New years resolutions
Richard McGhee swims up a gully in the Mamores
Nearly every year these days, things come to a head...cold. It’s the third year running I’ve done almost exactly the same thing. I work way too long hours, try to train on top of that, and then on my first winter climbing day of the season, make myself ill.
And so oops I did it again. Idiot. After a nice first day out in the snow with Rich I got ill and have spent the past week blowing my nose 10,000 times per day and shivering. The work has been worth it, even despite running myself down in the short term. Sometimes it is better to break yourself for a while, so long as you take the recovery afterwards just as seriously.
After this routine of hard work, results and consequences around Christmas time, my new years resolutions always take the schizophrenic form of resolving to do more things, but work myself less hard. Will I ever solve the balance?
Patience and impatience in equal measure seems to be good for long term health and making good things happen like hard climbs done, books published and good times enjoyed. The trouble is that impatience is my default setting.
