Life is a Puzzle

At least I didn’t say it was like a box of chocolates.  Seriously though, life is exactly like a puzzle.  Sometimes we think we see the image and we try to make the pieces fit that we think should complete the image, but they just will not fit.  Now, on the reverse side of that, sometimes you find, just by trying, by accident, that a piece fits.  Then the next piece then also, just fits. After a while, you stop trying to make the image what you think it should be, and allow it to become what it is supposed to be.

Too deep? Ok, well, to sum all that up is easy.  When you stop trying to make things happen, things fall into place.  To use another cliche, sometimes things have to fall apart to come together.  I have given a lot of thought into my life lessons, and really, every post on this blog.  I have a lot of readers, who have amazing hearts.  I haven’t updated in a while, because, well, it’s been a combination of things.

I’ve been busy.  Now, this doesn’t mean that I have been avoiding updating and that’s my excuse, it means I’ve genuinely been busy.  I’ve been spending my visitation time with my girls on a series of adventures.  I usually update you while we are staying at Beaver’s Bend, but this year, I forgot my laptop.  There will be pictures soon, some are already on my Facebook page, some soon to be on my Instagram. There, as always, are those who ask me how my personal life is doing, and I generally like to avoid that topic.  Something has changed that though...

Through a combination of luck and timing, I did meet someone.  When I say that, the statement carries a certain gravitas, I suppose.  I’m not the type to just put out information at random, well, not personal information, well, not this personal.  I was looking for someone, that much you know.

We started by just simply talking, or texting mostly.  In the process of getting to know each other, we discovered we had both had similar life experiences. Further on, we discovered that we had a very similar sense of humor, which is saying something, but honestly, that’s been difficult.  She is extremely intelligent, and gets my weird pop culture references.  Well, she might not get all of them, but I’m pretty sure that no one gets some of them.  Not even me.  Moving on.  We slowly (or not so slowly depending on who you talk to) realized that we really enjoyed each other’s company and conversation. We are both very happy, and I don’t see that changing anytime.

I figured I wouldn’t make this entry just a big love letter to Cassie.  I'm a happy man now, beyond what I ever expected, and all of a sudden all of those dopey love songs make sense.  I's a very, very good feeling.

Until next time, dear readers...

Still Learning

A few months ago I posted an entry called "I'm Still Learning," and I wanted to say that, that is still the case.  I find out bad things about myself, and I correct them as best as I can.  I find flaws in others and forgive them, as best as I can.  Actually to that point, I may have perfected that a little too well, and I may need to change that to "forgive and distance."  Anyhow, to the main point of this post, I wanted to give some more life lessons.  Keep in mind, some of these may be repeats, but there is obviously a reason they are being repeated, so pay attention.

Life Lessons (Again, without explanations):

• No one is perfect, if you think they are, they can only let you down.
• People will believe what they want to, often without hearing all sides.
• If your best isn't good enough for a person, then that person isn't good enough for you.
• Maintain your self-respect, walk away before you can't.
• A relationship should never be adversarial.  Your teammates, not opponents.
• Trust is built slowly, but broken quickly,
• Always pause to think before you do or say anything, consider all viewpoints.
• If someone doesn't show interest, then they are, well uninterested.
• Sometimes it is essential to tell people how you feel, so long as doing so doesn't hurt them unnecessarily.
• Sometimes if you know something about someone that they don't know you know, it's best to let them tell you in their own time, as long as it doesn't to do harm to either of you.
• You might need to hold your tongue from saying some things, and I mean literally.
• We as humans are inclined to form an opinion about someone before getting to know them, so we could end up loving or hating the idea of a person, rather than the person.  Either way, this way of thinking will affect our actual impression of the person.
• I joke around and always bring up Rule 13, that I am always right.  I'm not, in fact, I've been made shockingly aware that I am not right nearly as often as I thought.  I am imperfect, and I always will be, so using an absolute like "always" is meant as a joke.  Trust me, I'm right.
• Friends are a valuable commodity, one that over the years increases in value, invest in them.  Support them, believe in them, and encourage them.  In turn, they will do the same for you when you need it most.
• Sometimes juice companies use sweetened, colored, apple juice and market it as grape juice. Lies.
• If it's not pushing you forward, towards something better, then it's pulling you back, to where you don't want to be.  Change it.
• Don't live passively, be the most active part of your life.
• Don't let others make decisions for you, they don't have to live with the consequences.

I know, there's a lot, but there could have been a lot more.  I'll save those for another post another day.

Until next time, dear readers...

Real Talk

Some recent events in my life have made me wish I had a time machine. I just want to go back to past James, slap him in the face and tell him he needs to stop being stupid.

Anyone who knows me well will tell you that I always keep my word, I never lose my cool, I would do anything to help a friend, I’m incredibly loyal, and I care too much. Just so you know, I did not write this list, so please don’t think I’m that shallow. In the past few months (and maybe longer) I have acted out of character several times. This has hurt others, and myself. I can’t change what I’ve done, or it's impact, all I can do is keep reminding myself of the consequences of acting like an idiot.

During this time, I also came to the startling conclusion that if one person tells you something, it's possibly true, possibly not.  When two people tell you the same thing, it's more than likely true than not.  When you have three or more people telling you the same thing, you should probably listen.  The truth of the matter is that sometimes you see what you want to see, not what is actually there.  In my last post, I talked about inventories.  Well, I've did a huge inventory of myself recently, and I've discovered more about myself than I ever have.  I've found a lot of good things about myself, and I've found bad things about myself.  I'm working on those, and I'll be perfectly honest, it's going to be a struggle and take time on some of them.

Setting boundaries is key.  I have found that I have trouble setting boundaries with people.  You need to be honest with yourself and with them, let them know that you just won't do some things, not because you don't want to, but because once a boundary is crossed, it is much easier to cross it again. It's not a bad thing to help someone out, but don't change your boundaries in order to do so.

As I have been updating you on everything (which I've been told is too much, but, oh well), I'll go ahead and address the dating question.  I am not closed off to dating, but, as I'm sure you concluded, I didn't do so well with my recent try.  I am human, and I do make mistakes, and sometimes more than once.  I am (and always will be) in a constant state of personal growth, physically and mentally, and there have been people there at my worst, and stuck by me to hep me be my best.  I don't know where I'd be without them, and that's the type of person I'm looking for.  They are hard to find, but once I find that person, well, I'll be happy I guess is the easiest way to say it.  It's been said that when you find the once, "you'll just know."  That's wrong probably eight times out of ten.  Sure, I believe that some people just know, but they have to both "just know" before I'll believe it.  One sided relationships are far too common.  I think that I will only know if the person is right if she is by me through my struggles as well as my successes, and I'll have the same opportunity to do so for her.  Long story short, I guess I'm still looking.

I'll leave you with this, if you don't like what you see, don't blame the mirror.

Until next time dear readers...

Oh, the Possibilities

Let me start this post with a very big thank you to all who have chosen me to help them in their journey to get fit and healthy via riggsfitness.com.  I've gotten quite a few clients that are employing my services as an uncertified personal trainer, and so far, everything has been going incredibly well.  I say uncertified, because, well, I am.  I'm preparing to take the certification for both personal trainer and strength coach, as that's the direction I want to take my career.

Now, on to other things.  My book.  It is coming along quite nicely, but the more I get into it, the more I worry about offending people.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to alter any content so that everything is sunshine and rainbows, but I'm finding myself with the dilemma of wanting to omit certain sections that would cause conflict.  As far as what people think of me, I don't concern myself with that too much, because that's not my issue, whoever is thinking about me, well, that's their problem.  The problem I find myself facing is that in some cases I might be forcing some people to take a deeper look at themselves (something that probably should have happened a long time ago), but I worry that it isn't my place to go around pointing out flaws.  It's really not anyone's place to that.  If I don't, however, they might continue on a bad path.  It's a pretty big internal battle, my rough drafts have a lot of strikethroughs in them.

A lot of my readers apparently loved it when I just imparted a little wisdom with a little story, which, to all of those readers I say, I've got a great book in progress for you.  To continue with that theme, I'll tell a bit from my chapter on the inventory system.  James Lee Burke stated "There's nothing like rejection to make you do an inventory of yourself."  Rejection is one of the main events that lead to change.  The rejection can be romantic, career related or social, it doesn't matter, we will all perceive rejection differently.  We will even perceive it differently than we have previously perceived the same type of rejection.  That's called growth, and if it's in a good direction, it's a great thing.  The inventory system, which I have talked about here before is an amazing, yet difficult way to progress with your life.

The personal inventory is, as it sounds, about you.  You have to look at yourself, figure out what you like about yourself and dislike about yourself at this point in time.  Make the list, no matter how hard, no matter how much you don't want to write down that thing that you hate about yourself that no one else knows about, write it down.  No one will see this but you.  Write down what you'd like to see yourself as.  It can be anything, healthier, slimmer, at a better job, in a loving relationship, anything at all.  Now, figure out how to remove those bad things, even if it takes time, work on it everyday.  Figure out what small steps you need to take to reach those goals you wrote down.  Make a little progress everyday.  Slow and steady wins the race, right?  Well, that's not always literally the case, but the goal isn't to win the race, it's to cross the finish line.


Until next time, dear readers...

The Next Book

Well, I've started it.  My next book.  My last was really a short story, but it still counts. Search me out on Amazon if you are interested.  My new book, that will actually be book length, is entitled "How Not to Live a Life."  It's ironic (and meant to be), because it is telling you how to live a better life than I have.  I'm not saying I haven't had a great life, but I am saying there has been some crap happen that I wish didn't, so consider the book a list of detour signs for success.

In this book, I am brutally honest.  Anyone who know me knows that I demand honesty from my friends and those close to me, anything less is unacceptable.  The moment you stop demanding honesty, is the moment you stop receiving it.  In my book, I talk about my past, my family, my friends, and in general everything in my life.  Writing this book has been extremely hard because I'm facing issues I'd rather not remember or address, but, for the sake of humanity, I do.  I will lose friends over the book, and well, that's ok.  If me calling you out on your behavior upsets you, well, that's really your problem, not mine.  The interesting part is that I, for the most part, haven't named names, so I'll find out pretty quickly who's guilty of what, by their own admission of guilt.  Sad, but true.

To give you a preview of the book, here is an excerpt, from the chapter entitled "What Happened?"

Where do I start? Well, I guess I should start at the beginning.  Not the real beginning, but my last beginning.  Confused?  It’s ok, I’ll explain.  When presented with a big life changing event, you have a new beginning.  Most people don’t realize that, they think they are a victim and have to handle themselves how everyone tells them to.  That’s a lost opportunity to improve upon one’s self.  I’ve made a lot of mistakes.  I’ve had a lot of new beginnings, but I’ve wasted just about all of them.  Maybe I should start with examples of what not to do.  I have a lot, so, get ready for some crazy stories, some I have never spoke of until now.

January 9th, 2006.  I was working at Mercy Hospital, the same place my father has worked for over 40 years.  We usually had lunch together, either at the office or at my parents house, since they lived fairly close to the hospital.  We were eating in his office, it was Mexican fast food, it was completely unhealthy, and completely delicious.  At this point my Pa-Pa (my father’s father) has been a resident at the local veteran’s hospital.  He suffered from Parkinson's Disease. He had good days, and he had bad days.  It had gotten to the point that communication was extremely difficult.  Admittedly I didn’t visit him while he was in there as much as I should have.  It wasn’t that I didn’t want to, but after most visits I would find myself in tears, even sobbing sometimes, on my drive home.  My wife would ask me if I was ok, and I’d tell the lie that is most commonly told. “I’m fine.”  I wasn’t.  I wasn’t near fine.  I felt that I couldn’t really talk about how I felt with anyone.  My Pa-Pa and I were close.  We had inside jokes.  We could usually figure out what one was going to say before it was said.  I love him dearly.  

I don’t know if it was because of his age, his veteran status, or his awesome attitude, but he didn’t give a single crap what anyone else thought.  That’s something I still struggle with, but he had it down.  On work days at his house, deodorant was not worn.  He didn’t care what he smelled like, if smelling bad was a product of his hard work, then he wanted you to know it.  It was hilarious, well until we got in his truck to go drop off debris at the city dump.  Sometimes there weren’t enough windows to roll down in the truck.  On one particular occasion, my Pa-Pa, my father, and I all were working on my grandparents yard (this wasn’t uncommon, three generations of Riggs can get stuff done), we loaded up tree limbs and leaves into the back of my Pa-Pa’s 1985 Dodge Ram Truck.  I was sitting in between the two biggest influences in my life.  I loved these rides.  Now, the deodorant was still not present and I think my Pa-Pa got a kick out of the fact I wasn’t near a fresh air source and had to endure it.  He had an awesome sense of humor that aligned with my and my father’s.  We got to the city dump, my Pa-Pa was quick to inform us that he had to relieve himself.  We just thought it was a comment in passing, and that when we got back to his house that’s the first stop he would make.  Why we were under that assumption is beyond me now, but to our surprise at the time, he walked over to his back tire and began to water it.  In plain sight of anyone who might be around.  It was just us at the time, well and the attendant in his little building, butI don’t think he saw.

When I was 12, I was staying on my grandparents for the weekend.  Saturday was always shopping day.  They might not have got me much, but they always wanted to get me something while I was there.  This was a really special treat.  To continue, we went to the local mall one Saturday, my grandmother (Ma-Ma) had a hair appointment at JC Penney, and while waiting my Pa-Pa and I had some fun.  He took me to the arcade that was in the mall (a ritual that continued until the arcade closed down), and then he and I went to JC Penney to wait on my Ma-Ma.  He asked me if I needed any clothes, partially joking because he knew that at that point in my life, I didn’t care to go clothes shopping.  Well, we went ahead and looked, and wouldn’t you know it, I found something I liked.  They were a pair of long baggy pants\shorts that were a patchwork of black, blue and yellow.  They were a little expensive, but he saw me looking at them and asked if I wanted them.  I showed him the price, and he said, “Don’t worry about that, do you want them?”  I did, and he could tell I did.  He said he liked them too, which I thought he was just saying that not to hurt my feelings, or prevent me from getting something I liked.  He was incredibly awesome at putting others before himself.  That trait has passed down to my father as well, and I hope it continues to me.  It wasn’t very long after our purchase that my Ma-Ma came walking up to us, hair newly poofed up and colored.  She asked what we got, I opened the bag and showed her.  The change in expression on her face was almost immediate.  She couldn’t understand why I would want those, and more to the point, she couldn’t believe my Pa-Pa bought them.  This would be the first time my Pa-Pa would say this, but it wouldn’t be the last, not for years to come: “Hey, I liked the pants.”  I loved those pants.

Back to 2006.  While about halfway through our lunch hour, my father got a call from the veteran’s center that they had to take my Pa-Pa to the hospital by ambulance.  At this point, this was getting to be a semi-regular occurrence, as there had been issues with fluid needing to be drained from his lungs, and other ailments.  We were pretty much done, so we walked over to the emergency room.  When we arrived, they were about to buzz us in to go see him, when the double door entry to the actual ER patient rooms opened.  Dr. Black walked out of the doors.  You never see a doctor come out from that door into the waiting area.  We were oblivious, we never thought that he was coming out to meet us.  The doctor was blunt, he was known to have little to no bedside manner, and he said to my father, “Bobby, he’s gone.”  What? What happened? What do you mean he’s gone?  He went on to say he was gone before he arrived.  Have you ever had that feeling (or loss of feeling) in your legs, like you are about to just collapse to the ground? This sucked.  This more than sucked, this was like someone just reached in, grabbed my lungs, ripped them out and said, take a deep breath.  This was the end.

My first daughter was born on December 29, 2005, 11 days before my Pa-Pa’s passing.  I never took her to see him.  He was aware of her birth, my father made sure of that, but they never saw each other.  I didn’t take her to the veteran’s hospital because she was so young and could easily contract any one of the many airborne illnesses that I’m sure were present.  I have not ever, nor will ever forgive myself for that.  I’ve had multiple people tell me I did the right thing, and that they are sure my grandfather would have understood.  I don’t care.  I really don’t care about what everyone tells me about this, I feel like I robbed both of them of their only meeting they would have had.  I know that it probably wouldn’t have made any difference in anything at all, but coming from someone who never met his grandfather (my mother’s father), I really wish I could have made it happen.

After his death, I fell into a deep depression. My wife at the time couldn’t understand.  How could she? She never lost any of her family at that point.  I had already lost my Granny (my mom’s mother), which was hard on me too.  I don’t deal with the finality of death very well.  My father was probably the single greatest source of comfort during this time.  He too told me to forgive myself for not taking Victoria to meet him, but other than that, he had nothing but great advice.  I found it amazing, how my dad, who just lost his own dad, was able to tell me that everything would be alright.  He was wrong, but that’s not the point, the point is, he meant it.  When I say he was wrong, what I’m actually saying is, that things got better, or different, but never alright.  To this day, I still wish with all my heart that I could talk to him just one more time.  Whether it’s healthy or not, I regularly make it by my grandfather’s grave, I update him on what’s going on in my life, in my girls lives, and report to him on how his son is doing.

Since my Pa-Pa’s death, my Ma-Ma has now joined him in parting this life.  I now continue to talk to Pa-Pa, but I now let my Ma-Ma know how my sister is doing, how her children are doing, and I update her on my sister’s dog.  My grandmother loved dogs and so does my sister.  As I had a special relationship with my Pa-Pa, my sister had one with my Ma-Ma.  My sister has a tendency to have no filter, and as such she tells everything like it is, and what she’s feeling at the moment, you are aware of.  When my grandmother died, exactly 9 years to the day on my grandfather, well, she was a mess.  I say that only because that shows how distraught she in fact was.  My sister always can keep her feelings under a semi-loose control, but this was one of only a couple of times I witnessed unfiltered emotion from her.  I didn’t like it.  I knew she was sad, and I knew I couldn’t do a thing.  I got to wondering, is this what people saw in me?  Is it still what they see in me?  All I know is that in that moment, I realized that it was ok to mourn, and ok to cry, but it was even better to honor their legacy by living.

In my life, I have witnessed my father cry only five times.  The first was when a very close friend of our family died.  The second was when his father died.  The third is when his younger sister died.  The fourth was when his mother died.  The fifth time, well, I’ll talk about that one later.

Sorry this was a long one, trust me, it could have been a lot longer.

Until next time dear readers...

Looking Back

Recently I've been thinking.  I know, probably not the greatest thing for me to do.  Nevertheless, I've been contemplating about making my life a little more private.  I post a lot on this blog, I update a lot on Facebook and Instagram, but am I hurting myself by doing that?  I know of several people who would immediately say "YES!" and I can't really disagree with them.  The only counterpoint I can come up with is that I am probably doing more good than harm.  That is good for others vs harm to myself.  I get a steady stream of emails, texts, facebook messages, etc on how I've motivated someone to do something.  I've had several that honestly have made me tear up reading them.  Those people are the ones that have faced much more than I can imagine, yet see that it doesn't have to always be bad.

Your struggles determine your successes. So, we can derive from that, that you can not be successful at something without facing struggles. I mean it, think about your work, your relationships, and pretty much everything in your life. Those who aren’t successful are usually focused solely on the result. You need to focus and be in love with the process to get there. Want to get your PhD? Be in love with the studing, the research and the constant judgement by your professors and peers. It is all about the process. Want an awesome body? Learn to love the gym time and the diet. If you don’t, you will give up. Fact of life, unfortunately. The unhappy truth in life is not everyone will be successful. I mean, if everyone was, then how would you measure if you were or not?

So what’s wrong with not being successful? Not a thing. What’s wrong with being ordinary? Again, not a thing. It’s the ordinary things in life that are truly special. Spending time with a loved one. Teaching your child to ride a bike. Meeting friends for lunch. It’s totally the normal things that make life love living.  There are those though, who think they have to have to have the best, be the best, and it's not a question if they should, they feel it's their right.  That's called entitlement. There are two two of entitlement, the first goes likes this: I am so much better than everyone else, therefore I deserve special treatment.  The second goes like this: Everyone is so much better than I am, therefore I deserve special treatment.  That's dangerous thinking, the kind that can (and will) alienate everyone in your life. Everyone is special and unique, but that does not mean everyone deserves special treatment.  I mean, if everyone got special treatment, it wouldn't be special, it would just be, well, treatment.

Let me end today's post with this: the things most easily obtained, are the things that are easiest to lose.  What does that mean? Well, the world builds on your insecurities.  Almost all forms of marketing are trying to point out some that is wrong or missing from your life, often things you never thought about until the advertisement was presented to you.  Want to lose weight? Take this pill! Want to have beautiful hair? Try this shampoo!  Do you have a bald spot? We have hair in a spray can!  People get these products because they are insecure about something, and are willing to take the easiest option to try to fix it.  The honest truth is simple. To get something that is lasting, it's going to take a lot of work.  It's going to take a crap ton of time and dedication.  Results aren't always immediate, but they are lasting.  So, if you want it, be prepared to spend a lot of time and a lot of effort into attaining it.  Not only will it last, but you will feel a greater sense of pride and accomplishment for all said hard work.

While I know I was a bit all over the place on topics on this one, I still think that it's a solid post.

Until next time, dear readers...

Falling Into Place

Those of you who know me pretty well (and even not so well), know that I'm an optimist at heart.  I like to believe that good things happen to good people.  I like to believe that everything will eventually be ok.  I like to believe those things, but it's not always true.  I've generally been a good person, and I've had a lot of crap happen to me.  I've had a lot of adversity to overcome.  I've came out, for the most part, on top.

Without trying to sound terribly mean, I've heard that my ex-wife's boyfriend has said "looks like the better man won."  I whole-heartedly agree, but it's not him.  I'm a better person than I ever was when I was married.  That's not to say that my ex-wife held me back, or was a hindrance.  Well, that's what I'm trying not to say at least.  Since the divorce, I've been forced (kicking and screaming) to take a hard look at myself.  I've said before, I didn't like what I saw, and I really didn't.  I've changed my outlook completely on life.  I've started taking better care of myself and others in my life.  I'm just better off, but I really didn't start that journey until about six months ago.

Rewind the clock back to October 2017.  I was overweight.  Things weren't going my way.  I was unhappy, and by proxy made others around me unhappy.  To those people, I apologize, and I've tried to make up for it ever since.  I wasn't as heavy as I have ever been (which was 230 lbs, btw), but I was overweight.  I was around 215 or so and 30% of my body was fat.  I've came a long way.  I now weigh in at 172 lbs and 14% body fat.  How did I do it? Diet.  Exercise.  The most important of the two? Diet, hands down.  I switched to a high protein diet and well, I go to the gym a lot.  The muscle building has helped to mask what fat I have left on my body.  The diet though was the part that slimmed me down so much.  I now have that "V" shape that athletes strive for.  I'm not where I need to be, but, hey, I'm not done.

Six Month Progress Picture

A Few Progress Pictures

Again, am I where I want to be? Physically? Emotionally? Nope.  It's good to have goals, and one goal that I have is to simply move forward.  

Until next time dear readers...