Biggest Ever Loser...

I'm so happy that I have a new Biggest Loser in my Coleman Coaching Clients Portfolio. Since June 2020, Miss D has lost a massive 48.1kgs (7.6st) so far. And with 15.4kgs (2.5st) still to go, I'm keeping Miss D's identity under wraps until she reaches her goal of losing 63.5kgs (10st) - That's when the world will hear how during lockdown someone took the opportunity of upping their game and changed their life forever.

As you can tell, I'm super impressed and already amazed at the transformation that Miss D has undertaken both physically and mentally , whilst many people in the UK have lost the plot and found the biscuit barrel, whilst working from home during Covid.

Miss D is one of many success stories and you might seen how recently, Mitchell and Richard also upped their game.

Mitchell

Richard

Now, if you've slacked and stacked in recent months and want to shape up please contact me and find out how I can help. 

Marathons 1,083  Ultras 255  9 Guinness World Records  15 Marathon des Sables

Begin again...

Here are four questions that you might want to consider as we emerge from the post Covid-19 apocalypse…

What do you now expect from other people?

Are you wanting more? Do you expect a lot and are often underwhelmed at folks response? Do they see the world as you do? Do they share your thoughts and aspirations? Or are they just looking after number one at heart? 

 

People always say they care but are they there in times of crisis. When I found myself in a tight spot back in 2016, it was fascinating who stepped up and even more fascinating who didn’t. It taught me a great life-lesson and to those that did, I have heart-felt thanks and repositioned the hierarchy of my nearest and dearest accordingly.

 

What do you expect from work?

Do you expect to make your fortune? Be part of the next boom product? Earn the respect of those you meet and anger those you step on as your career blossoms? Or - feel a sense of satisfaction that you’ve made a difference and what you do has a real purpose and value. 

Having had the big job in advertising and printing endless amounts of brochures - I know my hard work and energy was wasted as none of it now exists - and, it feels kinda sad that it’s all in landfill if I’m being honest. 

 

Luckily I now feel that I help change lives and create brighter futures which has a far brighter future.

 

What do we expect from life?

I think we expect a lot. An awful lot. So much so, that it’s an impossible task. As we head towards Q2 in 2021, I mean, what on earth are we expect? It would be delusional to believe that 2021 will segway perfectly into a continuation of February 2019. The world has changed. We’ve all changed. Covid-19 has brought out the best and worst in people.  

Hopefully the Covid-Scowl as I call it will disappear as I run past folk out walking and we won’t have to queue outside the supermarket whenloo-roll, milk and prosecco disappears from the shelves in double quick time.

What do I expect?

I expect it’s going to take time. Time to heal and time for us all to get used to the new normal whatever that is. I haven’t got a crystal ball but whatever comes my way, I’ll adjust accordingly and with the flow hoping to make the most of whatever life throws at me and what I can throw at life.

1,081 Marathons - 255 Ultras - 9 Guinness World Records - 15 Marathon des Sables

Get it right next time...

Out on the street I was talkin' to a man. He said 'there's so much of this life of mine that I don't understand'.

Of course if we understood everything, the world would be a really boring place. An audience always looks to see how the magician did the trick, rather than just take the illusion at face value. Having seen a 'Magician of the Year' return an empty crushed tin of Coke to being full and in need of a ring pull to open and poured out, was asked if I wanted to know how it was done. When I said 'no', he said he was confused as everyone asked. You see, I was happy with the illusion and didn't need to understand. You see, sometimes it's okay not to know...

You shouldn't worry, I said, that ain't no crime. Cause if you get it wrong you'll get it right next time.

But we do worry don't we, me included about getting things wrong. Failing our peers, failing in public and not looking the fool. Oh the embarrassment! And yet, this is exactly the thing that stops us exceeding our limits. Yet if we look at lots of people we would class as being super-successful in life - they have all been failures in one way or another along their way to success.

You need direction, yeah you need a name. When you're standing in the crossroads every highway looks the same.

It's very easy to give in when things go wrong isn’t it? Giving into not going down the same route again and using fuzzy logic rather than common sense to guide our next steps. Imagine using Pot luck as your Sat-Nav the next time you travel anywhere. I understand how annoying being Google-Driven it can be but even in the pre-digital age we weren't traveling blind - remember using 'A to Z Maps'?

After a while you get to recognise the signs. So if you get it wrong you'll get it right next time.

We travel down the same paths of failure and make the same mistakes time and time again. Why is that? Why do we live so much in hope that things will turn out ok? Why do we believe that things will change for the better when it's obvious they won't and don't. Is that what we call it 'Human Nature'? 

Life is a liar yeah life is a cheat. It'll lead you on and pull the ground from underneath your feet.

And when it goes wrong you become the victim. Get despondent and can't find a way back. We can feel cheated. Having been in this situation myself, it would have been far too easy to say 'Why me'. But then I would have been giving into the negativity that surrounds so many people I meet that live under the grey cloud of 'Regret'.

No use complainin', don't you worry, don't you whine. Cause if you get it wrong you'll get it right next time.

My advice is always to draw a line and move on. People make mistakes. I make loads of them. We all make mistakes. We don’t do it on purpose - things just don’t go the way we planned. The feeling of liberation when moving on can be overwhelming. There's always another chance. Another opportunity. Another way of making things happen. You just have to dust yourself off and have another go.

You gotta grow, you gotta learn by your mistakes. You gotta die a little everyday just to try to stay awake.

Sometimes it feels like you are paddling upstream. It does for everyone right now I can assure you. Covid-19 has changed our world - Finished off over 100,000 worlds in the UK alone and will finish off many more worlds in the months to come. So when you feel everything's a mountain that you can't climb, don’t worry because if you get it wrong, you'll might get it right next time.

1,079 Marathons, 255 Ultras, 9 Guinness World Records, 15 Marathon des Sables, 27 Years' Dry

In a Moment - Stereophonics

A ‘moment’ can change a lifetime. And right up to that ‘moment’ we only have ourselves to answer to for the successes or failures we’ve created. In my experience however, it’s only the failures that actually flush the ‘moment’ out into the open.

Don't know where you're going, used to be a star

And everywhere you turn they're raining on your fire.

I meet many people that ‘Used to be’ something or another - or feel that the world is set against them. And maybe that’s true but the only person that will back on track is you.

You're searching for an answer your hands and tongue are tied

And everything that you thought you knew is buried deep alive.

The answers are there, right in front of your eyes - you just have to find the ‘moment’ to go and take life, head on.

You could take tomorrow, You think you've got it all

The emptiness will go in a moment.

The words of this track resonated with me yesterday (even though I'm not the biggest Stereophonics fan) as I tried to help a lost soul find the right ‘moment’ to start living life with a future. A future where tomorrow is brighter than today and every day brings joy, happiness and personal fulfilment.

I'm looking in the mirror, stare at my reflection

And I look like someone else.

I know how that ‘moment’ feels. What it’s like to be lost but also what can be achieved when you find a new direction and a reason to feel alive and full of hope.

Cause you just need to know

The emptiness will go, in a moment.

Now if you find yourself thinking about your ‘moment’ in the midst of this Covid-Madness’, well there’s no better time to press your reset button. Think about what you really desire, really want to achieve and really want to be.

Cause you just need to know time is on your side

Time will heal your mind.

It’s time…

1075 Marathons - 255 Ultras - 9 Guinness World Records - 15 Marathon des Sables

27 Years' Sober 

Twist in My Sobriety - Tikaram

Sober for 27 years - What’s it like to have been sober for all that time?

Well it’s a great question to someone that hasn’t had a drop of booze since 1994 - and here I’ll be as honest as I can about the journey that I’ve been on for the past 9,862 days.

  

And of course, it would be easy to say it’s been a piece of cake and in a way it has - however in reality the first few weeks were pretty tough but I’ve forgotten that over time. My Rose-Tinted Glasses see it only as a time of success and those first few weeks as being a euphoric blur as I discovered there was more to life than drinking tins of super-strong lager to help block out my failings and depression.

 

Those early booze-free days out jogging accelerated my detox and started building the framework for a new life of sobriety. Not that I’d marked myself out for a life sentence at that stage - it was just a one day at a time regime that gathered momentum and a value that became too priceless to throw away.

 

So if you are looking for a straight answer, it’s feels normal. Yes totally normal. And in the last twenty-seven years - I’ve packed a lot it. I’ve been to amazing places, achieved many notable feats and been lucky enough to meet many amazing people along the way.

 

Just from one day stopping drinking. Something I’d never have thought of on day one of my sobriety journey.

 

So fast forward and is every day a bed of roses? Is every day a day just perfect? Well of course not - BUT it’s another day in a world where anything is possible if you are sober and prepared live life with a fresh set of rules and ideals. 

 

And inside it feels - BLOODY BRILLIANT and I’m SUPER-PROUD of myself.

 

You can feel that way too if you are out of control and heading into 2021 just as I was back in 1994. Try living life sober one-day-at-a-time and see where life takes you. Then join me as I head on towards 10,000 days and my next celebration of sobriety in May.

 

Go on - be brave as you have nothing to lose.

1074 Marathons - 255 Ultras - 15 Marathon des Sables - 9 Guinness World Records - 27 Years Sober

Why Bother?

Every day we undertake a huge number of personal tasks and challenges that we call ‘Life’. We are living that ‘Life’ as a result of options and choices that we believed were the right at that particular moment in time. And, as a result, where we find ourselves at any one time, is of our own doing and have no-one else to blame.

It’s far too easy to become a victim and say ‘why me?’ Or as in my case self-loath and head into a darkness of depression and use alcohol to mask the pain of failing. ‘Point Zero’ as I refer to it, isn’t somewhere you reach overnight. It’s a gradual thing that slowly creeps up on you. It speeds up the more helpless you become and before you know it has you firmly in it’s grasp. If you’ve been there, you’ll understand where I’m coming from.

 

Back then, the only way out was to toughen up as reaching out was a sign of weakness not strength as it is today. At 58 years of age, I am in a much wiser position looking in life’s rear view mirror. I can admit that by the time I was 31, I’d created a huge mess that was not only challenging me mentally but physically too. That’s why on 5^th Jan 1994, I decided to make some changes, massive changes in fact and ‘getting fit’ quickly became my salvation and foundation for a ‘New Life’ where I found a ‘New Rory’.

 

I know personally that it’s a huge step to stop drinking, smoking or over-eating.

 

It took me only six months to reverse my very poor levels of health and fitness. And crossing the finish line of my first marathon is one of my life’s greatest achievements. Accomplishing a further 1000+ marathons impossible to my own previous incarnation.

 

Now, I’m not saying that you have to run 26.2 miles, be an Ironman Triathlete or become a body-builder but whatever life choices you make now or in the future, be it starting a new job, a new relationship or over-coming an illness or accident – fitness REALLY helps.

 

I know I’m far from perfect but I was lucky enough to be able to make positive changes to my behaviour that have given me huge satisfaction and a career where I can now help other people to reach their own fitness and life goals.

 

You see it’s far too easy to say ‘Why bother?’… but actually you must. Because if you do, you will be pleased you did. Now I’m always happy to be bothered and please reach out if you want to bother in 2021 and beyond.

 

Amen.

1,073 Marathons - 255 Ultras - 9 Guinness World Records 

26 years' of Being Bothered

Time - The Pink Floyd

‘Every year is getting shorter never seem to find the time’ - Wright

There’s never a right time or enough time is there? Our understanding of ‘Time’ goes back to the beginnings of the human race. Primeval man divided our annual solar transit into seasons by cleverly building one of the first timepieces at Stonehenge in around 3000bc, which remarkably still keeps perfect ‘time’ to this day. 

 

Of course there were more hourly timepieces invented over the centuries which have become far more accurate. In Victorian times, actually knowing the time had a value as timepieces were so few and far between - people actually paid find out what time it was, well before the ‘Speaking Clock’ (whose days must be numbered)… 

 

People use their phones as watches nowadays and I imagine that there must be an hourly global surge of energy as mobile phones the world over alarm their owners it’s ‘time’ to get up. I know I do…

 

Our fascination for ‘time’ and it’s accuracy has led to the invention of the Caesium Fountain Atomic Clock that’s so accurate, it misses only a second in every 15 billion years or so - although I’m not sure how you’d actually measure that.

 

Anyway, it’s easy to see how our lives are dominated by ‘Time’. My whole working day is.

 

But there’s hope - according to scientists in 200 million years we will be able to enjoy a 25-hour-day, which I’m sure we’d all welcome as there are never enough hours in the day to fit everything in - ha-ha.

 

For the record - There’s always ‘Time’. We just don’t make ‘Time’.

 

‘Time’ is just a mechanism for us to comprehend our position in ‘Time and Space’. To give us some kind of understanding of the past, the present and the future. Maybe it’s something we contemplate the older we get.

 

That’s why I find wasting ‘Time’ as being a crime and being ‘Bored’ unfathomable as I can’t ever think of a ‘Time’ when I’m personally not busy. But then I might be just as guilty for never taking a ‘Time’ out for contemplation or reflection - you could say that?

 

I do know I’ve made pretty good use of my ‘Time’ so far and will endeavour to keep valuing every second I get - how’s your ‘Time’ management?

1,072 Marathons - 255 Ultras - 9 Guinness World Records - 15 Marathon des Sables