healthy | butterflyification

Confession. I don’t know much about Basketball.

So yesterday at work I was trying to inspire one of my employees whom was struggling. Struggling with doubt really. Not sure he can do it. Feeling he is failing. Not sure whether or not he should keep going….

So we had a little heart to heart. I started the conversation with “Tell me a little bit about Michael Jordan.” His eyes lit up. This guy is very passionate about sports. So he went on to tell me about all the times that Michael Jordan has failed. All the people who didn’t believe he could be successful and that he never, never, never quit. He went on and talk about how Jordan had used Rejection and Failure to fuel him to success.

Fast forward to my 5k this morning. My Hot.. HILLY… HUMID… 5k this morning. It was an amazing run to benefit kids with life threatening illnesses. Now, keep in mind I have not been running much this year. I have gained more weight than I would like to admit and just am not in “Peak Tonya performance.” So this run was extremely difficult for me.

I wanted to quit more than once. More than twice even. I stopped to walk to catch my breath (which was really hard in the humidity) and wouldn’t you know… there was a guy passing me. Not only any guy. But a guy wearing a freakin’ Michael Jordan jersey. (side note…this story would have been a thousand times cooler if it was Michael Jordan himself…. just sayin’). Meanwhile, back at the story… this guy in a Jordan jersey comes running beside me. ALL I could think about was the chat with my employee yesterday. How could I encourage someone else not to quit when I am thinking about quitting myself?!? How could I expect someone else to keep pushing through and following their dreams and pursing their goals if I was just gonna quit in the middle of a 5k?!?! I need to lead by example. I need to keep running. I would like to say that I just kept running and never looked back. But it didn’t work that way. We kept switching the lead off and on a few times. Every time he passed me I just smiled and used it as fuel to push even harder. In the end I did end up crossing the finish line before him. This story is bigger than that. This is about following your dreams. Leading by example. It’s about NEVER, NEVER, NEVER giving up.

Ps. I did find the guy at the end of the run and tell him this story and thanked him for pushing me.

You just never know who you might inspire. and you never know when someone might inspire you. I didn’t think I would be the one getting inspired from the conversation yesterday. And who knows, telling the Jordan jersey guy the story just might have inspired him as well. Pay attention to those in your circle of influence.

I’ll leave you with these thoughts from Michael Jordan himself:

MJ quote 2

Time to blog… It’s been quite awhile since I posted a blog. Several reasons. Technology hasn’t been my friend. Been… Let’s say a little stressed out and a little busy. But I do have to take a moment and talk about the good things that have been going on. Take a quite trip back a few weeks when my boyfriend posed an interesting question. The bottom line was how fast could I run a mile. I don’t really run just a mile anymore. I like to run 5 miles when I go out for a run. So I set out to answer the question. I went to a local track and ran a mile: here is what happened…

The girl who could barley finish a mile in 14 minutes in high school (yes… I know that was a long time ago… But still). I must admit I was pretty dang proud of this. I don’t brag on myself much… But when I started running just like 4 years ago I couldn’t run even a mile. I literally couldn’t run like 30 seconds… So I am going to be proud of this. So there 😉 full disclosure I didn’t stop after this mile. I ran another 2. But not as fast. Second mile was 8:22 and the third mile 7:25. I am actually more proud of being able to knock out that third mile at that speed.

Bottom line. Do NOT give up. And when your tired… Just keep going. It’s worth it. I promise.

Up next. A little weekend road trip I have been dreaming about since I learned it exsisted. A little background. I am a Minnesota girl who loves the Green Bay Packers, it’s a long story and I get A LOT of crap about it… But it’s all good. I stand by my team. However I have never been to Lambeau Field. I discovered last year that they do a 5k where you actually run iN Lambeau field! Of course I wanted to go. Somehow I conned my non-runner, Eagles fan Boyfriend to go on an adventure to Green Bay, Wisconsin. (It wasn’t really all that hard and I think he enjoyed it just a little)

For me…The experience was more than I dreamed it would be. Just being there was incredible. But the run was so well organized and FUN! Not going to lie I got a little emotional entering the players tunnel and as I made the lap around the field. The coolest part of the whole run was seeing myself on the jumbotron as we ran around the inside of Lambeau! I couldn’t get a photo of me on the screen without really affecting my time (yeah.. I’m a little competitive now, and no it wasn’t my fastest…I didn’t expect it to be)… But here is a photo of me at Lambeau with the Jumbotron in the background. Soooooo cool!

Was a beautiful day/trip that I will never forget!

They say you know your a runner when you plan trips around running… Well I guess I’m a runner. What a great way to see the sights. Wonder were our next running adventure will be…..

Here are a few more photos from our trip… And of course technology is still fighting me and I can’t get all the photos I really want on here… But whatever.