Theory of Change
I've had this blog for almost 10 years. When I started it I was 27. I weighed 255 lbs and wanted to be a marathon runner. Laugh out loud. No, not at someone weighing 255 pounds and wanting to be a runner. That's actually pretty awesome, go jiggs. I laugh out loud at the fact that after ten years, 6 half marathons, five triathlons and one aaaallllmost completed marathon (damn you soggy sneakers and all cotton socks) I feel no more like a runner today that I did in 2006 when I started that journey. Granted: I weigh significantly less now than I did. Granted: I have a ton of medals that make me feel pretty cool. Granted: I have recruited more people to marathons and triathlons than probably reebok (not nike or adidas, I'm realistic). But there is something in my brain that absolutely refuses to allow me to be a runner.
I'm not saying there is a part of me that wont let me call myself a runner. Lol, that would be ridiculous. I'm absolutely not a runner. I know runners. They're maniacal. Beautiful and amazing, but complete nutter butters about running. All of the medals I have were for races that I mostly walked or pretty much half assed. This is not about titles, this is about action.
If I'm honest, this isn't even about action and it's certainly not about running. Running is just an example. This is about change. I think a lot about change these days. I have to. I spend several hours a week sitting across from people desperate for me to tell them how to change. I'm paid at my job to escort young men down a path of change. I'm spending time learning about all of these master theorists and their ideas on change. I spend a significant amount of brain space conjuring up my theory of change.
It is about a fantasy of being flowing down from my brain into my outer limbs and engaging the universe on a material level.This is about the harnessed present engaging the envisioned future in the space only marked "now" and solidifying a previously made commitment with actual experience. Change happens when the past, present and future ALL work together to declare "What I said before about who I'd like to be later is so true that it changes my action in this present space."
Is change as simple as electrifying the fantasies so that they never lose their incentive? "If I want to be a runner I look at pins of running all day on pinterest so that when I get off work all I want to do is run." Is change punishing inaction? So I just have to text a friend and say, "Hey no beers for me if I dont run today!" Is change an intense and present focused mindfulness? I'm confronted with the desire to not run and I engage all of my resources in that present moment to make a decision congruent with who I am and who I want to be. Is change only a declaration so intense that it demands following? I am a runner. I own the latest zero drop technology. Running is my life. I own that treadmill. Is change externally motivated? I buy a personal trainer to yell and me and call me a monkey's ass until I change.
Maybe change is an intricate web of all of these things that suspends us in a temporary new reality long enough to cement the new behaviors as a part of our identity. Then eventually the web disintegrates and we are a new creature unrecognizable to the old.
Not gonna lie, I feel about as close to discovering the truth of change, as I feel to being a marathon runner.Yikes, am I right??
I'm not saying there is a part of me that wont let me call myself a runner. Lol, that would be ridiculous. I'm absolutely not a runner. I know runners. They're maniacal. Beautiful and amazing, but complete nutter butters about running. All of the medals I have were for races that I mostly walked or pretty much half assed. This is not about titles, this is about action.
If I'm honest, this isn't even about action and it's certainly not about running. Running is just an example. This is about change. I think a lot about change these days. I have to. I spend several hours a week sitting across from people desperate for me to tell them how to change. I'm paid at my job to escort young men down a path of change. I'm spending time learning about all of these master theorists and their ideas on change. I spend a significant amount of brain space conjuring up my theory of change.
It is about a fantasy of being flowing down from my brain into my outer limbs and engaging the universe on a material level.This is about the harnessed present engaging the envisioned future in the space only marked "now" and solidifying a previously made commitment with actual experience. Change happens when the past, present and future ALL work together to declare "What I said before about who I'd like to be later is so true that it changes my action in this present space."
Is change as simple as electrifying the fantasies so that they never lose their incentive? "If I want to be a runner I look at pins of running all day on pinterest so that when I get off work all I want to do is run." Is change punishing inaction? So I just have to text a friend and say, "Hey no beers for me if I dont run today!" Is change an intense and present focused mindfulness? I'm confronted with the desire to not run and I engage all of my resources in that present moment to make a decision congruent with who I am and who I want to be. Is change only a declaration so intense that it demands following? I am a runner. I own the latest zero drop technology. Running is my life. I own that treadmill. Is change externally motivated? I buy a personal trainer to yell and me and call me a monkey's ass until I change.
Maybe change is an intricate web of all of these things that suspends us in a temporary new reality long enough to cement the new behaviors as a part of our identity. Then eventually the web disintegrates and we are a new creature unrecognizable to the old.
Not gonna lie, I feel about as close to discovering the truth of change, as I feel to being a marathon runner.Yikes, am I right??
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