Month: July 2016

Meditation

Lifestyle

 

As you know I started my swimming lessons – it went well. Last week my instructor give me a pair of flippers and told me to wear them in order to concentrate on my stoke practice. She even told me I could get them any time I want. I put them on and could swim like a torpedo but I thought these things were a bit like drugs and quite addictive, you know like having viagra for sex, so I decide not to use it when I practise until I take lessons again with her next week, just like following doctor’s instructions.

Another change for me is I started practising meditation, to be specific via headspace. I heard many people including Tim Ferriss had mentioned this type of thing in many occasions. Last month in the city a friends even told me he went to a class every weekend to do this type of meditation. I think it’s time for me to have a go. I downloaded this app a couple of weeks ago and tried it for 10 days, just 10 minutes after getting up – not bad. I did not feel any immediate impacts on me but I particularly liked the feeling when I was told not to control my mind and let it go. It was weird but very joyful and I also hope I will get more benefits in long term. I subscribed the service for a year last week and since then started practising it every day.

Wow, two new things in a month – swimming and medication. I hope I am not overwhelmed by the changes. I have adjusted my nap time a bit to accommodate my changes, which means I will have to sleep less but I will be fine. Oh boy, life is full of adventures.

Swimming Lessons

Sports

I don’t like work functions. I work in a small firm, so over working time, I have had enough social talks with colleagues. When it comes to work functions, I have nothing to talk to them any more.

I missed out dinners for the last two end of financial years, so when the HR manager walked to me and asked me if I could make it this year, I slowly said yes although I really really didn’t want to go – it was a Thursday and I had to go to the gym that day.

Anyway I went there. It was in a Thai restaurant; the only thing I could eat was spring rolls – they ordered too much meat.  I met this guy who was the partner of my colleague and he was the fitness instructor in the gym. We had a good conversation about how to make friends in a new town, how does bee work, and the upcoming election ect. Then it came to his specialty – fitness, I told him I had done marathon four times. He was not surprised but asked me why not do a triathlon.

This is an interesting question. I have been thinking about triathlon for ages but I have never made any efforts to get it started. I am relatively okay with running and cycling but very bad at swimming. In an ideal situation, it can take me three hours to finish 800 m of swimming, so my imagination of triathlon aways stops here.

On that evening, I thought I might be quite motivated. That guy’s encouragement reminded my early days in preparing my first marathon. It was hard and boring but not mission impossible. I might be a bit older now, but I could still try something new. So I told him I would start training for my first triathlon.

Following his suggestion, the next day I went to the pool and enrolled in an 16 weeks’ swimming lesson starting from this Saturday. It is never too late to do something crazy I guess.

This is the next question, I have a pair of budgie smugglers but I might need new swim trunks to cover myself a bit more. Not sure!