julez.meets.world

Now, when it comes to working out I have always enjoyed it. I don’t dread the thought of having to go and work out or how tough it may be. No, I love it, I feel strong and powerful and excited to see what I am able to accomplish and push myself to next. See, where my problem lies is the gym itself or rather yet, the people who may see me and be around me while I complete my workouts.  My struggles with the gym is not a physical one but rather yet a mental struggle. My body is not what it used to be and it is not that I hate my body I have worked really hard to be neutral with my body. I do not love it but I do not hate it. Some days are further on one end of this spectrum than the other however. Yet, even when I had what looking back I would call an amazing body, I was still self conscious at the gym.  I never felt good enough or like I knew enough to be there. I would look at the other people and think “wow, they must know what they are doing their moves are perfect, I should try those moves- but not when they are here then they will notice me copying them.” This ruminating has never stopped in the 10 years I have been going to the gym. I always feel inferior to the workouts of other people. I feel as though if someone is in front of the mats when it’s time for me to do my floor exercises I will just leave because I would hate to interrupt them or their routine. But what makes their workout more important than mine? Why am I putting these strangers who I know nothing about above myself. What makes me not good enough? Why am I feeling like this is a competition when in no other shape or form has it been brought forth as one? Another BIG issue is how I feel about my appearance. Getting to the gym is a struggle every single day. Again, not because I hate working out but because some days I hate myself. If I get ready to go to the gym I know now to avoid mirrors until I am there because if I look in the mirror before going to the gym then I will pick myself apart until I convince myself that I am not worthy to go, that no one wants to see someone on the treadmill whose boobs are bouncing and that no one wants to see my chubby upper arms. And usually how this ends is me in tears under my covers still in my gym clothes until I finally fall asleep to escape the world.  Really I am writing my Gym Journey Series because I want to get past this and through this and I feel like my blogging my gym activities through documenting my accomplishments as well as my struggles I may be able to find some sort of solace in all of this. Maybe this will strike accord with someone reading this and maybe someone has some advice on this issue they could share.  I hope to keep at this at least weekly so stay tuned.

I will however admit that it is refreshing to see that more and more people, especially the youth are becoming more political aware through these sites. Yet the paradoxical question remains as to if an uninformed vote is just as invalid as no vote at all? This democratic right of voting seems to be becoming more and more obsolete as more time passes on. Maybe it is possible that politics and social media and work together to try to improve this issue in a way that does not further produce a coming generation of anti-citizens and uninformed voters; personally that is all that I can hope for.

Everyone wants to be successful, everyone wants the best mark, the best job, the most money, the most life experience. Conversely, people do not want to work for these things and in the world we live in today sometimes you do not have to work for these things. You could just as easily achieve this success through the means of the path of least resistance. My issue with all of this lies with the path that one takes in order to try and achieve their success. For me, what determines the success of a person is the path that led them to it. Anyone can just as easily take the path of least resistance to try to get their 'best' of whatever they are trying to achieve, yet it is the person who works the hardest, the person who never gives up and the person who never loses sight of their goal that is truly successful. Although in the end they may have the same or even less than that person who chose the easy way out they will ultimately be more enriched and more successful. This is because they will appreciate every bit of it knowing everything that they put into getting this end result. They did this, on their own, with their own determination and will. Knowing that giving your all and your best does amount to something is the whole notion of success in itself. To have something handed to you or to for lack of a better word; be lazy and take the easy way out, does not get you anywhere in life and it will soon become apparent when they are called upon to either share their success story or prove their worth. People are more supportive and more merciful towards those who they know deserve what they have achieved and who have worked hard for it. There is nothing more rewarding then giving it your all and seeing it finally pay off, that is what success is.

Some say that the past is like an anchor, holding us back; others say that the past is what makes us who we are and we must learn from it in order to move on. Either way it has become inccreasingly apparent to me that ones past plays a very influencial role in our daily lives. We can try to ignore it, supress it, move past it or face is head on. But enevitably we are all forced to have some sort of relationship and interactions with our past. Why is it that we train ourselves to supress the bad events in our past and make our selves believe as though they never happend? I have found that when I try go go about this way in dealing with my past it subconciously still holds me back. We all have had to deal with unpleasant people, and unpleasant circumstances; but is pretending they never happend the best way to move forward? I think we need to acknowledge all of our past, even as hard as it may be for some of us. It is true that one can never trully start fresh if they have not dealt with their skeletons in their closet. We need ot deal with the hurt and pain that we have be caused in our past in order to truly feel joy and happiness once again. Although not everyone will get the chance to ever ask the questions that were never answered in our past, we much accept that there are some things we may never know, some motives that will never be explained to us... and as hard as it may be, we must accept that and come to a sense of peace with this unknown. We can not change other people, we can not read people's minds, all we can do is change our selves and our train of thought. We can change how we react to a previously horrific event in our past and we change our mindset's enough so that it no longer hold us back, the longing for answers does not hold us back any more. Only with the power of our own minds can we escape our past and trully be able to move forward and be more receptive to situations and people since we now know that we can not change others, but we are in control of our own selves. We are in control of what situations we put ourselves in, we are in control of how we react and counter-act to others. We may not be able to change our past, but we can own our past and most certainly we can take full control of our future.

Melanoma awareness is very important. It is one of the number one cancers amongst young people. This is something that is preventable, so why wouldn't you?! Please wear sunscreen, don't do tanning beds, please check your skin. No one knows your skin better than you, take the time to check please. I checked, I went to the doctor and made an appointment to get them removed and sent for a biopsy. If by doing this it could save my life, then of course I'm going to do it. It should be part of your regular routine and part of your regular check-ups. It's your body, your life, take control!

This is a question that is constantly being asked when something, often horrific happens to someone who does not deserve it, to someone who has done nothing but put good karma out into the world only to have it thrown back in their face. I do have a theory as to why in fact these bad things keep happening to seemingly good people; I believe for people to truly embrace all the good they have in their life and appreciate it they must first endure some aspect of suffering. Without suffering there is no good. It does seem paradoxical I know, but if you really think about it it's true... after a hardship even something as simple as a smile is enough to make you appreciate the good in life, you no longer take the little things for granted and it will ultimately make you a stronger person. Just remember if you are going through a hard time and it seems like it won't end, it does and things will get better, but you need not to close yourself off from the world. Just because you're having a bad day doesn't mean that the world stops and waits for you to pick up the pieces, no it keeps on going whether you are ready for it to or not. So yes, take the time that you need to reassemble yourself but once you've don't that you must keep going because the world doesn't just stop spinning because you need it to.

-Sincerely, The Breakfast Club.