Office Hours #12

In this episode of Parkour Office Hours we discuss tacs - a foundational skill - and share a fun balance drill. Give it a shot and let us know how you do!

My old enemy

It's been a while since the last blog post, huh? Sorry about that - I haven't felt like I've had anything to say and I really don't think you need to hear me talk about the importance of skill development again... at least, not yet :)

So this is going to be a good ol' fashioned personal blog post. I'm not trying to set up any big lesson or reveal any great truths about health and fitness. There are an awful lot of coaches out there dispensing fitness advice on their blogs. Many of them are legitimately really good. We're all trying to contribute something meaningful with (hopefully) the goal of helping people and definitely with the goal of making a living. I've got a lot of respect for everyone trying to make it as a teacher/coach - it may seem easy until you try it and then realize how insanely difficult it is. Here's the crazy part though - this is a job that is intensely humbling and humanizing, but there seems to be this conventional wisdom that all coaches have to appear infallible and 100% certain of the "correctness" of their methods... actually, scratch that, the superiority of their methods in order to be successful - or even taken seriously. I am not the best traceur and I am not the best coach (this isn't false modesty - I think I'm pretty good at both! I just know where I stand) but I'm also not overwhelmingly concerned with what other people think of me. So if I have the opportunity to dispel the specter of guru-ism in the fitness industry with a personal story I will gladly jump on it.

I went to the doctor recently. I guess a lot of people in the community like posting their lab results. I'll give you the bullet points: slightly high cholesterol, but extremely low triglycerides and very high "good" HDL - just what you'd expect from someone who eats the way I do. Solid vitamin D levels, (with no supplementation I might add) ...and everything else was normal - I did have slightly high blood pressure which we attributed to mild dehydration and maybe some stress issues. More on that soon...  So, I need to drink more water and relax a little bit more which is hardly surprising. I aced all the lifestyle questions - don't smoke, don't drink a whole lot, clearly I get a lot of exercise, etc. We talked a bit about my father (who passed away from kidney disease) and then the doctor asked me how my mood was.

And I paused. Because, truthfully, my mood has been pretty shitty for the past few months.

For as long as I can remember I have grappled with Depression. We all suffer from depression at times - something bad happens and we feel sad about it - it's normal and healthy and we recover from it just fine. Clinical Depression, on the other hand is more of a chronic issue. I'm not going to give a lecture about "Big D" Depression - Google away if you're interested... it's actually pretty fascinating. There's a strong genetic component to Depression and I've got it on both sides of the family. A big trigger is stress, and, well, starting a new and really unusual business is pretty stressful.

I've had two major episodes in my life.  One was around the age of 13 when my parents split up. I stupidly refused to go into therapy and slowly clawed my way out of it. The two things that helped most (Other than a loving and supportive family) were a large and magical patch of forest that was behind the house we moved into and starting to study martial arts. The second major episode was short lived but acute - it was the first winter of moving to Chapel Hill for business school. Lots of stress from classes, almost no exercise, and short dark days. I was older and a little wiser, so I recognized what was happening quickly. I carved out more time for exercise. To make it a little more fun, I decided to learn just one of those "parkour moves." I watched this video, found a picnic table and got to work. Obviously, it changed my life.

I don't want to speak for anyone else who struggles with Depression, but for me it never really "goes away." It's always there, but most of the time it doesn't cause any trouble. I remember being really preoccupied for a time about whether I could still experience normal sadness without somehow triggering an episode. I tried my best to not get sad EVER... which clearly is impossible. I learned that getting sad and getting Depressed were different - they felt different. For me, unless things are really bad, I can still experience a range of emotions while Depressed, but it's like they've been desaturated. I can feel happy, but there's not a lot of happiness in my happy, if that makes any sense. Perhaps because of this, I've always been pretty functional even while struggling with Depression. I daresay most folks I've encountered over the past few months didn't realize I am Depressed. The tough part this time around is that there really isn't a good way to eliminate the stress - and my typical coping mechanism (exercise) is now intimately connected with the source of the stress (the business) A proper pickle, that...

The upshot is that I spend a good portion of every day absolutely convinced that I am doing everything wrong and that I am utterly worthless as a small business owner, as an athlete, and especially as a coach. In brighter moments I'm able to reflect on the fact that I generally get very positive feedback from my students. Objectively, I know that while I still have a lot of room for improvement, I'm a pretty good teacher. Some self-doubt is good. It guards against hubris and the development of the cults of personality that plague so much of the fitness industry. But too much doubt is crippling and I often feel paralyzed by it or like I am spinning my wheels in an attempt to compensate for my perceived lethargy.

So yes, this round of Depression has been tough to crack. I think I'm the type of person who would benefit from therapy, but it isn't in the budget. I've never tried medication, but I'm open to the idea. I am consistently frustrated with how Depression is treated in the paleo community. There is general derision of any kind of anti-depressants and a constant refrain of "diet and exercise can treat Depression better than pills!" While I am firmly in the camp of "try lifestyle changes before drugs," I know many people for whom anti-depressants have been a life-changer. These are people who eat well and exercise. Anti-depressants are a tool, and they are often the right tool for the job. If things weren't improving, I would definitely consider them.

Yes, things have been getting much better. Interestingly, the answer seems to be LESS exercise. Also, getting better sleep and spending 30 minutes each day sitting still and breathing... some people call it meditation. I still have plenty of sad days, but overall this past month has been much much better. I've been down this road before and this definitely feels like I'm travelling in the right direction.

Why write all of this? Well, in part it's therapeutic to put it down and get some perspective. Also, I tend to be very direct when dealing with some issues and extremely passive on others. Depression fell into the latter category and I want to change that.

Finally, I suppose I'm hoping to demonstrate to other coaches/fitness professionals (or anyone really) that it's okay to make yourself vulnerable. The hard act may seem smart and it may seem like that's what clients want, but too much hardness makes you brittle. True strength is knowing how to bend. We're all human, we all make mistakes, we all have limits to our abilities and we all need help sometimes. You don't have all the answers and you don't need to. This may sound odd, or downright stupid, but admitting you don't know everything, that sometimes you are weak, and that you make mistakes is, I think, absolutely vital for long term success.... as long as you then commit to improving.

To all my wonderful students, I'm sorry if I've seemed a little down over the past few months. I'm working on it! - and you all help more than you can know. I am extremely fortunate to have a great support system of friends and family for whom I am extremely grateful.

If you've had any similar experiences and feel like talking about it, go ahead and drop a comment. I'm definitely not a doctor or a councilor or anything, but I'm listening.

A proper Fiasco

I talk a lot about the importance of play. Usually, it's related to fitness and then I go on to talk about Parkour and the importance of exploring what you are physically capable of doing. It's all true and important and good and stuff.

But we can't do Parkour all day every day. Believe me, I've tried - and I have the scars and obscene grocery bills to prove it. Play takes many shapes and sizes - and it's all great as long as it challenges your creativity, triggers your imagination, and is fun. I am of course talking about playing games. Well, good games... not WarPorn 3 on your Playstation.

I have a new favorite game and I think you all should know about it. In fact, I think you all should play it.

The game is called Fiasco. You can find it here. Fiasco is, to oversimplify things, a role playing game. Unlike most RPGs (Dungeons and Dragons, etc.) there is no Game Master. There also aren't any strict objectives. Or winners. Or rules, really. Fiasco is all about creating characters and plots like a fantastically delicate and elaborate house of cards, then not just kicking it down, but stacking it full of dynamite and blowing it all to hell. If you like the Coen Brothers movies you know how this goes: small-time characters in WAY over their heads generally behaving badly.

This is accomplished by rolling a pool of dice and then taking turns using those dice to create a network of relationships between all the characters. Things like "The Past: War adversaries" or "Crime: Embezzler and company accountant." Then you add in some delightfully volatile details like Needs ("To get rich through a re-written will") Locations ("The old oak tree") and Objects ("100 feral cats" or "digital recorder, accidentally left recording") When this is done you and your friends are left with a delightfully unstable powder keg of a  situation ready for some good exploding.

The game proper is played out in a series of scenes. Yes, you need to act. In fact, you need to improvise. It's potentially scary if you've never done it before but BOY is it fantastic life training.

(I'm going to stop talking about the mechanics of Fiasco now... if you're interested in more of that, check out this review)

Improv requires embracing some seemingly contradictory ideas. You need to be focused and attentive, but also relaxed and open. You need to be ready to contribute your ideas but also be ready to accept somebody else's idea and run with it. In a word, you need to be Ready. This should sound very familiar to anyone who has ever thrown him/herself at a wall or practiced martial arts.

There are two general principles in improv. The first is called Agreement, also known as the "Yes, and" rule. If, during a scene, someone says to you, "What's with the watermelon, Valerie?" then your name is Valerie and you're holding a watermelon. Run with it. Maybe you were planning on being a mechanic named Steve, but that was 2 seconds ago and a lot has happened since then! Saying "Yes, and" to everything requires that you be completely open and adaptable. You need to think of everything people give you as a gift.

The other big principle is to give good gifts back - to be Generous. This requires good listening and the ability to remove yourself from the outcome. This is perhaps my favorite thing about improv and Fiasco in particular: to be good you need to strip away any thought of "winning." If there's no winning, then there's no losing. There is only action. There is The Moment. What a fantastic mindset to develop.

Of course, at it's most fundamental level, Fiasco is about going gonzo and creating delightfully funny catastrophes. It may seem silly to try to pull deep lessons out of a game that makes you pretend to try to somehow embezzle funds from the local Chicken Hut with an army of 100 feral cats and your sister-wife, but I think there's a lot of value in developing the skill set Fiasco promotes. After all, our lives are 100% improvised. If you are open, accepting, and Ready, great things will happen.

Oh, one last word about Fiasco, if you're not sold already. Every month the creaters release a new playset bursting with potential mayhem. I dare you to check out these scenarios and not find one that piques your interest.