Welcome 2014

Another Year is over.  

Wow, I cannot believe its been a year since I have written on this blog.  Lots of changes this year for me.  Where do I start.  2013 is an odd number year and I always have my mind set that those years are not always good luck for me.  But this year was different in a lot of ways.  I am hoping that 2014 will be an even better year for me. 

This year was definitely the year of changes.  I broke up with my girlfriend of 4 years in March and I feel pretty good about that.  It makes it easier when the love just disappears and fades away.

I finally purchased a house after several months of looking.  I got really lucky to have bought a very near perfect rehab house totally remodeled in a semi-decent neighborhood.  I say semi-decent neighborhood because it is still in Chicago but in a better NW side of the city.  It is a 5 bedroom, 3 bathroom house with lots of room, for just me. 

My happiness level was even this year.  Not a lot of ups and downs.  

Health wise, I had a lot of migraines and sinus infection more then usual.  My running was almost not there at all.  The biggest issue I struggle this year was motivation.  The biggest part in pushing yourself to do something is motivation.  I realized what a huge impact motivation has on your goals.  

It is beyond me to understand why I lack such motivation to run and workout.  I did have some motivation for cycling and did a few trips.

I have been fighting the lack of motivation for the last 2 years now and feel very stuck and not able to push myself like I used to.

This year will be a different year.  This is the year where I am going to get my motivation back.  I am going to start running marathons and doing more adventure traveling.
My first goal is to run the Rock and Roll Half marathon in DC in March.  After that, I am planning to run several other marathons.  I figured I just need to jump right in and not look back.  I need to kick start my motivation and just DO IT.

So how was your New Year?  Any plans and goals for 2014?

Cheers

What happened in 2012?

It has been a long time since I updated this blog.  This year has gone so quickly and has had a lot of ups and downs.  Moving forward to 2013 that is all going to change.  

2012 was a very challenging year for me.  I had plans in finally buying a house in the far northwest side of Chicago or the suburbs but that was not to be.  I got laid off from my job of 5 years as a Front office developer and saw myself unemployed.  I did get a nice package but did not want it waste it.  I quickly found a job at TTX as a database consultant.  The contract ended up being only 4 months.  I was back out in the job market again.  I am lucky I am in the right field where there are a lot of opportunities opening up.  There are more IT job then there are people looking for.  I would get tons of emails and phone calls on IT opportunities.  After about 3 month I landed a contract job in November working as a Application developer for US Cellular for about 6 months.

While my job situation was swinging up and down, I tried to get myself re-motivated to run again.  I ran a couple of times and I even participated in the RAGNAR Midwest Relay, but my performance was lacking.  The more I thought about running and trying to get motivated the less I felt like running.  

The one thing that I was more active was cycling.  I did participate in the Bike ride across Iowa (RAGBRAI) this past July with my girlfriend and her teenage kids.  My 11th time in the event and the 1st time with my girl friend.  It was a very interesting adventure to say the least.  Let's just say that cycling in 101 degrees under the sun and camping out for 7 days was not want my girlfriend had in mind for vacation.  I marked that one in my books of things NOT to do with my girlfriend.  

I continue cycling during the year until it started to get cold.  I could have done more running or participated in some races, but my mind was pre-occupied with finding a job.  The not knowing when I was going to find a job was stressing me out.  That stress should have motivated me to get out there and release it.  That just did not happen.  No matter how hard I tried, I just could not get that run in.  Overall, I spend the entire 2012 without running any marathons at all.  This is the first time since 2004 that I have not ran a marathon race. 

I am glad 2012 is over with.  Stay tune for more ...