A Slow Start Indeed!

My my, its been quite a while since I created the first post on this blog. A slow start indeed! I guess all that's left is to make for a fulfilling journey.

A lot of life changes have happened since I made that last post. I successfully quit smoking, balooned in size to a hefty 306 lbs, relationship woes with all its quick turns and unexpected corners, got tired of being big again and worked hard to loose a total of 31 lbs as of my last weigh in (which was a couple weeks ago). I picked up smoking again due to family and relationship stress, and, proudly unprompted, picked a quit date and stuck with it. This is my first week smoke free (again).

On top of all the health stuff, I've been struggling career wise as well. I know I should be somewhere better in my chosen creative fields, but feel like I'm just treading water, waiting for the fast-food shark to bite into me and drag me kicking and gargling into the food service industry just to make ends meet.

Truthfully, it scares the hell out of me. And that's a good thing.

I've decided to use the Dark Side of the Force, to quote the philosophy of Concept Artist Brad Rigney. I'm using all my fear, all my insecurity, all my angst and hate, and I'm turning it into fuel for a total body, mind and soul transformation.

I love martial arts. Having taken it since I was a kid, and holding a 1st Degree Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do, I find it a fun way to increase my flexibility and get regular exercise. It is due to my good friends, teachers and mentors Geoffrey Beeson and Brannon Bain, that I started more heavily studying Tasamaru Ryu Bujutsu, namely the Modal Arts of Gomaru Ryu Kenpo and Gomaru Ryu Bukendo, and lost my initial 30 or so pounds in weight.

One of my buddies up here in Oklahoma (David, thanks bud!) lent me his copy of Beach Body's P90X Total Body Transformation workout probably close to a year ago. I kinda lazily sat on it, not really being motivated to better my health. At the time, I was fully on in the process of quitting, after being a smoker for about 15 years, so my fragile little mind was a bit preoccupied.

After feeling the rush of being able to put on a shirt that I haven't been able to wear for going on a year, I felt compelled to kick it up a notch. The P90X program is not kidding around. I did a few of the workouts last week just to see how things would progress in the first few weeks, and man, is it tough.

I'm currently on Day 3 of my 90 days, and I'm trying to leave as much of my self on the exercise mat that I can manage, on top of working Bukendo in the afternoons for my test for Kukyu (Yellow Belt) in a couple weeks.

I mentioned some career stress as well, something I need to remedy. Finding work is hard, so I've decided that while trying to find a day job in the creative field out here, I'll be trying to strike up a spark as a freelance illustrator using the Zero2Illo 12 Week Challenge, and Thomas James' 15 Steps to Freelance Illustration. I started the 12 Week Challenge a while back, but I was never really committed to it like I should have been. With this new found motivation, I'm really going to stick to it, and forge my new career out of the ashes of the life I'm leaving behind.

Hells to the yeah. I hope ya join me on this journey. Its going to hurt so good!

Cheers! Here's to Slow Starts and Fulfilling Journeys.