Against the Firewalking Wall

  All or Nothing  If you know me, I tend to hit the ground running when it comes to things that I am working on, with an all or nothing mentality. That mindset usually ends with a crash and burn. My wife Annette is incredibly consistent and has this superpower to be able to not work for things, but make things work for her. She understands you do not have to dive in head first into a 5k swim at 50m sprint pace. I, on the other hand, am all about the cold turkey approach. I can't even tell you how many times I have started something and then stopped and then started because I bit off way more than I could chew. For example, I might say I am going to start working out, eat healthy, get up early, no cheat meals, no candy or soda… and the list would go on. Halfway through the week, I do half of what I wanted and end up back at Taco Bell. That is when the all or nothing really hits. I gave up because I did not follow my goal perfectly. That was my cycle, and I was so good at i...

Note: If you subscribed with email last week it was not working. Please enter your email again to subscribe for real this time.     One Thing: January 17th was the day that I decided I needed to change one thing in my life.  I needed to take one step that would create movement.  It did not need to be a big step, it just needed to be a step.  This one winter when I was a child, my brother was pulling me on a sled behind his car during one of our Oregon snow storms. He also had a bit of a led foot, so speed was not an issue. I was on a sled attached to some rope attached to his car.  All the sudden I can feel the sled slowing and the tension in the rope loosening. I looked behind me and the neighbor's mutt was nipping at my heels, and my brother was allowing it to get closer and closer. I immediately started to scream (pre-puberty scream) for my brother to speed up. I could see him laughing. I was having the feeling that all younger siblings have. Powerl...

  Where I started:   No this is not my current transformation, this is me on June 11, 2016. I was in the best shape I had been in (including my college track & field days) This was a transformation that I had made over a 4 month period. I started my previous weight loss path with a lot less fat on my body than I did for my current journey. This picture is really a time shot of what would become some of the toughest years I would go through at this point in my life.  My dad was diagnosed with stomach and throat cancer a little before this photo was taken. (Soap box time) If you chew tobacco I want to encourage you to stop. I watch my dad go through some of the worst pain I have ever been a part of. Not only that, but before he was diagnosed, he was not able to eat any food. The cancer had closed up his eating tubes so much that he could not get food to his stomach. He went 1 month without being able to eat anything. He would try and then go throw it up because it would...