to an internal illusion of mine. Fitness. I see myself as the epitome of health. But I’m 20+ pounds overweight and nowhere near the peak fitness levels of my youth. Plus, that fitness was based on lots of exercise, and nothing else. My diet was atrocious. And is only slowly getting better. These are not the easiest changes to make. Decades of bad habits, brought home to roost as my metabolism calms.

At one point, I wanted to recapture the fitness of my youth.  Now, though, I want something very different. I want greater health, one of better diet, of richer health, as well as strength and endurance. I’m creating something new. This really is a new mental and physical place, a new way to live. I’m looking forward to this new journey.

Oh, Maslow’s pyramid and all that psychological think! Is there anything greater than interdependence and self-actualization? Yes, this is a rhetorical question. Right now, no. Or, better put, nothing we know of. But our culture evolves. I wonder what the future will think, looking back upon this moment, about what our perceived upper-bounds were in terms of compassion, interconnectedness, justice. I’m confident that they’ll find us amusing, perhaps with a judgmental view.