December 2019 – So Uncomfortably Numb

We hold onto anger and resentment way too much. We all have had negative experiences with people and grudges we hold onto. This takes away our focus, OUR power, and gives it to someone else where it doesn’t belong. I have said this to so sooooo many people in 2019. We give soooo many people that power over us and our heart, minds and well-being that don’t deserve it. Exes, Baby daddies, Mamas, employers, co-workers and even close family members. When we finally forgive and let go, we give ourselves the chance to find peace and move on. When we let it the fuck go, we find peace. And I have been posting so much about having a peaceful heart, that I think that’s the biggest take away for this year as we roll #into2020.

It’s about forgiveness. Forgiving yourself as well as those who hurt you or you have anger towards will bring you a new freedom. The resentment we feel may be valid, fuck I get taken advantage of at both my jobs, we like to think it helps us against the other person but that doesn’t mean we should hold onto it. Resentment holds no purpose in our minds or hearts and It doesn’t serve us to hold onto something so dark. We think it helps us, we build the wall – but the reality is that now that person occupies space in our mind. We gave them power. They don’t deserve the space.

Jesus the power of Italian guilt, even when it’s self-imposed.

The goal is to find inner peace, a peace in our hearts. We’ve been hurt, we’ve lost loved ones, we get taken advantage of, we get taken for granted. Ugh. Listen. We don’t have to forget, but we can forgive and push aside past interactions and experiences. This takes away the power we give to other people and gives it back to us. Indifference is better than hate. With this, we don’t worry or focus on others, but rather ourselves. We are enough and we deserve better.

When we don’t focus on other people, what they did to us, or how poorly of an experience we had with something, we give ourselves the opportunity to be in the moment. This removes stress from the past and anxiety from the future. We give full control to ourselves to live and not think about anything else. I think many of us need to take that living into 2020.

Letting go and giving forgiveness is not easy. I can get over something pretty quick, but letting it go or pushing it out of my head is something else. It takes time, effort, and a lot of emotional work, but the benefits of having peace and freedom are worth it. Our mental state drives everything. When we focus on ourselves instead of giving power to others in the form of resentment and grudges, we see a new world of possibilities.

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” -Martin Luther King, Jr.

Yeah that’s deeper than hey I got a Peloton and look at me in the gym but it’s a lot of stuff from my phones notepad and it took quite a while to push out. So I hope it helps a little. It helped me to write it.

Christmas is stressful and it’s a fucking day. One! Although so many people make it 2 weeks long with the millions of different family parties etc.

I have been watching a friend with a few kids struggle and write about some of it on FB. Questions that haunt her.

Is she doing enough?
Did she get the right present?
Will her kids be happy?
How will it compare to the other things their friends got?
Will they hate her when they get older?
Can she make this christmas perfect?
What will make this Christmas perfect?

We all have those same thoughts don’t we? I know I was stressing about it before Thanksgiving. My wife before I met her sacrificed to make sure the boys didn’t want anything and then when I game a long I did my best to make sure she didn’t either. 19 years almost later… What the fuck am I supposed to buy her? We bother have settled into the jewelry we wear on a daily basis. I shot that load in the first three years. We kinda buy what we want or what we need when the timer comes. If she wants new shoes in October I don’t tell her to wait till December,. I just get the damn shoes or she gets the damn shoes. Christ, I’ve been on “Buying probation” for a month now and still have two pairs of boosts I snuck in that were on sales. She knows. She’s not stupid. I mean she married me right?

But I still worry. I like the Christmas morning feeling. I spend a lot of time making sure there is a little thought behind something and not just hey this was on some amazon sale. I hope it doesn’t end up on the bottom of your closet. I think we need to find a quality over quantity folks. And I think we need to figure out how to buy and gift more experiences. And guess what folks….. just being present sometimes with your phone away is a major gift in this day and age and you can’t buy that on Amazon.

I love the internet chirping about a photograph of my wife and I in matching pajamas. And for the longest time I didn’t fit in any pajamas you could buy anywhere. Definitely not any pajamas that I could wear ever. Now that it is far from a problem. I work from home, I can live in pajamas most of the day. Don’t wear them to bed or anything still, sorry kids, the pajamas are still one of those non-scale victories. And they are just as important as pounds on the scale. And we have new matching ones for xmas eve for everyone so there is that. So yeah. I don’t give a fuck! Don’t be jealous.

It’s Christmas. I get cranky. I also do my best. That’s all you can do.

Oh – weight loss – the fuck I forgot what I am supposed to be writing about.

Let’s talk magic number. Trumpet please….. 26! Magic number is 26. It’s better than 35 a few weeks ago and still better than 30 before Thanksgiving.

I am doing my best to get 10 miles under my sore butt on the Peloton a day. I am trying to actually eat a little more because I think it really is time to do a little more of a reverse diet and I will do one for sure once I hit my goal. That will be interesting. I am hitting the gym 4 days a week still. BOOM!

My youngest started on the street in uniform for the local Police Department yesterday so if you pray, please add his safety in your thoughts and prayers. It would mean a lot to me.

I put a lot of stuff to think about out here. So take it all in. Forgive others. Forgive yourself.

Rock on with your bad self.

Franco

A few Mondays ago, time is a blur. I posted a gym selfie, nothing new for me, and then a picture of the Peloton. Yes that horrible bike that everyone is talking about on the Internet because her husband bought it for his wife for Christmas, that bike. What a dick. lol.

My long time friend Dave quickly messaged me two things. It took me a little bit by surprise because he had just posted a photo of him in the air on the way to London for his work. But then I read it and giggled because he was busting my chops about the bags under my eyes and a gym selfie, but then followed it up with hey dude is the bike really worth it.

I was angry at him to be honest with you. Dave was the sound man and the band leader of the Rockets. And a few nights before I was texted by people that Bigg Romeo (my band if your are new or didn’t know) was taken off of my agents website. Although we’ve been having problems for months and almost years if you really want to think about it, I figured it would would at least be a conversation before any of this happened. After 24 years not only was I entitled to one, so is the band. We all deserved that much.

But no matter how much anger I had inside me I was really good, thank God. I kept business and my personal life separate for one night. Maybe it was just the fact that I have done so much damn exercise that day, I was in a decent mood. I don’t know. But I answered Dave’s questions. And we left it that we would talk when he got home.

Unfortunately, the next day he passed away in London England. I am so glad that I did not go at him with my anger. And if you don’t understand why, I was told that he was the one who pulled us off the website for the “company“. I am so glad that I just rolled with our daily conversations of keto and diet and exercise. I never even mentioned the band going back-and-forth with him. I just thought it was cool that he was in the air and was able to message me. I have never been on a flight yet that had Wi-Fi readily available.

He was a little younger than me but only by a few months so with word from England that it was an apparent heart attack, I still haven’t fully wrapped my head around it. Not to mention it’s been almost two weeks and his body isn’t back in the US yet. There are other circumstances and I think about it now as I am typing and it’s just not real. I am still at a loss for actual words.

He was literally a fan before there was a Bigg Romeo and now he’s gone and I have no idea what is realy ahead of me. Maybe he was protecting me from the get go.

Rest easy Dave.

Fuck me!

I have the Peloton right behind my chair in the living room. It’s a reminder to me that works needs to get done. I just can’t wish to lose 30 pounds by March 1st and find my final weight loss goal magically. There is work involved in getting there. The scale has been harder to move then I thought it would be but in the end all we can ever do is our best and keep plugging away. The bike measures your total output. That’s how it grades you, handles your personal records etc… Orange theory works on calories burned. I tend to look at calories burned more than my total output. Your output is measured my your cadence and your resistance. Well I am not bad at the resistance part these legs don’t want to spin over 100 cadence much lol. But I am getting there. And above all , I still made it to the gym to lift weights 4 times this past week. By the time the week ends I will have 85 plus miles under my butt too. I think that’s really how I am gauging all this and that’s in miles rode per month and maybe calories burned. Who knows.

It is definitely an amazing de-stressor and I am glad to have it right now. I am plugging away a lot at getting the band work, weddings have come in and closed smoothly. It seems that almost everyone in the band has shit going on so I just keep working at what I believe is the best for everyone and I plug and plug away. It is a very humbling experience putting a club or someone at a higher priority than they have you. You see it very quickly as you wait for return calls or replies but that’s this horrible business.

Wish I could catch you up on the last two weeks properly but it’s a blur…. went to the shore…. went to the Flyers game… Booked a trip to the Bahamas with my peeps for March. Excited for the holidays and a few more surprises up my sleeve. Phoenix, Ambers Brother, the Flyers out there. And then summer…. it’s coming.

Thanksgiving was nice. No complaints. Very whiskey filled too.

I think I need a little Christmas and am going to spend part of my Sunday getting the house together for some xmas love and then head into the city to see some of the light displays that I want to see and will run out of time getting to if I keep putting it off. I really liked the house/living room done last year so much that I would turn the lights on early afternoon just for me. So I will have to tackle that sooner than later. Hopefully the bathroom remodel will be closer to a finish by morning.

I posted this photo and caption under it on IG this week and it has 900 likes. The most I have ever gotten. That’s cool and all. What really is important is the change inside me that one picture has from the other.

Seems like a lifetime ago but this is the progression over 6 years. Well these are six year apart. The left is my friend Kristens sisters wedding band was playing a little over 6 years ago and right – last week. I’ve been beating myself up lately and as I get ready to think about 2019 and what my vision is for 2020 I thought it was important to not look at the numbers on the scale but to actually see where I came from: #transformationtuesday