For those of you that know me and my workouts, there typically isn’t a whole lot of “messages” as I try to make it all about business.  However, this time around, I focused on delivering a message that meant a ton to me and my journey, but also hopefully sparking something in the hearts of the pax.  Let’s get w/ it:

Quick mosey over to the lit side of a building w/ plenty of heavy objects for the Pax to worry about while we did our warm-up.  It was short and sweet:

Wide Grip Merkins x10 (in cadence), followed by Diamond Merkins x10 (in cadence) followed by Merkins x10 (in cadence) – nothing like 60 push-ups to get us started.  From there it was all about sitting on our six and stretching so I could focus on the first part of the message.

I asked the Pax who had figured out their marriage and felt they are their spouses were 100% aligned – crickets.  Next question – Who has ever confused “being a provider” with being a good husband?  A few hands went up.  Well I can surely attest to that, and I’m a changed man because of it.  Without going into too many details, I let my priorities get so out of order that I lost my connection w/ my wife.  And it took an act of courage on her part and some serious gut checks to remind me of what matters.  In order, work took the most from me, got home, spent what little time I had w/ my kids (which was basically putting them down to bed), F3 probably got the next sliver (my mornings) and my wife got what was left.  That equated to nothing really, maybe some shallow conversations, tiredness from me, tiredness from her.  This went on for far too long until a late night conversation already past my bedtime lasted 3 hours.  It hit me like a ton of bricks  – our connection was nonexistent and it was time to get it back.

Next up – Heavy a$$ tabata stations.  6 stations, each had two different exercises, 2 pax per station.  40 seconds on, 20 seconds rest.

1a:  Coupon – 40 lb metal chain, Exercise – Jump Squats (wrap that chain around your shoulders / neck)
1b:  Coupon – 2 25 lb bags of metal pellets, Exercise – Curls

2a:  Coupon:  80 lb tree (I’m not kidding), Exercise – Man Makers (good luck)
2b:  Coupon:  30 lb tree or 40 lb stump, Exercise – Lunge Jumps (could swap any coupons for either exercise)

3a:  Coupon:  Cinderblock, Exercise – wood choppers
3b:  Coupon:  Cinderblock, Exercise – v sits (press cindy then touch toes pointed high w/ cindy)

4a:  Coupon:  50 lb bags of limestone, Exercise – shoulder press
4b:  Coupon:  50 lb bags of limestone, Exercise – flutters w/ push press

5a:  Coupon:  none, Exercise – vert wall w/ chalk (vertical jumps on brick wall – use chalk for first jump, mark your high mark and then spend the rest of the time trying to touch that line)
5b:  Coupon:  none, Exercise – bear crawl the perimeter

6a:  Balls to the Wall hold 40 seconds
6b:  Single Leg Wall Sit (20 sec each leg)

Mini break w/ continuation of the message – well the night of the “revelation” from my wife or what I call my re-awakening, I had a flashback so randomly of something CSPAN once said at a workout 2 years before.  It wasn’t random, because it was so fitting, but I honestly hadn’t thought about it in a long time.  It was the bullseye theory of prioritization that I clearly lost containment on.  My bud Witchhunt also helped me a few months back w/ some podcasts to listen to around time management.  Both pointed to the same tactical response – God gets your first.  That’s it.  So my wife and I got tactical – we committed to God and to each other to spend the first 45 minutes of every day together, reading God’s word.  Since that night, we have read together almost every morning (and the couple that we missed we text each other when we can catch up w/ reading and explain what we got out of it) independently the same reading plan, journal independently, but then share what God spoke to each of us.  When you share what spoke to you, you really hear what is going on with each other.  You hear each other’s real time emotions, real worries, real anxieties, what’s ahead, what’s behind us.  I can honestly say I feel closer and more aware of my wife’s true feelings that I ever did in the 13 years we’ve been dating / married.

RINSE AND REPEAT TABATA ABOVE.  NASTY.

We didn’t have a ton of time, so I ran the pax over to a wide open parking lot that had already been set up w/ cones.  An old fashioned football drill I remember doing from double session conditioning.  SNAKES.

One after the other –
Sprint 40 yards, side shuffle right 40 yards, back pedal your butt off 40 yards, side shuffle left 40 yards, sprint 40 yards, side shuffle left 40 yards, back pedal 40 yards, side shuffle right to starting point 40 yards.

I finished my message w/ something that was another a-ha moment w/ my wife about 6 months ago – a small group we did on a series called “Love & Respect”.  In a nut shell it taught us how God wired men and women differently.  Women need love; men need respect.  Not respect in a sexist, egotistical way, but our emotions are clearly influenced by when respect is given or clearly not.  Application – it’s all about how we talk to each other.  Always ask yourself if you’re the husband – did what I say come out in a loving way?  If not, you may want to apologize in advance and say exactly that (ie. I’m sorry honey – I clearly didn’t say that in the most loving way.  That’s not what I meant…).   Most times it’s not what we said, it’s how we said it.  Intent was harmless, the delivery was just not loving.  Same goes for the wife – instead of doing what most men do when they get angry and walk away, we should say, “I feel like what you said was not very respectful”.  More times than not, your wife will realize that was the case and apologize before anything gets out of hand.  Avoid the vicious cycles – husband gets mad, they walk away / internalize everything, they get distant, distance to the wife is clearly unloving, she gets more mad, results in her snapping at you and being disrespectful.  Repeat, repeat, repeat.  Avoid this and be loving men.  That’s all she wants.

RINSE AND REPEAT the SNAKES – only this time, double the distance for each direction.  Fun.

Made it back to COT 2 minutes late but the pax were cool w/ it.  Announcements, prayers for all the senseless violence the last couple days (peach stand, York county officers, kentucky school victims) and for vision / direction on those ideas / things that enter your life and you clearly know you need to do something w/ it.  Huge thanks to Maximus for asking me to lead this workout so early in it’s existence.  I really appreciate it man and I hope my experience can help some guys out there repriortiize and grow closer to their wives.

ChaChing