8.26.19

Heyo –

Hi my love. Today is another tough one. Woke up and really wanted to call out of work this morning. Also feeling bad about my food choices this weekend. I gotta ease up a bit on myself.

Wanted to share a thought about the ever-evolving political/social climate. We’re shifting into a territory where because everyone’s life is endlessly public, no one can make mistakes. For instance, on Saturday night Andrew Luck, the quarterback for the Indianapolis Colts, announced that he’s decided to retire. He’s 29 and has made about $100 million in career earnings but the mental part of the game was wearing him down. He’s been in a 4-year cycle of injury-rehab-play a few games-injury. Now here’s where I find societal norms shifting. Doug Gottlieb, a sports reporter analyst took to Twitter and said, “Retiring cause rehabbing is “too hard” is the most millennial thing ever #AndrewLuck”. To me, that comment leaves no room for nuance and completely oversimplifies the topic at hand. However, his job is to stir things up and get people talking, so I understand the approach, even if it’s crass. But the reaction to this tweet is where I think things are heading in a dangerous direction. People couldn’t just disagree with his point of view and outline his poor distillation of information. Instead, the public reaction was to condemn this man for a mistake he made when he was in college. See, when he was a freshman in college, he stole a classmate’s credit card and charged $950 worth of gear. Somehow that transgression from 1996 gets dragged up in response to his opinion on Andrew Luck’s retirement. These are completely separate events but in 2019 his 1996 mistake is used as internet ammunition and I’m scared we won’t be able to make mistakes anymore. When you’re in college, you should be able to mess up. I’m not saying he shouldn’t be penalized for his actions. But here’s the thing, HE WAS. He was expelled for being a thief. And now he can’t have an opinion because of it. This internet policing and censorship is not good. I don’t think it’s going to be good for society long-term. And I hate that you’re going to be brought up in a time where you won’t be afforded the opportunity to learn from your mistakes. Mom and I will always give you that chance. I want you to be able to grow without pressure and without perfection as an expectation. I will undoubtedly fail. I have low tolerance for ineptitude which will surely rare it’s ugly head, but I want you to know that I’m aware of it and I will do everything to raise you with flexibility.

Okay, less of a serious topic – yesterday we went over to Aunt Jane’s and hung out in the backyard. It was awesome. We talked about a lot of the different life things we have going on and we were able to pick Kristen and Rob’s brains about parenthood a little bit. Always a good vibe over there. At the end of the night Sophie put on a little performance. She crushed it.

Mom has to go back to the doctor on Friday to check on your heart because you weren’t in the position to see it when we were there last week. Kind of annoying. I’m also going to try to work from home so I can be there. I don’t want to miss any stuff that involves you. Plus, it’s going to be a 3-day weekend with Labor Day so Friday should be pretty chill at work. I’ve officially got the month of September to lock in and break through my weight plateau that I’ve hit so I think I need to switch my workouts up a bit. I’m definitely down in terms of weight but I need to push a bit more. I want to see abs when we go to Vegas. And I need to continue to build my chest. I’ve started to work a few more ab exercises in, so we’ll see how things go. They say 90% of fitness happens in the kitchen so I might tighten that up on weekends too. During the week I’m good, but on Friday for dinner I like pizza and then on Saturday and Sunday I’m pretty open to less healthy options. I need to make sure I find balance because I don’t want to resent my process. It’s definitely a mental challenge. I’m finding it a bit tougher to be as excited about foods I was really enjoying two weeks ago. To be honest, this is usually about the point where I fold like a cheap deck of cards and start going to the gym less. Or eating a bad breakfast here or there. Inevitably, that leads to me doing whatever the fuck I want and reverting to a fat lifestyle. But I’m focused. I really think following Kevin Love and a few other people has been a huge motivator for me to stick with it. Plus, yesterday I saw Joey, Brian and Andrew and they’re all looking jacked so I’m taking that as inspiration, too. They were on the opposite side of the spectrum, all twigs growing up whereas your dear old dad was doughy and now they’re packing on the muscle. No reason I can’t make the same progress.

Some words of advice:

·      Attack your goals and maintain perspective; don’t let small setbacks derail your progress

·      Stay curious

·      Hone your research skills, I’m sure they’ll only become more important as the internet becomes more and more ubiquitous

·      Most misunderstandings can be traced back to failed communication. Think about how you’re saying things vs what you’re saying. Both are important but keep your audience in mind.

Love you big time,

Dad